whirlwind

Goodness...what can I say...we have officially been in the states for two weeks...so much has happened yet it feels like time has flown...my brother came home a day early to surprise us...I turned 30 (crazy, I know)... my parents, brady and friend heather threw me an amazing surprise party...seriously, I am so blessed...I have had the joy to watch Parker 'tackle' just about every member of brady and I's families...I just love being home...we had amazing Christmas celebrations in Kansas City, Mankato and Wichita...we were able to see all of our grandparents at least once...I have eaten at every restaurant I was craving (the tuna sandwich at watermark books was the most satisfying:)...so blessed to have had such a great trip so far, yet so much more to come...we leave for Kansas City again today and then Phoenix on Wednesday...Parker is beyond excited to see a game...lucky, lucky us:)

The secret...

...to a happy boy on a flight...superman earphones, pillow, blankie, and orange juice!

Here's to a quick nine hours and a content Parker!

And we're off!!

Oh my goodness, oh my goodness! Today finally arrived...after a crazy week of errands, cleaning, cookie-making, packing, shopping, and more cleaning (gotta love having hurricane Parker around;), it is finally time to go home!!! Wahoo! We left norwich today and just spent a fantastic afternoon in London with our friends, Tom and Kat. We leave their house for the airport tomorrow at 7:30 AM...fly out at 12PM...and a mere 14.5 hours later, we will finally be in Wichita!!! We. Can't. Wait.

All I want for Christmas...

...is to get back home, but until then, we have been making the most of our time here.  I feel like it has been a crazy couple of weeks packed with trips to see Santa, parties with friends, school parties and lots of Christmas shopping.

Last Friday, we had Parker's school party.  It was kind of hilarious.  All of the parents got there to watch them sing and then the kids had a party while the parents had tea.  I was so excited to see Parker sing (I had already heard all of the songs in the car), but during the concert, P just sat there....literally...he was so tired (he had already been there two hours longer than a normal day), and he barely mouthed more than a couple of words per song.  He did, however, find enough energy to protest when the teacher handed him a star with 'too many sparkles'.  Silly kid.  I did video, but we were told we couldn't post any videos or pictures online...so...shoot.

We also celebrated our family Christmas this weekend.  Santa made a special trip to our house on Saturday night...Parker was so, so excited.  The worst part about celebrating Christmas early is that no one else is celebrating.  Brady was out of town until late Friday night, so we had to do Santa on Saturday night (plus we had to have soup and queso for dinner:)...but then we had church and a birthday party all day on Sunday (and brady had to work, ugh).  So, while it was a great morning...it was just a morning.

P is at such a fun age and he was so excited about all of his presents...such a great morning...

carrying treats for Santa

We tried to get him to leave Santa a 'traditional' mince pie, but P insisted that he like cookies better.

'Christmas' morning and seeing his new workbench from Santa.

He went straight to get his toolbox out:)

Such a good little builder

Cars...Santa actually could have just gotten him these two cars and P would have been ecstatic!

A book that folds into a pirate ship...he loved it!!

Trying out new crayons...the best part of doing Christmas before is that Santa was
able to bring some things that mommy needed to get for the plane ride anyway:)

So blessed to have these two...such a lucky, lucky mommy.

Purple pride

Parker has been asking to take his jersey to school for a while now. In his words...
"I think the kids want to see my jersey. They've never seen a football jersey before."

He has a point, so today I let him take it, in his bag, with instructions not to get it out unless he asks a teacher. Well, this is what he looked like when I picked him up (minus the coat). Apparently, he did at least ask his teacher if he could wear it...pretty sure this was his plan all along...

light switch-on

I am a little behind on blogging.  To be honest, I ran out of storage space for pictures on my blog and I wanted to consult the experts (aka Rachel and Victoria), before buying the storage space on google. 

Anyway, we had the annual Christmas light switch-on in Norwich a couple of weeks ago.  It was actually Thanksgiving and because Brady was working so much and had to go out of town right after the lights came on, this was how we decided to spend the holiday....dinner at the new Jamie Oliver restaurant (sadly, we won't be going back), and the awesome atmosphere of the evening.  Norwich really does this event right...bands, snow machines, fireworks, crepe stands, and giant snow globes...it is one of my favorite nights of the year, and a great way to get into the Christmas spirit!

at least he's learning something...

Parker is loving school...thank goodness...but lately, he has been coming home and correcting me...for example...

P, "...and then we had lunch, and then you came, mommy!"
Me, "did you see a lot of the other kids' mommies?"
P, "yeah, but they have 'mummies.'"
Me, "oh, ok"

Randomly talking about Christmas and Santa in the car after school...
P, "mommy he's called 'father christmas'"
Me, "gotcha"

Me, "were you helping Annabelle push the stroller when I came?"
P, "it's called a 'buggy'"
Me, "right"

My favorite moment this week was when we were driving home and Parker sang me 'Tiny Tim' from school.  It is a song he had already learned at church, but this time he sang it to me with an accent...it was kind of awesome:).