Cook Family: Catch Up!

Our computer had some issues a couple weeks ago, so my brother Les had it and fixed it for us, and we just got it back today. I've got a lot of catching up to do....so here we go!

First, we celebrated Christmas at my grandparents' house on the 15th. The kids had lots of fun opening their presents, and Judson and Nolan had a blast being around each other again. The kids all got some neat presents...but were extremely tired by the time we headed back to Matt's parents' house for the night. Though Nolan decided he was going to spend the night with Judson....so he left a little later with them. At about 10:45 that night, Nolan had not returned to Mom-o and Pops' house, so I decided to go on to bed....figuring that he may actually be spending the night for real

this time. Well, at about 11:30, Nolan and Kim were knocking on the door....guess he's just not ready for an overnight'er with Judson yet. Jason and Kim said that Nolan and Judson were both in the bed, in their pajamas, ready for some sleep. Jason had gone downstairs to get the boys something to drink, but when he started back up the stairs, both were crying. Nolan told Jason "this just isn't going to work," and Judson was in hysterics because he thought Nolan didn't like him since he didn't want to spend the night!

Next, we celebrated Natalie's birthday on the 20th (her actual birthday)....she and Nathan are having a "party" this Saturday, but we wanted Natalie to know that this was her actual birthday. We let her open her present from us and from Aunt Pam, and we had some cupcakes to celebrate.

I wasn't sure what to get her, but she really enjoyed the tea party toy that Nolan and I picked out for her. I let Nolan and Natalie pour some water into the teapot and serve each other drinks.

On the 23rd, Steve and Teresa came up to celebrate Christmas with us. The kids were all very excited to see Mom-o and Pops again so soon. We hadn't planned on opening presents right away, but the kids just couldn't wait. The first package that Nolan opened was an outfit and a pair of shoes....he kind of moped around and pouted a little....guess he thought this was all he was going to get. But then, Mom-o pointed out some other presents for him to open which contained toys, and this really brightened his mood. Natalie saw one of Nolan's toys, and decided that she really

wanted it. She tried and tried and tried to get it away from Nolan and threw a tremendous fit...somewhere in all the action, she scraped her face right under her eye. Once we found a Dora phone that was Natalie's present, she calmed down.

Finally, we had Christmas at our house! Christmas morning, Nathan decided to wake up around 6:30 am. I fed him a bottle, then tried to sleep with him on the couch. We were both almost asleep when we heard Natalie awake in her crib. Matt went ahead and woke up and brought Nolan and Natalie downstairs to see what Santa had brought. They were both excited to see toys under the tree. Nolan got a bike, a pirate dress up kit, a nerf ball gun, and a bouncy ball. Natalie got a Dora kitchen, some kitchen supplies, a remote controlled car, and a bouncy ball. Nathan got a push/ride-on toy and a cement mixer toy. We then let the kids open the presents from us. Nolan was more thrilled with his toy from us than with any of the other Santa toys....we got him a toy washing machine that Nolan had spotted at Wal-Mart a week before. I'm surprised we haven't had to replace the batteries yet, cause it's the only thing he wants to play with! Natalie was content playing with all the toys, and Nathan didn't care what was going on as long he could get his hands on a candy cane!