Bringing the outdoors inside

The best way to play in the snow -- shirtless and indoors, of course! Julian had a great time INDOORS shoveling the snow (in his dish pan!), building snowmen (well, the kind that pop out of ice cube trays, anyways), and sprinking salt around (watching the snow melt, in the pan again). Mom loved the fact that Julian could play comfortably while she sipped on hot chocolate in her plush booties and PJs. Julian was given spray bottles with red and blue water to "paint" the snow patriotic colors. Oh, boy, did he enjoy himself, and get carried away "painting" the kitchen walls too! All was easily cleaned up with a quick towel wipe down.

A little taste testing took place too!

Choo! Choo!

The engineer testing the tunnel!

Julian's fascination with trains has continued. (But don't worry, he is still quite the toolman when something appears broken and needs "fixing".) Yesterday, we brought home more than a dozen books that are all train related - Barney's Book of Trains, Train Song, Thomas' ABC Book, and more! The librarian was tickled with Julian's newest craze and kindly photocopied her list of train books, videos and music for us. Did you know that all the Thomas the Engine books are alphabetized by title; which 99/100 times starts with "Thomas"?!

We ventured out to an indoor playground today. Yes, it is literally outdoor play equipment set-up indoors. It's the Rainbow Play Systems showroom. Another mom mentioned it on Monday, so we just had to go check it out. They allow kids 2 and under in for free, and those older for $5. Besides the five jungle gym sets (complete with slides, swings, rock climbing walls, chalkboards, silly distorting mirrors and such), they have a basketball hoop, party room and very clean bathroom facilities. Julian had a ball! It was fun to watch him zip down the slides with a punk rock hair style due to all the static electricity built up. He played hard, but was predictably ready to leave at 11:15am when he started to sign that he was hungry and thirsty. He started his nap on the car ride home!

Earlier this morning we worked on an Epiphany-related craft project. As you can see, Julian thoroughly enjoyed sprinkling glitter on the banner. He even tried to lick some that was stuck to his finger - hope I don't see any traces of that during diaper changing time!

It's good to be back home

Happy New Year! Julian is going to take the year off from writing his own blog so that he can concentrate on his verbal communication skills, motor coordination and social graces. So, M & D (that's Julian's Mommy and Daddy) will take over posting pictures and sharing stories of our family life for your reading enjoyment. (Maybe this way Julian won't be upset later in life that Mommy hastily titled this blog spot "Sturmette" a year ago. The oddity probably bothers her more than him anyways.)

Well, Julian seemed incredibly happy to be back home -- he crawled into his blue tent among his familiar toys and waved "bye, bye" to Mommy when she suggested going back out to the grocery store together. He also is his father's son -- back in comfortable surroundings he soon had a BM. After Mass this morning, Julian quickly fell asleep as pictured below:

That's one exhausted toddler!

We arrived home to lots of snow but thankfully a neighbor had plowed our hilly driveway for us! It's been too cold to enjoy sledding down our front lawn or making snow angels -- perhaps we'll brave the elements tomorrow.

Trains were a reoccurring theme this holiday. Here are some recent photos capturing just a few of those special moments - all aboard!Enjoying the model train at Grandpa's house!

Braving the elements at the Museum of Transportation!"Climbing aboard the train" - new sand/water play station!

Intense train play with friend, Jack Kelly!

Toot, toot for now....

Santa Claus is coming to town

Joining in the Christmas celebration at the library was lots of fun. I got to decorate cookies with icing and SPRINKLES!!! We made ornaments that matched my Santa Claus outfit. Then, the big man himself came by to visit us. I really didn't want to go up near him, but I sat quietly on M's lap and watched with total curiousity as other kids were placed on Santa's knee. Some burst into tears; some clung to their moms; and then others shared everything on their Christmas wish list and had to be pulled away from Santa.

Oh, D's Alumni magazine really caught my eye today. It has a picture of a hammer, gear and chain on the front cover. I immediately ran over to collect my toy hammer and red gear set to show M the association. Yep, cool stuff with lots of possibilities!! I insisted on bringing my toy tricycle and lawn mower inside, so right now I'm in the kitchen with my tools playing mechanic! Love to all!!!

No more Christmas music

No more Christmas music...just teasing! (wink, wink) I was happily singing along with M and the radio today, until I found these cotton balls.

The fluffy white "stuff" is slowly accumulating outside. I'm really interested in going outside to play in it, but M says it is just a bit too wet right now. So, I guess I'll just have to keep humoring M and glue some more white cotton balls on blue paper inside.

We went to a music program led by Julie K; an upcoming children's musician. She was very engaging, and had a beautiful voice so it was easy for me to pay really close attention. I had so much fun that the hour just flew by. We clapped, jumped around, played instruments and sang lots! I made a couple of the other moms laugh by my enthusiastic butterfly spins, and social friendliness.

Busy, busy builder!

D received a package from FedEx today. Yep, he contributed to the economy by shopping online on Cyber Monday (from home, after work I'd like to note). Anyway, I could care less what's inside the boxes. Here's me in action. Boy, was I working up a sweat! Hope those items are packaged well!

Playing in Peoria's Zoo

What a beautiful, sunny day for the 1st of December! Mark my word, I'll be wearing my snow pants by week's end. Yep, snow's in the forecast. I can't wait. However, I'm trying to soak up all the sun rays that I can until then - I played in the back yard, at the park, and at the Zoo today. M was able to use the camera for just a moment to capture this picture of me. Otherwise, I've been the "unofficial" Jr. Zoo photographer today. We have lots of pictures of fences, railings, posts, feet, and grass in the photo album now! (Those were supposed to be giraffes, rhinos, emus, camels and lions.)

It's good to be home, but I sure had fun while in St. Louis with family and friends! Thanks again to all by "baby"sitters. My mind has been so active ever since....it was a little hard to sit still for the story book at the library; I wanted to start right in on the craft project and kept walking stickers over to the librarian to get her to hurry along the story. Whoops!