History of the J Man

As of October sometime we’re officially home owners, not only owners of a condo, but a true house now.

For those who don’t already have it, our new address is:

8050 Lowell Av, Skokie, IL 60076.  The landscaping has been updated but here’s a photo of the new house. 

Some recent photos of the boys.

Thanks to everyone who sent us a holiday card this year.  They are lovingly displayed on our mantle.  We send our letter via email last year though and I don’t think we can go back to paper now.

In case you haven’t seen it yet or in case your spam filter got a hold of it, I’m posting it here as well.  Happy Holidays and Happy New Year to all!

12/30/2010        

Greetings!

I hope this letter finds you happy, healthy and staying warm after the holidays.  With Hanukkah so close after hosting Thanksgiving this year and then Christmas after that, we’re slow getting this letter out, but hopefully it will find you before 2011.

Our biggest news from this year was the birth of our 2^nd son, Elliott Cameron Diehl.  He was born May 10, 2010 around 3:00am weighing 7 lbs. 7oz.  He was very easily and happily born at home, as planned, in under 5 hours. His big brother Jonah slept through the whole thing.

Jonah is 3.5 years old now and just started preschool down the block from our house.  It’s a new school with a class size of 7 and he loves it.  In fact he was unhappy about having to take a week off for the holidays.  He’s playing a lot, making new friends and learning things in the process.

Elliott is 7 months old now going on 3! He sits on his own and can pull himself up to standing to cruise the furniture but doesn’t crawl yet (he uses a commando crawl on his belly to get around).  He also doesn’t love baby food instead preferring to feed himself with his hands.  Through it all he’s a happy, smiling baby who loves to watch his older brother. 

This past July we went on our annual trip to Michigan with Julie’s parents, sister and brother-in law.  Elliott wasn’t sleeping all that well yet but Jonah had a great time catching minnows off the pier, going on a boat ride, picking raspberries, and just generally getting to run around a lot outside.

Chris’s family didn’t make it up to Michigan with us this year but we visited them over the 4^th of July weekend at their new home in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin, instead.  We watched the fireworks from a boat on Lake Geneva and Jonah loved them.  He said they were like “magic” as we watched.  The captain later told us he had a better time listening to Jonah watch the fireworks than watching them himself! 

Next July we are planning to once again have both sides of the family up in Michigan.  By then Elliott might be walking, so we’ll need the extra hands!

Chris and Julie are both doing well as they adjust to life with two small boys.  Chris is still commuting to Schaumburg from the city but loves his job, so we make things work.  Julie has been contracting with Cisco Systems now for about 18 months and continues to enjoy the work and the perks and challenges of working from home 100%. 

Our condo was on the market until shortly before Elliott was born last year but did not sell.  We may try listing it again soon because we’d still like to move to the suburbs to be closer to work for Chris and to have more space (like a back yard) for the boys and Bianca.  Ideally, Jonah will be able to finish out the school year here then start somewhere new next fall, close to our new house in the suburbs.  Keep your fingers crossed for us or send potential buyers our way! J

Wishing everyone a wonderful New Year!

Julie, Chris, Jonah, Elliott & Bianca Diehl

The first couple nights of Hanukkah have come and gone and so far I’ve done ok with gifts for the boys.  Jonah’s gift the first night was a play tent with a new tunnel. From the photos below it’s hard to tell who’s having a better time with it, Chris or Jonah.  Jonah has even slept over night in his tent and napped in it twice so far.  I wonder if he’ll ever let me take it down…

The second night he got a sit-n-spin but that wasn’t as impressive I guess.  Jonah has also had a good time opening and playing with the 2 new baby toys that Elliott got.  Elliott is just happy with the paper and boxes or to sit and watch everything that his big brother does.

Photo from our first family trip to the Museum of Science and Industry.

Reading Thanksgiving books this morning Jonah declaired that he was going to be “Buzz Lightyear for Thanksgiving!” I think the pumpkins in the Thanksgiving book confused him a bit.

Jonah was playing a fun game of “going on vacation” while I did the grocery shopping on Peapod last night.  He packed his bag, told me where he was going, and even changed into his vacation shorts and t-shirt.  I thought it was a great game until I went into his room and saw his the contents of his dresser all over the floor and then saw the contents of his suitcase all over the play room.  No wonder he’d been playing so nice by himself…

Halloween was fun this year.  Jonah is almost 3.5 and therefore old enough to like the idea of dressing up and candy.  He had been talking about or wearing his Buzz costume for weeks before Halloween.  I had ordered the wings so long ago that I was actually a little worried that he might not be into Buzz by the time Halloween got here.  I shouldn’t have been though.  I think he wore that costume for about a week straight leading up to trick-or-treating.  He and Kate even practiced going door to door here in the house. 

That day we went to Nana & Papa’s house after lunch.  Got our costumes on and headed out around 4:30.  We went up one block and back down the other side before Jonah declared that he was “all done trick-or-treating.”  I think by that time there were more big kids out and some of the houses and costumes were pretty scary.  Plus it was getting dark and cold.  We did get to see his friend Addie though and get a photo with Addie/Jessie and Jonah/Buzz (even if Chris did have to hold him in the shot).

Elliott’s costume was a spider which worked out great.  I strapped him on with the black Moby Wrap then put the web part on the outside of both of us. It kept us both warm and we didn’t have to deal with a stroller that way. 

Once we got inside Jonah had a great time answering the door for the rest of the trick-or-treaters at Nana & Papa’s house.  He liked to hold the basket and tell them they could pick 2 pieces.  He couldn’t understand why the lifesavers weren’t as popular as the chocolate candy bars.  And out of his own halloween bakset the tootsie rolls have been the most popular pick.  (That’s fine more Reese’s for me.)

A couple pre-halloween videos for you to enjoy.  Jonah had his costume on for our visit to the pumpkin patch a couple weeks ago.

Halloween Buzz 2010 from Julie Diehl on Vimeo.

Pumpkin Carving 2010 from Julie Diehl on Vimeo.

He also likes dressing up as Woody.  Here’s a photo of him as Woody holding Woody! 

We’ll post again with photos/videos from Halloween this weekend.

And away we go!   Jonah and Elliott are really starting to interact and it’s fun to watch, but the foreshadowing of the big brother/little brother dynamic is starting to take shape.  Up until now, each boy was able to exist in his own shell, so to speak — Jonah played with his toys, Elliott stayed in his crib — but now that Elliott is a little more mobile on the ground (no crawling yet, but he is rolling around like a log) and Jonah picking up on the fact that he can exert influence on his baby brother (making him smile, etc.), it’s clear that an actual relationship is starting to bloom.  I don’t have any brothers, but based on the ones I know, I’m hoping there won’t be too much bloodshed.

Boys Wrestling from Julie Diehl on Vimeo.

Also some more photos from that day: