Christmas Excitement

We took Eli to Bass Pro Shop to see Santa.  He was excited to sit on his lap and he was even practicing his smile while we were in line, but then he got a little serious when he was actually up there.  He told him he wants a bike though and gave him five.

On Sunday we had our Gastaldo family get-together.  Eli was well taken care of by aunts and cousins.  When he first started opening presents he would tear off one little piece of paper and say, “trash” and run off to the kitchen to throw it away.  We could see that that was going to take a while, so we gave him a trash sack to put the paper in.  He was still pretty slow though.  Marcus & Jake were done and he still had like four presents to open.  He loved everything though.  Monday morning I had to work at it to convince him to come eat breakfast.  He said he was hungry, but he was just having too much fun playing with his new stuff.

This is our first Christmas in our house, so we had fun decorating.  It was a little stressful too at times.  I guess I’m kind of picky and Christmas decorations are expensive, so I had to get a little creative with burlap and free holly clippings etc.         

Salami Day

 

A few years ago the Wardens started a tradition of making the Gastaldo family salami on the Saturday after Thanksgiving.  They have it down to a science now and we help.

The men butcher, grind, season, and pack the meat.

The women (mainly Aunt Mary & Lee) make homemade ravioli and and sides for lunch.

Eli and Marcus played inside and out.

Thanksgiving

Mom and I cooked Wednesday and Thursday and we ate lots of good food.  I thought it was extra yummy this year.  The empty chair is Derek’s of course because he took the picture.

It was nice spending the weekend at the folks with everyone.  Monday when we were back at home Eli said several times, “Grandma’s house [in]stead.”

We also did a new thing this year.  We all wrote at least one thing we are thankful for on this pumpkin.  Then, after we ate, we read the pumpkin.  There were some serious things and some funny ones, but it was fun.  Eli was thankful for honey, eggs, books, and grapes.  He must have been hungry when I asked him.

It’s a girl!!

My big ultrasound was today and it seems pretty certain that our little one is a girl.  The pictures are kinda cruddy compared to the fancy ones we got in Hawaii, but we are very excited none the less.

Halloween

We dressed up as large fries, small fries, and of course the cutest 384 oz bottle of Ketchup you’ve ever seen.

Derek putting Ketchup on my fries.

Eli & Jesse liked playing with the pumpkins more than posing for pics.

Aunt Perina made Eli a mini loaf of homemade bread just like she used to do for us when we were kids. Of course she had cookies and candy too. He loved it all.

We had a fun Halloween visiting neighbors, family, and friends. Eli loved trick-or-treating. We convinced him that people wouldn’t give him candy if he didn’t leave his hat on since it was part of his costume. When we would leave one place some times he would try to veer off course, so we would tell him, “Let’s go get more candy.” He would respond, “Get more candy!” and then he was right back with us. He didn’t really understand the saving candy for later business though, he was all about now.

Pumpkin Patch

It’s hard work pushing a wagon, look at that mouth.

We had fun at the pumpkin patch, but Eli wasn’t super cooperative to pose for pics.  When we tried to get him to sit in one place or smile, we got a lot of his current favorite phrase, “No like it.”

 

He enjoyed picking out the little gords to decorate the house.

Of course the animals were a favorite too.

 

A single pumpkin was laying out in the path by itself, so in true Eli fashion he backed right up to it and took a seat.

18 months

Eli on his first day of nursery. He did pretty well. He can say his teacher's name (Sister Wooden) and he is doing well with folding his arms and doing the motions to "The Wise Man Built His House Upon the Rock." He needs to work on sitting still and sharing though.


Running with Emmy and Mazee at the splash pad. He loves them! One of our favorite things he does is his own version of pat-a-cake. He pats it a a little, then he rolls it a lot, then he throws it in for "Emmy and me! and Mazee." I think he thought the "and me" part said Emmy, so now he just made up his own version (so that he and Mazee get cake too I guess).



One day I found him reading to himself, very sweet.

He decided to put my mesh grocery bag on his head like a hat and then ride his hippo.

Just wanted to post a few pics and comments about Eli as an 18-month old. The pics tell a lot, but there is one other story I wanted to tell to demonstrate his gift of gab. The other day, in the waiting room at the doctor, he went up to a random stranger and asked her, "How are you?" She said, "Fine, how are you?" So he replied, "Great." We had been working on that convo lately, but it cracked me up.