Christmas Day

The three of us had a great day celebrating Christmas together. We were all spoiled, Cole with more toys, Jeff with a new toolchest and me with styling new boots and other clothes! Later on in the day we had a big dinner with turkey, potatoes, stuffing and veggies. Mmmm!

above: Cole and Mommy, waiting to open gifts!

below: Cole clapping his hands, he's been doing this for a little while now, sometimes spontaneously but also when you clap he usually mimics it

below: Cole with all his Christmas loot!
below: Cole and Daddy, Cole honking the horn on his walker!

below: Cole and his stocking

Christmas Eve

For the first year ever I spent the beginning of Christmas Eve day running around getting groceries and finishing my Christmas shopping. I was reminded that there's a good reason I don't leave things that last minute when it comes to Christmas! Despite the crowds, by early afternoon I was home and we enjoyed the rest of the day together. A few pics below: bathtime with the cute towel Cole got from Aunt Sarah and one reading "The Night Before Christmas" that we got from Alison... we're planning on reading this book as a tradition every Christmas eve.

Family Christmas's

Grandma and Miriam with the girls

Cole and Aunt Sarah

Caitlin and Mackenzie having fun on the mini trampoline

Daddy feeding Cole

Caitlin eating her marshmellow chocolate santa... was all smiles!

Caitlin and her elephant
Cole discovering he can open cupboard doors
and he's pretty excited about it...

Cole getting lots of hugs from the twins

Cole in the sweater/hat that Grandma knitted for him

Cole watching tv with Uncle Matt and Uncle Benjamin

Cole and Aunt Miriam

Caitlin and Mackenzie trying to get a santa hat on their mama

family pic

Cole and my good friend Alison

Cole hanging out with my cousin, Heather

Once again we are WAY overdue for an update on here!
December 12/13th was my family Christmas back home on the farm.(pictures above) Cole and I stayed there for the week following that while Jeff came back to Windsor for the work week. It was nice to be able to stay over for the week. Cole definitely enjoyed the extra attention from Grandma and Grandpa and was all smiles for them. If Cole could talk I'm sure he would say his favourite thing was eating a piece of shortbread (Grandpa!) I guess baby's first sugar won't be at his one year mark afterall. In all fairness I wasn't around to calm him and desperate situations call for desperate measures. My favourite part was going for a facial, a treat my Mom arranged for me.
This past weekend was Jeff's side family Christmas in London at his Aunt Anne and Uncle Gerry's.(pictures below) Cole took a long nap in the morning before we took off but because dinner started around 2:00 he never got down for his afternoon nap. That, in combination with him cutting four teeth all at once right now didn't lead to such a great ride home last night. It was a good visit and great food though and we were happy he lasted for the time he did well he was there.

Well, Christmas day is still 4 days away but Cole has been spoiled with presents already. Now to find a home for everything... :)

Uncle Roger and Jeff

Cole with cousins Kristen and Noah

more fun with cousins: Kristen and Sarah

Cole and Aunt Kim

cute hat/bib set from Cole's great uncle Roger

while Cole and I were away Jeff went to work on the basement, drywall is almost complete! Yay!

Our week so far...

Cole changes so much everyday but in particular these past couple of weeks. He no longer wants anything to do with his exersaucer or jumperoo which he previously adored. Now, a majority of the time he fusses unless you stand him up! He can support his own weight fine (pictures above from this morning) but doesn't have enough balance to really move about on his own yet. I don't know if he's going to do the whole crawling bit... he doesn't show any signs of working towards it and I've read that some babies skip that milestone. Actually, Cole's sitter Katie never crawled, just started walking a little earlier than others and it never affected her. This afternoon we took a trip to Toys R Us and picked up a little harness thing they have there called "walking wings" we just tried it out tonight and I think it's going to help our backs out if this carries on for much longer! Will post a picture soon. Below, more pictures from earlier this week.

don't know about the "good ALL year" shirt but he is napping sooo much better with the static radio so mommy couldn't be happier for the time being!

snuggling with his bear

Another Christmas Photoshoot!

We decided today might also be a good day to attempt to get a few more pictures for christmas. Here are a couple that didn't turn out so well, but good for a laugh. He wasn't having anything to do with the santa hat this time around and pulled it right over his eyes as soon as I put it on him! And yes, we did end up with one good picture:)

Another Cat Lover!

Jeff says it's only because I make such a big deal when Austin (our cat) is around that Cole has developed a fascination with him. I think the fact that he's the same size as Cole and sometimes likes to play with his toys has more to do with it than anything. Pictures from this AM above as Cole and Austin play with his turtle that he received for xmas from Jeff's work. Whatever the reason they definitely like each other. Austin is alot more tolerant with Cole than I ever would have guessed he could be. If anyone else irritates him he doesn't hesitate to let you know it with a quick bite. (and Jeff and me have been bitten a few times!) Cole, on the other hand will get ahold of his ears, whiskers or a good handful of fur and just pull and Austin ignores it for the most part, if it gets too much for him he just walks away.

On the subject of family pets I should also catch you up with what what our dog, Duke's been up to. He spends alot more time in the basement now as Jeff has now gotten renovations underway here. When it comes to Cole, Duke mostly keeps his distance since he knows he's not supposed to touch Cole. When Cole tries to pet him he even backs away... I'm sure when Cole gets a little older they'll both use up lots of energy running around together... my guess is that Cole will be chasing after Duke!

We had a bit of a rough patch earlier this week when Cole woke up in the middle of the night two nights in a row... I ended up having to take him back our bed to get him to go back to sleep, and Jeff had to move to the guest room. Cole had been pulling on his one ear quite a bit and on wednesday when he started having a runny nose we took him into the doctors thinking it might be an ear infection. Thankfully it wasn't, just excess ear wax apparently, which we're helping to get out with the use of peroxide drops. Now he seems to be sleeping well, in fact, better than before since we've now started using a static radio for white noise.

This morning Daddy and Cole went swimming, I went along to help out with Cole but just watched. I was hoping Jeff would feel comfortable going by himself with Cole but admittingly I find it tough to do when I go by myself with him during the week... so no mommy swim breaks just yet.

Right now Cole has settled in for a nap, hopefully a long one. The plan for today is to get all my pre-pregnancy wardrobe sorted and back into my closet. Slowly some have been drifting upstairs as I fit back into them in the past few months. Now, I have finally lost all 45lbs pregnancy weight... woohoo! (putting it on, I was extremely doubtful this day would ever come!) and it's time to get the closet back together. Other than that, hopefully we manage to get our tree and some decorations up today/tomorrow. Oh, and a few last presents to get for christmas, but we're almost done. Time to get to work!

Visiting the Galea's!

Yesterday, I bravely took off with Cole for a day trip to London... though in truth I wasn't very optimistic, thinking in my head that there was a good chance we would have to turn around. Well, Cole proved me wrong and had better naps than he has in ages, sleeping most of the way to London and all the way home (he even took a little nap while we were there!)

In London we visited the Galea's who have a little guy, Lukas, who is pretty much the same age as Cole. It was great being out of the house, catching up and swapping babies for a bit! It'll be so exciting to visit as they get older and are able to play with each other more!

Pictures: above, Cole and Lukas on the couch

to the left, "momma" Kimmy and Lukas