Christmas North, Part III
Grampa Dave smiles while comforting the little one! See this image larger.
She’s got the whole world in her hands! See this image larger.
Another new book for Ian! See this image larger.
A cool activity cube! Nina received many more presents than this, but she wasn’t big on opening because she was so sick. See this image larger.
Little Einstein’s cup! See this image larger.
Another nice shot from Grampa Dave shows some of the casualties of Christmas morning… Private Christmas Wrap, we hardly knew ye! Captain Orange Astronaut, that one small step for man must have been more like a giant leap! See this image larger.
Mommy fawns over an awesome little denim coat for Nina! That’s going to look so cute! See this image larger.
Space buggy in the lower area! 
*Check this out, Gramma!* 
Astronaut potty located conveniently under the bed! 
*Anybody know the name of a good lawyer?* 
*Ranyruddy row ruh rame rof a rood rawrer?* 
Almost three-hundred sixty-five days of experience proves that this is one awesome place to snuggle in for a nap. 
It was time to open presents, and Ian was excited and happy to tear into things! 
Some cool band-aids! 
A cool mini snow globe that glowed many different colors! It even said “I-A-N” on it! He ran that puppy out of batteries in one day! 
Grandma Marcia shows Ian a big new book! 
Bristle Blox were a big hit, and Ian began engineering some fun stuff right out of the package! 
I may have mentioned Nina wasn’t feeling well, poor little girl! *Ungh, I said ‘no pictures,’ Daddy.* 
December 16th, Ian’s Christmas party. He got “Where the Wild Things Are” and that’s about all there is to tell about that. 
Our little hobo! 
December 17th, time for another Nina fashion show! 
Cute little ensemble.
Nina stands with a little help from a friend! 
Pull out the zooey and get a frown, it’s just like magic! 
That’s better… I guess?! 
Little bit of head tilt going on here… 
Admiring the Christmas tree. 
Bye everybody! 
December 12th, a quick trip to Meijer produces this gem with a little photoshop magic…
Hugs. 
Three of us making the “ah-buh-buh-buh-buh” noise. 
December 13th, Nina knows that someday she gets to challenge Ian for position on the couch… for now she mostly gets Ian’s foot, although we’re trying to correct this. 
Ian using his excellent imagination… take a parking ramp and an airplane and you’ve got a pretty awesome space shuttle! 
December 15th, we’re eating at Panera and Nina has made some friends with the table behind her. 
Where’d they go? 
*Say, I’d like some of that yogurt.* 
This may look like a threat, but it never left his hand, trust me. 
Still December 11th, here’s some cute shots of Nina! 
…and Ian. 
*yawn!* 
*This television program is agreeable to my young and perky sensibilities.* 
*derp.* 
Daddy the lounge pillow. (She also managed to fill her diaper while sitting like this, almost as if she were using me as support.) 
*ruh?* 
She gets around very well these days. 
Mommy and Ian put the finishing touches on the tree… it’s an “actibity.” 
Either this takes enough focus to crease Ian’s brow, or he doesn’t like being touched by the needles, not sure which. 
December 8th, and now Nina’s got Nina’s hat on. 
I think it might be a bit big. 
This may appear to be Christmas, (and in fact I accidentally titled it as such…) but it is not. It is December 10th, and the kids are being shown a lit Christmas tree. Nina missed out on the lighting of the tree ceremony previously. This was a beautiful moment… Nina is looking up at her brother in wonder, and Ian is pointing at the tree. Wish I had a good picture instead of this still from a video. 
December 11th, watching the tube, and I assure you that the Backyardigans was nowhere near as suspenseful as it appears to be in this image. 
There may or may not have been some slight brotherly/sisterly hitting going on here. 
Hitting confirmed. 
Somehow we ended up with a half an orchard’s worth of apples in our garage, and the critters had started smelling them, so I invited Ian for a special father/son moment wherein we threw the apples down our hill. 
In this shot and the one above it, you can see the apple as a red dot well above Ian’s head. He’s still learning to throw a good pitch. 
And we kicked a couple too. 
Mommy took pictures, thank you Mommy! 
I woke up with something on my face that I did not understand. Later in the week I called Uncle Chris, and sent him a picture — he told me to call a doctor and get in as soon as I could — it was probably shingles. I did, and Chris was absolutely spot-on. It is amusing that this is a sort of reanimation of the Chicken Pox virus caused by stress. Amusing because that’s also all it caused was a bunch of stress: I had the kids with me at the doctor, yet he said it was a good idea to stay away from them. One of the two prescriptions was about 200 bucks. And the prospect that I could have given the kids Chicken Pox (Nina in particular) was frightening. So yeah, stress! (I owe Uncle Chris for helping me catch this issue with such expediency! The kids never did catch it from me, thanks to him!) After I got through the meds I was prescribed, my face broke out about the same as when I was a teenager, my scalp started more or less shedding, but is looking better yet still healing as I write this now. Excuse this long caption, I’m trying not to make this about me by dragging it into more entries than it already has appeared. 
Our friends Elena and Scott took the kids for me on one of the days of “Hospital Week” thanks to an urgent email from Mommy. This helped me scrape ahead on my deadlines. Elena baked cookies and here Ian prepares to enjoy one. She has some great pics of the kids, if I remember correctly. I’ll need to get ahold of those. 
Ian makes a fashion statement on December 6th, using Nina’s hat. 
Nina makes her own fashion statement with a Christmas outfit on December 7th. 
If you see Nina with any kind of hat or shoes on in a picture, it means the photographer has a light-speed finger on the camera shutter trigger, believe me. She’ll whip those things off faster than you can say “cheese!” 
Wondering where we were? It was Ian’s (Daycare’s) Christmas program! He was an angel on-stage, which was awesome… because otherwise, not so much. 
That’s Elena holding Nina, we owe her and Scott many thanks for watching the kids. 
Nina’s got her hat on again, but not for long I bet! Where’d those shoes go? Gone! 
Elena’s daughter Rowen goes to the same daycare as Ian, she’s a class older than the one he’s in, I think. 
Yup, he can be a stinker when he wants to be! 
I don’t know who the little blonde haired girl is, but I don’t think Ian does either. That reminds me, last time we were at Playworld, Ian “met his best friend” and didn’t want to leave because of him. He’d never met the kid before, so it was pretty funny. 
There’s my sweet kid! 
Here’s Nina having a great time. Check out those teeth on top! You might need to click the link to the right to see the image larger… 
Consider what he’s been through. Nina’s a trooper, but she’s known nothing but fight since she was born. Ian knew a paradise where he was the center of all attention – and has had to cope with having to share every aspect of his life. He’s been amazing. 
It helps that he has a pretty good sense of humor developing. 
A whirling galaxy of hair on Nina’s noggin. 
Yep, we were just talking about you, cutie! 
Nina gets the patented “George Washington” powdered-wig (or “Flying Nun”) look from an inverted diaper! 
*That was fun, Daddy!* 
Love these kids! 
*Ian… stop trying to scare your sister, please.* 
Ian pointed out that the little red symbol on this sign means “Do Not Enter.” I was so proud of him I made him pause for a photo. He smiled brightly and I said “Not this time… look angry and hold your hand out like ‘STOP!!!'” 
