Collage Catch-Up

After missing weeks of Foto Fridays, here is a collection of collages highlighting just some of our fun since Thanksgiving week.
(The kids' Christmas Programs and Christmas will follow soon!)



Thanksgiving at Nana and Papa's house


While we were playing at the little park at Nana and Papa's, a super affectionate black cat (who reminded me so much of one of the cats we had when I was little) spent over an hour hanging out with us. Both kids were smitten with this kitty! Gracie recognized what it was and signed "cat" unprompted!


I cautiously gave Preston my camera to take a few shots of the kitty. I love this one - - the cat's off in the distance and Preston's shadow holding the camera is in clear view.


He also took these of himself when he turned the camera around! In all, he took over 60 pictures in a handful of minutes.


Snow Day!


We took the kids to play in the snow for a bit the day after Thanksgiving. Gracie enjoyed herself for all of ten minutes, but loved looking at the snow from the car! Preston, on the other hand, had a blast! He sledded, had a snowball fight with John and face-planted into the fluffy white stuff a half-dozen times!


Our trip to the San Diego Zoo



Gracie loved the camels, but the hippos were her favorite.

Decking the Halls
Each year we get an ornament for each of the kids - - a tradition my mom had for us growing up. This year, Gracie's was a school bus (to commemorate the huge milestone of riding the bus) and Preston's was a fire engine (to remember his obsession with all things related to firemen and, of course, the kids' Halloween costumes this year). The picture of the fire engine was taken by Preston with my camera.


A quick visit to Santa at our neighborhood shopping center.
This particular Santa and Mrs. Claus were wonderful with the kids... and it was free to take pictures! We had intended this to be a "practice run" for waiting in the long lines for more formal pictures, but I never was able to justify the wait time and dress-up fiasco this year! (And, as far as the kids were concerned, they saw Santa plenty! Though Preston was particularly frustrated with each encounter because he never did find any reindeer on the roof!)


Baking our first cookies of the season.
Preston turned out to be an excellent little helper in the kitchen... he likes to press cookies, help with turning on the mixer ("Big Red"), add ingredients to the mixer bowl and "wash" bowls and spoons in the sink.


Gracie, sans clothing, of course, was very excited about "her dozen" cookies. The two trays of cookies featured in the next couple of collages were not consumed! They were made for fun... the kids got to roll the dough in the colored sugar (and stick their fingers in, too!), they helped press the cookies (with my assistance using a mug and cookie presses!) and watched them bake through the oven window.


I set the timer on the camera to get pictures of what we were doing. Instead of continuing to pay attention to the cookies, Gracie saw the light on the camera blinking and turned to it. She looked right at it, smiled and signed "I love you!" Too funny. As soon as the light stopped blinking, she went back to the task at hand. Needless to say, I cracked up when I saw the pics later that afternoon!


In addition to her silly antics during the timed photos, Gracie decided that the place mats were better suited as hats!