So Let Me Tell You About My Christmas...

Christmas started early this year, in more ways than one! I got to go see my Nana D and Pap on Christmas Eve, and I got to open presents, even though it wasn't Christmas yet! Nana also made me lots of fruit salad and special cupcakes, which everyone kept saying were muffins, but I know a cupcake when I see one. I got to play with my Mom-Mom and Pappy, and my goofy Uncle Scott, Aunt Pam, and cousin Megan, and was so worn out from the morning that I was asleep in the car before we got home. I felt refreshed after my 15-minute car-nap, so I wanted to play with my new engine, Rosie, but Mommy and Daddy insisted I go to my bed and take another nap. This is where my stall tactics came in handy - they let me take Rosie to bed with me, so I had something to help me pass the time until they decided my quote-nap-unquote was over.

Our tree - I made my first Christmas ornaments in school this month, so we put them on the tree!

As for Christmas, all week long, Mommy and Daddy were talking about how Santa Claus was coming and that I had to be good and listen, and he'd leave me a bunch of presents while I slept on Friday night... well, then why were they surprised when I woke up at 4:15 a.m., ready to open presents?! I'd been really good all week, but they still made me go back to bed! But, at least I managed to go back to sleep in THEIR bed, hahaha....

Four hours later, they finally said it was time to go downstairs - and they were RIGHT! Santa Claus DID come, and he left me all kinds of presents to open! But of course, I can't do anything on an empty stomach, so the first order of business was breakfast. COOKIES!!!!! with chocolate kisses... yum! I'm beginning to like the "Christmas version" of Mommy and Daddy - they let me get away with eating dessert for breakfast!

Daddy helped me open some freight cars for my train set.

It was hard to be patient, but I managed to control myself! You'd be surprised at how distracting my Mommy's cookies are!

This was the coolest Thomas set I'd ever seen (and the biggest!) Once Daddy takes some pictures of the new-and-improved track, I'll post some pictures.

The only frustrating thing about getting Thomas presents is that I had to wait while Mommy and Daddy struggled with getting everything out of the boxes! I don't understand why every piece has to be locked down with four different steel ties, plastic bindings, and super-sticky scotch tape.

Anyway, Santa brought me lots of cool stuff for my Thomas the Tank Engine set - my Nana D gave me a little engine named Rosie the day before, and I got the big tender engine, Spencer, and some neat freight cars with aquarium and zoo animals in them. Santa also left me lots of supplies to do my artwork, including a big Ironman art book and an easel of my own!

This book has markers, stickers, puzzles, coloring pages, and all kinds of other stuff, and it's all about Super Heroes! Of course, I had to take a few of the IronMan and Spider-Man stickers out right away :)

This is my new easel. Priceless works of art forthcoming...

I LET the Grinch steal my bean bag - this is RoninGreyWho, waiting for the Grinch's heart to grow three sizes so I can get my bean bag back. In the meantime, I'll be playing on my living-room-sized Thomas track that my Daddy set up...

I had lots of fun playing with my stuff all morning, and then after I took my nap, we all went up to Nana K's house - we ate lots of yummy food (my favorite, of course - the dinner rolls), and I got to open even more presents. I had so much energy after dinner that my Aunt Michelle and I played "Ring Around the Rosie" in the kitchen about 100 times! I was the only one falling down, though, until Daddy joined in - he always has fun falling down with me :) We were having so much fun that we got home WAY past my bedtime. I still wanted to play when we got home, but since it was really late I had to go straight to bed. It's okay, though, because we've had a couple of days to play since then. It's going to be tough to go back to school tomorrow and away from my toys, but I get to see my friends and my teachers, and we can talk about Santa's visit!

Cheesin' it with Thomas...

Mommy and Daddy slacked on getting the Christmas cards out, so this shot will have to do... Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

I hope your Christmas was as fun as mine was, and if I don't see you before then, have a really Happy New Year! It's gonna be a great one!

A Long-Awaited Return...

Hi! Yes, I'm finally back! It has been a very long time since my last post, but I really do have a good reason for that - Mommy and Daddy got a new computer, and they're so busy playing Thomas the Tank Engine with me that they haven't really had a chance to set up the camera and download any of my latest photos until now.

Quite a bit has happened since I last wrote - I went trick-or-treating for Halloween in TWO different costumes (Thomas, and Clinton Portis, my favorite Washington Redskins football player), I visited a pumpkin patch and a fire station with my class at preschool, and I got pneumonia for Thanksgiving... don't worry, Mommy made sure I got some turkey a few days later!

Do you see how small I look on this slide?! It's not an optical illusion. That slide was HUUUUGE!!! And as you can see I did it all by myself!!! Pretty sure I scared the you-know-what out of Mommy and my teachers. Hehehe.

This is me in the maze at the pumpkin patch. It was pretty awesome. Again, I didn't have to hold anyone's hand or anything. It was such a blast. I was pretty worn out after all that running and laughing with all my friends from school. After the maze we went to pick out our own little pumpkins, which was cool with me 'cause I was able to chill out a bit.

I also got to visit my school on a Saturday night to see the Christmas Light Show! Mommy and Daddy and I drove through thousands of lights and they blinked to the Christmas music on the radio - but the best part was when we got to go inside and have s'mores and lemonade.

We ended up wearing some of the s'mores on our faces :)

I've also been making a lot of time for my indoor hobbies, now that the weather has gotten colder (and I've been sick recently with pneumonia, which is counterproductive to my efforts to go to the playground).

Daddy lets me play his drums once in a while - I'm getting pretty good!

Mommy and Daddy sometimes let me play on this cool new iPad thing - it's got animal flashcards that make the actual animal noises! I really like to listen to the lion and the fish (which sounds like water bubbling, hehehe), and it even spells the name so I can practice my letters. Oh, and by the way, my latest obsession is singing my ABC's ad nauseum to the girls in my preschool class :)

And, of course, I always make time to play with my Thomas and friends engines.

You can see some of my school artwork in the background of this picture. I had to get my hands messy for that one, but that's not such a big deal anymore.

You can see one of my latest "engines," Alfie, who isn't really an engine, he's a front-loader friend of Thomas's. He likes to feel included with the rest of the engines, though, so I make sure he gets some time on the track, too!

Mommy probably took this picture while I was watching a really exciting part of a Thomas story... he and his friends seem to get into trouble all the time!

Well now that Mommy and Daddy got the camera set up on the new computer, and are figuring out something called Red Eye Reduction, there will probably be a lot more pictures in my next post. Until then I think I'm gonna catch some Z's. 'Night.