Fun with balloons and other things

Hi! It's been awhile. Here are some random pictures from over the last month. :-)

One night our friend Mike came over to visit, and we were playing with some balloons we had. I let Hagen pick out a package of balloons one day because he loves playing with them. Anyway, we had a bunch blown up and were having fun doing science experiments with electricity. The two big boys were having just as much fun as the little boy. I love the one that's stuck to his bum.

Here is our new storage cubby thing in the living room that I bought at Lowe's to help keep things more organized. I had overheard a lady at Super Target tell her husband that storage things were cheaper at Lowe's. I thought that was impossible and that she just didn't fully appreciate the greatness of Super T, but I figured I would check it out...and she was right! It wasn't my favorite thing in the world, basically due to the color since we don't really have anything else that's white, but I do really like it because it stores everything I was trying to get contained better, so I'm happy. And Hagen can reach everything really easily so that's good.

One night, Hagen wanted Daddy to toss him on the couch so I took some action shots as they did this over and over again. It was funny and Hagen LOVED it.

After a bath...

Shawn and I had talked about getting Hagen a fish so we finally decided to do that. It turned into a bigger ordeal than I intended, but now I'm glad! I had gotten rid of a fishbowl I had a long time ago, so I was just going to get another big bowl and a betta fish. Long story short...we have a 5.5 gallon aquarium and 5 little fish. So far they've survived a day and a half so I'm hoping that's a good sign. When we pulled into the garage after getting the fish, Hagen said, "We're home, fishies!".

My new car!!!!

On Saturday we went to Don Davis Auto Group in Arlington (I highly recommend them, FYI) and I got a brand-new 2009 Nissan Rogue. It's AWESOME!! It's Venom Red. SWEET. We were going to have to replace the rack and pinion on the Civic so we looked at trading it in and got a GREAT deal. I had been wanting a Honda CR-V if we ever got rid of the Civic and the Rogue came out last year to compete with it and it's less expensive. I totally love it!! It has a navigation system which is awesome, and it has airbags out the wazoo. It doesn't feel as weird as I thought it would driving a bigger vehicle, and I love that I sit higher up - it makes me feel tall (which doesn't happen very often in my life). YAY!!!!!! :-)

Christmas and New Year's

Happy New Year! Here are some pictures from Christmas and New Year's. We spent Christmas at our house with our parents (Grandmommie, Granddad, Opa and Oma), then went to Granbury for New Year's at Opa and Oma's house. Santa brought Hagen a toddler-sized Kawasaki Ninja motorcycle - it's just like Daddy's, only green! Hagen was in awe when he first saw it, and quickly got the hang of it. My dad (Granddad) got Hagen a real hockey helmet and gloves, which are SO cute. Hagen is a little unsure of them because they feel really different than the bike helmet and mittens he usually wears, but we think over time he'll get used to them. They're big enough that they should last for awhile and fit him if he wants to play hockey in the next year or so.











Here is a Play-Dough hamburger that Daddy made for Hagen.





Hagen likes to play with Mocha. Sometimes he gets a little rough, but he has been getting better at really interacting with her and getting her to play with him.




Shawn was playing the Wii Fit at Opa and Oma's house for New Year's and Hagen wanted to try the ski jumping, too. It was cute watching him try it. And no, that beer is NOT Hagen's...








Here are some of the pictures Shawn took for the Christmas card this year.

Christmas festivities

On Friday night we went to the lighting of the Christmas tree at Allen Civic Plaza. I didn't take pictures that night but we went back the next morning to get a few pictures of the Thomas look-alike train and the big tree. It was fun Friday night, just cold!

The next day we went to visit Santa...if you remember last year's picture, this one looks pretty much exactly the same except I'm in it this time. I thought Hagen might do better if I was sitting on Santa's lap while holding him, but nope...and seriously, he did just fine in line beforehand, and waved bye-bye to Santa (just like last year), He just doesn't like sitting in Santa's lap. I thought he might do better because about a week ago he had even said he wanted to see Santa and I thought, oh, great, maybe he'll do really well this year! Oh, well. There are also pictures of the big Christmas tree and two of Santa's reindeer.

After Santa we went to the Christmas festivities at the shopping center where I work. It was REALLY fun! We went with Matt, Darby, Madi and Aly. They had carriage rides (we avoided the one with Santa), face-painting, pony rides, hot chocolate, cookies and things like that.

Here are Hagen and Madi getting painted. Hagen said he wanted a butterfly and I thought it would be on his cheek, but these are really cool face-painters and the lady painted his whole face. I wasn't sure Hagen would sit still for that, but he did and he LOVED his face painted like that! It was neat.

Hagen wanted to try the pony ride at the end of the night, but he only sat on the pony for about two seconds (with me RIGHT there with him). The pony BARELY moved and Hagen flipped out, so I quickly removed him and we didn't try again. I felt bad for the pony - I wanted to tell him (or her?), "Really, it's not you...sorry...". I felt better because another child got on the pony and was fine.

Last weekend my friends Jen, Val, Donna and Donna's son Steven got together to celebrate Val's birthday. Here she is with her "Twilight" t-shirt. Her party was pretty much "Twilight" themed. The teenage girls behind us were jealous. And there is a picture of Steven and Hagen.

Here's Hagen pooped out after our lunch out with the girls, then Shawn's hockey game.