Pre - Chritmas activities

Gus was introduced to many things this Christmas in New York.  One of them being Calamari!  Most of us enjoy squid fried.  However, my family like it cold in a "tossed salad" if you will of oil, lemon juice, salt and pepper.  Poppy decided it was time for Gus to learn how to make it, so he took Gus under his wing and taught him.

Gus was a great student and caught on quickly

And when you are finished cooking, you imbibe!

Christmas at Bass Pro

Of course, Poppy had to take Gus to Bass Pro.  We made a visit to see Santa and let him know what Gus wanted for Christmas.  He even had a train set Gus could play with.  We had to sit on all of the ATVs in the whole store.  Thor and Gus even sat in some ice shanties.  Hopefully we'll get him out on the ice and teach all about ice fishing soon.

This one came with a shovel! 

He wouldn't sit on Santa's lap, but he gave him a hug.

He always loves looking at the huge fish tank, but the stuffed giant alligator took it over the top for this little boy.

It is a little hard to feed the fish through the glass, but Gus had to give it a try.

Ice shanty testers

Not sure who was having more fun, Gus or Daddy.

Chuck's 70th birthday Party

So we arrived in NY!  We started off our trip with Chuck's birthday party.  It was good to see the family and celebrate with Chuck.  Happy Birthday chuck!

Best part of parties is the cake and ice cream!

Playing with his little cousin, Gavin

Playing with his big cousin, Natalie

Random Pictures

Thor getting into the holiday spirit and writing some Christmas cards.  You can tell by the pained expression on his face how he loves doing them.  Keep an eye in the mail, they should be arriving soon.

This is the best part of the end of the week.  On Friday nights, Gus and I watch Signing Times and Marty Stouffer after bath time.  Daddy makes us popcorn and we get to lay in bed and eat it.  It is only about 40 minutes of videos, but Gus gets so snugly.  I love it!

Always a naturalist.  He walks around the house with his binos hanging around his neck waiting for wildlife to happen.  This day we were extra lucky.  Two bucks were about 30 feet from our back door banging their antlers together in a display of an ancient matting ritual.  We watched it for about 15 minutes.  It was super cool!

Enjoying the Great Weather

Our weather has been awesome this month.  It has gotten a bit chilly, but the sun has been shining and we have had beautiful blue skies.  We decided to take advantage of this with our friends, Dani and Teagan.  They live here at Astrocamp too.  We took the boys out to climb rocks and trees and to do "other boy stuff" (aka peeing in the woods).  Teagan is 10 months older than Gus, but they enjoy hanging out together.  Dani and I are both working moms, so we enjoy spending a some time together too.

The boys climbing on rocks

Teagan and Dani in our favorite old oak tree.  This thing is huge and has about 10 trunks to it.

Daddy's Little Helper

We noticed a leak under our sink, so Thor set to work after dinner one night.  However, Gus was not about to let him work with out a little help from the Gus-a-roo.  Here are some photos to document the process.  

Notice Gus' stuffed animal, "Baby Hun Hun Bear" is supervising the crew (the bottom left corner of the picture).  Gus didn't want her to miss any action

Thanksgiving 2011

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving.  It was small.  We had Grandma Juju here and my assistant, Chris, joined us, as well as another friend Mike B.  I couldn't bear the thought of not having Mrs. Barker's creamed corn this year, so I finally got the recipe and made it myself.  All the food turned out great.  I also made a pumpkin almond cheesecake.  I thought I would try something a little different instead of just pumpkin pie.   It was yummy!  Afterward we sat around the Christmas tree trying to digest.  Here are just  few pictures.

Gus was very into helping with the cooking.  He thought the turkey was pretty cool and added the finishing touches before we put the bird in the oven.

Reading by the Christmas tree before bed

The day after, we went to our friends house to eat some left over Thanksgiving tamales.