Snow Day

Big storm last night brought this gorgeous snow. Beautiful to wake up to, and Noelani and Gabriel played in the backyard for almost an hour this morning. Quote of the day: "This is fun. I'm having fun playing in the snow. I didn't think it would be this much fun." - G

View from the driveway (the tree is our Japanese maple)

The backyard in the early light.

Another view in the backyard.

Don't eat the berries.

Our house.

N and G digging a fort.

Birthday Party

First things first, need to clean the house for the party.

First priority when Grandma and Grandpa arrive: show Grandma how to play a video on internet TV using Netflix. Done.

Second priority, do the puzzle!

Then, of course, there were some presents. [Mary's aside: this is classic monopoly, which is awesome, but there are still some differences. for example, they changed the shape of the property cards to be the same shape as a regular card -- reduces the cost of manufacturing, I'm guessing, but it is really disturbing]

The whole Scotton clan together in our new house.

The whole Scotton clan together at the table...if I tell you this was the best photo I had, would you believe me?

OK, thanks to Noelani, there are some other good photos...

Mom and Dad

Patti and Ernie

Even a photo of me!

There was some wrestling. It seems this is something boys do (who knew?!).

Grandma and her boys.

The boys playing a new game together. Ernie made up new rules to make it go faster. We like Ernie's rules.

But let's not forget the birthday cake, or in this case, mouse. Overheard at dinner: "If you don't eat your vegetables, you can't eat your mouse."

Silly Grandpa, you can't light the candle with your car door opener!

Or maybe you can! Happy Birthday, little g. :-)

And Then I Was Four

"I don't feel any bigger." - G

"Stop talking about my birthday! It's not my birthday anymore." - G, Jan 7, 2011

On his actual birthday, here's what we did...

Play-doh was the first gift of the day. Reminded us of Cottage and of Renata. Missing on all of G's little buddies.

"Why do you keeping talking about Justin Bieber?"

(fyi- this is Justin Bieber)

"We went to the ball pit place!" (he's the one on the right)

"Look, it's sponge bob!" (G took this photo)

There was also a basketball. (G directed me in the taking off this photo, we took a dozen photos to get the "swoosh" of the ball in the net just right...)

"Eeeeeee! You can't catch me, Mama, I'm invisible!"

Mommy spotting G as he climbed to the top of the wall.

He also made a few moves without help. ("backstep/mantle combo...nice." - Susan)

We also played with his new nerf football ("it's a football, you can only use your feet" - G ... we have some sports training to do). Then we visited Grandma and Grandpa ("are you up for a visit today" G asked Grandma), read a Bernstein Bear book, and played "the fishy game" on the computer ("my favorite game!"). Back home we had calzone (um, how is calzone NOT in the spell-checker dictionary?) with candles on it for dinner, and did I mention we had ice cream for breakfast? After dinner he started his first model-building experience, putting together a Bloco troll. He really liked it! Photos of the finished troll are coming soon...