Holidays and Winter

The holidays came and went so quickly it seems.  I can't believe that it's February.  Here's a rundown of what we've been doing: 

In December we did a lot of our "normal" Christmas time things.  We went to see the local live nativity, we went to the Christmas program at church, both boys had Christmas performances at school, class parties, Corban kept getting the words "version" and "virgin" confused ("I want to listen to a different virgin of that song!"), lots of family came to visit at different times.  This was the first Christmas that we've lived in Virginia that has not involved a trip down to Georgia.  There were good and bad things about that.  It was nice not to pack up and go anywhere and to have Christmas at home with our traditions (yummy breakfast, presents, watching The Nativity Story, Waffle House for dinner).  It was a little sad not to have big family gatherings though. 

Cool hats from Once Upon a Child.  They can only wear them for playing in the snow
 and at home.  The first day we got them Gabriel wore his in the Chick-fil-a play place
and scared a little kid so badly that he started crying.

It has been a cold and snowy winter so far.  I'm a little over it personally.  But, if it's going to be cold at least there have been a few days where the boys could play in the snow.

Their "snow store".  They were selling random treats to eat.

Gabriel is still really enjoying school and making improvement with his ability to focus and keep his talking in check.  One area where he is having a hard time is with chewing and putting things in his mouth.  His classmates have even noticed it.  One day in particular he had chewed on his shirt so much that it was completely wet and he bit through one of the buttons.  He had his 6 year old wellness visit back in December and I brought it up with the pediatrician after a conversation with his teacher.  He is supposed to start occupational therapy soon but it's taking the referral a really long time to get set up.

Christmas program

Hanging out at Gabriel's class party.  He's just one of the kindergartners. 
He likes going to help with Gabriel's lunch and talking to the kids there.

Christmas Party

When I was having a meeting with his teacher she told me a couple of funny things about Gabriel.  One is that many days he goes on and on to his classmates about Narnia (he listens to the audio books on the way to school with Daddy sometimes).  She said no one knows what he's talking about but he gets really into it.  She also said that he can explain theological concepts to everyone really well, which I find interesting.

One day he was talking to a girl in his class and said "Right now you're a 'Miss' but when you grow up and get married you'll be a 'Mrs.'  Like if you marry me you'll be 'Mrs Rollo.'  But that's my mom's name. . .wait. . ."

Another day he asked one of the girls if she wanted to pretend to be his wife.  She said "No, I want to be a unicorn."  Gabriel said "you can be a unicorn and my wife."  She agreed to this.  Then they decided that the other boy in his class was their son.

After Corban's Christmas program

Building his first Lego set with Daddy

This couple was trying to take a nice picture after the Christmas Eve service.  The wife sent me the
picture and said "your pastor kid son is photo bombing us back there preaching his sermon"

Christmas morning

He bought this Lego set himself and then came home and built it with no help

Snoozing with Hannah Kate

Mary Poppins Returns!

The big news if you were to ask the boys is that we finally got a van.  I was sad to say "goodbye" to my Civic, since it was just a little over a thousand miles shy of hitting 200,000 but we needed more space and we found a used van with really everything we were looking for.  The boys love it and it certainly was nice the last time we took a trip to have the extra space.  I still can't seem to park it very well and I'm still not sure what all the buttons do.  Corban somehow set a destination into the navigator and it took me a couple days to figure out how to delete it.

Transportation Museum

Corban still loves preschool and he has adjusted to having Gabriel gone during the day, even though it's clear that he misses him.  He told me the other day that he wished that he was Gabriel.  When I asked him why he said "because then I could take violin lessons too." It's hard sometimes to be the little brother, but I sure am thankful that they (mostly) like to play together.  I like the mornings when they wake up and just start doing things together in their room without even coming out.  Part of me wants them to be so excited to see me that they think about nothing else, but I'd rather that they are content to be together and talk and play.  They actually decided one day that they were going to both be construction workers when they grow up and work on the same job site.  Another day, after having a long discussion about orange juice, they decided that when they grow up they are moving to Florida together to grow oranges and make orange juice for people.  I hope they always stay friends :)

UNO and hot chocolate with Daddy

Corban relaxing

Cool guy haircut