Party at the Daycare!

I almost forgot to mention that on top of all this he had already had a party at the daycare in the morning. Nonny took him there and told us it was fun. He even got a present from the daycare, a toy for in the bath tub. He still loves taking baths, so I have no doubt that it will be a toy that gets lots of use... At the daycare they also made him a hat. He is wearing it in this picture while kissing Elmo, yet another toy!

On the hat it says "Tobias 1 jaar! Hoera!" (I guess no translation is needed here, but just to be sure: "Tobias 1 year! Hurray!")

Lots of Gifts...

I wonder if I was as spoiled as Tobias. Probably not, because I was only the oldest grandson on one side of the family... Tobias has two sets spoiling him to death...

As you can see in this picture I must have put a lot emphasis on the fact that Tobias seems to like music. I can tell that he does, but, well, he can only play one instrument at a time...

Here he is playing a trumpet but as you can see he also got a xylophone. Other gifts included a duck on a stick (head visible in left of picture), a pop-up toy (from mommy and daddy, the thing by his right foot), a bear shaped chair (the blue thing in the left bottom of the picture) and a play table with two chairs (one chair partly visible in picture). There were more gifts but they are not in this picture and I don't want to bore you with all of them. I guess you get the idea by now, he got lots of gifts.

However, he is not much of an unwrapper. I think he likes the unwrapping but not necessarily doing it... he likes to watch though. I also think he equally likes the wrapping paper and the toy inside it...

Anyway, we thought we had a rather sizeable toy box for him, but with all these new toys... it is (almost) too small already! Tobias has a lot of playing to do :-)

Happy Birthday!

I can hardly believe it is already a week ago that it was Tobias' birthday, let alone that Tobias is now one year old! I know I am a little behind with posting pictures, especially after such a big event, but, ah well, always the same excuse, busy busy busy. Also I wanted to wait for all the pictures to be in my posession because Tobias' birthday was registered by multiple cameras...

I actually have been kind of busy... We had Lisa's mother over for a visit. She came over especially for Tobias' first birthday. I enjoyed that so much and we are so happy and grateful that she did that just for us... well, actually just for Tobias I guess... or maybe a little for herself too, because I am pretty sure she enjoyed it too... Anyway, I had to work so when I came home at night I did not exactly think about posting pictures but more about enjoying the scarce time that we have with Lisa's mom. On top of that I was sick for two days last week, and of all days to be sick, one of them was Tobias' birthday. By the time we celebrated I was feeling a little better though (thanks to a rather generous dose of advil...).

We invited a close group of friends over, some of whom cancelled. Then we invited my parents and my brother and of course Lisa's mom was there. Cake time was set for 18:00. We had a slight delay but just after six we lit the candle, popped open a bottle of champaign (for adults only :-)) and proposed a toast to Tobias, the now one year old Tobias. Tobias loves the word "Proost" combined with the clinking of glasses so he was looking around and laughing. Initially he seemed to be a little scared of the cake so he started sort of poking it. After a little bit of that I guess he took a liking to the cake because he put his pretty smile on and started to go at it with both hands! We cut him a piece and he ate it, or better yet, shoved it in his face and spilling it all over himself and the floor, with both hands. He had a lot of fun doing that and so did his audience... As you can see in this picture he had yet to touch the cake. Quite the family picture huh? 

I love Nonny!

Every good thing must come to an end. So did our vacation. We had such a good time, I think we all did! I guess I can keep this post short because the writing on Tobias' shirt just sums it all up... It says:

"It's Easy to Get to Grandma's, Jus' Hard to Leave!"




PS: Tobias has four teeth now. Here he is showing off two of them. Doesn't he have a cute smile?

Skinny Dipping

Nonny and Ganddad have a pool in the yard. Since it was sunny and warm (for Dutch measures anyway) throughout the vacation, we used it quite a lot. The pool itself was a little cold, but the spa was perfect. So we (me, my brother and my dad (oh, and one day even my mom)) would go into the pool, get really cold and then jump in the spa to warm back up.

The spa was so nice and warm (and for a guy Tobias' size big enough) that Tobias went in there a few times as well. As you can see in this picture he is thoroughly enjoying it! We even submerged him entirely a few times and he did not seem to mind that either. We forgot to bring his pants so he skinny dipped... I guess kids can get away with pretty much anything, right?

As for the adults? Well, notice the beer bottle in the background... Quite relaxing I can assure you, sitting in the spa sipping beer in the Texas sun! 

My Favorite Gift...

Tobias got so many gifts, so I guess it is hard to decide which one really is his favorite, especially for him... I just know that he loved this one. We would push him around the house and he would laugh. He even made some attempts to sort of use his feet while riding.

Anyway, as you can see this gift has a drawback too, for the parents. Once Tobias was on it he would be laughing..... while in motion. As soon as we stopped he would start to cry. Also once we got him started and we would stop and take him of he would cry and try to get back on, in other words, he would not stop! So, we spent quite some time wheeling him around. My back can't wait until he can self propel by using his feet. 

Christmas in the US

Well, it has been a while since I posted to Tobias' blog. That is because we were in the US for the holidays. We had a good time and Tobias had some pretty good experiences, starting with flying! He was such a good boy! Even though we asked for child friendly seats we did not get them so Tobias had to be on our lap the whole trip. He did not make a fuss about it and just dealt with it. He even slept for a little while. He did not start crying until the plane landed.... I guess he just could not get enough of it :-). Once in Dickinson, it took a few days before he was used to the time change, but then again, that was no different for mommy and daddy.

This trip was very special in many ways. One of the main reasons is the fact that everybody was there. Opa and Oma from the Netherlands and Uncle Ferdinand also came over! So the family was all together. It was a house full, but it made it very special. I doubt Tobias will remember, but I know that we will.

While in the US Tobias got quite some books. The one he is reading here with Oma is actually not a Christmas gift, because as you can see in the background the gifts are still unwrapped. There are a couple of things to notice in this picture. Like I said, the gifts are still wrapped. If you focus on the gifts you see some rather large ones there.... well, those are Tobias'. Next, the tree. First of all it is something that is supposed to be in a Christmas picture. Second of all (although you cannot see that in this picture) there is an ornament on there especially for Tobias. It says "baby's first Christmas" on there and then Tobias' name and his date of birth. Well, they misspelled his name: "Tobias Queen" instead of "Tobias Quinn". This gave us quite a laugh actually... Finally notice the stockings in the background.... Isn't the small one cute?

So, all in all I thought this picture to be quite the Christmas picture, and it was taken on Christmas day as well. Hence this picture in this post...