Our little baby is turning two today. We can’t believe it has happened so fast. Next step, she brings home her first boyfriend.

It looks like April’s great crafty skills has helped the Indiana McIntosh family win the 1st McIntosh Holiday Challenge.

Great job, April! I know how much you disliked the putting the icing on and the fact that you wouldn’t let me bloody the horses head and have the other animals eating it.

Although 2009 may not have been as good to some people, we came away with several firsts and many positive things in our life.

Ean started school (which he loves), April reconnected with old friends, Dylan connecting with some gaming friends, Ean’s first dentist trip, Ella walking/running/eating/getting into everything/talking/laughing/feeding herself, Ean letting us eat at Rainforest cafe, Cocoa Beach, Ean riding a bike, Dylan working 120 hours a week to start up a major project, and April trying and liking sushi, which has become a regular item on our menu now and many many more things.

So as much as we enjoyed 2009, we also look forward to 2010. We get to work on Ella potty training, Ean and homework, getting the house ready to sell and many other projects.

For those that were in our lives this past year, we thank you and we appreciate everything that you have done to enrich our lives and our children.

For those that were not in our lives this past year, we wish we had more time together to share our lives with you and learn from yours. I hope that 2010 brings us more opportunities to be together.

Here are just a few major moments from the past year in pictures.

I know – crappy home videos that people dread watching, but I wanted to share them anyways.

Ean’s preschool class made a trip to the Christian Care retirement community before Christmas to help spread some Christmas cheer and some of their excitement. The kids sang a couple of holiday tunes, handed out cookies that they helped decorate, and show off some of their favorite toys to the residents.

I was really surprised at how open Ean was in sharing and talking to the guests. He tends to shy away from the large crowd type of activities. Maybe he is growing up after all.

Well, our Christmas holiday is wrapping up and we are working on retiring the old stuff (clothes and toys) and moving the new toys/clothes into the rotation.

Other than the snowy and cold weather, our holiday was a good one. Ella wanted nothing to do with unwrapping presents, but loved pulling socks from the stockings. Ean, on the other hand, loves opening presents so much so that he was unwrapping his presents and not waiting for anyone to watch him.

We still owe a couple of gifts and should get them out hopefully by the beginning of the new year.

I hope everyone had a great holiday as well.

I won free tickets to see the Colts play the Jets on December 27th. Unfortunately the coach decided to the loose the game for them and pull most of their starters when they only had a 5 point lead and allowed the Jets to come back and win by a large amount.

The roads were very snowy as we got about 3 inches of snow throughout the whole day and the roads were not always fast moving.

Other than that – we had a blast as it was April’s first professional football game and Lucas Oil Stadium was huge and a great place to be as a fan!

From Colts Vs Jets

From Colts Vs Jets

From Colts Vs Jets

Here is the slide show of our day:

While there is not a creature stirring in the house, we wanted to wish everyone a Merry Christmas and safe holidays!

Ean had his Winter Party at school and had a blast doing it. The kids all exchanged gifts and even Miss Leslie gave some gifts to the kid.

The kids decorated cookies as well that they were going to hand out at the Christian Care Nursing home (video to come shortly) and they played several games.

Here is picture of Ean and Isabelle:

It’s funny – the kids never eat all of their food in one sitting. However, we discovered a place that the kids not only eat at all of their food, but they ask for seconds. Sakura’s japanese restaurant, which was previously a date night eatery,has been put on the lunch rotation. It has also been placed on one of the Fort Wayne favorites.