Ringing in the New Year

 Over New Years weekend we drove down to North Carolina

to visit Uncle Ted, Aunt Annie, Abby and Barrett.

We had a blast visiting their new farm in Lenoir!

 The cousins enjoyed running around

and playing together.

 I can't believe how quickly my niece is growing up!

 Aunt Annie brought along a fun toy called "stomp rockets."

 First, she had to build the launch pad.

 Then, Uncle Ted loaded on a rocket.

 The kids took turns "stomping" the bellows

to send the nerf rocket soaring into the air...

 ... and then they all ran as fast as they could to the rocket.

Repeat until kids grow weary of the game.

Stet that. 

The kids will never grow weary of the game...

they just grow weary.

 So, you take them on a hike

to expend every last ounce of energy before loading back into the car.

 The Ted Georges.

It works like a charm.

After a day of fresh air, good exercise and lots of laughter with their cousins,

the kids took amazing naps in the car.

We hope this will be the first of many, many visits to Ted's farm.

Thanks for having us, guys!

Jack-in-the-Box

 Grandma and Papa gave Matthew a wonderful

Jack-in-the-Box for Christmas.

Remember my last post about Matthew's emotions in visiting farm animals?

They are pretty much the same in playing with this new toy:

 Anticipation.

Sheer Delight!

Hey you're only one once!

Boxing Day at Frying Pan Farm

 The day after Christmas was unseasonably warm -

so we decided to spend the morning at one of our favorite spots in NoVa:

Frying Pan Farm.

(Notice that the sign says Kidwell Farm.

But we all know it as Frying Pan Farm.)

 Kate and Matthew enjoyed sporting their new "froggie" hats

from our wonderful nanny, Erin.

She's a smart lady

'cause the kids are easy to spot in a crowd with these matching hats!

 As per usual, the tractors were a huge hit!

 One should concentrate while operating heavy machinery:

 These two photos pretty much sum up Matthew's emotions

while visiting farm animals:

 Anticipation.

 Sheer Delight.

 A story from Matthew:

Sometimes you decide to crawl through a tunnel at a playground.

It looks like so much fun at first.

But then you get scared.

And you start to cry a little bit.

Then you start to cry a lot.

And your Daddy comes to the rescue.

 And then you're happy.

But Daddy has to figure out how to get out of the tunnel.

The End.