Independence at its finest

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Bammmmm!

Eric may not be the famous Emeril Lagasse yet, but let me tell you, he is on his way. Eric loves kitchens, preferably the real deal. But when he finds a kitchen his size, he goes to town. Opening and closing the microwave with food inside, then putting it in the oven, and turning the burners on and off. It definitely could keep him entertained for hours. Most likely, that will be the first thing we buy him when we get a new house with a bit more room.

And to kick it up a notch...maybe an Easy Bake oven (do they even make those any more?!)

Baby Fred

No, no...we didn't have Baby #2 early and we didn't decide to name him/her Fred. Baby Fred is Eric's second best friend (after his monkey that he sleeps with). We gave him the baby for Christmas to hopefully start to expose him to babies in preparation for the real thing.

Baby Fred helps us out alot. He shows Eric how yummy his veggies are, he sits on Eric's potty (even though he has been pushed through the hole a few times!). Eric even puts him down for a nap and to bed everyday with a kiss and a belly rub. Unlike Monkey, he is allowed out of Eric's room and even on car trips with us to the grocery store.

Grandma Lohse caught a great photo of Eric and Fred that I just had to share. It may be one of my favorite pictures to date.

Now if Baby Fred could only help cook dinner and take Pokey on walks...

In Daddy's shoes....

And Doug complains that I leave alot of shoes around the house!

Let it snow!

When I moved to New England, I learned a very important lesson. You want it to be warm enough to snow. I guess I never realized that it could be too cold for even the snow to show its face.

Lucky for us (and most of the midwest) we are expecting sub-zero temps starting on Thursday. Looks like we will be hiding out indoors until the snow returns.

Here are some pictures from our latest snow.

Dena turns 30!

Doug's parents and Aunt Arlene flew in on Thursday night from Wisconsin and we all snuck up to Maine on Saturday to surprise Dena for her dirty 30th party. It was a blast and Dena swears she didn't have a clue. You be the judge..take a look at the photos below.

(In case you were wondering, we are the ones dressed in paper bags...you know we can't do anything normal, it just isn't any fun!)

Then with a little prompting from the iPod, Dena and Eric decided to turn the party into a dance party. Eric was hilarious...he just ran to the middle of the circle and started showing everyone his moves! We have a bad feeling that Eric is going to be the president of his fraternity some day...we are very, very afraid.

The dogs had a great time too, as they were in charge of guarding the food table. Knowing them and seeing their pleading, big brown eyes, I am sure they had their share of goodies that night.

We rounded out the night with cake and ice cream...a family favorite.

Happy 30th Dena and great job Matty with the weekend full of surprises.

Christmas 2008

It feels like we have been traveling FOREVER! And looking back, it was 3 weeks for Eric and I on the road... Charlotte, the NC Mountains and Maine. It was a blast, but I think we are both happy to be back in our own beds.

And now we have started the Christmas Detox program (thanks to Auntie Meg for the very descriptive term!) The next few weeks will be dedicated to trying to get Eric back into his groove and teach him that Mom and Dad aren't going to feed him cookies & ice cream all the time! (He LOVED his grandparents spoiling him!) I have a feeling that many temper tantrums are in our future.

Below are some of our favorite pictures from Christmas. Enjoy and Happy New Year to everyone!

Hide & Seek!

Decorating the Christmas Tree

Helping Mom wrap presents

Cuddling with Grandma

Grandpa and Eric getting ready for Church

Opening Presents

Grandpa and his toys

Hiking in the woods

Cleaning the horse stalls
(temper tantrum resulted when he had to leave the rake)

Daddy...can I have a steer?