The Year of the Water Buffalo

Happy Tet! We plan to celebrate Tet with Alex this week. Unfortunately, there are not a lot of options here in Kansas City to celebrate, but we will do our best! The Plaza, KC's premier shopping district, does have some red lanterns out on the pedestrian bridge.

This week we celebrated fours months with Alex. Wow, where has the time gone? It is hard to imagine our lives before Alex. (Except for the restful nights!) Joëlle's co-workers threw a baby shower for Alex on Thursday. We are very thankful for the many gifts and celebrations for Alex and Alex is especially thankful for cars in any form. He loves to play with cars and is amassing quite the collection.

I like my picnic table.

I love chocolate!

Baths are fun.

Time for bed.

Cars Cars Cars

Joëlle's co-workers meet Alex

Alex loves all the presents!

What Can I Do?

We are settling into the new year. As we mentioned last time, Alex seems to be more comfortable with us and our surroundings which is awesome. We had our three month home study this past week and all went well. The night before Alex slept through the night for the first time. We hope that continues. We were also in for our second round of shots, (only 3 this time). Next Dr.'s visit is next month.

As for language, Alex has been a bit slow to start saying words, but in the last week we have heard quite a few. Part of this is due to the fact that he is picking up two languages at the same time, English and French. He understands both languages well and responds appropriately. We now hear mama, papa, ball, dog, go, please (when asked), bye bye, and cuckoo. He also knows and says most of the animal sounds. He likes to sing and dance too. Since he is starting to babble more, we should have a talker on our hands in no time!

Playing with corn

I like motion!

Toys R Us rocks!

Check out my tower

Daddy, I want this car

The artist

I love my new table!

Alex at rest

Playtime with Dad

Me and my fridge farm

Alex turns 2!

We celebrated New Year's Day, Christmas, Alex's birthday and a Nebraska victory all on January 1st. It was such a party, it took us until now to recover and post some pictures to the blog! We went up to Eric's Mom in Nebraska on New Year's Eve and returned to KC on Sunday. It was nice to see the family with the added bonus of Alex's cousins, who played with him almost non-stop. They had to watch him in shifts because he wore them out! Alex had a good time during his first Christmas, but was a little overwhelmed with the extra attention and decided to take an early nap right after opening presents and an early lunch. He made it back in the afternoon to open birthday presents and eat some chocolate cake. Boy, does he like chocolate! The rest of the weekend, we just stayed at Oma's house and played. We did take a trip out to Eric's brother's farm. Alex still isn't too sure about those cows! We enjoyed experiencing the holidays through the eyes of Alex. It gave us much for which to be thankful.

Alex has given us a nice Christmas present too. He has started to sleep more in his crib. He can now make it most of the night by himself. He also is sleeping a bit later in the morning and his naps are a bit longer too. It appears he is starting to settle in and be more comfortable with us. That's great and we like the extra sleep!

Happy New Year and all the best in 2009!

Alex is modeling his pool shooting technique.

I hope I get cool presents too!

Did you know I can play the organ?

Doesn't Dad look good as a present?

This is the coolest present ever!

Now what am I supposed to do?

All those presents wore me out!

Everywhere the cow says Moo.

Basket race!

John is reading to me.

Kristin gives great piggyback rides.

I love my farm!
Thanks Uncle Gilles!!!

Merry Christmas!

We celebrated our first Christmas as a family on Christmas Eve. Alex is a pro now at opening presents and enjoyed doing it once again. We feel truly blessed this Christmas season to have Alex in our lives. We plan to celebrate again with Eric's family on New Year's Day. It will be a two for one celebration as Alex will also celebrate his second birthday!

Mamy sent some homemade Christmas cookies from France... Yum!

Alex loves to sit at the computer and type away.

Alex opening presents!

Walker and Cynthia came over on Christmas to help us celebrate. They had fun watching Alex in motion. Walker learned how to play hide and seek .... Alex style.

Friday morning we went to the College Basketball Experience at the Sprint Center. It is a neat place with lots of things for kids to do. Alex had a great time practicing his dunks.

Waiting for Christmas

We had a nice snow fall early in the week. Alex enjoyed being out in the snow, but he definitely did not want to get any of that cold stuff on him!




Eric likes to make peppernuts, a small Christmas cookie, and we thought it is never too early to teach Alex how to roll out and cut the dough. Who knows, maybe next year he'll do a whole batch?


Sunday, we had lunch with Alex's friend Theo. The two had a great time together and later we went to Union Station to see the model trains. It was pretty neat. Alex and Theo even got to ride in a train!






Today, Alex tried out a little play-doh and some markers. He had fun tearing the play-doh into tiny pieces. Daddy showed him how to make a ball and then mash it flat. He thought that was hilarious!

Barnyard Dance

Alex loves the story Barnyard Dance by Sandra Boynton. Check out his moves!

Switching Roles

Here are a few pictures of mom's last week at home with Alex.

We had a great time playing at home and at the indoor playgrounds. Alex absolutely loved riding the car and monopolized it for about an hour. The other children had no luck trying to convince him to trade the car for the fire engine, police truck or tricycle. Alex may be smaller in size than the other kids, but he sure knows how to get what he wants.

Since Alex' appetite continues to amaze us, we bought a rice cooker. He loves to check out new kitchen gadgets and wants to know how everything works. Who would have known that a rice cooker is much more fun than actual toys???




With the cold weather sticking around for a while, we went to another indoor playground at the mall where Alex met with his friend Marc. Alex had a great time there too going up and down the slides and chasing after girls!

Playing with his Bugs floor puzzle

Alex with his house shoes "on"

Alex' favorite thing to do is to take his socks off 15 times a day and throw them somewhere. We got that fixed by putting house shoes on him. Now he takes his house shoes 15 times but leaves his socks on. Go figure!

Today Mom and Dad switched roles. Mom went back to work after being off for 12 weeks and Dad stayed home with Alex. It was bitter-sweet for Mom to say goodbye to Alex in the morning, as this was the first time Mom had been separated from him since September 22. Alex did very well with Dad but sure was happy to see Mom come back in the evening!