I accidentally had the camera in video mode while I was trying to take the boys picture in front of a train display. This is basically why I don't have any pictures of the boys posing in front of things.
In the last couple weeks before Jake was born, Matt and Ben kept a countdown of how many more days until the baby gets here. Their teachers at school even made a countdown chart for the class which was really cute!
When they came to visit Jake for the first time, they liked getting to see and hold his little hands and toes. 
They also gave Jake the lion they picked out for him that is just like their Giraffey and Monkey.
Born December 8th at 2am. Seven pounds, 4 ounces and 20 inches long. Everyone in the delivery room remarked that he really had a set of lungs on him. Hearing this from people who deal with crying children for a living has me a bit worried.
So after I explained that the snow was vanilla flavored. The boys each tried to catch snowflakes on their tongue. Ben lasted as long as it took one flake to hit him in the face and he went back in the garage. That's why you see him running away around the 40-second mark. Matt was a little more persistent.
It seems like it wasn't so long ago we were saying "they aren't babies any more, they're toddlers". Now I feel like we're saying "they aren't toddlers any more, they're little boys". We had a great weekend of birthday celebrations for them - complete with a lazy day to recover at the end!
... but a great picture of two of our other favorite Wetzel Boys in the Cincinnati Reds dugout during our tour of Great American Ballpark. 
A few other pictures from the tour...
The boys rode their first roller coaster in September at P&G day at Kings Island. Ben was even brave enough to ride by himself!
The cars were also a big hit that day (perhaps practicing for that car their dad keeps promising them when they're 16?)
This had better be the only time we find them in the back of a cop car!
They also really loved the fire engine showing up this year!
At first I wondered how they learned how to wrestle, but maybe they found some of those old videos of their Dad, Uncle Mike, and Uncle Mark!
The boys took swim lessons this summer. Matthew really liked the water, especially jumping in off the side and blowing bubbles. Ben wasn't such a big fan, but did better and better as the weeks went on. 
The boys started preschool yesterday. Matt said his favorite part of school is "eating muffins". Ben said his favorite part is "playing with cars". 
This is a bit old but I found it organizing photos last night and wanted to put it up. This is Matt when he discovered he had a shadow that followed him around. The video cut off but he spent a good 10 minutes testing out all the other things he could make his shadow do.
So we were unpacking some boxes this weekend and the boys had never seen bubble wrap before. They figured out what to do with it pretty quickly.
So while both the boys really enjoyed seeing all their favorite Sesame Street characters, Matthew only wanted to see them from a distance (note his death grip on us in the pictures). Ben was a different story. By the end of the 2 days we were there, diving catches from Shawn were required to keep him from cutting in line while running to give Cookie Monster and Ernie hugs.
We started vacation by visiting friends - Lisa, Wes, and Gabriel - and had a great time seeing them and catching up. They had a pool by their house that we all went swimming in on Sunday.
Ben doing his version of swimming and Matt blowing bubbles in the background.
Lisa and Gabriel
Drying off!
