Christmas Portraits 2011

Tonight we took Brady to have his Christmas portraits done. We had initially intended to go last Thursday, but Brady had a small accident involving the corner of a windowsill and his eye over a week ago, that led to us cancelling and rescheduling for tonight. There's still a small amount of bruising, but I know where to look, I used a small amount of concealer on it, and it's not too noticeable in these portraits. Phew!!!

This is my absolute favorite!!! He's such a character when the cameras come out!

This is last year's formal shot.

Now it's time for a more fun outfit!!

It's been a tradition of mine to buy the Christmas Winnie the Poohs that the Disney store has put out since 2003. I have at least one from each year and last year we started the tradition of Brady getting his informal shots done with that year's Christmas Pooh.

Story time for Brady and Pooh

Last year's informal shot with Pooh

Our Little Carry-On

There is never a shortage of shenanigans in the Trap house. Brady is always getting into something and Andy always takes advantage of the situation. We were packing for our trip to Delaware and Philadelphia last weekend and Brady decided he wanted to get into the suitcases. Andy saw this as an opportunity to see if he'd stay in while wheeled around. Brady thought it was hilarious! He was the perfect size for the carry on bag and would have loved to have been wheeled around in it all day.

More Fun with Boxes

Andy is always looking for new and interesting ways to mess around with Brady. On this particular day, we had a few empty pop boxes and Brady had torn them in half of his own accord. This gave Andy the idea to make him like a robot and cover him with the boxes. Brady was really into it and walked around like this for a half an hour. Every time a box fell off, he came over to have it put back on. It's never dull in this house!

Cousins - Brady & Adalyn

Andy, Brady, and I do not have a wealth of first cousins. I have three, Andy has two, and Brady has none. On the other hand, we do have a lot of extended cousins.

On my side, things are a little skewed on both ends. I am the fifth oldest of the Lira great-grandchildren (my maternal grandmother's side), but the age range is from the oldest being in his mid-30s and the youngest is only 2 and was born only 6 months before Brady. Brady is the first in the next generation. On my Tramposch side (dad's family), things are even more crazy. My grandpa was the youngest child, so he was closer in age to his nieces and nephews. This trickled down the line, and today the age ranges in the same generation are huge. Granted, we don't have contact with everyone in the family, since some of them are still in Europe, but my dad has first cousins in their 80s. In my generation, the oldest is in his early-60s (older than my dad) and my brother is the youngest at 19. Brady is currently the youngest in his generation, but the oldest is 40. To make things even crazier, there is a generation younger than Brady with a 6 year old and another baby due in March. Those kids will be in the same generation as Brady's kids, which is crazy to think about.

The cousins on Andy's side are all reasonably close together in age. So it was really nice for him growing up with his Trapuzzano cousins all around the same age and having Sunday dinners each week with his Trapuzzano great-grandmother and the rest of the family. In Brady's generation, they are the great-great granchildren of the Trapuzzanos who came over from Italy and started Washington Tailors in Washington, PA. The oldest just turned 12, but what's really cool is that there were four babies born within one calendar year. The first was Cooper (August 2009), then Ysabella (early-February 2010), then Brady (February 19, 2010), and finally Adalyn (August 2010). It's nice that they are all so close in age, but unfortunately they are scattered across four different states.

This past weekend, Brady and Adalyn got to meet for the very first time! We drove to Delaware so that Abby (Andy's cousin and Adalyn's mom) could watch Brady for us while we attended a wedding in Philadelphia. They were nice enough to also allow us to stay in their home and it was a great chance for the kids to meet. They had a blast hanging out over the weekend! Brady was excited to play with her toys and Adalyn was excited to have someone to play with. They're both only children and only 6 months apart in age, so it was really fun to watch. Everyone has plans to be home in Pittsburgh for the holidays, so we are hoping to get the kids together again next month!

This was their version of playing house. It was funny because Brady would turn on thing up high that Adalyn couldn't reach and she would just look at it and wonder how to turn it off.

Playing outside riding cars.

Playing in the leaves. A fun treat since the leaves have yet to fall here.

Build-A-Bear

Brady has no shortage of stuffed animals, but it's always nice when he gets another one. He has a Build-A-Bear that my mom got for him over a year ago, who is Charlie Bear and always wears some Steelers gear. My mom emailed me a reward from her loyalty card and we decided it was time for Brady to stuff his first Build-A-Bear. When we got there, there were a lot of choices and I started to think about what he already has at home. He has a million puppies, monkeys, and a few bunnies. I narrowed it down to the penguin from Happy Feet 2 and Snoopy (yes, I realize he's a puppy). I decided on Snoopy because my mom had recently bought Brady a stuffed penguin when we went to the Pittsburgh Zoo.

Brady was very interesting in how the machine worked and the woman working there was trying to coax him into letting her have Snoopy.

Time for stuffing! He actually had his foot on the petal powering the machine the whole time! He's getting so big!

Getting ready to put a heart inside.

Pushing the heart deep inside Snoopy.

The "hug test." Don't worry. He passed ;)

Time for a bath Snoopy

A very satisfied customer ;)

While we were at the mall, we even had a Santa sighting. We had seen the decorations up a few weeks ago, but heard that Santa made his grand debut the day after Halloween. I think it's a bit too early and there was no one in line. Maybe they'll learn, but I doubt it.

Balloons Over Anderson

This past weekend was the annual balloon festival, named Balloons Over Anderson. They have hot air balloon crews come for the event from all over the United States and even Canada. We thought this would be something cool for Brady to see because it's not very common to get so close to hot air balloons.



They had tethered balloon rides (pictured above), but we were too afraid to go for a ride because we figured Brady would try to jump out like he tried to jump out of the ferris wheel at the fair. The first thing we came to when we arrived at the festival was the balloon walk. This is where they blow up a balloon and let you run around inside of it. When I was in elementary school, there was an assembly where they brought in hot air balloons and blew one of them up in the auditorium and let us walk around in it. They had beach balls inside so the kids could play. Brady had a blast in there!







They had a few cars on display as well. The Great Clips racing car was there and since cars are one of Brady's two favorite things (the other being puppies), we let him get up close. He kept saying, "car, car." He tried to touch, but we wanted to make sure we didn't leave his fingerprints to incriminate himself ;)

They also had the Dukes of Hazard car.

And what festival is complete without funnel cake?

The balloon launch was scheduled for 3PM, but it got pushed back an hour due to winds. We were very glad that we chose Sunday to come because we found out later that they were unable to launch at all on Friday and Saturday due to the strong winds.

Getting blow up

In standing position

The next few pics are of the first balloon to leave the ground. Of course, it was the Clemson balloon ;)

Look at that hot air!

Several balloons in flight

"Look daddy!" There were also several small planes that few overhead and that got Brady very excited.

Of course, Brady wouldn't let us leave without getting to go into the bouncy house. He loves them and you should hear the laughing.

Of course, when it's time to get out, he plays a game where he comes close to the exit and then runs away. Andy's title for this pic is "Don't make me come in there and get you."