Minnesota Birthday and Thanksgiving Part I

We went north to Minnesota and Wisconsin for Thanksgiving and Stian's 3rd birthday. First we spent a few days at Kris's parents' house and then we spent a few days at my parents' house.

Here's Stian with his "I'm excited face" as he gets to open one birthday present the first morning we are there.









Stian, Klebo and Grandpa make cranberry relish for Thanksgiving using Grandma's Grandma's grinder.













And we celebrated Stian's birthday.

Minnesota Birthday and Thanksgiving Part II

We went to Klebo's scout Honor Court while we were home. They were awarding merit badges (Klebo got one), doing skits, and eating pie. Mmmm pie! Stian got key lime, he quite liked it! (why do boy scouts shake with their left hands?)













Stian had lots of fun playing with cars with Klebo.



Stian helped Grandma decorate her Christmas tree.















We had a nice Thanksgiving dinner over at Karin and Brad's too - but apparently we didn't take any pictures of that!

Pretty!

First Snow of the Season

~ I've gotten behind on the blog. Things are a little nutty here at the moment trying to finish out the semester and get ready to leave for Christmas and other things too. I need to put up posts about Thanksgiving and Stian's 3rd birthday! I'll get there. Hopefully before I have Christmas pictures I need to put up! In the meantime... ~

We woke up to our first real snow of the season. We had a dusting earlier in the week, but this time we got about 4-5". Kris and Stian went out and played in it this morning before Stian's swimming lessons. And then when they got in Stian had his very first hot cocoa! He liked it!

Leaves

While I was sleeping in Saturday morning, and our friends and family up north were waking up to snow, Kris and Stian were outside raking and playing in the leaves. As you can tell by Stian's shorts (he's still in his jammies) it was warm out - in the 60s.

Headband

Stian made this headband in school last week. He thinks it's pretty awesome and wears it a lot. His teachers are always coming up with fun projects for them. I never did get a picture of him in his spider hat, but it's pretty cool too.

A Big Boy Bed!

Stian has never tried to crawl out of his crib, so we haven't been motivated to move him into a big kid bed. He was happy enough in his crib so we just left him be. But he has outgrown his pack n' play, which is what he sleeps in when we travel. So he was going to have to sleep in a big kid bed when we go north in a few weeks for Thanksgiving and Christmas. So we decided it was time to switch him to a big boy bed.

Yesterday we drove up to Chicago to go to Ikea to buy one. I had been eyeing this bed since we saw it last May when we went to Ikea after a trip to the aquarium with Kevin, Dawn and Quinn. It's such a neat bed. When they are little it's like a regular bed, but when they are older you can flip it over and it becomes a lofted bed with a neat fort area underneith.

We put it together this morning. Stian helped out quite a bit.









Stian loves his super soft, fuzy green blanket we bought for him when Karin, Brad and Klebo are here. And now he gets to sleep with it!



This is what it looks like all together. For now the crib is still in his room. He didn't want us to move it out yet, and that's fine, small steps. But we were talking tonight about how he'd have much more room for playing if we moved the crib out and moved the bed where the crib is now. He thought that sounded like a good idea. So maybe in a few days he'll be up for it. He is a kid who does not like change. (He had quite the crying fit yesterday in the parking lot at Ikea when Kris had to move his carseat to behind his seat in the car so we could get the bed into the car)



So then is was nap time. I told him he was allowed to get in and out of bed, and he could play for a little while, but he also needed to sleep and he wasn't allowed to leave his room without either Kris or me saying it was okay. So he played for quite awhile, and stuck his head out the door and called to me a good 20 times needing something or other. He was just so excited that he could get in and out and that he could have Matchbox cars in his bed now and books! So he was pretty stimulated. But after probably 30 minutes of that he crashed.

And then he took a huge nap. I think the time change might be working in our favor here, he didn't sleep in this morning, so he started his nap about an hour late and went to bed tonight about an hour late as well. So he was a little more tired than usual. He also only napped for about 30 minutes in the car yesterday, so perhaps he was even more tired than normal.

He slept for 2 1/2 hours. I finally had to go wake him because I wanted him to go back to sleep tonight. I brought the camera with me. I would normally never attempt a picture of him while sleeping, he is an incredibly light sleeper. In fact just my quietly tip-toeing into the room had him stirring a little. But I snapped a quick picture before he sat up.



Unfortunately the bedrail we bought so he wouldn't fall out while getting used to a big bed doesn't work on a platform bed, you have to have a boxspring on the bed. So we don't have a rail for him. Hopefully he won't fall out!

Bedtime went quite smoothly tonight (knock wood). I'll admit that I've been dreading this transition. Stian has always had a hard time sleeping and I really just didn't want to mess with that. I also really wasn't sure I wanted him to be able to get out of his bed. I was afraid he'd never actually lie down and go to sleep. But it hasn't been a problem today. I doubt I'm going to get off quite this easily, but it's certainly not as bad as I feared. At least not yet!