Merry Christmas!

As expected, Christmas day started at 6:15. But, it was Nick that woke up first. Ben slept in until about 6:30. Then the fun began! I have a video of Ben coming down the steps, but I need to resize it before I can upload it.

Santa brought a big haul to New Orleans

Ben got a Thomas chair thing. When Ben woke up, he found the old school phone upstairs. He used it to call Santa before we went downstairs and the phone had to come with us.

Suuupppeerrr Baby!

The awesome new easel complete with all sorts of coloring materials

A cool new wooden train

Nick's new wooden dump truck

Daddy's Kindle Fire (which he hasn't put down much since opening - and I was afraid he wouldn't like it and want to return it)

This is a SWEET bike helmet - it looks like a hat. You can get fedoras and sun hats and all sorts of cool covers. It's totally awesome

Merry Christmas! From the Wolny's

Christmas Eve

Yesterday we headed downtown to St. Patrick's for Christmas Eve mass. My 50mm camera lens just so happened to come yesterday (thank you Mr. Postman!!) so I took my camera to church in case there were any photo ops - you never know... We sat on the side of the church, so I only got half of the alter, but it was done very pretty. St. Pat's is like 180ish years old and it one of the prettiest churches in New Orleans. Nick was a very good little boy. Ben left a little to be desired, but he did not take a nap yesterday, which was awesome. But he promptly fell asleep in the car before we had even pulled out of the parking spot.  Once we got home, we had dinner and then the boys got to open one present, their Christmas jammies. Ben got Dinosaur Train jammies and Nick got Superman. After putting out cookies and carrots for Santa and his reindeer, it was off to bed so Santa could come!

New Friends

Ben made some new friends on Friday. The neighbor and her grandsons came over to play and decorate cookies with Ben. Morgan is 7 and Baxter is 3, almost 4. The boys played together in May when we came down, too. They all got along very well and had a good time playing grocery store and watching Grandpa's choo choo train under the tree.

A Busy Day on the Mississippi

We took the boys down to the levy yesterday morning to see the river and the big ships. The river was hopp'n with lots of ship and barge traffic. And if you were wondering what happened to all the water that flooded Toledo a few weeks ago - I found it. The MS River is very high, which made me very nervous about Ben falling down the wrong side of the levy. If he went down the side, Adam was going down with him.

Grandma's Butterflies

Grandma now has some pet butterflies. She found the caterpillars in her community butterfly garden and brought them home to see if they would turn into butterflies. She ended up with two swallow tail butterflies. She is going to release them into the butterfly garden. Ben got a kick out of them!

Road Trip!

Wednesday was the big road trip day! We packed up the car (to the gills) and hit the road around 4am for our trip to New Orleans. We rearranged the car a bit so I could sit in the back with the boys. Ben moved into the 3rd row, temporarily. The boys were extremely good on the 17 hour car ride. We pretty much didn't have any crying, whining or fussing. Ben watched movies quite a bit and Nick slept quite a bit, which he needed since he has a cold. Once we got to Grandma's, that's when they had melt downs. But I'll take melt downs at grandma's house over the car any day!

Tent

The boys love their new tent. Ben got a camping play set from Uncle Kevin and Auntie Dre for Christmas. It came with a working lantern, camp stove, skillet and shovel, along with this tent. The boys love playing in it. In and out, in and out. Ben stored all of his toys in it one night. Nick drank a bottle in it. Even daddy got in and checked it out.