Old MacDonald had an Itsy-Bitsy Spider

Thats a little glimpse of James and Willy at the moment; James is getting pretty imaginative with making up his own stories and getting everyone involved. These little plays become even more involved and important when it is time to go do something- get in the car, take a bath etc. He is not thrilled when you break character as 'Daddy dinosaur' to go off and change out the laundry or whatever. 

The rest of the story is busy busy springtime here in CT at the moment. We are hoping that everything works out in the next few weeks with our mortgage on the house in Middletown and that we can close at the end of May. Figuring out where the money will come from and going through the mortgage approval is a pretty complicated scenario but we are trying to stay positive and balanced about it. 

We had a nice long visit with our Dutch friends the Grefhorsts and sent them back to NL with an appreciation of hectic American schedules, toddler life, and the intricacies of double twelve dominoes and homebrew. 

Big Willy style getting bigger all the time! We went out to a huge park near us when the weather was nice this week and I don't think Willy had ever seen so much open space in his life- he was super manic and couldn't stand still for a second. 

March

We are so awful about blogging these days, and we apologize about this to our friends far away. Now that Mike is working full time there does not seem to be enough time to blog most days. At the end of our busy work weeks we are usually ready to just relax and veg out, take a hike, go to the grocery store or park-- do anything but click around on the computer. 

But never fear, we will continue to post a little something from time to time about our boys. They are growing so much. Willy is talking now, and James is talking ALL the time. So many questions. Questions that cannot always be answered. Especially by a tired parent. 

They are a lot of fun. The winter has been long, as we seek out strategies to get them out when days are cold. We have spent ALOT of time at the local library this winter-- thank you Toddler Time! We have only been able to visit the playground again in the last few weeks. We attempted a hike two weeks ago, and slipped and slid ALL over the trail. We made an effort, but did not get very far. Today we tried it again and were much more sucessful-- the frozen ice and snow on the trail had melted for the most part-- much easier to maneuver. I never realized before that when all the snow finally melts, it leaves behind a muddy, mucky mess. Our yard had become a bit of a swamp in the last few days. The boys LOVE it, so what can you do?

We are eagerly anticipating our first Dutch guests in March-- our dear friends and former neighbors Cor and Marian are planning a trip to visit us, and I think they will also be able to do some sightseeing in both New York City and Boston. We are so excited to have visitors and thrilled to see our dear friends again. You can expect more posts in the next month at least, as we detail our travels and adventures. 

Now, without further ado, some James and some Willy

James helping mom shovel the driveway in late January

ahh. co-tubbing-- Aunt Lizzie, recognize the Little Einstein's Rocket?

The Little Professor. Willy loves these glasses. No surprise considering his mom was known to wear Mr Potato Head glasses as an accessory.

The brothers, here working out some dispute-- that only happens about half the time. Option B includes chasing and screaming "mine" by both parties. 

Willy outgrew this suit later that day... sad to see this one go. Here he is, not saying any of his new words. You can't force it!

Body Movement

The boys have been growing in leaps and bounds here over the winter. Willy has recently come into some language, which has made it a lot easier for everyone most of the time. Its amazing to watch him work things out; even just being able to communicate a little with us makes him much less frustrated. He adores James of course and everything he does, with mixed results.
We finally broke down and ordered cable tv after 6 years without it- there has been a little too much indoor time here this winter (especially at these ages, there is only so much you can do) and we are all enjoying it immensely- though now I see why every other family has more than one television. James and Willy particularly love the 'Imagination Movers', a Disney show. They will dance to the theme song every single time- its pretty hilarious:

Kid City!

We have been meaning to get down to Middletown CT to a great kid's museum/playplace that we had heard of and we finally made it this past weekend. We have been, and dragged the boys to a lot of different places geared for kids but this one was really amazing. Every single kid in there was having a great time- and it was pretty entertaining for parents as well. Part of the philosophy of the business is actually to provide a place that makes it easy to play with your young kids and get involved. All the exhibits were very tastefully done by a small group of local artists and there was a ton of stuff to do for all different levels- we could have spent the whole time in just one of the areas-

James particularly liked the trains of course:


There were several places you could crawl under and poke your head through the scene and watch everything move around you- very cool.

Kat and James on the see-saw in the Tibetan room; lots of instruments and gongs built into the walls:


James in the Dinosaur room-

Kat and Willy ride in the space car-

James pumping the space car's fuel cells (making bubbles go up big transparent tubes)-


Mural in the 'sea caves', a place for 1-3 year olds:

Willy in the sea caves:

Willy and I trippin out man!:

Sea caves-

We are now looking at houses in and around Middletown!

Christmas 2008

Our Christmas was real whirlwind this year- we had a great time with the Northeast family- even though it was a lot of time for James and Will on the road and in strange beds. First stop was PA; Joe and Peg and Brendan made us very welcome in their house for Christmas Eve and Day- 

Everyone lined up and 'waiting' on Christmas morning: 

  
Super BFF's Brendan and James-


James making sure all of Willy's presents were OK-

Brendan and Joe got Peg a new bike!

Turn your back for a second and Willy has scaled the tallest peice of furniture in the room-


The boyz with their racetrack; we could have just unwrapped this as it was the only thing they played with all day-

On Friday we travelled to Pequannock to get ready for the big Maier sibling party at Jim and Ann's house- it was nice to be among so much family again and it really brought back the joyous and chaotic flavor of Christmas as I remember it as a kid. 

Uncle Bill and Willy on the same page--






What did you say?! The chaos in full swing-

Exhausted.

The rest of the break was spent helping Bill with his new timber frame shed- check out the update over at 

openbuilding.blogspot.com

Good times

We have to confess- our recent exposure? infection? experience? with a little social network called Facebook has taken a toll on our blog postings. Its a funny monster Facebook -it is more immediate than blog posting and easier to compose and keep up with than email- and a great tool for keeping tabs on disparate groups of friends- but can also be an enormous time suck. We promise not to completely abandon this format--

The boys are doing great- Willy is becoming his own unique character; we have a blast trying to find different ways to encourage him/ get him to laugh- I am constantly amazed at how basically different siblings can be. James has luckily become very good at keeping himself occupied and amused for the most part during this period when Willy needs a lot of attention and guidance. They ocassionally will even play really well together, but there is a lot of refereeing.  I should keep a list of the funny things that James will come up with, but it all goes so fast. One night he told us that he was stressed out- pressed, he replied that he was confused and didn't know how things worked! Repressing the urge to say 'join the club' - I assured him that he was doing fine and he would have plenty of time to figure it all out. While Willy is developing language and motor skills, James has really progressed in his ability to imagine things and make up his own stories. 

Here, he is pretending to be sick on the couch and was 'acting' fussy--

The big event in the last week was the snow fall- a foot and a half in tow days! We tried to bring the boys out in it but after spending a half hour getting them ready, they lasted about 10 minutes before they were cold and wet. We will update our gear and try again but especially Willy is still a little young to appreciate the potential fun of 4 foot drifts of snow.


Kat on a mission to replace the suet in our birdfeeders that hang off the hammock-


My frame and ad in the front yard (sans rafters)- this has actually worked pretty well- I have had three people come by and talk about little buildings they want in the spring- we'll see- 





James' off broadway song and dance pre-bedtime- 

We made a good effort to bring the boys into NYC on a frigid weekend in December.  Lets just say we learned a lot. The temps were in the teens and it was very windy; we did see the tree at Macys and St. Patricks and had a great pizza but that was all we could manage- even with the weather there was a line of 200 outside FAO Schwartz. 

We did get a chance to visit with Laurens, Rick, Andy, Ann Clark and little baby Stella- 

Stella is a great smiler-
James with cousin Brendan outside St. Patricks-

James totally lit up when we got our tree home and pulled out the lights and decorations. You forget how wondrous these simple little tradtions are but the look on his face brought it all back home--