Christmas Tree, Oh Christmas Tree

Our Christmas decorations are fairly pathetic. Since we have normally been away at one of our parent's homes for Christmas we haven't really made much effort in the past to decorate our house nicely for the holidays. Some years we didn't do anything at all since we'd be gone for the majority of the holidays. We figured it was too much work to decorate only to leave and then come home to take it all down. This year we are hosting Christmas with the DeBoer side so we decided we'd actually put some effort into decorating. I'd been wanting to get a new tree for quite awhile and had been searching for deals on the internet but didn't really come across any that stood out so we just put up our ridiculous, Charlie Brown-type tree again and planned to get a new artificial tree when they went on clearance after Christmas.

Apparently Luke had another idea. He's been extremely curious about all the ornaments on the tree this year (last year I expected him to be more interested but he pretty much just left them alone... not so this year) Since the majority of our ornaments look like little toys, he just wants to play with them. The whole "look, but don't touch" thing doesn't really work here.

One evening Matt and I were busy in the kitchen, knowing that Luke was playing in the living room with the nativity scene, when we heard a crash followed by crying. Best we can figure, Luke tried to pull a stubborn ornament off the tree and ended up pulling the tree down on himself! No, I didn't get pictures, although now I do wish I had captured the moment. (does that make me a bad mom?) Luke was fine, a little shaken up but other than that no harm done. The tree, on the other hand, was not so fine.

(after picking it up off Luke and propping it against the wall)

That was when we decided to bite the bullet and get a new Christmas tree before going on clearance... one that looked much nicer and was much more sturdy incase Luke got the nerve up to pull more ornaments off the tree.

This new tree is SO much nicer! It comes in three parts vs. the old one that had a center stand and you needed to put each individual branch on separately. It is also pre-lit which is, oh so nice! I put lights on the old tree three times- once because I misjudged how long the strand of lights was and ran out of lights by the time I reached the top of the tree, another time because Luke pulled half the strand off the tree, and the third time I forget why. Regardless, it was awesome to just connect the plugs and be done with it! The only down side is that it is an artificial tree, meaning no fresh pine smell. I bought some Christmas tree-smelling candles but they don't quite cut it. oh well.

Matt and Luke setting up the new tree

"Fluffing" the branches

The finished product!

Hopefully this tree will last through a few more Christmases and a few more kids wanting to play with the ornaments!

I let Luke play with most of the Christmas decorations, so long as they are safe. As a kid, I LOVED playing the different decorations, especially the nativity scene, so it is fun for me to watch Luke play with some of the same things this year.

This is the nativity scene my parents had in our house while I was growing up. My parents gave it to me last year. I have lots of fun memories with this nativity set. It is so much fun to watch Luke playing with it now.

A few days after this all of the nativity scene figures disappeared. I searched high and low but couldn't find them anywhere. After about a week, Matt finally found them in a random cabinet! I was thrilled. The thrill wore off, however, when we discovered that the majority of the animals on one set no longer had any ears! Oh, the joys of toddler-hood.

In other related news....

Now that I've caught up on the posts about our Thanksgiving break I'm back to posting about our normal, everyday life, which involves one big announcement...

In case you can't quite figure it out since the shirt is on the big side Luke is going to be a Big Brother! That's right, I'm pregnant with baby DeBoer #2! We are extremely excited and looking forward to what life is going to be like with two little ones. As of this post I'm a little over 17 weeks along due mid-May (the official due date is May 12 but we're putting no stock in that whatsoever). We've known for awhile and have already told most family and friends. I'm just a little behind in making an 'official blog announcement'.

This is me at about 14 weeks (I think) - showing much earlier than I did when I was pregnant with Luke. Sadly those stomach muscles never quite recovered. sigh.

A comparison to my belly with Luke at about the same stage in pregnancy.

The 'related' part of our news is... drumroll please...

Ok, so you can't see the main news on either Luke or Micah's T-shirts but since they are matching I'm sure you can figure it out....my sister, Erika, is also expecting #2! Yup, we're pregnant at the same time! Erika is due June 6 but the baby will come late May. That we are putting stock in since she is more high risk. SO, there you have it. Two more babies to add to this generation. The Thomson clan is growing right before our eyes, literally.

Twin baby bumps! SO much fun!

Klingenmaier's in CA: The Last Days

After cooking, cleaning and, of course, eating way too much on Thanksgiving we were all ready for a day of some R&R. The weather was pretty junky...very Midwestern-style weather for this time of year; cold and rainy. While all the adults were pretty much content to lay around, eat left overs and take long naps the little boys were not so keen on the idea and became stir crazy early on. Lucky for them we have enough floor space to be able to get a little creative. We moved our normal furniture to the sides of the room and brought the outdoor toys inside! They boys loved it (and by boys, I mean both the little ones and their dads, who could watch their sons play while also keeping an eye on the football games on t.v... it's the best of both worlds).

Micah learning to climb the ladder. Luke waiting ever so patiently.

Showing Micah how to slide like an expert

Micah's turn!

He wasn't so sure at first but quickly got the hang of it and enjoyed himself thoroughly.

Later in the day we ventured to Frugos, a frozen yogurt place where you serve yourself and pay per ounce...easily a piece of heaven on earth. We sampled all the different kinds of frozen yogurt and each made ourselves a nice bowl with plenty of toppings. Yum. I could seriously eat Frugos daily! After eating Frugos the boys were nice and sticky, covered with frozen yogurt drippings, chocolate sauce, etc. Needless to say, it was bath time when we got home. But that doesn't mean the fun was over! On the contrary. Bath time, aka splash time, with a cousin is the greatest ever! At least according to a 19 month old and almost 11 month old. I designated myself to be the videographer/photographer. This put Erika on the front lines of the splash zone! I think she was as wet as the boys were by the time we pulled the plug in the tub!

"You've got a little something on your head Micah"

Luke graciously helped Micah clean that oh, so hard to reach spot on his back.

squeaky clean and cute as can be!

The next morning we, sadly, had to pack up the car and head back to LAX so the Klingenmaier's could trek back to the far off land of Illinois. We were/are extremely grateful for all the fun we had and the time we had together. And of course, we wish we all lived closer so we could enjoy times like this more often...maybe someday. But for now, we are glad to have had this time together and look forward to the next time! We love you Klingenmaiers!

Klingenmaier's in CA: Day 6 & 7- Thanksgiving Day

Day 6 of the Klingenmaier CA vacation we had originally thought we'd head out to Joshua Tree and do a little light hiking. However, after walking throughout the zoo the day before we still a bit worn out by Wednesday morning. Both Micah and Luke were fighting runny, gunky noses and hadn't been sleeping/napping the greatest. We weren't so sure that hiking around Joshua Tree in the cold wind without adequate warm clothing, especially for the boys, was a good idea. So we decided to post pone the Joshua Tree excursion and opted for something indoors and a little closer to home. Aaron found a children's museum in Palm Springs that looked good so we loaded up the boys and headed east. The weather in Beaumont was not so pretty but Palm Springs was beautiful...real CA weather. :) It was a smaller museum but had plenty to offer a 19 month old and almost 11 month old. We all had a great time watching the boys play, enjoying the warm weather and just hanging out. I took as many pictures as I could before my camera battery died. Here are a few, in no particular order...

The Micah Man learning about magnets

Coloring Pictures

Coloring a turkey in honor of Thanksgiving

Playing in the sandbox outside - adults trying our best to keep the sand IN the box.

Micah chasing a ball around the grassy area. Poor kid was a little small to keep up with all the older kids running around and had to seriously fight for his toys!

Back to the sand

Taking a joyride

Testing out the police motorcycle

More fun toys

Digging in the archeological exhibit, complete with the costume

Aaron and Micah's turn on the motorcycle

Making a ramp/maze for the ball to roll down

When we got back home Erika and I got busy prepping for our Thanksgiving meal. We definitely felt very 'grown up', planning and prepping everything for the meal ourselves. It was so fun to be able to chop and chat. I rather prefer cooking that way!

We found a recipe for the turkey on allrecipes.com that sounded good so we decided to give it a try. We had to brine the turkey for 24 hours in a salt water mixture. I thought my stock pot would be big enough but I was way off. Aaron found a large bucket in our garage and put it to good use holding the turkey. So we are a little bit on the redneck side! It turned out fabulous regardless of the slightly unconventional way it was prepared.

View of our fridge the night before Thanksgiving. Not much room. We had to get creative with the small amount of space but it worked out.

Luke 'helping' Erika make a mint chocolate chip cheesecake for dessert

Some final preparations of the turkey before popping it in the oven on Thanksgiving morning

Luke was just a little anxious for the bird to be done! It smelled SO good!

Sister Cooks - our first Thanksgiving together as the adults. No more kiddie table for us!

The finished meal! It's making me hungry all over again.

Matt and Jung digging in

Mmmmm. Good.

The boys even did the dishes afterward!

... Sort of.

After completely stuffing ourselves and getting the meal mostly cleaned up, we enjoyed a relaxing afternoon of watching football, naps, playing with Luke and Micah, and chatting. The DeJong's joined us for dessert later on in the evening adding two more little boys to the mix. It was so much fun watching them all play and interact together. Needless to say there were toys everywhere! Which is really how it should be. It was a wonderful Thanksgiving. We are so very thankful for all of God's blessings and hope to live out our gratitude on a daily basis.

Klingenmaier's in CA: Day 5- San Diego Zoo

Tuesday we ventured south to the world famous San Diego Zoo. The weather was great- sweatshirt weather- perfect for a day walking around the zoo. The zoo wasn't crowded at all and practically all of the animals were out and active. It was really a perfect day for the zoo.

Both boys slept for the majority of the ride down and were very excited when we finally arrived. After a quick picnic lunch in the parking lot we were ready to explore the zoo! I took lots of pictures so I'm going to let the pictures and captions tell the story.

The whole gang by the Zoo entrance

Of course, one of the boys favorite exhibits was the ducks and flamingos. They could have probably watched those silly ducks all day but we figured that we can always go to the park to watch ducks, we can't go to the park to watch tigers, elephants, etc. so we moved on.

Pointing out all the sleeping flamingos standing on one wobbly leg

Watching some species of monkeys- I think we saw at least 5 or 6 different species of monkey while at the zoo. One of the highlights, for Matt at least, was watching a chimpanzee poop in his own hand and then eat it. I had to walk away - that's a bit much for my stomach these days.

This picture is a little blurry, sorry, but I had to post it anyway. The boys were far too interested in the animals to bother looking at the camera.

The Klingenmaier boys

The DeBoer boys, in their matching Calvin sweatshirts

(no, we didn't do that on purpose, it was the warmest sweatshirt Luke had with a hood and Matt was already wearing his. They are super cute though!)

The DeBoer family - rare picture with Luke actually looking toward the camera!

Checking out an interesting animal (I forgot the name).

It was like part giraffe, part zebra, part donkey.

More monkeys

Playing on the hippo statue outside the hippo's tank.

They probably would've stayed there for hours playing if we let them.

I think Luke was watching more monkeys in this picture, but I can't remember exactly what animal it was. Regardless, he was awfully excited and animated!

Watching the polar bears swim around and reach for berries

This mountain lion was right next to the wall of his cage, looking at the spectators, growling, and pacing back and forth. It was a little creepy but pretty cool at the same time. We were just glad that there was a fenced wall between us and the lion. Coming across that sucker in the wild would be terrifying!

Around 3pm the clouds rolled in and the weather cooled off a bit. Time to bust out the blankets for added warmth.

We decided Micah bared a strong resemblance to Mother Teresa... what do you think?

While walking back to the exit we got to see some trainers transporting two of the animals- an Arctic Fox and a New Guinea Singing Dog. It was crazy to see them on leashes walking through the park. At first I thought nothing of it, like they were just regular dogs. I'm sure had it been a lion or tiger walking through the zoo on a leash it would have caught my attention earlier.

Both boys fell asleep once we were on the freeway home and slept until we were ready to stop for dinner. We had a delicious and healthy dinner of fat, I mean fast food, and headed home. We were all ready to hit the hay by the time we got back to the house. Today we are mostly rested and ready for whatever adventures this day has in store for us. Stay tuned...