um... december 23rd?!?!

hi! it's luke here this time. we've been having a great december, looking forward to Christmas and enjoying the texas weather - days of 86 mixed in with days of 56!! we haven't posted a lot but we'll try to make up for it sometime in the future. here's what we've been up to...


i still like to chew on anything and everything, including shopping carts (target's are my favorite) and leaves...

you'll notice that i'm in my awkward, chubby, blob phase. ben went through the same thing right at this age, so mom knew it was coming. of course she still thinks i'm the cutest baby ever, but she knows that's just because she's biased. i should grow out of it in a few months, and then i'll regain my status as actually the cutest baby ever... :)

here's ben dumping something into the neighbors' sprinkler drain/bucket thing, who knows what he's up to...

we never tire of pictures of the silly eyes, do we??

i'm finally hanging out on my tummy a bit more! i've been flopping from a sitting position onto my tummy to get something out of my reach - a precursor to crawling, but no official crawling yet...

here's me trying...

and then resting from all that hard work trying!!...

ben on the dinosaur at our favorite italian restaurant, demonstrating the warm winter weather in texas - in a t-shirt!!

but only a few days later in a fleece hat! he looks a little silly. he likes this hat because it has a "chin strap" like a football player helmet...

and here i am sporting a hat too! this one is momma's favorite... and here's ben getting me, like he always does... he always looks a little evil or mischievous when he's getting close to me, but he really loves me. he just has an unusual way of showing physical affection. so when he bonks me on the head, or gives me a sideways evil stare like this one, i know it's his way of showing he loves and cares. and that's okay because that's ben, and i love him so much too...

i may be in my awkward, chubby, blob stage, but how can you not want to eat this face?!?!?

ben, on the other hand, not so edible... (oh teasing, he's cute too - just not right in this moment!)...

and finally, for all of you out there who think momma is really the one who writes these blogs, i have a picture for you. clearly if she was in charge of these, this picture would never hit the 'net. all three boys in our various chairs watching football...

notice the remote in my mouth and my highchair tray being used for daddy's beer, and ben with no pants!! clearly this moment would not be made public if momma was really operating behind the scenes!

gotta go! bye!!!

biggest p.s. ever - merry christmas!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! we're headed to IN tomorrow for a week - yahoo!! we'll have good stuff to report when we get back and will also look forward to celebrating with our matthys family then too - bye!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

december 13th?!?!

yikes-a-roni!! i can't believe it's december 13th already! first of all, let me shout-out a happy late birthday to uncle greg!

and second of all, please forgive us for not updating in a while! we had a good streak going there but definitely broke it and will try to get back into it again. momma is working on christmas cards and christmas presents (among other things, stay tuned) and, while she is still taking pictures of us of course, she's not keeping up with the uploading and editing and all that, so i'm left to post these pretty boring shots of us the other day, just so you guys don't forget what we look like! here's luke trying to eat me a little bit. he has two teeth and more on the way, so he's definitely been sinking into anything he can get his hands on... literally...

he's doing pretty good, growing, teething, eating lots of solid foods, sporting those girly eyes and just hanging out. the kid could use some hair, though, let's be honest...

and i'm still really looking forward to christmas and *snow* and seeing everybody! it has been getting chillier here but we still play outside when we can and i've been having even more fun with luke as he gets older and starts to actually play with me a little bit. we especially love playing peek-a-boo with each other, or i can even really just run circles around him and he'll laugh hysterically for a good five minutes or so until one of us gets bored with that. i look pretty much the same.... could use a hair cut...

the other day was P day for Porcupine, so we made one with a styrofoam ball and toothpicks. very cool. very pokey!

i regret to say that i don't really have much else to say! at least not right this minute... i hope everyone else is enjoying the holiday spirit, and i especially hope i can do a better, more respectable blog post again soon. we've decorated the tree and made paper snowflakes and have worn our fuzzy, fleece hats as many occassions as possible (three?). and now december is already half over (almost) - crazy! better hit up momma to bake some christmas cookies for us, and we'll be all set. more pictures soon, including some of the pumpkin patch that i mentioned before. momma was able to recover ALL of the pictures that were corrupted on the memory card - yes!!! anyway... that's all... bye!!

i'm thankful for...

okay, i almost missed the boat on getting this thanksgiving post done, but i really wanted to share!

to celebrate thanksgiving and focus on what we're thankful for as a family, we each wrote down one thing we were thankful for each day in november. we did this at dinner time, and actually momma did all the writing down. and technically, she spoke on luke's behalf, but i did think of my "thankfuls" (which is what i called them) each night, all on my own. the very first day, mom and dad explained what being thankful is all about and what kind of things we might be thankful for, and then i took it from there.

here are my thankfuls from each day in november leading up to the 25th, in my very own words...

1. school buses

2. daddy's coin (a special coin daddy gave to me that i had played with all day)

3. beamee

4. nutella, peanut butter, condiments

5. yummy nests momma made

6. trip to pumpkin patch, especially ice cream there

7. ice cream (we went to baskin robbins as a family)

8. new car (toy version)

9. the little jelly beans that we got

10. mint chocolate chip ice cream

11. black crayon

12. grampee

13. getting to make beer bread (which i did in my pretend play, not even in real life that day!)

14. me being good in church (this was also daddy's thankful that day!)

15. eating this soup and grapes and bread - all of those things

16. looking at the moon and looking for ozzie (the neighbor's dog - i like to see him outside playing in their yard)

17. me having a turnover... and the mustard and honey... and you (momma) putting some salad in my bowl... and doing the airplane at the el salido park

18. for making T's (i wrote a bunch of letter T's all on my own this day)

19. for you (momma) making those cookies

20. those sweet potatoes and steak

21. playing on the playground at church in the playroom... and having a cookie

22. these steak sandwiches... pushing that black thing over the yellow ones (in the backyard)

23. that chocolate that i had... and zebra... and monkey... (two animals we learned about that week) and daddy painting (the back deck)

24. momma playing with me while i was in the bathtub

25. maggie dog playing with me

i would write down luke's too, but they pretty much boiled down to: momma holding me, daddy holding me, ben making me laugh, pacifier.

if i didn't specifically mention your name in my thankfuls, please know that i am still very thankful for you, of course. beamee and grampee have just really been on my mind a lot lately because momma tipped me off that we're riding on an airplane to their house for Christmas, and so i pretty much think about that and look forward to that every single day now. we'll be starting our advent calendar tomorrow so hopefully that will help me understand that we still have a little ways to go before Christmas, so i can't exactly start packing my bags yet. but it will be here soon!!!

Thanksgiving was great because of all the good food and all the nice and fun relatives i got to see (on mimsie's side and grandpa's side - yahoo!) and Christmas will be great too. we have our tree up already with lots of sparkling lights, which i love. we will be making ornaments this week, so i will report back soon on how that goes and other things that we have been up to.

hope your Thanksgiving was good. and a special (although late on here) happy birthday message to both Gabrielle and Lauren!! see you soon!!!!!!!!

and oh man the biggest P.S. ever - check out our walls in the picture above - that is our kitchen!!! without the flowered wallpaper!!! that is definitely what momma is thankful for. :)