The toddler chasing is self explanatory, but it was so great to have L and J together for Christmas. They did their best to share toys and keep their screeching to a minimum (okay, that might be a stretch). Perhaps the best thing was that they stimulated each other so much during the day that they slept like logs at night and even graced us all with an extra hour of sleep on Christmas morning. Of course children don't give gifts easily and they decided that extra hour of sleep entitled them to not take naps on Christmas afternoon. We were all grateful for little presents.
The week began with some unplanned excitement as D decided he would make things more entertaining if he fell off an imaginary chair that he thought was at his spot at the table which was really taken away from him by his wife. As he crashed on the hard, cold tile, I thought he broke the chair, but upon further investigation, we saw that there was actually no chair behind him at all. He was okay, but the wall was not. Enter the beginning of the marathon trips to Lowe's for drywall, spackle, texture, and more texture.
In between toddler wrangling and drywall patching, we actually had a chance to be grown ups for a little while. We went to two movies during the week, which I believe is my quota for the entire year. We saw Quantum of Solace and The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. Both were really good. The sad part? The fact that we had to make arrangements to eat dinner at 5:30 because we would be too tired to go to a 9:00 movie. Ahh, how times have changed.
There were nonstop comings and goings from other family members throughout the week. My aunt and uncle popped in for a few days on their way to Brownsville, Tx. B's best friend J came and stayed with us from icy Seattle. Grandparents from Florida and California also joined us. And we had some last minute surprise guests who stopped in from Lubbock on Christmas night as they were leaving from Austin to go to Mexico in the morning. We fed 17 people on Christmas night, which was chaotic, but we had plenty to go around, including a fully cooked turkey and plenty of pie, so it was lots of fun.
Santa was very good to J this year. The biggest hits from Santa were a tom tom drum, (everyone says I am crazy, but I can't not encourage this kid to be musical since he loves it so much) and a guitar (Santa shops at garage sales and found a kid-sized one for $1.00!). It's completely out of tune, but I know nothing about guitars and J doesn't know the difference, so it's a perfect match in our house. Both instruments are used to jam to the new Biscuit Brothers cd he got. Uncle D was a little tired of them by the end of the week (sorry!) because the jam sessions started early in the morning and repeated themselves throughout the day. He also got some great books, which I will probably add to the side of the blog. J became a complete present opening zombie and wanted present after present. We actually put a halt to his present opening at one point because he wasn't even noticing what he was opening anymore.
Matching pjs to please the mamas
1st trip downstairs
Hard at Work
In addition to fixing a hole in the kitchen wall, the boys decided to make an all out effort to build a new border for our garden. This almost turned out badly when D told me the plan and it was nothing like I had envisioned it and they were planning on carrying out said plan without my okay. Thankfully some other mothers in the room insisted this was a bad idea and we all got on the same page first. I think this building project included about 4 trips to Lowe's and a very heated discussion about what to do about the fact that the previous owners built this garden on top of a zone of the sprinkler system (which means the entire garden may need to be ripped up if a pipe ever breaks and needs fixing). The finished product looks really good and will hopefully keep the annoying St. Augustine grass from invading my planting territory.
The New Year's Eve guests arrived a day after all of the Christmas ones left. Round two included B's dad, stepmother, stepbrother and his wife (visiting from Poland after spending their honeymoon on a cruise). We cooked prime rib for dinner because B's stepbrother never had it before. He ate four pieces. We also went to a ballroom dancing party to ring in the new year. I'll spare you the long story, but just say that it was BYOB, which saved us money, but they didn't provide any mixers, and even though I called to make sure they would have mixers for whatever drinks we brought(this is important stuff to do when some people in your party consider tonic a fifth food group), the only mixers they provided were "dance mixers". As in everybody gets on the dance floor and mixes up their partners type of mixers. Disaster was averted with a last minute trip to the grocery store. Upon further inquiry, I found out from the stepbrother and wife that their preference for New Year's Eve is to usually stay home. I wish I would have known that. I felt like the chaperone at a high school dance as I looked at the clock wanting it to be midnight every ten minutes. It was so hard to stay up until midnight without alcohol. We had a good time, but it felt like everyone was forcing themselves to stay up late.
I forgot to mention that Jonah caught pink eye and a nasty cough in between all of this as well. We had to give him eyedrops and cough medicine. Imagine a screaming child. Now raise the noise level by 100 and that's what we had three times a day. We gave up on the cough medicine after two days of him literally spitting it all out on B's arm. I finally became a pro at doing the eyedrops. It's amazing what mini tootsie pops can do.
B's dad and stepmom left and returned two days later for doctor's appointments before she heads back to Poland later in the week. Yesterday was the first day we had nobody in our house. We're a bit tired, but fine. I'm getting fat and kicked. She's already a night owl. Happy New Year everyone!
B's boss gave J a Texas jersey. He loves it. Hook 'em!
1 comment:
J looks bigger than he did in NOVEMBER!!! What are you feeding that child? Thanks for the update.
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