Christmas Twinkle

Since I was too little to appreciate Christmas last year, this is a big year for me. We set up the tree this weekend and it is sparkely and beautiful. I love the way the lights twinkle and the ornaments tease me to play with them. Needless to say, I'm getting a little less unsupervised time in the family room right now.

Noah and his classic tongue sticking out while he concentrates on hanging an ornament.

I did my part by helping take all the ornaments out.

Anna helped by getting the Advent calender ready.

The shiny twinkle of the nice (cute) ornaments was just captivating to me.

The Sorensens gave us a star for our Christmas tree. From what I hear, this is the first year in ages that we've had a tree that's small enough, with ceilings high enough to allow for a star. Isn't it lovely?

While the rest of us were busy decorating the tree, you can see that Allan, Mads and Anna were also busy.

Let's Go to the Movies

While the neighbors were in town, (even though we're miles apart we still can't stop calling them neighbors) Anna and I got to go to our first movie in a movie theater. Ida and Mads came with us to make it even more fun, while Allan & Gitte watched Jonah. We saw Happy Feet Two, and although it wasn't as good as the first, it was a great first time movie theater experience.

Here Anna and I are with the movie poster and our first movie tickets!

All cozy in our seats and waiting for the movie to start.

Willis Tower

Since before we moved to Chicago, I've been excited about seeing the Willis Tower (formerly the Sears Tower). It's one of the tallest buildings in the world and it was all I could talk about when I talked about Chicago. Well, this weekend I got my wish and with the neighbors in town we went to the Willis Tower. It was awesome. We actually went out to breakfast to start the day, then to the Tower. Mummy and the neighbors stayed in Chicago visiting a few extra sights, including "The Bean".


Mummy & Gitte & the Bean

The Sorensen's - clearly it's a red coat year for them.

Because the Sorensens are like family, I made sure to be part of the red coat crew as well.

Our view from the Willis Tower.

A more recent addition to the Willis Tower are these kick out viewing windows. They're a little freaky with their clear floors, but with Anna's brave example and a little bribery I was bold enough to check out the view.

Jonah was a little less convinced and a little harder to bribe.

Anna and her fruity pebbles french toast. Yummmmm!

Ida and I after we finished our yummy breakfast. Here we come Willis Tower!

Most Thankful

The one of the things that we're all most thankful for this year is that our Danish neighbors from Reading came to spend Thanksgiving with us this year! We had a visit filled with lots of laughter and warm memories. The distance may make our visits less frequent, but we've got plans to keep them going.

Ida had recently had a small (or little) surgery that prevented her from picking any of us up, but we all still managed to get some snuggle time with her. Here Jonah is getting his turn.

Mads showed mummy & daddy what living with a teenager is like. Because of our early morning exuberance, he didn't get to sleep in as much as he'd normally like, but this was a pretty common scene.

There was a lot of technology sharing during the visit. Allan was especially kind and shared his ipad with me all the time. Of course, I was always interested in what else was going on with the other technology as well.

As I said, there was a lot of technology sharing. As you'll see, Allan shared not only with me, but with Noah as well.

Our neighbors gave us a beautiful photo book that highlighted some of our best memories together. We read a little bit of the book with everyone; here Ida is reading a to us.

Big Day

What made today a big day you ask? As promised, I'm walking before my first birthday! Ok, to be fair, I'm not walking across the room, but I have taken my first official steps. Since all my steps have been toward mummy, it's hard for her to capture them so this stroll with the stroller will have to do, but watch out world, here I come!

Anna was excited for my achievement.

Other news from the day is that I took a small tumble down 1 stair today. This was yet another opportunity for mummy to have to deal with mouth blood. As you can see from this picture, the damage isn't noticeable, but mummy is curtailing my freedom on the stairs.

The final wonder of today is that I have found a new stash of toys! Mummy keeps telling me not to play with the small appliances, but I don't know what she's talking about, this is a great face guard!


As I'm making all these discoveries today and growing up before your eyes, here I am terrorizing Noah by trying to steal his markers. I actually was able to grab the marker cap and as Noah was trying to take it back he colored blue marker on my head. Between my walking and terrorizing skills, I think the tables are turning for me!

Monkey See

Let's open up the B-I-B-L-E, clap!

Mr. Brad teaches Noah, Noah teaches me and I teach Jonah........

Noah's gotten into imitating his teaching situations lately. This week he was acting like his Promiseland (Sunday school) teacher, Mr. Brad. Monkey see, monkey do has a cascading effect in our house and the other day I was acting like Noah, acting like Mr. Brad. That was the same day I debuted my first pigtails. I see a lot more imitating and a lot more pigtails in my future!

Trick or Treat

Most of our trick or treating crew: (left to right) 2 neighbor girls we don't know, Cami, Regan, Noah, Gavin, Ashlyn, Autumn, Ben, Ally, me, Anna, Zach & Emerson (feet only as she didn't want to be in the picture otherwise)

There was a family fall festival at church that we attended this weekend. There were lots of fun games and candy so of course Noah and Anna had a great time. I got lots of smiles and attention, so it wasn't all bad for me either.

Happy Halloween! We neighborhood-hopped this year and joined the Riddles & Tuckers (who were also joined by the Smiths, Tofilons and Sudermans) for trick or treating. I was stuck in the stroller for most of the activities, but the big kids had fun at least, and Noah said he'd share his candy with me (although mummy put a stop to that).