2.

On Wednesday our guy turned 2.




Henry and I had come to Arizona the day before, so we held a small birthday party for him on Wednesday night at my parents' house with Bill, Alyson, Syd, Mia, and Kennie. The party featured loads and loads of balloons (with only a few mild injuries sustained while blowing them up), Henry's favorite Christmas album by Bela' Fleck and the Flecktones, a Frosty the Snowman cake, and a special guest appearance by Dad via Face Time on our phones. Henry had a blast dancing and jumping around all the balloons with his cute cousins. The video doesn't do justice to how much fun he had that night -- the boy can dance -- but it's the best one we ended up with. Thanks to everyone for the well wishes on his big day.

Videos:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tfDfGM7DECs

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E7fE3eCP_hQ

thanksgiving in dallas

We tried to take some family pictures while we were in Dallas for Thanksgiving. Be serious. It was 35 minutes full of tears, wiping Henry's nose, feeding him marshmallows between shots, and shouts of, "Henry! Look! Truck!" and, "Henry! Look! Plane!" and, "Henry! Look! Cows!" Thanks to Grandma and Grandpa for being such good sports about it. Here are some of the winning shots. Really.

(check out Grandpa's shadow on the tree. Very artful. An instant classic.)

Mom, how did you ever manage to do a family picture every year with three kids and Charlie?

Hooray!

We put up our tree this week, and every morning when Henry wakes up he runs out to see it glowing in the living room, jumps for JOY, and shouts, "Hooray!" (Thanks to Daddy for turning on the tree lights each morning, before heading to work, before the world is awake.)
It usually goes something like this, minus Dad, minus the sunlight.

SMK

The second half of our trip was spent in Arizona. We hit a beautiful patch of weather (even more beautiful than usual!) and spent lots of time at the park with Sydney, Mia, and Kendall, the three of whom Henry now talks about all day, every day. The week went by too quickly, and we can't wait to spend Christmas break with them next month. Unfortunately I somehow didn't get a single picture of Henry and Sydney together. I think the only time I pulled my phone out for pictures was during her gymnastics class! We love you, Sydney.


Henry and Mia


Henry and Kendall


Video of Henry with Mia and Kennie

St. George

Our trip to visit Charlie, Cassie, and Jaynee in St. George was a blast. Some of our very best memories as a family involve visits to see Charlie and Cassie. We really love them, and I hope Jaynee's cheeks have healed from a week of me kissing them incessantly.
Jaynee and Henry are 5 months apart and they played together better than I had even imagined they would. It was so nice for Henry to have someone his size and age to play with, for once. They are so funny together; just a couple of little monkeys running around all day. We were especially sad that Josh had to miss out on our trip. Here are a couple of the moments of them playing together that I was able to catch on my phone.

• Ring Around the Rosie
• Riding Jaynee's Bicycle

How to kill time with your two-year-old during a flight delay at Phoenix Sky Harbor

(I can't believe we missed seeing S,M, &K for this)

happy halloween

Trunk-or-Treat

Dear Henry,
We never would have imagined that The Nightmare Before Christmas could possibly get any better.

We love you.

Apple Orchards

Puh-kiss & Gabbla

A few of Henry's favorite things as of late:

• Pumpkins. Pronounced, "PUH-kiss." I had nothing to do with this. Our son just has a great eye for Cucurbita Mixta. Must be genetic. (Okay, maybe I had a little something to do with it.)
  
• Yo Gabba Gabba ("Gabbla")
  
• Parks
  
• Slides ("Sauce")
  
• Trucks of all varieties (He does not discriminate)
• Talking about our family (Mamma, Daddy, and Numma/Babies), talking about parks, talking about pumpkins, talking about Gabbla, talking about his sucker (don't ask -- it's a work in progress), talking about books, talking about Opa, talking about relative temperatures, and talking about trucks. So far he's a talker.
• The letter W
  

We went to a pumpkin patch today with some friends. Here he is patiently waiting for the hayride to begin.

Schoene Reise!

September

Thank goodness you're here.

What's Gonna Work? TEAMWORK.

Post-park, pre-bath, Friday night entertainment.

parK.

Gotta Go!

This week Henry's favorite phrase is "Gotta Go!" His favorite time to say it is either when we are heading out the door, or when he is in the tub at night and he decides that his bath time should be over and begins to climb out. This morning he ran into the bathroom right as I stepped out of the shower and shouted, "Gotta Go!" and then turned around and sprinted out of the room. Perhaps it was a not-so-subtle hint that I was moving too slowly this morning. The past two months have been particularly busy for him with lots of moving around, lots of new things, and lots & lots of attention from some of his favorite people. With all of the traveling over the past weeks, we've been saying this to him more frequently than we had realized. I guess we need to start paying more attention to what we say around him. Also good would be to take more pictures of him. We apologize for the haircut in the top picture, but catching it on film did inspire us to buzz it all off for the summer.

With Opa in Mesa

With Grandma and a new, summertime haircut in Dallas

Cameron+Chelsea's Wedding

...that we missed.

Not a single American Airlines flight left Phoenix Sky Harbor Airport for Dallas on Friday and, with the time difference between Arizona and Texas, there wasn't a flight which would have left early enough on Saturday to make it in time for the actual wedding ceremony. So after a long day of waiting with hundreds of irritated passengers through flight delays and cancellations with our very hungry 18-month-old son (who was such a good sport), we finally threw in the towel and headed back to North Keesha where the goldfish crackers flow like wine.

We are beyond disappointed that we missed it -- especially after seeing Aunt Wendy's pictures of all the Thatcher grandchildren together, sans Henry. In an effort to keep the dream alive, here are some pictures of Henry dressed and ready for the wedding.

Our heartfelt congratulations to Cameron and Chelsea on their marriage. We love you guys.

Saturday at the Park

Happy 5th Birthday Sweet Mia

Valentine's Day

...in Arizona. With Uncle Bill's nice camera. Minus Chasey and Cabes.
(Henry hopes next time C&C are there. He felt a little overwhelmed.)

Kendall, Jaynee, Sydney, Henry, and Mia

Henry & his Oma

oh my josh!