Catching up on Orson, Thanksgiving and Life :)

So, I owe everyone quite the catch up...we've had Thanksgiving, Birthdays, snow, Christmas decorating and general fun since the last time I posted.  

Orson is currently into putting words together into sentences, snorting (when he laughs, when he says Hi, all the time), riding his "Good to Go," colors (coloring) and as usual, trains.  He now says "Bless you" instead of just bless when we sneeze, fart, cough, make a strange noise he doesn't recognize.  He must be working on his back molars because he has started trying to bight again and he is into pushing as many boundaries as possible, just to see what happens. 

Now for a whole bunch of pictures:

 We took our first big drive since the accident to Portland for Thanksgiving this year.  The pass was covered in snow and ice and the snow fall was some of the biggest I have seen since leaving the North East.  We went slow and steady and everything went well.

 Apparently having a hybrid engine means our car never really got warm enough to melt the ice forming on us...we got lots of strange looks from people driving by us (which really freaked us out until we saw this).

Little man spent many hours in the car over the week and got most of his naps in it as well.  We drove in lots of circles to aid in the sleep, since he refused to nap most of the days we were in Oregon.

 He was really into three things at Grandma's house:

the goats

his cousin Romie

and "his" car

 At Grandpa's we spent a lot of time hanging out and having fun.  He also discovered what ice was...rocks didn't quite do what he expected :)

 We took an afternoon to visit the Portland Children's Museum...Orson loved it.  He was really excited to get to run around and see other kids his age.  He sure misses his friends when we go away.

 Playing with clay and driving the ambulance

 Music time

And the awesome dig pit made out of recycled tires (I think this was his favorite) but

the water room came in a close second.

 Bob lives in NW Portland, so Orson and I got to ride the train a lot and even more exciting (well for me) every restaurant we went to had GF options.  My favorite was the night we snuck out after O went to bed and had dessert at Papa Hayden's!

 Then we headed back home, enjoying more snow :)

 In the above picture you can see the door hanger I made for Orson so he could have access to his toys on the drive, he loved it and it is still working really well.

 By the Monday after we got home, Orson had a hankerin' for more trains, so we headed out to the train museum.  He got on the train that sways and climbed straight into a seat so we could go see Grandpa Jones.....

 Lu came over Tuesday night (Matt watched them both while I was at Orchestra) and you would have thought they hadn't seen each other in years!  When she came back on Thursday it was rainy outside, so we set up a tent and had fun in doors.

 We also went to Art Beast for the first time in a long time....Orson is finally the right age.  He loved painting, coloring, making a bird feeder, playing with the instruments and in the kitchen.

 And we also have put up the Christmas decorations.  I taught Orson how to lay under the tree to see the lights.  He prefers sitting in the window seal behind it and seeing it reflect into the glass.

 He is in love with baby Jesus and I constantly find him trying to hind him all over the house :)

 Last but not least, we went to Penny's birthday party over the weekend (boy have we been busy).  The theme was coloring and its hard to tell who enjoyed it more, Matt or Orson.

 Penny got a trike for her birthday and all the kids loved it.  It has a back step, so two could play at once!

Orson pooping a balloon :)  Can you tell Mat was in charge of pictures?

I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving.  We are off to Houston for Christmas with my family!  I cannot wait.