Oh January

Oh January, how long and cold your days, how cabin-feverish you make us! Here are some of our best indoor attempts at beating the winter doldrums.

I've been watching our friends Ava and Eli on Tuesday mornings, which means LOTS of silliness for the kiddos ... Ava and Ben ham it up.

A favorite (and I'm certain completely safe) activity at our house is playing in the stairway ... (I mean, what's not safe about rolling around on the stairs?)

A couple of Saturdays ago, we met our friends Katie and Andrew and their cutie pie kids Kaili and Gavin at the Children's Museum ... Farmer Ben with a couple of farmhands.

Kaili, Gavin, and Ben test the waters.
Kaili and Noah (who would have crawled into the water table had we let him), gone fishin'.

Last week, the boys and I took an afternoon trip to Fernbank Museum ...

Inside the "Fantasy Forest" exhibit. Ben plants a vegetable garden,

and feeds wormies to the birds.Noah spots some dinosaurs! (although he kept doing the sign for "doggy" - close, honey)

This morning we enjoyed some playtime with friends at Leapin' Lizards ...

Thanks for a great birthday party, Carter and Drew!

And this afternoon ...

Cardboard boxes are always a cheap source of entertainment.

The boys have also been having a ton of fun playing with a Christmas present from Birdie and Grandpa. It's a picnic table ... Flip it over, and it's a rocker! ... Until he puts on a few more pounds, it's actually a Noah catapult, unless Ben stands in the middle as he's doing here. Thanks for such a fun gift, Birdie and Grandpa!

Michigan - A Winter Wonderland

We just got back from a week in the snowy, snowy Upper Peninsula of Michigan. We had a blast visiting with Boomma and Papa, aunts and uncles, and cousins galore! Our visit started with a Christmas pool party ... The kids decorated cupcakes,

ate their finished products (I'm so glad he didn't go overboard on the sugar),

played "pin the carrot on the snowman," and just hung out with Papa. Noah was anxious to get in the pool.

"I'm so excited!"

It was so worth the wait.

Then it was time for presents ...

On New Year's Eve we all got together for yet another party. Ben and Noah had a great time ringing in the new year with all their cousins. Noah had to go to bed before the real festivities began, but he tried out the dealy-boppers and maracas before turning in.

The kids enjoyed karaoke,

and noisemakers,

and more noisemakers,

and more noisemakers.

Did I mention there were noisemakers?

And eventually came the ...

silly string!

There was a crazy amount of snow this year. Although it was bitterly cold the whole week, we did manage to get in some outdoor play time, including a trip to the sled hill, which had mixed reviews.

On the way to sledding ...
Ben, are you in there?

Sledding ...

Strangley, Noah didn't enjoy being pelted in the face with cold wind and snow.

On the way home from sledding ...

You'd never know they didn't actually have to climb back up a single hill!

One of Ben's favorite parts of the trip was riding Papa's 6-wheeler. He seriously didn't want to get off. Ever.

Ben, Daddy, and Jeremy's masterpiece (Ben's been dying to put a carrot nose on a snowman all winter).

And, of course, there's nothing's better than coming in to warm up by the fire.