Christmas with Grammy and Grandpa

John Harrison curious about Grammy's candle

playing with his new ring-sorting board from Uncle Jon

eyeing a gift

David's parents let John Harrison open a Fisher Price Precious Planet monkey that they bought for Elise and he immediately loved pushing the buttons to make monkey talk and sing...I'm sure he'll have fun entertaining Elise with this new toy at Grammy and Grandpa's house.

John Harrison and Grandpa
John Harrison has been having so much fun playing with his new toys that he got for Christmas. So much fun, in fact, that he still has several gifts left to open. We've divided most of his current toys between his room, the bonus room, and the living room (where he plays most often). One of his favorite new toys is a Fisher Price Little People Farm set from Grammy and Grandpa. John Harrison loves taking the animals in and out of the barn and gets a huge smile on his face and swings his arms around when the rooster plays "Old MacDonald Had a Farm." Grammy and Grandpa also gave John Harrison a Duplo farm--John Harrison's favorite thing to do with it is to drive the tractor into and out of the barn. A few days after Christmas, John Harrison and I were playing upstairs and he decided that every single toy in the bonus room...including the recently put together Duplo farm....needed to be moved into his playhouse. It was quite cramped with all of the toys and John Harrison and me in the playhouse, but he seemed happy with this arrangement.
Christmas lunch was the first meal we had ever hosted at our house on Christmas (or any major holiday for that matter....other than Fourth of July this past year). David's mom and I both cooked various dishes and David smoked a turkey....everything turned out really well! We had so much fun having everyone in our home for lunch and hope to repeat the tradition in years to come. It was really nice being able to put John Harrison down for a nap at our own house (and also having him contained to one area of the house while we visited and opened gifts). We are so excited that David's parents live in our neighborhood now and really enjoy being able to drop by for a short visit or drop off John Harrison when we need a babysitter (my dear mother-in-law will almost never say "no" when we ask her to babysit, so we have to be careful not to take advantage of her generosity:).