My Son

December 4th 2006. This is my favorite picture from the day we met Nathanael. It was one of his few smiles, and in the months that followed, crying far out-numbered smiles, but this special smile was caught on film, to be remembered always!

I Can't Believe it's Been a Year!

Yesterday, December 4th (above) marked one year since the day we went to go meet Nathanael for the first time. We were so nervous and stressed. We questioned whether we were doing the right thing. It was scary. Then we met him, and he was so small and sickly, with a horrible chest cold. It made us even more scared! So much has changed in a year! I can't imagine life or our family without him. Thank you little Nate for joining our family. Thankyou for one exciting year of milestones, ups and downs, and cute little kisses. I even forgive you for learning to say "Amma" (Grandma) before learning to say Mommy!
Missie and her brand new brother, Nathaniel.

Snow Wonderful Snow!

The kids are having so much fun playing in the backyard. It just reminds me of how glad we are to have moved out of the apartment. When we lived in the apartment we never went to go play outside. As soon as there was snow on the ground, within a day it was covered in dog droppings. It was horrible, and in the summer it was even worse, because you couldn't see it as well, and it didn't freeze. People can be so disgusting! Now, with our fenced-in backyard, we know the kids can play poop-free! It's awesome!

Great Minds....

Micah (5), Michaela (4), and Elizabeth (3). 300km apart, and still so much alike! And amazingly, they were all a different Ninja turtle. When I saw that picture on my Mom's blog, I had to steal it to put them all together. If Halloween had been on the weekend instead of a Wed. we might have done Halloween all together. Now that would have made for a cool picture! (and Nate could have been the 4th turtle!)

Happy Halloween

Michaela decided to go with a cyclops pumpkin this year.
Michaela went as Michaelangelo, the teenage mutant ninja turtle, and Nathanael wore Michaela's old Bumblebee costume. They both went out and had a great time.

Painting up a Storm!

My little Picassos. Although Nathanael was more interested in eating the paint and tearing the paper, Michaela has begun to produce real works of art.

The Beautiful Wedding

The Neufelds!
Michaela was so excited to see her first wedding!
Exchanging vows

What a Pair!

Sorry to the vegetarians out there, but Dad and Michaela like to fish, and eat fish. I just love this picture.

A Touch of Creativity

The cake I made for Cait and Sharons wedding (pictures to follow).
The painting I did of their house.

Micah!

Micah came for Michaela's Birthday party last weekend. The kids had a blast.

I Can't Believe She's 4!

Look at the pretty flowers!

Enjoying the Pool

One of the benefits of our new home, is a large swimming pool, complete with lifeguards and swimming lessons! Michaela has come so far with her swimming in the last few weeks thanks to daily lessons.

Spring

"P" IS for princess!

Happy Mother's Day

Another wonderful Mother's Day. Thank you Jonathan, Michaela and Nate for making me the happiest mother in the world!

Dance Michaela, Dance!

Michaela's first ballet show "Under the Sea" was a huge success. She made us "ooh" and "aaah", and made us roll in our seats laughing! Flowers from Grandma and Grandpa! She keeps them in her room now, and keeps asking to have another ballet show so that Grandpa will give her flowers again.

A Girl and her Spider

Michaela spotted this spider on her wall and was so happy to have it. She seemed to feel he came because he wanted to be friends with her. I agreed to catch it and put it in her bug jar, and after many squeals and shrieks (on my part) I did it! She held her bug jar with delight saying "my very first pet, it's my pet!" I wanted to remind her that we had bought her 2 gerbils, but she was just so happy! That was yesterday, and she still has that poor spider.

Unfortunately she also has the habit of standing on our balcony, talking (yelling) to everyone and anyone who will listen, even if that person is on a balcony 2 buildings away. Well, yesterday she stood out there all day yelling to people about all the bugs we have in our house, "We have so many bugs, mommy caught one, look at my bug, spiders eat bugs.....etc...." Sigh.

So far we've seen one fly and one spider, but to a 3 years old that amounts to lots of bugs.....





I'm so embarrassed!

Because it's been a while...

This was taken last night. Welcome Spring...We missed you!

Congrats!

Congrats guys on your new home and your new puppy. They're both great!

Welcome Beatrice

Our little boy isn't the only new member of the extended Neufeld family. Caitlin and Sharon have a new baby girl (pug) named Beatrice. This cute little bundle joy is so adorable. Can't wait to watch her grow into a lovable terror like her sister (just kidding, we love you Heidi!).

Classic Grandma and Grandpa's House

This is a Stick!

Here are Jon and Michaela enjoying the beautiful weather at Mom and Dad's. The lake still isn't frozen so no luck skating this time.

Christmas!!!!!

This is before:




















And now this is what happened:


(Please excuse the resolution but I wanted to fit a bunch of stuff for people to see.)

Please note that there's a section of the video dedicated to Josh, Heather and Jamie's gift. Michaela spontaneously said "thank you" without even knowing what was inside yet.

Some other highlights include:

- Michaela's astute understanding of where presents actually come from
- All of her "wows" and "ooohs" and "aaahs"
- Her saying "Merry Christmas guys!"
- The sheer excitement displayed at receiving a gift of scissors. I realize now that this would have been the ideal year to get her socks.

Bethel's Christmas Eve Service

Michaela participated in her first Christmas Church service.



Now keep in mind, she is the youngest person up there by two years...

Michaela Playing Computer Games

Last Christmas, Rick and Donna gave Michaela a bunch of computer games. Unfortunately they wouldn't work very well with WinXP but on the laptop they worked very well.

Here's a pic and a clip of Michaela playing the "I Spy Junior" game where she gets to put objects into the right categories.

Decorating the Tree

Michaela's first job was to hang the much anticipated candy canes on the tree....
As proud as she was of her placement skills, the rest of the tree was left pretty bare!

This is just a cool picture of Michaela playing in a grove of old (Spruce?) trees.

Family Fun

A Hunting We will Go

We went on Sunday to cut down our Christmas tree. We went with Rick, Donna, Matthew, Sean and Stephanie. While we were walking from the car to the place, we passed some people leaving with their tree all wrapped up in netting, carrying it on their shoulders. Michaela was very excited and cried out, "Look, Look! They caught one!"

Here we are finally choosing our tree to "Catch". It's the one on the left.

Michaela's Big Girl Room

Michaela just graduated from a toddler bed to a "big girl bed". She also moved into her toy room, wich now serves as her bedroom as well. She's adjusting to these changes (and others) very well, and we're very proud of her.

First Snowfall of the Year

Michaela had her first opportunity to play in the snow this winter. Fun was had by all.

We've also got a video of it here!

America's Funniest Home Videos

Here's a clip of Michaela watching a clip of "America's Funniest Home Videos" cats:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nMiaj3UcyI8&mode=related&search=

It's definitely worth the 1min, 35sec:

Movie Night

Friday is again movie night. Lately, Michaela has been attached to the "Wizard of Oz" or as she calls it: "The Lizard of Oz".

She has recently only accepted being referred to as "Darcey" (Dorothy), while Daddy is the "Lion", Carrie (Massey) is the "Tin-Man" and Mommy is the "Scare-Crow".

We keep asking her who Toto is, but she adamant that "Toto" is "Toto".