Finally Christmas...

Thought I should throw a few photos up on the blog before we take off for a Memphis New Year's. So here are some scenes from the many days of Christmas...
We started out with a quiet celebration and dinner in Deerfield.

Van waits patiently for dinner to be served.

Henry tries his first bite of Lefse.

Henry was very tired by the time we got to present opening, so he needed some assistance.

Liz listens for a telltale rattle.

Pete struggles with some Help Me Dress Elmo packaging.

The next day Mom and then Will, Sandy and Lucy arrived. Our house was starting to take on that warm, full holiday feeling.

There was much cookie making to be done, as well as preparations for Christmas day dinner.

Our luminaria greatly improved the look of our sad Christmas lights display and they stayed lit until well into the night, still burning when I went to bed at 12:45.

Pete and Henry and I dressed up and snuck out to a Christmas Eve party for a bit, but we didn't make it to church.

Henry had a new plate and cup from Grammie to leave cookies and milk for Santa. Henry promptly dropped the cup on it's edge right onto the table. So we used Pete's traditional Sylvester glass to leave the milk. We also left some cheese for Santa Mouse, of course.

Henry did come out to check on the plate of cookies first thing when he woke up on Christmas morning. He wanted to finish off the cookies that Santa didn't get to.

The tree was resplendent, surrounded by piles of gifts.


Will used some caramel he had brought to make us all caramel pecan rolls.


Henry brought his stocking in from the family room.


The dogs enjoyed some extra large dog biscuits.

Henry stayed mildly interested in discovering the treats from his stocking. Later on the gift opening all became too much. He had to take frequent trips to the family room to play quietly with his train.

My battery is low, so I'll wrap it up for today. These final shots are of Christmas day. Rob and Carrie arrived with Oscar in tow. I was pleased to have a yard to shoo the dogs out to. Mary, Liz and Peter arrived as well, with no dog. Some drank wine and chit-chatted while others finished up dinner.

The dinner was only half an hour past schedule. The roast was maybe a little rare for some, but Will and I thought it was perfect. Other food served: mashed potatoes and gravy, corn, zucchini, salad, spinach-Gruyere casserole...cranberry upside down cake for dessert.... I think that's it.

Just Because...

I don't have the energy to actually type about my day. So I thought I'd post my two favorite photos from the news recently.

Apparently a baby hippo was born somewhere...
And also, someone stole a whole bunch of lawn Baby Jesi (that's the official plural form of Jesus) and put them all in someone's yard. The person who found them in her yard "panicked" and took them all to her church. Something about that whole scene is just humorous to me.

Call a Doctor!

I think I've given Rob adequate time to be the first to blog on the subject...now my site is getting stale, so I'm just going to go on ahead.
Carrie had her graduation ceremony last Friday! We're all so proud of her. The ceremony was held at Hancher.
Henry was not in much of a mood to sit still, so we spent a bit of time in the quiet room at the back of the theater, and also running around out in the lobby. Pete got this shot of Carrie crossing the stage after receiving her hood.
Here she is, with a proud hubby and proud parents in the background.
The next day we celebrated with an open house at Rob and Carrie's. The cake was delicious!
Carrie got some very nice gifts, but I think this shirt was the best, if I do say so myself. Sorry about the overwhelming shininess of the bag.
Hip! Hip! Hooray!

Ode to a Snow Gentleman

Oh you gentle man of snow
Friend to Elmo Sprinkler and Garden Gnome
Bushy brows of celery stalks
A Dixie cup fez atop your jolly head
Now when I walk past the cold sliding door
Your elusive smile I see no more
We didn't pay heed to Tom Skilling's warning
That winter would have another warming

Scenes From Our Holiday Party...

We had a holiday party last night and even with a few last-minute cancellations we still had quite a full house! I tend to overdo it with food at parties, so I really tried to rein myself in this time. Turns out I reined in a little too much. We had a few tasty treats, though, including roasted chestnuts that Mom made! Our friend Laura, who grew up in France, recognized them immediately. Mary brought some yummy artichoke dip, which went quickly. Here she is with an empty dish, caught under the mistletoe.
Phase one of the party, the earlier hours, was mostly dedicated to the kids. I believe there were six kids all together. They dined on snowman shaped bologna sandwiches and milk and they probably had a few cookies as well. We played the Rudolph special and Charlie Brown. I had several Christmas picture books out. When Donna sat down to reminisce with The Sweet Smell of Christmas she suddenly had an audience for a brief story time.We also had a craft table with peel-and-stick foamy shapes and pipe cleaners. The kids took some fine artwork home.
Around eight o'clock the kids started to slowly melt down, and those friends trickled out. A few other friends trickled in, including Jonathan and Amanda with a bottle of glogg; slivered almonds, drunken raisins and all. Thus began phase two of the party.Mom even woke up from putting Henry to bed. The grown-ups took over the craft table and made themselves a few holiday accessories. Hope's wreath-glasses were my personal favorite. We played a little bit of Apples to Apples.Kevin decided that Henry's fire hat would be a nice addition to his outfit. I guess you can't see it so much in this picture, but it's still a cute shot. Kevin is almost smiling. Marni and Allan told me all about their plans to move to Albuquerque! I can't even spell Albuquerque! Thank goodness new blogger has spellcheck!At the end of the evening Jim employed the use of Henry's step-stool to wash up. Thanks to everyone who came! I had a great time! Sorry to those of you who weren't able to make it. We'll try it again next year!

Beginning to look a lot like Christmas...

Amber asked if we had decorated the tree yet, so here are some photos of Christmassyness...

Okay, this one actually isn't Christmassy. It's Henry and Pete at Chili's (they did have lights up!) last Sunday. Henry was dancing to the music, but you can't really tell in the photo. We didn't really want to go to Chili's, but it was the only thing open that was close enough to the theater.
After Chili's we went to Henry's first in-theater movie. We took him to Evanston to see Happy Feet. This was actually just during the animated ads before the movie, not even the previews yet. He was already enthralled as you can see. I mostly liked Happy Feet, but it did get a little weird towards the end. I would be interested to hear what others think. Do not be fooled. Henry did not stay in his seat the entire time. It did take a tootsie roll pop towards the end to get him to sit still.
Here's Henry last night with his advent calendar. We have Uncle Rob and Aunt Carrie to thank for the lovely and labor-intensive Playmobile advent calendar. I spent at least an hour on the night of November 30th putting together all of the little boxes and filling them with the pieces of the diorama. Henry loves it, though. He has trouble opening only one box. Note the post-bath wet head.
And, finally, here's the tree. I told Henry to stand by the tree and he went over next to it and then did the sorority girl lean-in. Love it.

Oh Christmas Tree

*For some reason Blogger has not been letting me post photos. I was finally able to get them on today (has anyone else had trouble when they want to choose 'small' for the photos?) so here is Saturday's news.... My original vision was that the photos would be smaller and along the right side of the text, but now they're all just thrown in there at the end. Sorry.

Today we headed out to Richardson's Farm to find a Christmas tree. We originally had a Fraser Fir in mind, but we were talked into a Canaan instead. It's a quite lovely tree. I'm not sure it's as fragrant as I would like, but it's hard to tell when you've been in the house with it for a while. It probably goes without saying that Henry loved the tractor ride and the donuts most of all. I was a little concerned when I realized that we actually did have to cut the tree down ourselves, but Pete (you can call him Lumberjack Pete) had that thing down in no time. He tied it to the top of the car all by himself as well! Not that I ever doubted him, but I was pleased when we arrived home and the tree was still with us.

More of our snowy day

Henry helps his papa shovel...

Please don't chastise me for letting him outside in his rain boots. They were all we had. I put two pairs of socks on him and figured that it was better to have chilly toes than to miss out on the experience of the snow.

His first serious attempts at walking through the snow...

We made a snowman!!

Our tax dollars at work... we were excited to be outside when the big tractor came by! Then he turned around and came back again! Good stuff.

Proof that I do have the qualifications to deal with this weather: