A Taste

As previously mentioned, Christopher's favorite Christmas carol this year is "Jingle Bells." Well, wouldn't you know, Grandpa T knows how to play said song... on the accordian! The dynamic duo (T and CJ) performed the following duet with little buds on bells. Enjoy! More stories and pictures from our trip to follow this weekend. Happy new year everyone!!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x0g5jYZBye8

The good, the bad, and the cute

The good news? We survived the east coast mega blizzard and made it safely back to Kansas.

The bad news? I'm way too tired to upload the pictures from our trip tonight. There's always tomorrow!

The cute news? Margarita time!!! (Some of you will understand this reference immediately. I will explain it in our holiday update if you don't get it.)

No Power

So... two minutes after I uploaded the last blog entry, the power went out. Nice, especially when it's 14 degrees out. Don't worry, though. We know how to make our own fun!

Chris decided that he can't sleep without his humidifier on too. All is well now. The power just came on and we are set to defrost!

Fun in the snow

We received our first snowfall of the year last night (not too much really--you could still see the grass) and Christopher was revved up and ready to go when the time came to go outside. He had a blast rolling around in the white stuff and even tasted some to see if it was as good as everyone says! He was extremely disappointed when the time came to return inside for his nap (and he let us know about it!). Even though the wind chill was like 5 degrees, he would have stayed out all day long.

One of CJ's favorite activities this afternoon was rolling down the hill in our backyard. He likes to do this regardless of the weather conditions and was covered in snow from head to toe! Check out this video of him in action...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hM5i19z47NY

Of course, Chris was not the only one to have all the fun. Kasey had some "Crazy Kasey Time" in the snow as well!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jYFLBQn8AVk

And with all this freezing cold weather, our window feeder has been like Grand Central Station. There's really only room for two birds at a time. Here you can see another one swooping in for the goodies!

Good morning!

Good morning! Have you had your pancakes today???

Haircut... finally!

Well, after months and months of dreading our trip to Shear Madness for Christopher's haircut, mother and son went this morning and the result was fabulous! There were no tears, there was no screaming, and there was only a beautiful boy with a beautiful haircut. Chris did a great job and even put up with the electric trimmer. Thank goodness too because his hair was absolutely unruly! To celebrate we enjoyed this "springlike" weather at the playground by our house...

No he is not in jail... Chris is just happy to be taller than Mommy! He also found a small pile of leaves to play in...

Chris also did some driving (he said he was driving his car to San Diego) and, as usual, ran around like crazy!

And just when I was losing all faith in the diversity of Johnson County, Kansas, we turned on PBS to watch "Dinosaur Train" this morning and "Shalom Sesame" was on instead! Christopher learned how they make olive oil in Israel and at least one of the letters on the dreidel. He loved the candles on the menorah so much that I think he may want to celebrate Hanukkah next year too!

Playdate!

Christopher (and especially his Mommy) had a wonderful time today catching up with friends at our house! Lucy, Emily, Connor (6 months), and Olivia came over to play for a while and all of their moms got to chat for a couple hours. Chris is currently obsessed with babies (look out Poppy, Elsie, and Bennett!) and even though he's only met Connor twice, he kept asking about Connor all morning and wanted him to "play choo choos." Above, the kiddos are all enjoying banana muffins at the snack table. It was a great morning for everyone!

Elf Yourself #2

This video speaks for itself. Let us know if this one tops last year! 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4125yeBG3UU

Okay, Grammy, have you picked yourself up off the floor from laughing yet? 

Big shoes

Christopher went through a major growth spurt this weekend and his feet grew to a size 11 1/2! Check it out!

Jingle Bells

Dear Christopher,

I am sorry to inform you that I do not have control over when 98.1 FM plays "Jingle Bells." And asking for the song once, rather than a hundred times, while we are driving is just enough. Thanks buddy!

Love,
Mommy

PS--Speaking of Jingle Bells, if you guys want to laugh, check out the blog from December 19, 2009 when Chris and Kasey dance to the hip hop version of his favorite carol. I'll have to see if we can pull that off again this year!

Smiles and birds

Good morning everybody! I am a happy boy this morning because I had some of Mommy's gingerbread waffles and fresh fruit. Yummy in my tummy! And also (in this picture) Daddy is tickling me. That's one of my favorite parts of the day... What's even more exciting is that we finally got some birds to visit our window feeder! Check out this goldfinch chowing down...

We got another feeder a few weeks back and put it outside my bedroom window but the birds didn't know it was there so it got no traffic. We moved it to one of the backyard maples and now it is like a 5 star restaurant! Mommy has to fill up the feeder almost everyday! I love watching the birds that visit our backyard. So far we've had goldfinches, house finches, downy woodpeckers, mourning doves, chickadees, and juncos.

Have a good day everyone! 

Smiles!

Rockin' Out

Last night, Tristan came over to play while his parents went out to an event and the boys had so much fun! Here is a video of them rocking on both the horse and the rocking chair. As usual, Buds is doing things with utter enthusiasm, as you will see...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xaxBUOCGVO0

For the birds

Of all the fun places we have here in Kansas for Christopher to play, I believe his favorite has to be the trail by our house. The trail system out here is fantastic and the particular trail we go to is 15 miles long in total.  (No he hasn't walked the whole thing yet, but he did walk over a mile and a half straight on Saturday when it was so nice out!) Over the past week, we have gone to different parts of this trail literally every day. Chris loves to walk, run, and explore on the trail. We've even hiked up an unpaved part to the top of a ridge to watch the trains go by! (On his way up, CJ says, "I think I can, I think I can" during the steep parts).  I often come home with my pockets full of Christopher's treasures that he finds along the way. We've explored the trail so much that Chris is becoming a birding expert. There are tons of birds to see there including red tail hawks, great blue herons, ducks, geese, blue jays, cardinals, etc. We've also seen some beautiful woodpeckers-- two different types in fact. One is the red-headed woodpecker and the other is the red-bellied woodpecker. They don't look very different from each other, but Chris knows the difference. When we were watching our bird feeder in the backyard today, one of them flew onto it. Chris says, "Red-bellied woodpecker, Mommy!" and indeed he was correct.

As much as he loves being out in nature, his favorite part of the trail is the "choo-choos" he gets to see there. We were fortunate enough to see five trains while at the trail this morning and a very cool thing happened with one of them. We were out in the open and Chris was standing there watching the train go slowly by. The driver must have seen him because he opened the engine's window, waved to us, and blew the horn especially for CJ! You can imagine how excited our little man was as he waved back and gave his own best "choo choo!" It was a fun morning!

Christmas Decor

We hope all of our readers had a lovely Thanksgiving! Ours was quiet this year and we spent the day watching the Macy's parade with Chris, making homemade playdough, and eating our holiday food...

I like to wait until the day after Thanksgiving to put up our Christmas decorations and Christopher helped me do it with much enthusiasm! I remember setting up the tree last year and worrying about the fate of our ornaments as last Christmas was our little boy's first as a toddler. He was so good with the tree last year, but I already see that there will be some ornament casualties this season! He usually stops playing with the ornaments when I tell him too, but he is two and impulse control is not high on his list. (Dear Santa, This year I would like a toy plane, blocks, and the ability to control myself when necessary!). He is thoroughly enjoying the season so far, however. Here is a video of Chris enjoying some of the things we have put out in the house this year...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9jhF_UJ38nE

Laundry boy

My, my, I sure do love doing laundry! When my clothes get all messy and smelly from my endless days of playing, there's nothing I like better than to give them a good scrubbing in the washing machine. Say, would you like me to do your laundry too? I only charge $25 per hour. For that price, I can sort your laundry, bag it...

... and drag it down the hallway to your washing machine...

... and supplied with a properly-sized step stool, I'll even put in the detergent along with the clothes!

I do charge extra for drying and folding, but if you just want me to do the sock sorting game, I will happily throw that in, free of charge. Contact me for details!

Such big kids!

Okay, seriously? Will you look at these two big kids? Can you even believe how much they've grown? It's so fun to see Chris and Olivia and how they've become these big kids together! I mean, they're not even toddlers anymore. Olivia came over to play this morning and, after Kasey was finished giving her kisses, she got to play with Chris. The two of them literally played with every toy in the house and then some and they had a wonderful morning together! Here are some more pics...

Brrrr!

Well, I guess considering that it is November, the weather is supposed to get chillier, isn't it? After a cloudy morning (and a nice run for Mommy where she could see her breath the whole way!) the sun came out and we got outside to play. Buds is sporting his new fleece hat and looks as cute as ever, in my modest opinion. Anyway here is some footage of Christopher exploring the great outdoors (and getting some good vitamin D, Grammy) before his nap. He is currently recharging for his friends Lahna and Liam, who are bringing their parents over for dinner tonight. Enjoy!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GuRhExvC-SE

Open gym

So, thanks to Jaime and Olivia, we have now discovered a fabulous new place for indoor fun. With the weather starting to cool down, we need to expand our options beyond the local parks. Anyway, we met Olivia and Jaime at Emerald City Gym which is a place where they teach actual gymnastics but have an open gym time for an hour each day. The only things the kids don't get to play on are the uneven bars, horse, vault and 4 foot balance beams, and would you want our little monkey on that stuff anyway? Everything else is fair game, though, including a rope swing and foam pit, trampolines, huge slides, obstacle courses and the bouncy floor that gymnasts use in their floor routines (and when I walked on it, I now understand how they do all those super high flips--it's really bouncy!). Anyway, Buds was in heaven and it's just too bad they don't have open gym all day! His favorite part on Wednesday (although not today when we went with Maddie!) was the three person swing. Here are some more pics...

 

Man, I wish I was two again. This place is super fun!

Goings on

Much has been going on in the life of little Chris Woglom these days. It is very busy being a two year-old, you know! First of all, we watched the condensed version of the New York City Marathon last night on TV and Chris liked what he saw. I told him that I ran the race 8 years ago, but I'm afraid he thought I was running the race we were watching. Hence, he kept saying "Go Mommy go!" when they showed the lead women's pack. (I could only dream to run that fast!) He was also not apt to sit while watching the race. He would watch for a minute and then take off around the family room. He also ran zig zags saying "go crazy" while he did it. The boy loves to run! And you are hearing it here first: when we watched the men's winner cross the finish line, I said "There's the winner Chris. He wins the race." Christopher said, "Chris." I said, "Chris wins the race? Are you going to win the marathon?" And our little runner gave us a definitive "YES!" Mark his words... Chris had a blast yesterday at his friend Lucy's birthday party. Not only did he get to play with her toy planes, but he also got to stay up past his nap time and he had a cupcake (plus another one after dinner). Christopher adores Lucy and even sang "Happy Birthday" to her. It was truly adorable. Here is Chris playing with one of her planes as well as one of his own...

Because of the time change this weekend, we let Chris stay up a little later on Saturday. Since Mommy and Daddy got to go out on Friday evening (yay!) we all just chilled at home and played until late. Christopher likes to make himself comfortable, that's for sure. I think he was having flashbacks to when he used to sleep on Daddy's chest as a baby. Only, now he weighs a whole lot more and it's not quite as cozy for Daddy!

 

New Video

I'm not sure what was in the pancakes this morning (perhaps some supercharged blueberries?) but Christopher was on his A game this morning. He was exploring the laws of gravity with this little blue ball we found on the beach in San Diego. He was also trying out his throwing arm which, I have to admit, could use a little work. The cutest part of this video (in my opinion) is when he says, "Ball, come back, come back, come back!" Enjoy...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6uhQMce1qic

How you doin'?

My little man

I wish I could videotape the entire story hour at the library and put it up on this blog so you could see how stinkin' cute Christopher is during it. That's right, I'm a proud, gushing mother right now. So be it! This is the second week in a row that we've gone to story time at Lackman Library and Chris knows what to do. First of all, the man who runs it is also named Chris so our little man likes that whole idea. CJ goes in, gets his little carpet square and sits down to listen. He listens so well to the stories and occasionally answers questions that Mr. Chris asks. In between stories, the kids get up and sing and dance to songs. CJ watches very carefully and catches on quickly and it is so awesome to watch him! Today they sang "Six Little Ducks" and the first time through he watched and soaked it all in. Then the second time through he did all the movements along with Mr.Chris. It is so highly enjoyable that I don't want it to end. Now, when we go play with the trains in the library afterward, that's a different story ("No sharing, Mommy.") :)

By the way, if you want to see the cutest Halloween tiger ever, click on the Bennett Chen Da Ching Pariso blog on my blog list. This kid is so cute!

Round two

So we thought we were done trick or treating but when all the kids started coming to the door at 6, Chris wanted to go out again. (Plus it was dark and he kept saying "trick or treating in the dark" so how could we resist?). Looks like Brian will have a lot of candy to bring to work tomorrow! Oh and we'll let CJ have some too...

Trick or Treat!

Here is our little trick-or-treater as he set out to gather candy for the very first time! You may remember that on the morning of last Halloween, little Chris was returning from his overnight stay in the hospital for an allergic reaction. This Halloween (ear infection and all) Buds was ready to go. Of course, we never got the memo that the neighborhood trick-or-treating is from 6 to 8. No wonder we were the only ones walking around in costume! No matter--we were only planning on going to a few houses anyway and then we ended up in the cul-de-sac behind us where Chris played with the Klussman kiddos while we talked to Jeff and Kay...

When we returned from our outing, Christopher was allowed to choose a treat to enjoy and he chose M&Ms. I am proud to say that he didn't quite know how to eat them and several kept falling out of his mouth and onto his costume! He did enjoy them however and he will get another treat after dinner.

Happy Halloween everybody!!!

ABC Song

Christopher is quite the singer these days. Among his favorites at the moment are "Hot Cross Buns" and the "Grocery Store Song" from Kindermusik. He also likes to sing the ABC song. The other day, I took his to story hour at the library and they sang the ABC song there. Chris sang right along! It was so cute. Tonight, after brushing his teeth, he was looking at a little sign I put up on the mirror that says "Happy Halloween." Any time he sees block letters or words, he starts singing the ABC song and that's what he did tonight when he saw the sign. Check it out! You would never know that he is miserable from an ear infection and cough! (Since blogger is being a pain with uploading my videos, here is the link to YouTube...)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m9zZVMdUUBk

Party time at Kindermusik

Today was the annual Halloween party in Christopher's Kindermusik class. Our little man broke out his Thomas costume and actually wore it for the first half of class! We sang and danced to all Halloween-themed songs today. Here he is playing some rhythm sticks to "The Addams Family" theme song...

There were many cute costumes this year including another Thomas as well as a princess, a dinosaur and a sprinkle doughnut (that one was awesome!). Chris got his dance on too! He did pretty well considering he was wearing a big Thomas apron that kept getting in his way.

Hide and Seek

Last night, we were in the back yard enjoying the unseasonable weather. Chris, as usual, wanted to play hide and seek. If you are familiar with our yard, you know that it is built out a bit and there is a 5 foot rock wall to hold back the dirt. This is an ideal place to hide for a little boy of about 3 feet. Here is how the game went...

CJ: Hide from Dada! Mommy hide too!
Mommy: Okay Chris, let's hide and Daddy will count to ten.
Daddy: 1, 2, 3.... 9, 10. Ready or not here I come!
CJ: (Being pretty quiet but smiling at me as we hide.)
Daddy: Now where is Christopher. Is he behind the tree?
CJ: No!
Daddy: Where could he be?
CJ: By rocks! By rocks! (and laughing)

He is soooooo obvious!

5th Annual Pumpkin Carving Extravaganza!

It happened again... pumpkins big and small, goofy and scary invaded the home of the Eakins on this Saturday before the Saturday before Halloween! After spending the morning at the pumpkin patch, what could be better than carving and decorating some pumpkins for little Christopher? And of course what could be better than playing with the super cool toys of a 3 1/2 year-old boy? You can see how much fun Chris had by the look on his face...

By the way, in that picture above with all the pumpkins, I carved the one furthest to the left and Chris decorated the one right next to it. (Daddy chose to abstain from carving this year. He didn't want to make anyone look bad, what with his artistic abilities and all!) The night was fun and we all had a great time as the Eakins threw yet another fabulous soiree! We also got into the Halloween spirit and dressed up (all of us). You will see a preview of Christopher's Halloween costume as well as those of his parents below...

In case you couldn't tell, Chris is dressed up like Thomas, Mommy just wanted to have purple hair, and Daddy is, well you guessed it--Hulk Hogan. Before we left for the party, he got way into character! Also, notice how Chris and Kasey are just staring in awe (or... something...) at this "Real American."

A great time was had by all and we are looking forward to next year's party already!

KC Pumpkin Patch

The Woglom family headed out this morning to the KC Pumpkin Patch, just 15 minutes south of us in Gardner, Kansas. We had a great time and, as you can see, Christopher had the best time of all. Above, he is riding on a hayride on his way out to pick the best pumpkin ever. We were teaching him how to be selective because if it were up to him, Chris would take the first pumpkin he saw! Here he is browsing and then taking his sweet pumpkin home...

We also got to ride on several different types of trains. When we first got to the patch, there was a little tractor pulling this barrel train. Buds got to go on it all by himself! I was crossing my fingers that he wouldn't try to exit the car while it was in motion. Then we all got to ride on the Yellow Brick Railroad, which took us through the Land of Oz...

There were lots of fun activities for the kids to do, including lots of big slides as well as digging in the sand and corn!

And finally, Chris was trying to figure out how to operate the bulldozer to dig deep in the sand. As you can see from the look on his face, he is a little confused about how he's going to do it!