This past week all 3 of us battled the stomach flu. Of course, it barely slowed Kade down but it knocked me and Erik out for a whole day! Unfortunately, I missed out on a day of baking Christmas cookies, but luckily I felt good enough to play the next day. We had big plans to spend the day at Owen and Ellie's and an evening meeting Santa and his reindeer!

I'm told Kade made up for my absence at the baking extravaganza. He was a big help by putting a half a bottle of sprinkles on approximately 2 cookies. He was also able to incorporate a Ford tractor and wagon into rolling cookies in powdered sugar! I guess tractors really are multi-functional machines!

Meeting Santa was not quite as successful. We knew it probably wouldn't go so well as Kade regularly tells us, "I'm a shy guy". However, we hoped that after seeing Owen, Ellie and Rylee on Santa's lap he might be a little more open to it. He wasn't. The tears literally shot out of his eyes, like a cartoon, and the screams could be heard a mile away! Of course, the second we left, he got a big smile on his face and informed us numerous times that he saw Santa Claus :-)

Here's some pictures of the fun filled weekend. Completely out of order and caption-less because the Blogger App is worthless! It drives me nuts :-)

Kade and I were home today catching up on laundry and other chores after last week's festivities. He also helped me do some decorating for Christmas. I did a post in July about Kade calling Santa, "the bad guy", but I think he's starting to understand just how awesome Santa really is.

After receiving Louie, our very own Elf On The Shelf, and seeing pictures of Santa with presents in his hands, Kade's putting 2-and-2 together very quickly. I think we need to work a little harder on explaining the true meaning of Christmas though because a couple times he called Santa, "God".

And, quite possibly the quote of the year:
As I'm carrying Kade to a time-out after hitting me he grabbed my pony tail, gave it a yank and said, "Get going horsey!"

If you go back to a post I did in 2010 called, "Thanksgiving Weekend", these are the same two kiddos from one of the pictures in that post!  How is that possible?!

"Warwen" (aka Lauren) was a trooper.  Kade pulled her in every possible direction to play and she obliged with a smile on her face the whole time.  That's stamina!!

"The Great Grandkids" on my mom's side of the family.

And, because I like to age myself...Zach and Lauren were only 3 & 2 years old when they were the "little people" in our wedding.  Lauren was the same age that Kade is now!  Now, they are both MUCH taller than me :-(

A rare picture of the 3 of us together :-)

2 little cuties

Kade-O loves his cousin Vivienne.  She loves Kade's truck.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Today we are hosting some family and Kade is providing a lot of the entertainment. A few people came yesterday and stayed the night so he was pretty wound up with excitement. And when he gets wound up, he gets hot and sweaty. And when he gets sweaty he wants to remove articles of clothing. So last night's entertainment turned a bit risqué! Luckily we convinced him to keep the diaper on! :-)

Now that the holidays are upon us I've been talking to Kade about Christmas. The meaning of it and also about decorating the tree, making cookies and gifts. So far, after asking him what he wants, he's said: pancakes, bacon, flowers and birthday cake. Sounds to me like he just wants breakfast in bed to celebrate Jesus' birthday! Sounds perfect to me!!

Some cute pictures of a future model?? He's a looker! In one of the pics is him wearing the Indian headband they made this year at daycare. They were pretty "flashy" this time! Even his cousin, Vivienne got into the spirit :-)

Kade and I are spending the next two days getting ready for Thanksgiving at our house next week.

Vivienne, pictured below (not her real hair :-), is coming and Kade couldn't be more excited!

So, this post is just a couple of recent Kade Quotes. Because, let's face it, what's funnier than things a two year old says? Also, this post has a few pictures of Kade and Michael's recent play date. They're definitely turning into a couple of rough-and-tumble boys!

Grandma: "What do you want for Christmas?"
Kade: "Pancakes."

Kade: "Mom, look at my cool socks! I'm a cool guy."

Kade:  "Mom, you share?"
Me:  "What do you want me to share?"
Kade:  "Daddy."

Kade Quotes

Kade, Erin and I were playing "farm" with beans.  Erin started to sing a song, that she made up as she went, about the beans.  Kade stops what he's doing, looks at me and says, "Mom, why she doing that?"

Kade:  "Mom, cows not like beans."
Me:  "What do cows like?"
Kade:  "Apple pie."

Do Work

As I've mentioned before Kade LOVES to "do work", as he puts it. He cries if Daddy doesn't want to do work. He regularly says, "Daddy, lets go do work". Scooping dirt, moving rocks, raking leaves it doesn't matter what he's doing as long as it's outside, with Daddy and a sweat-inducing task, he's happy.

This fall there were lots of leaves to rake...in other people's yards. First Erik and Kade went to "Aunt Air-win's" (formerly known as Aunt Erna, actually named Erin) house, then we went to my parent's house and finally finished at Uncle Michael's house. They went not because help was requested (although much appreciated). No, they went because my 2 boys LOVE to do work and would be insulted if someone worked without them!

Here's some pics of our little worker. Since I can't organize pics with my iPad, randomly thrown in there are some pictures of Erik and Kade enjoying their new "toy"!

Kade Quotes

"Carry me, I'm shy."

Kade: Mom, what you doing next day?
Me: I don't know. What are you doing?
Kade: I hang out with Daddy.
Me: Can I hang out with you and Daddy too?
Kade: No.

"MOM!!! DADDY NOT HAVE PANTS ON!!!"

Kade was showing me how he looked in a new pair of pajamas.
Kade: Mom! See me?!
Me: Wow! Don't you look good!!
Kade: I know! I'm so cute!!