Christmas Day

Opening presents from Santa....Michael opened most of Sofia's for her...she seemed to enjoy watching him do it though!!! Michael was so excited when he woke up and realized Santa had come....he promptly woke all us and was ready to open presents!!!

Sofia loves her pacifer....watch and see!!!


One of Michael's favorite gifts was his Polar Express Train!!!



Testing out his new train!!



Christmas is always a day of incredible amounts of food at the Lupoli house!!!! You have to wear your stretchy pants to make it through the day!!!! Below is just an example of one of the many antipasti plates that was part of the first course (unless you count the appetizers before we sat the table as the first course). The food just kept coming out!!!


The boys always love to pose for a picture with their cigars :)

We finished out the evening (after of course coffee and many choices of desserts) with some games of wii bowling, boxing, and baseball.....it was pretty fun watching most of the family play for the first time!!

Here are a couple more pictures of my cuties.....Sofia with her new Cabbage Patch kid and Michael got to open up a tool bench set when we got home to Kansas.

My cuties on Christmas Eve

I love that Sofia is strong enough now to sit up on her own without falling over!!! It makes picture taking so much more fun!!!

Visit to Princess

We took the kids to visit my sister-in-law's horse Princess...she has had Princess for about 20 years!! Michael was a bit nervous and didn't want to sit on her back or touch her face, but Sofia was brave enough to touch her face and we put her up on her back. It made me think more about possibly doing what is called "hippotherapy" with Sofia as she gets older....it is therapy on horseback to work on balance. Michael got a bit braver and was willing to help with some horse chores :)

St Augustine

We spent a cold afternoon/evening in St. Augustine....it was hot just the day before!!! Crazy North Florida winter weather!! In all our past visits to St. Augustine we never went to the lighthouse...I think Tom was hoping to see a ghost!!! Then we made our usual trip to St. George Street and ate at the Columbia...this is when Sofia surprised us for the first time with how great she did sitting up in the restaurant highchair for well over an hour!!!

Lighthouse

At the top

Checking out an old fashion cannon

It was cold!!!

Sofia & Michael

I just had to post this oh so cute picture of Sofia on her daddy's lap!!!!!!! I love this picture of her!!


Grandpop put up his Christmas train and village again this year and Michael loved it!! He learned how to operate it it and would spend a good couple of hours playing with it at a time!!! We have a video as well:

Disney World

One of the first events on our Christmas vacation to Florida was to visit Magic Kingdom....we went on Saturday, Dec 18th....and it was a hot day and very crowded!!! We knew it would be pretty crowded, but didn't think it would be so hot! Sofia held up really well considering how hot is was...she always tended to not tolerate the heat well. She was a little unsure of the rides we went on, but she seemed to take it all in without any tears!! Michael did great!!! Even with the long lines. He was pretty quiet when we were on the ride, but seem excited about them afterwards. He wasn't into visiting any of the characters. I think his favorite areas were the ones where he got to explore and run more. He does now claim that Cinderella's castle is King Michael's castle!!

I'm in Disney World!!

Sleepy Sofia waiting for Peter Pan ride with Grandpop

Playing in ToonTown

Swiss Family Robinson Treehouse

Waiting to ride on Dumbo

King Michael's Castle (i.e. Cinderella's Castle)

Happy New Year

We've been back from Florida now for almost a week....the kids and I brought colds back to Kansas...lots of snotty noses :)

We had a great time in Florida and I have lots of pictures to post...so I am going to go divide them up into a few posts.

Sofia adjusted very well during the trip...it was nice to see her so interactive with everyone...we also learned she does great sitting up in a restaurant highchair without her high chair cover...she loved it and was constantly trying to pull stuff off the table....we didn't expect that and when we at at the Columbia in St Augustine, if a matter of seconds she had Tom's bread plate and it went flying on the floor!!! The waitress may not have liked it, but we loved it!!!

Keep reading the above posts!!!

Natalie