Sledding!

Upon arriving home from our Christmas vacation, we discovered about 2 feet of snow on the ground here.  We have been waiting for snow in order to take Will sledding.  We have an awesome sledding hill in the back of our house...I mean PERFECT for sledding!  So, we took Will out to sled.  It was lots of fun for both him and us.  He would grin and giggle the whole way down, as did we.  Great fun for sure.

Will was all bundled.  He stayed warm and dry, but he was a bit like a little turtle when he fell on his back. :)

Daddy and Will getting ready to sled down the hill.

Daddy rigging Will up on the sled.  After we went down a few times each with him, we let him go down by himself and he loved it!  Of course we put him on a lower part of the hill, so it wasn't quite as fast or as far as we went with him.

Will and mama sledding.

Will sledding like a big boy on his own.

Happy Trails

Over Christmas we visited Carl's family in Arizona.  We had a fun time, and Will was able to meet many relatives he had not met before.  One day we went out on a family trail walk and let Will explore a bit on his own walking on the way back.  This is pretty pic heavy...I couldn't decide which ones to put up.  :)

The lighting is poor, but I love the picture of these two.

Daddy and Will trekking together.

Will loves to give high-fives when he accomplishes something.

This boy LOVES the outdoors!

This was quite a feat...climbing this hill on his own.

Will made it up that hill!  : )

Will didn't fight being put back in the carrier after his time of exploring...he fell asleep shortly after AND took a long nap when we got home.  All that exploring was hard work!

Daddy carrying his precious cargo back to the car.

Pops and Deedee's Visit

Over Thanksgiving Carl's parents visited.  It was wonderful to have them visit, though unfortunately for them they were sick over the actual Thanksgiving holiday.  Fortunately for us, we never became sick.  Despite the illness, we were still able to have a nice family visit and Will enjoyed seeing his Pops and Deedee.  Here are a few pictures from the visit.  :)

Deedee and Will playing.

While they were here we celebrated Christmas as well.  Here's Will on the rocking horse Pops made for him by hand.  Pretty great craftsmanship, isn't it? 

On his way to becoming a real cowboy. ; )

At MIT in front of Carl's building.

Pops and Will hanging out in Daddy's study office.

A Day in the Life of Will

Will is a very active boy, always doing or into something.  :)  He is so much fun, I just wanted to share a few videos of when I was actually able to "catch" him doing something.  So here's some activities in the day of the life of Will...

Sometimes he dances...

Recently he has discovered this toe-tapping type dance and circle spinning.  Definitely takes some coordination and concentration.  :)

Sometimes he tells very ANIMATED stories...(sorry about video quality...I was trying to keep Will from seeing the camera)

And sometimes he just sits in his chair to play quietly...(please excuse the loud background noise--the window was open and they were leaf blowing outside)

No matter what he does, a day in the life of Will is always an adventure!  :)

Playing Outside

Will LOVES to play outside, no matter the weather!  This past week it grew especially cold here, so we had to bundle up.  Is it just me or are children impervious to the cold?  Here are a few pics of Will playing in the cold.  :)

All bundled up and ready to play!

Will LOVES little plastic houses like this one.  He will play and play and play in them.  Here Daddy is playing peek-a-boo through the window. 

Canada

I was just looking through our posts for some pictures and realized I never posted any from our trip to Canada.  In August we went visited Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island with my grandparents, who were already in Canada.  I have always wanted to visit Nova Scotia and since we live so close we thought we'd go now, since we can drive, as it is likely we'll never go again.  We camped and had a wonderful visit with Will's great-grandparents on his first trip out of the country. :)  FYI, this is picture heavy.  :)

Will thought he could climb up the tent.  This was before he could walk.

Carl and Grandpa chatting at the campsite, which was still in the processes of being set up.

Will thought it necessary to ensure that rocks in Canada taste the same as rocks in the U.S.

Nova Scotia has some of the highest tides in the world, and you can watch them come in.  Here's Grandma in front of where we watched the tide come in...you see behind her there's almost no water.

The tide is starting to come in behind us.

The tide is in.

Ferry to Prince Edward Island.

Campground on Prince Edward Island.

Prince Edward Island.

We were amazed that they could farm all the way up to the salt water on Prince Edward Island.

Playtime

I've been unsuccessfully trying to get video of Will chattering.  It's very hard to get video of him w/out him noticing the camera.  He's pretty observant.  I'll continue to try, but in the meantime here are some recent pictures and videos of Will playing.  :)

Obviously not Will's best picture, but it's the clearest.  He decided that he needed to pull one of the storage tubs off his toy rack (on the left side of the pic) and sit in it.  That spoon is one of his favorite "toys".

He started anticipating the flash... :)

Still getting ready for that flash...

Here's Will playing w/his toy microwave.  He's not really chattering so much as just making noise.  :)

Here's Will sitting in his favorite chair.  He was "reading" his book, until he saw the camera.  You can tell by his faces that he again, seeing the camera, starts to anticipate the flash that never comes.  So funny.  Silly boy.

Last one.  Will playing peek-a-boo for a second.  He quits pretty quickly after seeing the camera.