Staycaction - Keith's Projects

We didn't have many plans for this week, so Keith took the opportunity to do a few projects around the house:

 

After our near flooding, Keith put a "ceiling" on our patio, under the deck.  Of course, he ended up doing it in the pouring rain, and most of it in the dark by himself.  But it turned out pretty great.

 

 

See all that water coming out?  That's all the water that's no longer trying to flood our basement.

 

He also built a little shelf for Cecily's room.  So I no longer have to store all her diaper supplies on the big blue rubbermaid on the window seat (maybe now I should give it back to Heather).

 

And our favorite project:

 

 

Inspired by this project I found on Pinterest, Keith built Parker & Cecily their own table in the kitchen nook.  It's just a shelf from Home Depot, and 5 chairs from Ikea.  The whole project was under $100, took just over an hour (including assembling the chairs), and it's awesome!  Parker already loves using it for coloring, and now Parker, Cecily, and 3 cousins can all eat at the table together.

 

We go to tiny zoo?

 

After going to the zoo Monday morning and Tuesday night, Parker is currently obsessed with the zoo and wants to go every day.  So, when we headed over to Swanson's to see the reindeer, he asked about the zoo.  After explaining what we were doing, he declared, "We go to tiny zoo?"

 

He's still pretty afraid of animals, so he wasn't too excited about the reindeer, but he still had a great time.

 

I think this is the best photo we got in the sleigh:

 

Parker was much more interested in climbing in & out of the sleigh than in sitting in it for a photo.

 

He loved the Koi pond.

 

I wish this photo did justice to the evening.  Swanson's displays their Christmas trees by hanging them in rows from the ceiling.  Parker had a blast running up & down the aisles between the trees.

 

And here's the one photo I took on Friday. (and it's out of focus).  We went downtown for Keith's office family Christmas party.  Traffic was terrible, so we were pretty late.  But we did get to see Santa, which flat-out terrified Parker, but Cecily was happy to get her photo taken.  We also took a turn on the carousel, which also terrified Parker...until we tried to get him off, then he suddenly wanted to ride the horsey.

Staycation - Day 3 - Keith's Birthday Breakfast

 

We drove down to Renton to meet Keith's parents for breakfast.  We're really looking forward to having them closer so they can take us out for breakfast more often...um, I mean, so we can see them more often.  Parker loves his Grandparents and gets super excited any time he gets to see them. (right now Cecily only really has eyes for Mama, but that will change eventually)

 

But the drive did give us an excuse to stop at Ikea for a few things we needed for Keith's project.

Zoo Lights!

The Woodland Park Zoo is doing Zoo Lights this year, so we headed over this evening.  It's much smaller than the Pt. Defiance zoo, but still really fun, and much easier to get to.

 

 

They even have reindeer.

 

Parker's showing off his new finger-sucking technique he picked up from his cousin:

 

Our little guy is such an observer.  Everyone is having "snowball" fights all around him, and he spent most of his time just watching.  But eventually he figured it out & started throwing snowballs at Daddy.

Sorry the pictures are so dark, total user-error on my part.

Zoo!

 

Keith is taking vacation this week (11 whole days of having him home, it's awesome).

So, Monday morning, we headed over to the zoo.

 

The weather was clear & cold, just perfect for the zoo.  See, Cecily's even excited:

 

The bear is one of Parker's favorites.

 

He's still a little wary of the monkeys & gorillas,

 

but he did manage to say "Hi" to this guy.

 

Cecily was over it by that point.

Trim up the tree!

 

Friday morning, Keith & Parker went to Home Depot to take care of our little "patio issue", so Cecily & I stayed home & decorated.

 

We were planning to get the tree on Friday, but between the patio project, the rain, and alternating nap times, we didn't get it until Sunday afternoon.

 

We went for the table top tree, I love it, I can have the lights & decorations on in just over an hour.

 

This is the first year Parker has noticed the decorations.  He points to every piece of decoration and says "Christmas", "Christmas over there, Christmas on the table".  Occasionally followed with "no touching" (just because he knows the rule, doesn't mean he follows it).

Happy Thanksgiving!

 

I made Cecily a new skirt for Thanksgiving.  Having learned a ton in the making (and re-making) of Fiona's skirt, this one went together pretty quickly & easily.

 

We went to my folks for Thanksgiving this year.  At my best count, we had 11 adults and 8 kids, with four under 3.

 

Dianne has a preemie newborn, who slept much better during the day than my baby.

 

3 Generations of Hamilton women.

 

 

Parker, did you want pie by any chance?

 

Nora tried her hand at baby-wearing as well.  The baby slept through it all.

 

All worn out and ready for bedtime.

15 Weeks