We’ve had snow three times already and winter has barely begun. If that trend continues we’re going to have a very excited two year old on our hands. Nathan loved playing in the snow (as long as his mittens adequately covered this wrists…the one time the snow got in there, he was done.)

The first snow was relatively light, but there was still enough sticking to build a family of little snowmen. And Nathan had a lot of fun stepping on them all that night.

The next snow was much heavier. Gary measured 18 inches of snow by the end of it.

Nathan had fun “helping” Gary shovel

And Fen had a blast.

Here’s Nathan and Gary making Challah together. Nathan really likes helping in the kitchen, which mostly means helping Gary in the kitchen. His jobs usually consist of salting the food or mixing things up.

Nathan has become a big fan of pools this summer. We don’t get to them too often, but he loves when we do.

A few weeks ago we went to a party with Gary’s family and Nathan spent most of the party in the pool. He didn’t want to get out and thankfully Gary was a good sport and played with him the whole time.

Baby pools don’t seem to have quite the same draw. He gets excited about getting in, but then loses interest pretty quickly.

(Fenny is TOTALLY eyeing that cheese cracker in Nathan’s hand)

Nathan and Rintoo (AKA Daddy) had a long conversation while we were at the beach. Nathan howled with laughter the entire time, and it was hilarious to watch.

Now, Nathan will hand Rintoo to Gary and say “Talk to me Rintoo.” It’s actually become a great way to get Nathan to cooperate more with getting dressed or brushing his teeth. Because of this, Rintoo is often seen wearing a diaper, and even had on one of Nathan’s t-shirts for awhile. I guess it’s kind of his equivalent of having a doll and it’s cute to see him pretending to talk to him or share things with him.

My Mom got remarried a couple weeks ago in a beautiful wedding in Ithaca, and Nathan got to be the ring bearer. We weren’t sure how he’d do because he didn’t want to sit still at the rehearsal, but he managed to have perfect timing and come back to me under the chuppah just when he needed to take the pillow to Mom and Bob. He got to wear a tux, which was completely adorable even though it was a size or two too big.

We got some nice family pictures after the ceremony. It was drizzling a little, but the setting was so nice it didn’t matter.

There was some other nice moments too.

Gary and Nathan picking flowers during the rehearsal dinner.

My Mom and I putting her veil on.

The Itkoff Family (It was so nice to see my aunts!)

Nathan loved watching the band playing at the reception; he kept wanting to see the “instruments”. And he had a blast dancing and stuffing his face with chocolate covered strawberries. He was completely exhausted by the end of the weekend, but thankfully that meant he took a pretty long nap on the way home!

Congratulations Grandma & Grandpa Bob!

*Credit goes to John Sullivan for the lovely pictures*

Don’t you just want to eat him up!? (Nathan that is.)

Ok, so this is a little late, but Mother’s Day weekend we took a family trip to the Aquarium in downtown Baltimore. We made the same trip last year but Nathan enjoyed it so much more this time around, and we had a gorgeous day.

Nathan loved looking over the side of these walls that run all the way through the aquarium. On the other side is a big open tank so you can look down at the rays, sharks and fish.

I just love his little head poking out here, trying to see over the side.

The best tanks were the ones that went ceiling to floor where there were big fish or turtles to watch (I think it was an amazon rainforest exhibit?)
This is not one of them, but he liked the tropical fish too…he heard some kids calling the fish Nemo and Dori, and then whenever we saw an orange clown fish or bright blue fish, he’d call them that too (I think Nemo is the only movie he’s watched to date, so he knew the characters.)

These are always one of my favorite animals to see.

Last we headed to the dolphin show. Nathan was intermittently amazed and fidgety…as were we, since the show is light on dolphin action and heavy on slideshows and environmental messages. But still fun of course!

The afternoon ended with lunch at Hard Rock Cafe. It started out well, but ended with Nathan throwing up into his bowl of mac&cheese, probably due to the huge amount of milk he sucked down in a really short amount of time. Luckily the mess wasn’t bad and he was fine afterward. I felt worse for the other diners than I did for him and us

More photos in the May 2009 album.

We took our second plane trip with Nathan this past weekend, and it was another trip to Dallas to visit my Grandma and other family there. Nathan was very excited when he saw all the airplanes at the airport and loved watching out the window once we were on the plane. I wasn’t sure if he’d get that he was actually on an airplane, but as we were walking down the hallway to board the plane he got more and more excited and kept pointing to the door and telling me “airplane!”

On the way to Dallas Nathan didn’t fall asleep until 15 seconds before we touched the ground. Literally. He was happy to be in his carseat for the first 90 minutes or so, and then understandably got fidigty, so we brought out the DVD player and just about everything else we’d brought with us, and I walked him up and down the plane a few times.

Having a snack before we got on the plane.

Sleepy, but not sleeping.

Since Great Grandma is a handful to say and Nathan already has a Grandma, I started calling my Grandma, GiGi. Nathan picked up on it fast and was calling for GiGi during the entire weekend. I’d tell him we were going to find GiGi and he’d run to where ever she was yelling “GiGi! GiGi!”. It was very cute, and so sweet to see how much he loved her right away. He even called for her a few times after we got home, which was a little sad since he couldn’t see her.

Every morning we took a family walk to Whole Foods for breakfast and coffee. It was a nice way to start the day.

Saturday we went to the Dallas World Aquarium with Uncle Allen. We loved this aquarium. You enter in at the top and spiral down through a rainforest that’s filled with fish and other animals. There are also other great areas with fish, sharks and land animals.

Saturday evening we visited my Aunt Helen and Uncle Arthur and then went out to dinner. Nathan was not entirely thrilled to be at a restaurant, so we took turns walking him around outside until food came. Gary found a dog statue that Nathan had fun with and it kept him entertained.

Sunday morning was low key at home. Since we didn’t bring lots of toys with us, we had to keep Nathan busy and ended up spending time outside playing in the leaves. The weather was gorgeous most of the weekend.

Sunday afternoon my Grandmother had friends and family over to see Nathan. I’m so glad she does this when we visit because its really nice to see everyone and for Nathan to spend time with family he doesn’t see much. Once everyone left Uncle Allen broke out his guitar and played a little for us. Nathan was fascinated with the guitar and loved the music.

Nathan started trying to copy how we look when we take pictures. Here he is pretending to use GiGi’s camera.

GiGi & Nathan (and me).

Monday morning it was time to pack up and go. By this time Nathan was just bursting with energy and didn’t want to listen to anyone. I think it was a combination of wanting to express his opinion and independence (which he’s been wanting to do a lot lately) and having been in a new place and different timezone with a new schedule and us constantly keeping after him to make sure he didn’t get into anything he wasn’t supposed to. We were lucky that he slept well throughout the trip (minus the 5am wake up the first morning), and on the plane ride home he fell asleep before we even took off, and slept about half the trip.

As usual, I went way overboard on pictures, but they’re all here.

Last weekend we spent a VERY hot, but fun, day at the zoo. Maybe it was because of the heat, but we didn’t have to deal with any crowds, which was really nice. Nathan really like looking at most of the animals and getting to run around. I think his favorites were his first peak at the zebra, the fish tank in the monkey house that was filled with tons of little fish and turtles, and the goat petting zoo. He could have stayed in that petting zoo all day going from goat to goat to goat, trying to feed them hay and dirt. He didn’t seem to have any fear, and luckily they were all pretty friendly (they were probably too exhausted from the heat to try running away.)

Pointing to the Zebras.

Showing me what a Monkey does.

Picking up dirt to try to feed the goat.

Talking to the goat.

Someone was nice enough to offer to take our picture.

More photos from our day here.

Saturday was beautiful, so we spent some time in the backyard.

Nathan loved carrying the beach ball around, then throwing it and chasing after it.

He seems to really like the new slide/climber.

A quick rest.