christmas vacation

I can hardly believe Christmas has already come and gone! We spent Christmas up in Minnesota and had a great time, although it was a pretty quick trip as we flew in to Minneapolis Thursday morning, headed up to northern Minnesota Christmas Eve night and then flew back out of Minneapolis on Monday night! Ethan was quite the trooper through all the travels - taking his first flight, having to nap and sleep in new places, staying up way past his bed time, and getting passed around to all of the excited family members throughout the weekend. It was a whirlwind but totally worth it!

Here is Ethan on Thursday morning at about 5:30am all bundled up in his orange coat waiting for Uncle Russell to come and pick us up and bring us to the airport. He was in great spirits considering we had to wake him up 2-3 hours before he normally gets up!

Here we are at the airport. Pete and I thought we had a good plan by bringing the Baby Bjorn carrier with for me to carry Ethan in while we were in the airport. The problem was that I didn't put Ethan in the carrier until we got through security and by that time we only had a short walk to the gate! I had spent at least 45 minutes carrying my 20 pound child on my hip while also balancing a few carry ons while we waited to check in, drop off baggage and get through security. Live and learn - on our return flight we put Ethan in the Baby Bjorn right after we got out of the car!

Here we are waiting to board the plane!
We spent Christmas Eve with my mom's side of the family, hosted by cousin Janelle and cousin-in-law Andrew.

The Flannel Family Weseloh
Ethan with cousin Lainie.
Andrew's Grandma Maryann spent some time with Ethan too and even let him wear her Santa hat for a bit.
Papa and Ethan, sporting his brand new "J&L Auto Repair" hat from Lainie & Jeremy.
We headed up to my dad's house in northern Minnesota late Christmas Eve night.
On Christmas morning Ethan tried peas for the very first time while sitting on Grandpa Todd's lap.
We had fun opening up stocking presents.
Ethan got to enjoy a bath in Grandma & Grandpa's sink!
It was a very Merry Christmas!
On Monday morning before we left my dad's house for Minneapolis to fly home Ethan had another first - he rolled from his tummy to his back! I snapped this picture right after he did it - we were all pretty excited!
Once we got home we opened up the rest of our presents that we didn't want to have to bring on the plane.
And finally, we headed to Pete's parents house later in the week to have a meal and open up even more presents! These are just a few of the many "attempts" to try and get all 3 cousins together and looking at the camera for their first Christmas. Too cute!