Grandparents.

These kids were lucky enough to have all of their grandparents come visit over Thanksgiving and for Finn's blessing. The girls loved having so many people to play with, and Finn happily accepted being passed around endlessly. 

Poor fellow, he is already being roped in to all sorts of princess games with his sisters.

At least little brother can rock a pink tiara pretty well.

Hanging out with Grandad some more. I love those fat cheeks! (Finn's).  And his fat chin. His major tickle spot is in between his two chin rolls, he has the cutest husky little man giggles when you get your fingers in between his fat rolls and tickle him. 

We took a trip up to Fort McHenry while everyone was here (where Francis Scott Key wrote the Star Spangled Banner during the war of 1812). I can't believe it's taken us so long to visit there, it's only about twenty minutes from us, up in Baltimore, and is a very cool memorial.

That canon ball was just too heavy for our girls...

  

The whole gang, minus me and Finn.

These three. Santa sent some elves on December 1st to deliver some Christmas pajamas for the kids. Marc put together a fun little scavenger hunt for them which eventually led to finding their pajamas wrapped and taped to the bottom of the dinner table. Teresa loved it, of course. Nora was a bit slow to warm up, but that was because it happened right after her nap. They are definitely ready for Christmas.

Hanging out with Gigi. And the laundry. And Finn totally has a little baby bald spot on the back of his head, poor fellow. 

Gigi brought the girls some stylish snowman sunglasses. Nora was definitely a fan.

We took Granny and Grandad to a Korean BBQ place up here. Nora and T totally showed me up with their chopstick skills. 

Finn loves some attention! He is starting to get so much chattier, and Granny is always so good about getting sweet smiles and coos out of him. His hair is so long on top, I guess to make up for that bald spot in the back ;)

Happy little Finn fox. 

Blessed Baby

We were able to bless Finn in church this past week. On the way to church Marc and I were discussing how nervous we had been for T's blessing - we were both worried she would cry and scream through the whole thing - and how Finn is so laid back and easy going that we weren't worried about him doing that at all. So, of course, he started fussing right before Marc took him up and then cried right into the microphone the whole time. It's really quite unusual for him to cry much, in fact, for the first part of the blessing I was wondering whose baby was crying so loudly, and then I realized it was Finn! Marc gave him a beautiful blessing, and we are so glad that we have this little guy in our family.

He is such a chunk. He wore the outfit Marc was blessed in many years ago. Except for the bonnet which, even if Marc had not deemed it too girly to be worn, was miles too small for his big ol' head.

Also, just as a heads up, there are a LOT of pictures in this post. 

Teresa thought he was dressed like an angel and Nora said "why is he dressed like an old lady?".

  

With Granny and Grandad

     

  

   

   

  

These sisters sure love him bunches. 

With Gigi and Poppy

  

  

   

Nora decided to help Finn smile for the camera...

   

I know I've said it a hundred times, but I'll say it a hundred more - we just love Finn so much. He is such a perfect baby in so many ways, and we are so thankful for him everyday. 

Pumpkins and Cousins and Birthdays

Woops, I totally forgot to get the pictures off my point and shoot before I did the October post! The girls had a blast painting their little pumpkins for Halloween. They always pick red, pink, and white as their paint colors, so of course the pumpkins ended up being purple, like everything else we paint.  

Nora was too focused to look up for pictures.

I've been a super-lame-mom for the past year, thanks to Finn, so I figured Halloween was a good time to get my act together again. We made some monster cookies, which the girls loved. Mostly because I did most of the work while they shoveled powdered sugar into their mouths.

They were so excited for Jack O'lantern quesadillas and mummy hotdogs. Until it was time to eat them, when they both promptly peeled off all the breading to just get to their hotdogs, little rascals.

Erin and Rob were in D.C. for a night (because Rob is super awesome at his job and was getting an award. High five to Rob!), so we were very excited that they got to come spend the night at our house. Especially since we had not even gotten to meet little Deirdre yet! Baby girl just turned one last week and this was our first time getting to see her in person. Shameful.

She is so cute! The girls just loved her so much. It was fun to see them interacting, and made me so sad that we are way out here in Maryland.

Seriously, look at that cute face!

And this cute face.

And Marc had a birthday. 

Happy Birthday to Marc! We are sure glad he was born thirty-one years ago! Teresa thought that sounded very old. Don't worry, I told her it was only a little bit old. 

 

This is the best picture, ever. T was just devastated that Marc blew out all the candles without her help. Oh, she was just so sad, it was hilarious, but I felt so bad laughing at her. We re-lit a few of the candles and let the girls help the second time.

And we think Finn is so cute. He got weighed when we took him in for his little cold the other week, and is already just over 13 pounds and 24 1/2 inches.