The best cookie exchange I have ever been to

I think you all know I run a children's literature book club for adults.  A few months ago, I jumped at the chance to join a friend's book club to have a chance to read some literature meant for grown-ups because I don't always make it a priority on my own.  I had no idea I was about to meet a really incredible group of women that are pretty intimidating to hang out with.  More on that another time.

For Christmas we decided to have a dinner with spouses instead of our normal book group.  The club was also planning to host a cookie exchange so we decided to combine both events since the holidays are so busy.  Our friends Kersten and Tai hosted at their amazing house.  Tai made his famous lasagna and then the rest of dinner was potluck, except Kersten asked me to help decorate as my contribution (she knows I cannot cook).  Kersten told me I could share some of the photos with you.

Here's her house all lit-up and welcoming.

We wanted the decorations to be affordable, but big enough to make a statement in her large living space so this is what we came up with (I got the idea from this post that I remembered seeing last year).

We used red cardstock to spell out some of Kersten's favorite phrases from Christmas carols, and then draped them across the room.  Larry, Tai, Kersten and just freehanded them as we were watching a movie one night and it went much faster than we would have predicted.

It's hard to get a sense of how many there were since her living space is so big (oh, to have that problem . . .)

Tai and Kersten were the perfect hosts.

And the star of the show was there gigantic two-story Christmas tree that they cut down themselves in the Uintas.

I was a really nice nice of visiting,

eating Tai's lasagna (which did live up to it's reputation),

and a lot of other great food.

Oh, and did I mention all the amazing cookies?  We gave a lot of ours away as quickly as possible because we would have gobbled them all by ourselves given a few days. They were that good.

I feel so lucky to get to know these girls.

It makes me so sad that we'll probably be moving away in a few months (more on that when we have some of the details worked out).

Christmas Ornaments 2010

We have a tradition of giving the boys each an ornament every christmas.  This year, Creed was big enough to have an opinion about his ornament and I made the mistake of telling him he could choose it himself.  So you know what we ended up with?  This Beauty!

He was so in love with it, how could I say no.  It makes me smile every time I see it.  Plus, it will make a great story when he gets older.

 It made me more aware that I only have a few years to pick Ollie's ornament on my own so I tried hard to find something special that would really be a keepsake for him.  Larry and I ended up settling on this Jonathan Adler Squirrel ornament because it made us both smile. I have to say I do look forward to seeing what he will choose for himself once he has an opinion on such things.

Ah, young love

Parents are always saying that Christmas is even better when you have kids and it's moments like this that prove it.  Creed's class sang two songs at their preschool's Christmas program.  We've been singing "Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer" for weeks to prepare for this moment, but I had no idea that Creed's class was sing a song in Chinese too and Creed knew every single word.

 He got up there with no fear and was so sincere and adorable.  I think it helped that he got to stand by his best gal-pal Malan and Yen-Yen, who Creed has a crush on.  Creed came home from school a few weeks ago and said, "Mom, isn't Yen-Yen stinkin' cute?"  I replied, "Ummm, yes, I think Yen-yen is very cute." Then he told me, "She's hot stuff!"  What?  Seriously?  At first I was like, who says "hot stuff"? How does he even know that phrase, and then I realized he learned it from me!  Whenever Larry gets his hands on someone's cell phone he like to reprogram his name to say something ridiculous. his number comes up as "Larry Boom-Boom Ford" on my mom's phone. My new phone says "Larry Hot Stuff Ford" so I often answer his calls, "Hey, Hot Stuff"  so I hold Larry responsible for the fact that Creed is now using the term on preschool girls.

 I wish I could show you the picture of his whole adorable class, but I would feel weird about that since I  don't have permission from all of their parents.

 We're looking forward to many school performances to come!

Trying something new

I made a movie using I-movie! (Ok, it's really just a slideshow, and I could have used Powerpoint or something, but still, it's a start.)

We've been enjoying the snow around here. There's a small hill across the street, perfect for toddler sledding (and a little grown-up sledding too)

And because some of the pictures are so adorable, I'm posting a few of them again for your viewing pleasure.  I'm a mom, I'm allowed to do that.

And oh yes, I set Ollie down to take some pictures and looked down to see his little face burried in the snow as he chowed down. Gross, but he was happy.

Wish granted!

Where ever we are for Christmas, we try to take advantage of some of the local celebrations.  Last year, we went to the Festival of Trees and Creed remembers it well.  He begged all year to go back and get a magic wand at the kids section where there are lots of games and craft projects.  So of course, you can imagine what the first thing we did was.

Ollie watched from the stroller and wasn't sure what to make of everything.  He slept through most of it.

 Creed on the other hand, had the time of his life.

 The gingerbread houses did not disappoint

 and neither did the funky trees this year.  They are auctioned off for charity and little did we know that we would have ample opportunity to get a better look at this one during Ollie's trip to the children's hospital that month.

 My favorite was a book themed tree with a Wild Thing decorating it.

 Creed's favorite was the Cookie Monster tree (maybe you could have guessed from his face)

 although they squabbled a little bit about both wanting to ride on the back of our stroller, Creed and his gal-pal Malan love being together and it was fun to check out the trees with them this year.

What were your favorite local holiday events this year?

We decked the halls

I wasn't counting on having any Christmas decorations up this year, but Larry and our friend Jason surprised me by digging through our storage unit and finding each an every box (A serious fete because our storage unit is crammed full)!  Creed and I were so excited to break out the decorations.  There was sort of a surplus for our small house, but that didn't stop us. 

There were reindeer prancing

 and wreathing a-hanging (Creed threw those mitten up there and they were too cute to take down)

 Stocking were hung by the chimney with care

 Even Creed's room was not spared

Creed picked out that white tree last year (he wanted pick, but unfortunately, he had to settle for white) and he worked so hard to decorate it without any help and was very proud of it.

 Our real tree was tiny this year.  We picked up this two foot rosemary tree to deliver to neighbors and Creed begged to keep it instead of buying a big tree because it "smells so beautiful" and I was happy to oblige since that saved us a lot of money and effort and we had nowhere to put a big tree anyway.

 And since they couldn't go under the tree, we stacked all the presents on top of our entertainment center where they were safe from curious little men (and we made no effort to arrange them artfully, oh well)

My favorite part was looking at all of the Christmas cards lining our hallway. I almost justified skipping cards this year even though I am a stationary designer, but looking at these cards everyday changed my mind.

 And, of course, all the decorating was done while wearing reindeer antlers, the required uniform for Christmas decorating around here.

So it was sort of a hodgepodge this year, but who really minds where there are happy reindeer prancing about?

Holy Cow, I'm behind!

Cuddling with kids has been my main priority lately, but I think I'm catching up with life again so here's the beginning of our Christmas ventures.

I still planned an advent with Christmas activities to do everyday, but this year we tried out a new tradition. Have you seen all the toy advent calendars out there?  I knew the lego calendars existed and we set out to pick up a Playmobil calendar, but you can find all sort of options.

I chose this Playmobil set for Creed and he was so excited to open a little door everyday.

We had to be careful to keep all of the tiny parts away from Ollie, but the hours Creed spent playing with this set was totally worth it. (We cheated and opened Santa first instead of on Christmas Eve because that's the most exciting toy to play with.)

I'd highly recommend picking up a set next year.  Lego and Playmobil are my favorites and they both come out with a few different advent calendar options each year.

Oliver at 10 Months

I know I'm biased, but everyday I find myself thinking about how adorable and amazing this kid is.

 His ten month pictures are kind of sad because he has a big bruise on his cheek from falling and having a seizure.  The next day was even worse because he hit the opposite cheek when he fell and had another seizure.

 Over Christmas vacation our family and friends kept commenting on what a happy, content baby he seems to be.  I have to agree, but he's also very busy so most of his ten month pictures look like this

 and this.

When I'm out in public with him, I often see people I don't know grinning at me, and then I look down and realize that Ollie is waving at them.  He's quite the ambassador of good will.  Here he is doing the double wave.

 He's living up to his nickname Tiny Ford.  He's only in the 25% percentile for height and 10th for weight (Creed was enormous and always at least in the 95%)

 He started walking at about nine and a half months.  He only started standing on his own a week or two before that so I was totally surprised.  He took ten steps on his second attempt.  He slowed for a few days once he realized that he was going to fall, but the last few days he walks more than he crawls.  People are always shocked to see him walk because he's so tiny.

 He's nowhere near sleeping through the night and we can't let him cry because he might have a breath-holding spell or seizure so we are feeling exhausted and there's no end in site.

 When he turned ten months, he had three teeth, but he's had three more break through since then, and I haven't noticed any crabbiness from teething.

 He waves, claps, and loves to give high fives.

This is the best shot I have of him walking so I'll work on taking some more pictures for evidence, but he makes a pretty adorable reindeer.

 He's never liked pacifiers and he doesn't suck his thumb so he didn't sooth himself very well, but he's fallen for soft blankets.  He doesn't suck on them, but when he's in need of comfort he puts them in front of his face and moves his mouth like he's nursing.  He can often be spotted dragging this small soft square my mom made around the house.

I feel lucky to have him as a constant companion everywhere I go.