Warner enjoyed walking through the snow ...
Sledding (our backyard is perfect for sledding with little kids - it's just the right size of hill) ...
Making snow angels on the driveway ...
And playing on the deck.
I bundled up Maren and moved her jumpy horse to the garage so Warner and I could play this morning. She did great for about 20 minutes and then wanted in on the snow action, so I carried her around with me after that. 
Yay for snow days!
My mom made these headbands and detachable hair bows for Maren and I'm all about them. In fact, I've made a few more bows myself and am having a hard time finding a reason to not have a matching bow for every outfit she owns. 
Here's another bow and a pair of shoes. They're just from Target but they are oh so adorable. I don't think Warner had a pair of shoes until he could walk but for some reason I believe Maren needs multiple pairs.
My mom got Maren this outfit for Christmas. Seriously? The cutest ever. She wore it to church Sunday and was the cutest girl in the nursery for sure (I'm biased, but really, wouldn't you agree?). Thankfully both of Maren's grandmothers are generous and have bought her many clothes. Otherwise I'd need to go back to work to afford this dressing-my-girl habit.
Maren is now five months old, which is the age Warner was when we first fed him cereal. Keeping with the same pattern, Maren had her first taste of "solid" food a few days ago. Why rice cereal is considered solid is still a mystery to me.
Warner was in Maren's face the entire time we fed her (no surprise). Here he is giving her a pep talk before her first bite.
The first spoonful. She wasn't very excited about it.
She did better for Kevin, but not much.
We found that when she holds the spoon herself it goes down a bit easier. I'm afraid Maren isn't going to be the eater that Warner is, but we'll give it some time.
Abby and Ashley got microphones from Nanny and Grandaddy and all three kids performed for us Friday night. Warner had so much fun playing with his cousins.
Warner's favorite gifts were probably his new vacuum from Nanny and Grandaddy (it actually picks things up with the attachments so I'm pretty pumped about this one too) ...
... and his new Nerf gun from Aunt Leslie and Uncle Bill.
He can't operate the gun by himself yet which is probably a good thing because it has quite a bit of power for being so small. So now our son has a gun. What have we gotten ourselves into?
We tried for a family picture but Warner didn't cooperate so Maren gets the spotlight in this one. I guess one child out of two isn't bad.
The boys hard at work assembling the train tracks.
Maren with Grandpa and Grammy on Christmas Eve.
Warner loved opening gifts this year. In fact, I think he opened the majority of the gifts, regardless of whether or not they were for him.
This is what Santa brought Christmas morning. 
Warner's three "big" gifts from Santa were Elmo, a workbench, and a toy tractor. I'm afraid Elmo is his favorite, and am beginning to wish Santa didn't bring him. He talks a LOT.
Warner also loved the small gifts in his stocking.
Kevin and I are old and boring and exchange mostly practical gifts. Example: a microwave food cover (or hat, if you're Kevin).
We spent Christmas night in Muncie with my mom's family. This is the traditional eggnog picture. My grandpa makes the most incredible homemade eggnog on the planet. I look forward to it every year.
Apparently Maren enjoyed it too. We travel to Somerset this weekend to celebrate Christmas with Kevin's immediate family. I'll post more pictures soon. In the meantime, Merry Christmas!
He was pretty excited to lick the sugar off himself after we took a few pictures. 
Abby and Ashley worked hard to make their cookies look just right.
Warner did a little bit of decorating and a lot of eating.
After we made the cookies we bundled up the kids and headed outside. I bought snow pants for Warner the night before at Target and I'm pretty confident they were the last pair available in northern Kentucky. Everyone was out of snow pants! Hence, the hideous, orange plaid, size 4T pants my poor child is wearing.
I hope Warner will forgive me one day. (If you look closely you can see that I even had to roll the pants to fit.)
The clothes didn't slow him down - Abby and Ashley quickly taught Warner how to make and throw snowballs. For whatever reason, Aunt Leslie was his favorite target:
He also insisted that Leslie pull him in the sled instead of me.
Abby enjoyed rolling down our hill ...
And taught Warner how to do that, too.
He enjoyed the rolling so much he didn't even stop at the driveway. He'd just keep rolling right across the bare concrete. Apparently snow isn't necessary for rolling.
Ashley and Abby made this snowman. Unfortunately Warner destroyed it soon after this picture was taken. Thankfully they didn't seem to mind.
After playing in the snow we came back inside for lunch and hot chocolate. Leslie texted me on the way home to tell me the girls said they had "the funnest day ever". My thoughts exactly.
Thankfully he woke up in a decent mood and was good the rest of the evening. It took nearly 15 minutes to get both kids bundled up - it was so cold that night. Poor Maren reminded me of Randy from the Christmas Story.
I'm not sure she could move due to the number of layers I had her in. She was impressively quiet the whole night, but looking back this may have been because she was frozen. I'm not sure. In any event, she survived our adventure.
The biggest hit of the evening was the train ("choo-choo") ride, with the carousel coming in a close second. I personally enjoyed the reindeer but Warner wasn't that impressed. Despite the cold we had a blast and I hope this becomes a family tradition for us each year.
Warner got a little aggressive with the couch jumping Tuesday and hurt his right foot. He has been jumping off the couch without pillows on the ground to break his fall. This time he landed funny and got an "otch" as he says (pronounced like "watch" without the "w"). After limping pretty severely for 24 hours I called the pediatrician, afraid something was broken. We spent the better part of Wednesday at the pediatrician and later at Children's getting x-rays but thankfully nothing is broken. They think it's just a hairline fracture in his big toe. 
The doctor told me to tape his first and second toes together for 2-3 weeks until it heals. This was a novelty yesterday and went quite well, but today the newness wore off and he wasn't as cooperative. Hopefully he'll tolerate the tape until it's better.
Warner loves loves loves to help in the kitchen. Seeing as I love love love to cook (and eat), this generally works out well. I try to involve him in cooking as much as possible (depending on time and my level of patience that day). His favorite thing to say is "Me! Me!" - as in, "let ME do it!" - but this is not limited to the kitchen. He wants to do everything himself these days. Oh, what fun to have a two year old.
I was so excited to find this apron at www.theapronplace.com for $12. Warner picked out the colors for the apron and embroidery. Hopefully it will save me some time in the laundry room ... but at the very least, it's incredibly cute.
Here I am with my girls from college - Katie (left) and Erin (the bride, middle). Katie, Maren and I stayed together at Erin's house and so enjoyed our girl time together. It even included a two-hour conversation over coffee at Panera Saturday morning. Divine. 
It was a gorgeous setting - a winery in the mountains - and Erin was a gorgeous bride. 
Maren pulled off the leopard print look quite well, I must say. We drove back Sunday, and got back to Warner and Kevin around 6pm. They had quite the boys weekend together (I'm not sure I want all the details) but I'm happy we're all under one roof again.
