Life of a Sampson: Merry (Belated) Christmas and Happy (Belated) New Year!

Daniel taught Noah how to drink from the faucet...

...which he now loves and wants to do frequently!!!

Noah is taking after his daddy way too early! :)

Learning about different kinds of birds.

Clearly, Santa was NOT a huge hit with Noah...

Noah LOVED adding the sprinkles to the sugar cookies for Grandma Shoemaker.

My son got in his first "wrestling" match with his cousin, and I ran for the camera! Oops.

Noah loves rocking in the kid-size rocker at Grandma and Grandpa Shoemaker's house.

The neighborhood Santa came by for a present, but Noah clung tightly to Daddy. After Santa was halfway down the street, Noah finally said "Bye!"

Playing with the present from neighborhood Santa.

One of Noah's favorite activities is to climb off and on the couch (he just needs a little help to climb on some of our couches--others he can do on his own). He loves putting his hands behind his head and "sitting like Daddy".

Noah thought one of Mommy's Christmas presents was a perfect jungle gym....

"Boo!"

But Mommy likes it much better as a toy organizer!

Singing songs at the Christmas Eve service. Noah loved dancing to the music. A little boy in front of us entertained Noah by showing him how to work an iPhone. His parents probably weren't entirely thrilled with him handing over their phone to complete strangers...but Noah enjoyed it!

Daniel and I both worked all week the week of Christmas except for Christmas Day so we didn't get to do any traveling. It was the first Christmas we've spent on our own--not at a parent's house. It was quiet, but it was nice to start our own traditions. (We do hope that Noah won't choose to start a tradition of the Christmas Eve he gave us---he got sick 5 times in two and a half hours through the night. Thankfully he chose to sleep in a little Christmas Day to let us all make up some of the sleep we missed out on! After that, he was fine! We're thankful it was short lived!)

Noah (or was it actually Daniel??) got waffle blocks from Grandma Sampson for Christmas. He/they loved them!

Noah knew he wasn't allowed to touch the tree...when we told him to get presents he stuck his bum way up in the air when bending over and trying to reach under the tree without touching it. It was adorable. And hilarious. And maybe we made him get all the presents just so we could laugh at him doing it over and over again....maybe.

The weekend after Christmas and before New Year's we drove to Pennsylvania to see Daniel's family. About an hour before we left St. Louis it began to snow and continued to snow most of our drive. At a gas stop in Indianapolis, the snowflakes were huge. We took Noah out of his carseat to experience it--he didn't know what to think! The flakes scared him at first and he tried to back away as they were flying into his face, but once he realized they wouldn't hurt him he laughed and squealed--I guess he liked it!

Noah was a fantastic traveler--we couldn't have asked him to be better. He didn't sleep nearly as much as I thought he would, considering we drove through the night, but he was happy and talkative when he was awake, which made for a great trip. My favorite memories from the drive: I had handed Noah his sippy cup and was turned around halfway in my seat to wait for him to hand it back. He took a sip before bringing the cup down from his lips, looking me in the eyes, and saying, "Hii-iii", in a "what are you looking at me for?" tone. Hard to type into a story, but it cracked me up. A while later, Noah started fussing just a little bit as he was trying to fall to sleep. I handed him a pacifier (which I have an incredible desire to break him of, but it just works so well to calm him down when needed that I can't bring myself to do it!) which he popped in his mouth and sucked on a few times. He then took it out and said, "Ahhhh!" Oh, Noah. You do make me smile. :)