A Sunday afternoon in DC

What's cold, windy, and full of Chinese people?

A CHINESE NEW YEAR'S PARADE!!!!!

Sunday, Kelly, Armin, and Jack went to DC for the parade in Chinatown. We also went up with our neighbor Kellie (her husband Fred was out on business) and her two kids, Haley and Noah (Jack and "No-No" are daycare buddies).

As the first line tells ya, it was cold and windy. Kids were bundled, adults weren't. But the kids enjoyed it...they liked the banging drums and animals everywhere.

In case you wondered, it's the Year of the Rat.

This was one of the "teams" that was a dragon. It's the big bundle of yellow on the ground

You can barely see anything, but that's a bundled Jack on the right, Noah is front left, and the blue thing is Haley. Kelly is checking out the Po-po in the background.

That's the "other" Kellie. Armin is just happy to be there.

Jack says, "Yay Taiwan! I consider you an independent nation regardless of what the Communist heathens say!"

This is a Chinese New Year's Parade...or a really bad acid trip.

He wants to be a cowboy...

And you can be his cowgirl...

Seems Jack's Grammy decided to keep a very old pair of cowboy boots that Jack's dad used to wear as a kid. It's bad enough that Jack has shoephilia...leave ANY pair of shoes on the floor, and he'll try them on.

It wouldn't be as bad if he'd at least put pants on.

Enjoying this, Jack?

Which is more fun...no pants or the boots?

Well, after 30 minutes, that's one! At least it's on the correct foot!!!

Be careful what you ask for...

Not that Jack is necessarily behind in development, it's just that his parents haven't really started doing the "Where is your ___?" routine until recently.

He knows the ear and nose. Emphasis on nose.

Both Mommy and Daddy ask him this morning, "Where's your nose?"

He proceeds to pick it. Oh, well...

Holiday Party!

So, it's that time of year...holiday pageants at daycare! I'm sorry to say, we don't have any pictures of Jack's group...our camera arrived late. We have some on Armin's cellphone, but he was standing about 30 feet away, so you really don't see anything.

It was comprised of about 20 1-2 year olds...guided in by their teacher, who all became petrified/distracted because 1500 adults with cameras were staring at them. Jack was cute...he walked in with a Santa hat on (that lasted for 20 seconds).

Here's the aftermath, when all the kids and parents got together in their room.

Jack sits with Mommy while she reads.

This Christmas should be good...he's getting into opening things.

Oh, Boy!!!! Jack's secret Santa gave him little trucks!

This is Jack with Ellie (she didn't turn around). She greets him every morning with "JACK!"

This was a few seconds before Jack started picking up dolls.
His father promised to buy him a BB gun and drumset if he left the dolls alone.

Wishing everyone a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!!!!! ----A,K, and J.

Prepping for the Christmas Photo

Last weekend Grandad Jim and Grandma Jean (known as Grandpa and Mimi) got a chance to visit--if you didn't know, they're living in Dallas now, having left Leesburg (about 2 hours from us). The weather was pretty good...sunny, mid-40's, but breezy.

We knew it was the best day we'd have for Jack's Christmas photo. So we went down to St. Mary's City (first landing in Maryland) and let him run around.





Grandpa enjoyed walking Jack around the field.


















Once we showed him how, Jack enjoyed kicking leaves around. That's St. Mary's River in the background.

















Ooooh....he found a rock! Even better...TWO!

A freshly shorn Jack

If you saw the last post regarding Urbanna and Jack's hair, well...we finally decided to do something about it.

JACK GOT HIS FIRST HAIRCUT. We've added a few photos from before the haircut; so that you can understand how big a deal this haircut business was.

Here he is, under Mommy's awesome guidance...she asked for a bit off the top and got more than that.

We thought that because his hair was rather fine, it'd look really thin once cut. Turns out that only the ends are fine. Now he looks like a little boy.

Jack's hairstylist, Tammy, did a great job...here she is with the first offending piece, and here's Mommy and Jack with the final result. He really did well!

Urbanna Oyster festival.

Okay, I'm going to start off-topic. This kid needs a haircut. It doesn't look TOO bad, probably because it's blonde, but it's time to trim the mop. It seriously looks like a comb-over at certain points. The best is when the back gets all curly while the front looks okay. It's almost as if he has a mullet (aka The Kentucky Waterfall).

Anyway, back to the oyster festival. Last weekend we traveled to Urbanna, VA for their oyster festival. By festival I mean parade, really greasy (but good) food, and...well, that's really it.

We went with Kelly's friends from Norfolk Mike and Amy Cutter. Her family has a house in Kilmarnock, about 30 minutes from Urbanna.

Here's Jack watching the parade. Lots of Shriners, old cars, and a gigantic papier-mache oyster. We put him in the fisherman's sweater so he'd feel "fishy."

With this hair (see comments above), I'd wear a hat, too.

This is our lame attempt at a family photo. I thought it was cute.

Okay, this one isn't Urbanna...Jack eating at home. He's really pleased with himself for some reason, so he's relaxing with his hands behind his head.