Baby Its Cold Outside

Ah the semester is finally over--I turned in my papers a couple weeks ago but had to grade some final exams this week which weren't turned in until yesterday morning. It feels good to finally have the stress relieved, which means I actually have time to update my blog. And who knows, there may actually be someone out there who still reads it... And since its snowing like crazy this morning, what better way to spend the time to provide a little update.

Over the past couple weeks, we've been relishing in the Christmas festivities and holiday cheer. We've gone to a number of Christmas parties, had one of our own on the 12th, went to Duquesne's Christmas chorale concert on the 6th (it was ok -- too much Latin music for Amber's taste), and went to the Pittsburgh Symphony Christmas show this past thursday night, which was fantastic. Thankfully, Santa's stage time was kept to a minimum at the symphony (which also included the Mendelssohn choir and some special guests). They sang one of my top five choral pieces, "O Magnum Mysterium," and performed a wide variety of traditionals (portions of the Nutcracker), hymns, and contemporary songs.

As for Emerson, he's keeping us busy, getting his hands into everything and crawling all over the place. Earlier this past week he crawled up our entire flight of steps in less than two minutes (he was pretty proud of himself!). He's taken a liking to a number of activities around the house. Just earlier today, we found him rummaging through Amber's purse and had pulled out a number of items and placed them into his own little pile. Here's a few other things he enjoys:

Going through the tupperware drawer... and licking every single one he pulls out. This is one of his new faves.

Reading, or, er, pulling books off the shelf. Actually he loves to read and even flips to the next page on his own (his books are over to the right and often pulls them all out too). And yes, he did rip that piece of the book out, but alas, I'm not planning on reading Shakespeare's "Julius Caesar" anytime soon. "Et tu, Brute?"

Doing the dishes. Ok, so he pulls more dishes out, licks them, and then throws them on the ground more than anything, but he LOVES standing over there so much that we actually wait to do the dishes for when he's really bored and we can't think of anything else to do. He also tries to scamper into the fridge right behind him whenever we open it -- and seriously, that kid can hear the door open from anywhere on the first floor!

And using the restroom. So I wish he was potty trained, but alas, whenever he gets this close to the toilet is usually when one of us is trying to use it (no sense of privacy whatsoever!). It was definitely a shocking moment when I was going the bathroom the other day and suddenly he crawled between my legs and grabbed the toilet seat with both hands!! Actually, I think he likes the bathroom so much because he's come to love bathtime, and he just goes nuts when we turn the water on and take off his clothes. He's also learned that unraveling the toilet paper is quite fun too.