Monkeying Around

Forts are awesome. Dad can sleep while
Ira plays

Ira had a little trouble sharing with a friend we were
babysitting, until he realized there was enough to go around.

Getting creative with the snow.

I hope no one saw me eat that yellow snow...

Dad trying to imitate Ira's camera smile

Exploring music has been fun, I wish we lived near my sister
Tiffany so she could teach him.

Let the holiday traditions begin

Christmas Eve has arrived! I'm actually a little disappointed in myself, I really didn't have Christmas on my mind much until yesterday. For those who don't know, we finally heard the 4th and last rotation for the program I'm in will be in Danbury, Connecticut. We will move the first week of February.  With such a short timeline the last few weeks and days have been full of distractions and the sudden urge to make sure things wrap up smoothly with this rotation. It wasn't until yesterday I realized how unprepared I was for the Christmas. I shamefully admit I was one of those people running frantically through stores picking up 'last minute' gifts yesterday. One would hope I had made more progress since my teenage years when my brothers and I would go Christmas shopping on Christmas Eve; one day is all the progress I can report.

Luckily, we are staying in Michigan for both Christmas and New Years. We will be starting our own family traditions as this will be our first Christmas with a child, away from family. We kicked things off today with a Christmas Eve Aebelskiver brunch. You may remember me mentioning my family making them for Christmas in an earlier post. We received the strange and ever so helpful Aebelskiver pan as a gift this year and couldn't wait to put it to use. You can find the recipe I use here. What are some of your favorite holiday food traditions?

He really liked them, despite his the disgust on his face.  It's really just his camera smile.

We wrapped presents and braved putting them under the tree today. Ira has been good about not playing with them. He can feel the excitement in the air, and loves all the sugary things to eat. He's been pretty cute and funny the last couple of days. What would a family post be without some highlights of him.

He loves helping out in the kitchen. He insists, "No, I do it"

You can't let those beaters go un-licked!

He likes all the shiny and glittery ornaments everywhere. We decided to do some Christmas Art with some old glitter glue we had lying around.

The Ira in boots picture of the day. He's still obsessed with them. Since he can put them on himself you never know when he will come around the corner and be wearing them.

We wish you all a Merry Christmas!

Minnesota Acculturation

We are starting to feel settled in our new place in Minnesota and have begun the acculturation process. I have to honestly say I'd never imagined living in the North Central United States before and have met very few people who have been from the area. I now know why, very few people seem to leave. The community is great here and the culture distinct.

We will post on some of the interesting insights we have while we're here, but this weekend gave us a wealth of wonderful exposure to the way of Minnesotans. My work opted for a 'Winter Extravaganza' event in place of the usually summer picnic, clue #1 that people up here enjoy doing things a little differently. The event took place on (literally) a lake out in the suburbs of Minneapolis.

 Nothing like some good old ice bowling! 

They had an ice fishing tent, complete with a wet bar for the adults. Needless to say no one caught anything all night, but we at least got to try ice fishing... 

 They had fires set up so we could roast some mallows eat s'mores. 

 Ira liked the lemonade they served at dinner.

They also had a DJ so all the kids could get their wiggles out.

We went on a 'sleigh' ride pulled by horses, but didn't get any pictures. Some other activities we didn't play because it was getting too late and cold for Ira, included hockey, ice golf, ice bocce ball, and 'couching' (They put skis on the bottom of a couch and towed it behind a jeep on the lake).

To clear the confusion of our move to Minnesota six months after moving to Connecticut, I'll provided a brief update on why we're in Minnesota. I'm in a two year program that for the sake of explanation works like a two year Mormon mission. Within GE Capital (The 'mission') I move (get 'transfered') every 6 months to a new assignment ('area'). With each new assignment, there is the possibility of moving to a new City or State. The purpose is to give the people in the program a wide breadth of experience on different types of projects filling a diverse range of roles as well as expose them to different parts of the business so they understand the 'big picture' of how the business works. My first assignment was in Connecticut (where a large majority of the assignments are for GE Capital). My second assignment is in Minnesota. In six months I will get my Third assignment, which will probably be back in Connecticut, so we will move again.

Winter Wonderland

Before we left Connecticut was getting more snow than usual. It felt like we had a major snow storm every week. The schools haven't had a full week of school since they got out for Christmas break. I took the train to work the other day and ended up coming home early because no one was in the office and work was slow as I wrapped up my 1st rotation work.
I snapped some pictures on my way home. Quantity wise, it really wasn't that much snow compared to what I grew up with in Park City, UT; however, the city doesn't know where to put the snow or how to plow it and people don't know how to drive in it  so it just makes for a bad situation. We also were getting a lot more 'ice' storms with the temperature oscillating between freezing and not freezing.

Enjoy the pictures.

 Messy Intersection at the train station

 Snow piled High

 Downtown Danbury

 Getting away from the main street the snow paths get a little more interesting

 They really need to learn how to use their plows more effectively, sometimes I can hardly tell the streets have been plowed.

 Getting closer to home, I'm the one making fresh tracks through the snow.

 Our house, new car, and the moving van waiting to be loaded. Who moves to Minnesota in the middle of the winter?

It's Snow Time

Connecticut got a nice big snow storm this week. There was a travel ban until they were able to clear the roads so I was working from home. It was difficult to get anything meaningful done because so many people were trying to sign into the network they ran out of connections. I got a good workout moving the snow around, I am now a qualified 'Snow Relocation Engineer'.

We took Ira out for his first play in the snow....

As you can see, it didn't last very long. We are going to have to warm him up to the idea of being cold and playing in the snow.