Disney with everyone!

This year the eastern Rosenbaums came west for Christmas ... we are building quite a contingency out here! We SORELY missed the Platts but had fun skyping and calling throughout the holidays.

Deda (Bucky) always wanted to go to Disneyland but never had the chance while they lived here, so we ALL headed over a couple of days before Christmas and it was a great success! E loved having everyone there with him, and I think we beat the crowds by going early!

Meeting Pluto:

Dr. Lin's

We love our pediatrician and so does E ... we play "Dr. Lin" quite often around here!!

Luckily we haven't had to see him too often for sick visits, but did manage to get the croup just before Christmas ... just chilling in the office:

First In 'N Out

E got his first In 'N Out burger and was pretty skeptical ...


...until he realized he could eat it vertically like he prefers to do with all disc-shaped food (cookies, crackers, etc.).


This is normal, right?

Balboa

Yup ... it's V-day and we're STILL doing Christmas posts around here.

It's a little cheesy, but when we're in town for it, we love going to the Balboa Island boat parade. Unfortunately we decided against it this year because of cold, crowds, past bedtime, etc., but to make up for it, we went down to the Island to see if we could get a sneak peek of any lit-up boats the night before it started. It ended up being a lovely sunset stroll, ferryboat ride to the Peninsula and back, and of course, lots of talk about boats and the NO-ISE they make!!

How I love those sweet eyes!

Baby brother would definitely not zip into this jacket now! My, how we've grown :)!!!


How he spent most of the evening:

It's cookie time!

One of my holiday projects this year was making Christmas Cookies with E. It was messy, time-consuming, and did I say messy? But OH so much fun for me!

It was really a 4-day process for the dream team of a pregnant mom and a 2-yr-old! We do what we can :)!! One day to "mees mees" aka mix the batter. One day to cut the shapes out. One day to bake and cool. One day to decorate. Whew ... I'm tired again just thinking of it :)

E did great with each step, especially since he was probably a little too young for it all.

The best was decorating which we tackled one night while daddy was off working. He worked really hard and did really well concentrating and being patient with each step of icing then decorating each one.

He insistently chose blue icing for almost all of them, and I let him decorate with some of his favorite treats. It was so fun!



The finished product:


Obviously I knew he would end up eating way too much sugar and candy during the process, but I tried to control it until the end, at least. He had done really well at not eating anything for many cookies in a row, but once I let him eat one marshmallow, it was a free-for-all!

Pretend City

Courtney, Jenny, and I took our little ones one day to a kids museum called Pretend City where they have lots of activities that grown-ups do but on a mini-level. Here's a map of everything there is to do ... its not quite as grand as it looks here, but the kids loved it!!


Construction site:

Don't really think the tractors were supposed to merge with the gardening section, but how could he be expected to keep such an awesome bulldozer from scooping and dumping as it was intended!?!

Baby chicks:

Pumping gas "just like daddy":



Gardening with Emma and Princess Rae:


Fireman E riding the back of the truck:


Crusin' at the beach in his "vertible":


Sound engineer:

Water section (and no ... the protective bibs didn't work very well and the poor child was soaked and freezing the rest of the day but didn't seem to mind with all the excitement!!!)



Going to the dentist with Rae:


Then, since it was near Christmas (yes, that's how far behind we are), they RANDOMLY had a special visit of Santa Clause who arrived among a fleet of about 50 Harley riders. It couldn't have been more random, but E was FREAKING OUT with excitement at the motorcycles and all the noise they made! They all pulled into the parking lot, and of course all the kids ran to Santa while E ran to the motorcycles!!

I think the bikers liked him because he was so excited about their bikes!!

Random biker who wanted E to sit on his bike:


Finally we went to see Santa after looking at all the bikes ... E didn't stop talking about motorcycles or pointing the whole time ... never really acknowledged Santa! Can you see he is forming the "mo" of motorcycle in this pic? He seriously wouldn't stop!!


Still looking at the bikes and uninterested in Santa, but Rae looks adorable!!

Whoopsie!

The day he discovered the word "whoopsie!" ... we just caught the excitement on the tailend:



**This must have been a Sunday lunch because he loooves the robot that comes on Fox Sunday football!!**

Bathtime

for baby doll!