Thursday, December 27, 2012

Merry Christmas 2012


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We’ve had a very enjoyable Christmas and vacation so far! It started around 8pm Friday evening when we said goodbye to our students with a little Christmas program. Søren, Silas and I enjoyed a relaxing weekend with little to do Saturday and Sunday. We had so much open time that we could spontaneously invite some friends over one day and go swimming another day.

Then Christmas Eve arrived and the adventures picked up. I played horn and sang at our church service at 11am. It has become a tradition that I sing O’ Holy Night as the opening song, and tradition held this year. We added a little gospel sounding ending this year, and I think it sounded really great. I was personally frustrated that my voice wasn’t completely at it’s best after completely losing my voice over 3 weeks ago. But with a lot of prayer, I was able to get through the whole thing, and even hit the high note at the end. In the recording a small kid glads and says YAY! in the rest right after the highnote and the Gospel ending. Cute!

After Silas’ nap we headed to Holstebro to be with Søren’s sister, Ulla, Peter, Lukas, Nikolaj and Celina, along with Søren’s Mom. We had some time to relax before eating, where we just watched some Christmas Disney programs and Silas played with Nikolaj’s new kitchen stuff making coffee for everyone. 
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Søren and the boys watching Disney
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Playing kitchen.
We had an amazing dinner consisting of: Duch, Pork Roast (flæskesteg), 2 kinds of potatoes, red cabbage, chips, gravy and other condiments. It was very delicious. For dessert we had the traditional Ris alamande (Rice pudding with almonds) with the undtraditional Strawberry sauce. There is always 1 large almond hidden in the pudding and whoever finds the almond gets a present! And this year it was me!! I had never won before, so I was pretty excited. I got a new DVD and hope to watch it soon.

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After dessert, Silas opened his presents, as it was already getting late. We all sat around as he ripped of the paper himself. It was fun seeing him this year, as he can now show his excitement. While taking the paper off he would exclaim “Neeeej” in a very excited voice and with a huge smile. After unwrapping every present, he then wanted to actually open the item, and begin playing with it right away!! He really liked the sled he got and wanted to sit in it to open the rest of the presents!

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Neeeej!!!
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Playing with Uncle Peter

Then we all walked around the tree sining Christmas Carols before finishing where we ran around the house holding hands singing “Nu er det jul igen…” (Now it’s Christmas again). After that it was finally time to open presents. Lukas and Nikolaj had been incredibly patient, and it was fun to watch them get so excited and shout “This is just what I was wishing for” after opening many gifts!

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Singing around the tree
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We all recieved some wonderful gifts and enjoyed each others company. To end the evening we read the Christmas story from the book of Luke and were again reminded of the greatest gift we are given every single year, the birth of our savior.

We spent the night at Søren’s sisters’, and the next day Silas woke up at 6:45 even though he didn’t go to bed until after 9pm the night before. We had lots of time to play with his new toys before church and after church we had another great meal. After Silas’ nap, he got to open his final presents and then we headed home. Silas was so tired and pretty grouchy the whole day.
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"I am soooo exhausted"
When we got home we set up his new trainset, put on some Christmas music and opened our stockings! It was a great way to end the Christmas festivities.
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Silas and his presents.
Merry Christmas Everyone!
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Monday, December 10, 2012

Funny!

I forgot a few things in the last post, and then of course Silas does funny things daily.

One of Silas' favorite words is ketchup, and he loves to dip any and all food in ketchup. The other day during breakfast Silas kept saying, ketchup, ketchup...and pointing at something on the table. We thought that sounded weird and didn't do much about it, as we didn't think he should have ketchup on his oatmeal. Then the next day I was eating breakfast alone with Silas, and he pointed over near the refridgerator and kept saying ketchup, ketchup...To shorten the story, after awhile I figured out that he was pointing at the sugar. Søren had some sugar on the table for his cereal the day before and it was the sugar that Silas was calling ketchup. So anything that goes on top of anything, or used for dipping is now called ketchup.

Silas had known the word baby for awhile, and points at little boys/girls and says baby. He also points to pictures of himself or in the mirror and says "baby."  Recently he learned to say boy, and then just today we looked in the mirror and said "boy, mmwah" and gave himself a big kiss. I guess he can see he is growing up too!









Wednesday, December 5, 2012

Silas 1½ years old!

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A month has gone by, and we can’t keep track of all the words Silas knows anymore. He suprises us daily by saying words we didn’t even know he understood. Silas likes to communicate with us, and talks pretty much non-stop. (I do remember hearing my Mom tell me stories of how  I talked “from the minute I woke up, until the minute I went to bed”…I think I can relate!)

Here are the English words that he can say on his own: keys, hot, flowers, finger, kight (light), fork, spoon, chair, glasses, cup, “oh boy”, teeth, tractor, jacket, ketchup, blocks, touchdown, stuck.

Here come the Danish with translation: varm(warm) trommer(drums), geek (when he is trying to say MUSIK or music), stole (chair), støvsuger (vaccuum), traktor, bil (car), arbejde (work), tegne (draw), finger (finger) gynge-gange (swinge, swinge)

He also started saying a lot of names: Samuel (Sam,mu,mu,el..a boy at daycare), Margit (his daycare provider), Farfar, Grandma, Grandpa…and many others. A random name he knows is Daniel, it’s from one of the biblestories he has, he points to him and says Daniel!

He also started saying “kommer” (which means come) and then he pulls on your clothes until you come. Just recently he started saying “kommer, okay” like he is answering for us!

Silas has also learned the word NO! And says it even if he means YES, it sounds like Nooa, where his tone goes up at the end.

He has learned more animal noises now including: cow, train, horse, sheep, monkey, lion and Old McDonald, where he then says: “ee-i-ee-i-oh when asked. (He also does them all in Danish, but for some reason not sheep yet)

At the beginning of the month Silas was counting to 10. Mostly sounding like ONE, TWO, FIVE, eight, nine, ten…But now he mostly just says ten when I start counting.

He still says up and down, but often gets them mixed up. When he wants to get up to the piano he says, DOWN, and vice versa.

A fun game for Silas is finding your nose. He then says “doot, doot” and pokes it. It’s funny because if he does it to me, then he has to immediately do it to Søren…he goes around the house saying “FAR, doot doot” until he finds Søren. We started teaching him the other facial parts and he can now find mouth and sometimes eyes, but usually when we ask him to find a body part, he goes for the nose and says “doot, doot!”

Silas continues to love climbing and climbs up on any chair. When he gets up onto it, in the standing position, he says “SID” (meaning sit) as he knows he is supposed to sit down on his butt.
He has a shape sorting toy that he is beginning to master. He looks for the right holes before even trying to put the plastic pieces in.

At night time we always sing a song for Silas. He has begun singing along to the song I wrote for him singing “sleep, baby…sleep baby”. It is so precious.

Finally, Silas has now taken an interest in drawing. He says “tegne” and points at the crayon box. We started taping paper to the table and let him draw away. He usually uses his right hand.

To end, here are some funny things our daycare provicer has shared with us.
1) The other day they were practicing saying “Hej, med dig” (Hello to you). After Silas’ nap he went over to Margit and said “Margit, hej med dig” and gave her a big hug.
2) Just before going down for a nap Margit said to Silas “Det er sovetid (It’s sleep time)…then Silas responden “Suttetid” (Pacifier time) and started laughing. Margit said you could just tell that he was trying to be funny.
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Sid!!
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Yummy, French hotdog
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Drawing at the kitchen table



Tuesday, December 4, 2012

Thanksgiving, thanksgiving

Again this year we celebrated Thanksgiving twice. The first one was on Thanksgiving day, at our house. The tradition that began 4 years ago with just Jette, Carl and their daughter Ida. Has now turned into a party of 9 adults and 7 kids! I was able to prepare a lot of food Wednesday morning before work, and then we did the final touches Thursday. Thursday turned out to be a bit of a chaotic day, as Søren’s Grandmother passed away the previous Sunday and the funeral was on Thursday. Luckily, we were able to attend the service and coffee afterwards, before coming home to a house full of guests. We had a very crazy dinner (with 7 kids under 5) and then after the kids were put to bed we had pumpkin pie, had a round where we shared our thanks, and watched some football. Every year I look forward to celebrating a tradition that  I hold dear, and I have to say myself that the food tastes better and better! Thanks Auntie Anne for your recipies and advice! I couldn’t do it without you!

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Yum
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5 of the 7 kids playing in Silas' room after dinner!
 
The following Sunday we celebrated Thanksgiving in Viborg with our American friends from Watermark and their families. Søren had to work, so it was just Silas and I, but we had a very nice day. Silas was very occupied with Josh and Bodil’s little girl Hannah, who is just 2½ months younger than him. He just followed her around all day saying “Hannah, Hannah”. Even days later he was still saying her name. It was pretty adorable.
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Hannah and Silas
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I'll follow you onto the chair even Hannah!
This year we are very thankful for our health, having jobs we love, and living in a country with so many benefits so that we can prioritize our little family. What are you thankful for??