Noel

Christmas is so fun with little kids. Here's Seth and Ada on Christmas Eve in their new sleepers and bathrobes. Their awesome Grandma Rutman makes those fancy stockings for each of her grandkids.

I love that it's not hard to get them to pose hugging. There's something fulfilling about making two creatures that cuddle and love each other. It melts me every time when I find them cuddling in one bed together instead of in their own.

Here's the spread after Santa's visit. Seth's gotten suspicious about Santa, but some kid in his class claims his dad met the actual Santa, and Seth went for it for another year at least.

Here's Seth with his Hobbit sword, Sting. It was a huge hit.

Ada with her new kitchen and felt pizza set. Both kids love playing pizzeria for Aaron and I. They named their restaurant Luigi's.

Seth might have to watch his back here in Seattle as he proudly displays his Kaepernick figurine.

We got Ada a diaper bag with baby doll bottles and diapers, etc. She can't wait for our baby to be born, so she's doing some practicing.

More love.

I love the kids' excitement when you're about to open a gift from them.

Ada loves music and always wants to join in on the action. She loves her new guitar and now writes pages of music notes and pretends she's written songs.

A new bat is always a safe bet with Seth. He can't wait for the season to begin.

My brother's family got this tea set for Ada. She declared it her favorite gift. Aaron said to me "That'll teach you to try to compete with the Disney princesses."

The gift of new life.

The kind of mess that you don't mind cleaning up. We had a blast.

Lincoln Park on Christmas Day

We were just as surprised as the rest of the city that Christmas day was beautiful outside. We took advantage and went down to the water to watch the sunset.

The view never,

never gets old.

O Christmas Cookie

Our yearly tradition of Christmas cookie decorating. Silly girl.

   

 Seth goes for quantity.

   

 Ada likes to spend time on each one.

   

 These are obviously Aaron's.

O Christmas Tree

The official beginning of the Christmas season

Halloweeny

The kids wanted to be Star Wars characters for Halloween. We have a hard time letting them dress up in costumes that we see all the time, or that are hard to elaborate on. The classic Luke Skywalker with a tunic and leggings and Princess Leia in the white dress were too simple to satisfy my yearly costuming appetite--the appetite to drive myself crazy with a project. Seth decided to be the X-wing fighter Luke Skywalker.

The helmet was really fun to create. I thrifted a $4 ski helmet, glued tupperware lids and foam insulation onto it, and spray painted it. 

Aaron painted the details on it. I usually hand over the non-sewing aspects of our costumes to him. He really didn't have time to get involved, but man I love doing projects like this with him. He made the gray chest console too--from tupperware and erasers.

Ada warmed up to the idea of being a queen instead of a princess because Queen Amidala has so many cool outfits. (Princess Leia's coolest one is that gold bikini, but a 4 year old dressed in that sounds creepy). Amidala's most recognizable costume is this one:

The headdress looked too limiting for Ada to be able to move and play, so I went with the Parade Celebration Costume from Episode I. 

Ada loves how fancy it is. 

Unfortunately, there aren't as many Star Wars nerds out as I thought, and our costumes were off the beaten path enough that most people thought the kids were a spaceman and a geisha. 

Oh well. The cape with hundreds of petals was tedious, but the parasol collar (made with bicycle spokes) and styling the wig (with dish scrubbers to hold the shape we needed) were tricky and kind of fun. We had a fun Halloween and found the kind of neighborhood I'd always dreamed of trick-or-treating in as a kid--tons of decorations and full size candy bar giveaways. It was great.  

Soccer

Seth is obsessed with sports. He was missing baseball and decided to give soccer a try. 

Despite the often rainy days and muddy fields, he loved it.

 He got to play with some close friends.

Now that soccer's over, he keeps saying, "What sport can I play now Dad?"

Crafting for Halloween

Transformation of a little girl's helmet,

into 

 a

 rebellion x-wing starpilot's helmet.

Starting over one last time

After much deliberation, we decided to do it one more time. So Lindsay got knocked up (somehow), and there's no looking back. We're pretty excited. 

Lindsay survived her first trimester with copious amounts of ondanstetron and she's been feeling great this second semester. The kids were really excited to find out the sex of the baby, so we went down to the hospital as a family to take a peek. Seth was of course rooting for a boy, and Ada a girl. 

They had fun playing with the $150K machine. 

Careful! 

Seth was genuinely trying to figure out the anatomy.

And he was pretty excited to see "the ballsack" as he put it. Yup, it's a boy.

Due in late Feb/early March. We're pleased as punch. Mostly because we haven't had to figure out where to put the little guy and how he's gonna fit in the car and such just yet.