Tuesday, December 10, 2013

Busy and cold

We have been busy, busy, busy and cold, cold, cold.
 
I know that every Christmas season seems too short and there is always too much to do, but I am definitely feeling it this year.  Maybe because we also have about 7 million birthdays to celebrate this month as well.
 
It has also been really cold for the last week.  Not as cold as a lot of places, but for the Phoenix area, a week of highs in the 50's and lows in the 30's is coooooooold. 
 
Here's a recap of our last week or so.
 
Last Monday, the 2nd, we took our first walk around the neighborhood to look at lights.



 
I thought Elliott looked so cute in his new hat.

On Tuesday the 3rd I stopped at Babies R Us on the way home from work.  I had a $10 gift card that was going to expire.  I found some adorable shirts for $5 each.  Done and done.
 
We took pictures with those shirts on the 4th.  Can you see why I couldn't say no?



Thursday, the 5th, was the 2 year anniversary of when I went into labor with Elliott.  I only have 2 December 5ths to make this analysis, but each year I felt sick all day.  I don't think I will ever enjoy that date ever again.
 
Things were much better this year when compared to 2011 though...
 
December 5, 2011
On Friday the 6th we had Monica and Rick over for dinner.  They took our family Christmas picture.  I can't show you yet, but I can show you Spencer's 6 year-3 month picture.
On Saturday Spencer and I were up bright and early to go to the birthday party of one of his classmates.  It was at Skate Land.  Spencer has never been in skates before so we went to the hour long lesson that was held before the party started.
 
He was pretty excited. 
Right after I took that ^ picture he tried to go out into the rink, promptly fell in an awkward position (one leg forward, one leg back) and started sobbing.  A very nice instructor came over and told us that we needed to find the class on the carpet because the rink was much too slick for a total beginner.  Then I felt like crap for not knowing that.
 
So, we found the carpet class, which consisted of the 3 kids from the party that were there.
 
The first thing Mr. Chuck taught them was how to safely fall and safely get up.
 
Then they practiced baby, baby, baby steps.
 
And going down an incline.
Towards the end of the hour he took Spencer onto the rink, but had him stay right by the wall.
Spencer was still pretty nervous about being alone, so I paid $5 to rent one of the skating walkers.  It was money well spent.


 
With the birthday boy.
We were at Skate Land from 9 to 12:30 and Spencer went around the rink a grand total of 1 time.  Except for that 1 time he stayed on the carpet, played games, ate pizza and ate cake.

On Saturday night I went with my friends to the Phoenix Botanical Gardens.  Every Christmas they have beautiful lights and a bunch of different musical acts set up around the garden.

 
 We had a blast.
The night ended with us in a hut doing tribal dances in total blackness.  Totally normal behavior.
 
In the hut.
 
My hair was kind of a mess when I took my ear warmer off.
 On Sunday we headed to birthday party #2 of the weekend.  It was a Mickey and Minnie theme.




I love, love, love being busy, but this past week and what we are facing for the rest of this week are insane.  I was only at home for a total of 3 hours on Saturday.  That's not enough! 

Sunday, December 8, 2013

Winston 2013- Report #1

We were expecting Winston to make his return on December 1st, but he surprised us and showed up in Tucson the day after Thanksgiving.
 
Friday, November 29th
Winston made his return hanging out, quite literally, in a snowy-looking hammock.
 
 
He also left us a message written in M & M's.
Saturday, November 30th
Winston was very tricky on this day.  It took us a long time to find him.
But we finally did!
He was hiding in a cupboard, complete with a gift for Spencer and Elliott.

 
New Christmas plates!
Sunday, December 1st
Winston somehow knew that we were leaving Tucson and heading home so he made himself comfy in the car.

Monday, December 2nd
Oh Winston!  He must have been missing Santa because we found him snuggled into Santa's facial hair.  Cozy.....and a little gross.

Tuesday, December 3rd
We found Winston on my exercise mat pumping some iron.
 
Well, trying to pump some iron.
Wednesday, December 4th
That silly Winston.  He was riding a piggy on this chilly, stormy morning.

Thursday, December 5th
Winston must have been feeling nostalgic about the first Christmas because we found him spending some quality time with his buddies in the Nativity.

 
'Sup Joseph?
Friday, December 6th
Winston was hungry after his trip back from the North Pole so he roasted himself some marshmallows.

Saturday, December 7th
Winston was doing some...gymnastics? Zip lining? Air yoga?  We're not sure.

Sunday, December 8th
Winston was in the sleigh having a deep conversation with the snowmen.

Spencer enjoyed him for about 4 seconds before he pointed out that we found him in the same sleigh last year.


Wednesday, December 4, 2013

An early Christmas

We celebrated Christmas with Nathan and Kendra on Sunday morning.  They will be in Florida for Christmas so it was our last chance to be together.
 
Nathan collects nutcrackers so we got him a Darth Vader nutcracker.  Every time somebody talked about it Elliott would demand a cracker to eat.
 
We got Kendra some Christmas story books, 
and the Little People Nativity.  They will be living with a little person next year so they need to start preparing.
 
They got Spencer a light up Earth for his outer space room

 
Elliott got a light up T-Rex.  Spencer got to open it.
After we drove home on Sunday we went to a close-by park for a Snow and Santa day.  The line for Santa was insane so we stuck to the snow. 
 


 
There was even a sledding hill.






 
Michael and Elliott took out the line.




 
Elliott pretty much hated the snow and just observed from the sidelines.

We got pizza for dinner that night because I was eating carbs and dairy for the weekend.  Elliott is eating whole pieces now.  I will not miss the days of cutting pizza into tiny pieces.
I opened up a bottle of Martinelli's Sparkling Cider and put it in a plastic goblet for Spencer.  He thought he was big stuff.
I just re-read this post and it is probably the most boring thing I have ever written in my life.  We had a middle of the night power outage at 1:30 am.  It really messed up our sleeping since we all sleep with fans and the house was eerily quiet without them.  Everybody but Elliott was awake.  I need a solid night of sleep before I can get back to my usual combination of sarcasm and sass.