Our Christmas!

We celebrated our Christmas super early so Max would have time to play with his toys before heading down to California. This time Max knew exactly what to do with the presents under the tree! It's so fun to see how different everything is each year with him. This year he didn't need any help opening the presents, he knew there were toys inside, and he was excited to move on the the next one (though after he opened each one, he always went back to the train, which he had opened first).

 I kept seeing people making super cute Christmas stockings for their kids and I felt bad that I still didn't have one for Max, so I pulled out my felt and made one for him. I intended it to just be a filler stocking until I could get a real one to replace it, but I actually kind of like it.

 My wonderful in-laws are the reason for any of us having any presents this year and we thank them so much! Bryan and I bought ourselves a combined gift and got a Wii U (we sold our old Wii and a bunch of games for a really great price). Everything here is for Max.

 Max walked over to the presents and started signing "train". I figure there are two possible reasons he could have been doing this: 1) he hoped there would be a train there, or 2) he thought the long present was actually a train.

 My guess is that he predicted the long one was a train because that is the first thing he reached for to open. He is such a smart little boy!

 My sweet boy :)

 He made his own pile of wrapping paper. After he opened every gift, he would take the wrapping paper over there.

 The play kitchen was a huge success! I'm so glad I was able to find a nice, small, great priced kitchen for our little apartment. Though it took me 3 hours to build it while watching Sound of Music Live, it was so worth it. Poor kid wanted to wash his hands and thought real water was going to come out of the sink.

 The greatest success of all! We bought him a slide and he is so in love with it! He wakes up in the morning and goes to slide on it first thing. We'll probably have to store it on our balcony when we get sick of it taking up space; though it is a really good size; big enough to get a good slide out of it, but small enough to not take up too much space.

 Shopping cart and register from Abuela. This thing is awesome and I can't wait to really start doing more pretend play with Max. 

 Max was using it as a chair to watch TV.

So Merry Christmas to us! It's been so fun these last couple years having Christmas at the beginning AND at the end of the month. I don't know how I'm going to be able to wait until the end of the month next year!

Halloween Fun

Halloween was a ton of fun! I just love watching Max experience new things and try to figure things out. We went to our ward chili feed and trunk-or-treat.

Max dressed up as a little blue monster. I love these Carter's costumes because they are so warm! We dressed him up for his speech appointment and he is such a cutie!

 Bryan and I thought it would be fun for him to grow out his beard just so he can say he did it once in his life. Max curiosity peeked and he kept rubbing it. Every time Bryan kisses Max, he curls up and giggles because it tickles.

 I LOVE this picture! It's so great when I can get a good picture of the two of them because Bryan doesn't like taking pictures and Max never smiles for them.

 I decided last minute to dress up. I was going to go for 80s theme, but I feel like it's so cliche, especially among Mormon girls for whatever reason. So instead I went for the 90s grunge look. I kind of like it.

In true 90s grunge fashion, I hadn't washed my hair in probably like, 3 days.

 Max would only eat the cornbread at the chili feed. Figures.

 While Max was still eating his, he reached over and stole Bryan's and double-fisted it.

 Max loved being on the stage.

 Max was so unsure of everything that was going on at the trunk-or-treat. He followed our directions of walking up to the cars and holding up his bucket, but he had no idea why he was doing it. Occasionally he would sign please and thank you, but he didn't really understand what was going on. Halfway through, we gave him some candy and he would no longer hold the bucket and just wanted to eat the candy and run around. By the end, however, he willingly went up to the people and took candy from them, once he realized what they were handing out.

 Max was doing a little jig.

I thought these were some cute comparison pictures from last year :)

 I tried getting Bryan to dress up this year, but he wasn't into it.

 We came home and watched Monsters University and Max actually watched it on and off. There's hope yet for me to be able to watch Disney movies with him!

 Pretty good haul for 15 minutes of trunk-or-treating. We separated what Max is able to eat and what he can't since he's still too young. My hope was that Bryan and I would eat from the pile that Max can't eat, but we both like all the candies in the pile Max CAN eat from! I don't think the candy's going to last long.

 I probably let him eat way too much candy last night. Max had so much fun for Halloween though! I can't wait to see what adventures are in store for us next year!