A week or so ago Ella visited her friends Ethan and Carter's house. While Layla took a nap inside Ella borrowed some snow pants and headed outside to play. Ethan and Carter showed Ella their swings and slide. You should see how slippery a slide is when a child is wearing a snowsuit and it is slicked down with snow. Thanks to the Raucherts for letting us crash their Saturday.
Angie brought home a little plastic fish tank from her trip to Indiana. It fits inside a wood box with a whole in the side and looks like you are watching a TV. Earlier today Ella and I went shopping and picked out two goldfish, she picked the color of the gravel and the plant. She thought the gravel was candy and we were going to feed it to the fish. She named the little one Sarah and the bigger fish is Girl.
Nana, Papa, Ella and I were eating dinner tonight in Bay City. Halfway through dinner Nana and Papa started talking about how surprised they were about Layla following Ella around and wanting to play with the train that she was pulling around the house. Nana said that she peeked in on Layla when she woke up from her nap and she was almost pulling herself up in the crib. She couldn't quite make it ... until dinner time. All four of us look over and one foot at a time, Layla stood up! Too bad mommy, you will have to see it on the blog like the rest of the world. I hope your checking the blog from Indiana. Photo courtesy of Nana.
I think the cats are catching the napping fever like the rest of the Woods. You know how everyone in our house was born to sleep. Actually the only time that the cats get some peace and quiet from the three-year-old roaming our house is during her nap time. 
I am not sure what Ella's plan was, but I guess she was having a couch party with all the dolls she could find. These were only the dolls downstairs, there are just as many upstairs I am sure. Our house is getting a bit crowded. A kind note to everyone that reads this: neither of my daughters need anymore dolls. I know many of you can pick out a doll that was purchased by you, and we (I really mean Ella and Layla) love them dearly, we (and I mean mostly me) think there are enough dolls in the house.
December is always so busy that my dad's side of the family decided to have Christmas this past weekend. 
Lots of cheeks. Layers and layers of cheeks.
Ella playing cars with the Stothard boys.
Layla thought Grandma Wood's walker was the bomb.
Zane looks innocent enough, he was one mean ping pong player. It doesn't take much I know, but he could put a shot past me once in a while.
Ella and I turned off all the lights and sat on the couch watching the lightning and eating peanuts tonight. We decided to wake mommy up when Kristy called to let us know there was hail and wind shears heading in our direction. Don't worry it wasn't too strong as it blew by our house. When our TV went out Angie and Ella called Grammy and Papa to keep up on the weather updates and make sure we didn't need to head to the basement. The lightning was lighting up the whole yard, we could see all the way out to the pond.
Don't you find it amazing that patterns can be made with the lack or presence of something. These images were taken around our yard as the 50 degree temperature took it's toll on the winter landscape. My best guess to explain the patterns in the first picture is water that melted from snow and ice washed away other snow like a river as it flowes to a lower area of the yard. As I was making my way around the pond I flushed three partridge. I wandered over where they were hanging out and found their tracks weaving through the snow that was left.
Here is another photo from Christmas morning. Ella came downstairs to take a look at all the presents Santa left for her and Layla. More miraculous than the tree stuffed with presents was the emply plate that, only the night before, held cookies for Santa and carrots for his reindeer. The empty plate was all the proof that Ella needed. "We need to get Santa more cookies," Ella exclaimed. We then quickly tried to explain that he wouldn't be back until next Christmas and he only comes once a year. I do feel a bit guilty lying to my children, I guess it is all for holiday tradition and cheer.
Note: For any of you that have not seen our new house this is a view looking into the library. Someday we hope to build in bookshelves, for now it is a mostly seving as a play area. And yes, we told Ella that Santa came down the "chimney" to our little propane stove.
Look what Angie found under the Christmas tree. Five days before Christmas I visited the pound and rescued two kittens to give to Angie, Ella and Layla. My sister, Ashley made up some story about finding the kittens while doing chores outside so her kids wouldn't spill the beans to Angie before Christmas. After fostering them for days, I made my niece Carley cry Christmas morning when I came to pick them up. On the way home I wrapped them individually in laundry baskets. Before I could even get them home Peekaboo (Ella would later name her) was escaping from her basket. Lets just say that her energy meets that of the three-year-old that got her as a present. The other kitten, slept the whole ride home, she never made a sound. I decided to present one kitty at a time, the quiet one first, and it was perfect. Angie thought she got a laundry basket until she peeked inside to see Happy (which Ella would later name her) looking up at her.
These two cats couldn't have more different personalities. Peekaboo (pronounced peeky boo by Ella) runs sideways, sliding across the wood floor from one end of the house to the other. It didn't take her long to find the Christmas tree and the ornaments.
Happy on the other hand would prefer to cuddle and lay around the house. I have seen Peekaboo lay down as much as I have seen Happy play around, very little.
It couldn't have turned out any better. Happy matches Angie's energy level, they both like to lay around and cuddle. Peekaboo and Ella deserve each other, racing around the house antagonize each other.
So our foot of snow turned into a few inches of snow in the past couple of days. With warmer temperatures came perfect snowman making weather. Ella and I got a chance to roll some balls of snow together and make our first snowman. We didn't have coal or buttons so we settled for a tiny little carrot and dog food for the finishing touches. When we got home tonight the rain and 40 degree temps. took it's toll on our creation, his head was laying on the ground and he had a real bad tilt to him.
"That, is a big snowman." Ella said after I heaved the head onto the top of the snowman.
Most of the time when Layla find herself on her belly she realizes it is easier to lay there and suck her finger than to move around.
Ella was unwrapping each individually wrapped domino that she got for a birthday present from us this past weekend. Nana and Papa called to wish her a happy birthday and she didn't want to stop unwrapping her dominos. I think she might have dropped the phone a couple times but for the most part she did pretty well multitasking.
J. Ranck participated in Coleman's annual illuminated holiday parade this past Saturday. "The Miracle of Christmas" was this years theme and there were many "little J. Ranck miracles" throwing candy while trying to stay warm in the 20 degree temperatures. One of the judges, who is a reporter at the Midland Daily News, said that our float had the most participants. The lit up stinger crane and trailer decorated by Angie and Stacey (and I am sure many others) was voted first place for commercial floats. Nice showing for the first year. 
The family and Brett got together for Thanksgiving at Grandma and Grandpa Bishop's house. Brett wasn't able to go home for Thanksgiving (his stupid boss made him work on Friday). My niece and nephews loved him, he read them book, played horse with them, and he took tons of photographs. I would recruit him to come every year but I know how much he missed his own family. Either way, you are welcome anytime Brett. See Brett's blog (link is at the right) for more photos.
Brett's self portrait while being mobbed by children.
The only photograph were someone doesn't have their eyes closed, fingers in their mouth, talking or looking stupid.
Grandpa Jack got a kick out of watching the kids and Brett taking pictures.
First and third photo were shot by Brett.
"It wasn't my fault... It was the degraded mail server after four years of carnage," Midland Daily News Information Technology Manager Shad Sprague said about our email server crashing burning.
So really though, I need everyone to send me their email addresses. My address book and emails before 8 p.m. last night were "officially hosed" according to shad.
So these are a long time coming but better late then never.
October is fog season. You can see in the distance, a fog bank rolling in over the Golden Gate Bridge.
Here is a view from the cable car we rode. You figure it out.
Chinatown. A photo from the evening Angie and I walked back from dinner.
In the center you can see Angie and her mom, Lou looking over the bay. Alcatraz is on the left, the skyline is a view of San Francisco from the north.
We didn't even leave the state yet and Angie was aready setting the tone of our trip to San Francisco. I am doing what I can to keep our trip exciting and drinking beer to even our all of her water. This photo was in the Jose Cuerva restaurant during our layover in the airport in Detroit.
All kidding aside, we are having a good time. Touring the town and reminiscing about our honeymoon. Here are a couple quoetes from Angie about being bored.
"If someone is bored that is just a reflection of themselves. I create my own fun so I am never bored," Angie Wood said just before heading to her hotel room to read a book and take a nap.
Here is my excuse for not blogging the past couple of months. The house is all consuming. It seems so many decisions need to be made: siding color, shingle color, doors, closets, outlets, lighting, mailboxes, garage doors, fireplaces, wood flooring and stain colors. I am sure this is only the first round of decisions too. The good thing is the house has windows, doors, electrical and a roof. The water line was going to be run today. At lease if things stopped today we would have a roof over our heads:)
Ella trying to not fall over on the rough terrain, while checking out the pond.
Angie looking out what will soon be the kitchen nook. In the background is the view towards the pond.
When we moved out of the house and now we don't even have spotty internet. So I can't tell you how consistent I am going to be with posts until we move into the new house and get internet our there. These are old photos so I will try to update with something more recent soon.
Layla is sitting now (mostly with help) but some by herself. She is still a little round and rolly, also a bit top heavy. Anyway, she is becoming really aware and starting to interact. The other day she was following Ella around with her eyes as Ella played in her bouncy. Every time Ella would poke her head out Layla would laugh histerically. I would say that is the first time I have seen them "play together." This is an old picture taken in the old house. We sold our house and closed on it last week. We moved in to a rental next door. It was weird to see the new home owners sitting on "our" porch swinging on the swing that my dad and I made together. It still feels like our house.
So first off, to everyone that is a wood frames groupie, I am sorry. It has been awhile since my previous post. I know you all don't want to hear excuses but let me vent. Between building a house, selling a house, home inspections, projects at work, interviewing babysitters and a bunch of other stuff, there just isn't time to blog these days.
This weekend Channing was in town visiting. Although we had to change our initial plans, we had a blast hanging out like always. Check out his blog (the link is on the right side) to see pictures from his time in Michigan. It really is a can't miss, Channing style, know what mean man?
Thanks for coming in during the late innings Channing and pitching me (and the family) some much needed stress relief.
