Christmas Eve

Christmas Eve was a busy day. Kyle took Peyton to daycare on his way to work. I was off work, but I needed the alone time to clean the house. I worked hard all morning. Kyle only decided to work a half-day and he picked Peyton up from daycare early on his way home.

We went to church in the afternoon. The service was scheduled to start at 3:00. Last year we arrived only a few minutes before 3:00 and there were no seats left. There were extra chairs set up everywhere and people were still standing in the aisles. Since Peyton was so little, we decided not to stay. This year, we got there about 45 minutes early to ensure that we'd have a seat in the main church. We brought goldfish, juice, and books for Peyton, so he was happy. He did really well once the service started. He enjoyed listening to everyone sing. He'd clap after each song.

We headed home to relax for a little while. Then we left to go to dinner at Sabatino's with my dad's side of the family, as we do each Christmas Eve. We got the restaurant just before our 6:00 reservation. Dinner was ok, but definitely not great. I got the gnocchi which was decent, but Kyle did not really enjoy his chicken and Peyton didn't eat much either. I got a cannoli for dessert which didn't taste bad, but didn't quite taste right either. Peyton seemed to like it though. He also ate some of Pop-Pop's cheesecake, which might be his favorite dessert.

Peyton loaded up on lots of goodies at dinner. Kim, Bo, and Dougie got him a snow globe that plays Christmas songs. Aunt Bev gave him his traditional gingerbread man and some cookies. Nadean, Austin, and Vester gave us a wreath ornament made out of jingle bells. Mom and Dad hooked us up with some yummy fudge.

Here is everyone at dinner. There was a wall just at the end of our table, so I couldn't get everyone (Kyle and Peyton) in the picture.

Peyton borrowed Austin's light-up reindeer antlers for a bit.

We left the restaurant around 8:00 to head home. There was still a lot to do. We dressed Peyton in his new Christmas pajamas. Isn't he so cute?!

Then I read him "The Night Before Christmas" like I do each year.

We wrote a note to Santa and left him some cookies and milk. We also left a carrot for the reindeer.

Then it was finally time for bed. Peyton didn't lay down until almost 9:00, which is past his bed time. We told him he had to sleep so that Santa could come and bring him presents. He happily complied.

Snow!

Yesterday when we went to work, the weather forecast was that it was going to snow 8-12 inches on Saturday. By the time we left work, the forecast was up to 15 to 25 inches of snow. It started snowing last night around 9:00. It's about 5:30 now, and it hasn't stopped at all. We're estimating that there is about 20-24 inches of snow out there already. The snow is supposed to continue until tomorrow morning around 6:00 am. So who knows how many more inches we'll get before the snow stops.

Peyton couldn't wait to get outside to play in the snow. He loved it the last time it snowed. When he woke up from his nap, I got him dressed for outside. We put lots of layers on. Grandmom bought Peyton some boots last night (Thanks!), so we put those on too. The boots must have been uncomfortable or strange to him, because he was walking around like he was just learning to walk. We added Peyton's hat and gloves and then he and Kyle headed outside. I passed on playing in the snow this time and just took pictures from inside the house instead!

Kyle carried Peyton outside and then plopped him down into the snow. We were trying to gauge how deep the snow was. In this picture, Peyton is standing up, even though it looks like he's sitting. The snow is up to his waist! Kyle said he wasn't even standing on the ground either, but on some packed snow.

When Peyton tried to move, he couldn't and said, "I'm stuck!" The snow was just too deep for him to be able to go anywhere. He tried to walk a few times, but just fell over. He got pretty frustrated pretty quickly.

My Snowmen!

The boys were only outside for about 5 minutes when Peyton completely gave up and asked to come inside. He didn't like playing in the snow this time!

Symphony of Lights

On Wednesday night, we went to the Symphony of Lights in Columbia. You drive through the woods for a little more than a mile and there are lots of light displays set up. It is a fundraiser for Howard County General Hospital. Peyton sort of liked the lights, but I don't think he was very impressed. I think it was hard for him to tell what some of the displays were. There were some things that he hasn't encountered before, like toy soldiers, so he didn't know what he was looking at. Here are some pictures.

Poop!

Interesting title, I know... I just wanted to document on here that yesterday, December 18, Peyton pooped on the potty for the first time. He has a potty here at home and loves sitting on it, but has been unsuccessful at putting anything into it. At daycare they put him on the potty a few times throughout the day. It was there that he did his big accomplishment. I think it was pretty much lucky timing on their part, but I'll take it as a start!

Way to go Peyton!

Santa, Take 2

Since Peyton was wearing his coat when he got his picture taken with Santa at the Bass Pro Shop, we decided to take him to see the mall Santa for another try at a good picture. We got to the mall at about 6:55 Monday evening. Santa was at dinner until 7:00, so there was already a line forming. There weren't that many people in front of us though. The line was moving so slow. There was nothing to keep the kids entertained, except for the fake snow on the ground. They were all playing with it and throwing the glittery mess everywhere. Peyton was so bored of being in line. He didn't want to be held, but if we put him down, he just wanted to get into things he wasn't supposed to be getting into. So, Kyle and I took turns holding him and we both ended up with sore backs.

Eventually, after AN HOUR of waiting in line, we were up close enough to Santa to discover the problem: the camera kept breaking! They couldn't get the big flash to go off as they snapped the picture with the camera. They were on the phone with technical support and jiggling wires trying to get the camera to work. After each kid was sitting on Santa's lap for a good 5-10 minutes, the camera would work just long enough to get a picture or two. Then, it was the next kid's turn. But wait, the camera would break AGAIN!

We finally made it to Santa after AN HOUR AND A HALF! Yes, 90 minutes. It was craziness. Here's the picture.

It turned out pretty good. Peyton told Santa that he wants a basketball, a soccer ball, and a baseball (all of which he already has!) Kyle had to bribe Peyton with ice cream to get him to be good in line. As soon as we paid for the pictures and started to leave, he asked, "Ice cream?" The boy is not dumb! We headed to Rita's for some delicious italian ice. I'm happy Kyle used ice cream as the bribe because we all know it's my favorite food too!

Basketball, Christmas Party, and Santa... Oh My!

Kyle plays basketball in a league that is associated with his work. He's played in the league for as long as we've known each other, I think. Sometimes his games are on Friday evenings and sometimes they are on Saturday mornings. This week his game was at 9:00 Saturday morning. Peyton happened to wake up while Kyle was getting ready to leave for the game, so we decided to go watch his game.

Look at Kyle's mad ball handling skillz!

And he goes up for the lay-up!

Look at that fine free-throw shooting technique!

These guys are not really the greatest basketball players, but I think they try their best. And Kyle has fun doing it, so that's all that matters. Kyle scored 5 points, which may not seem like a lot but that was about 25% of his team's total. He even got a technical foul, which was pretty funny because it was called on a misunderstanding. I think the referee got into his head! Peyton had a good time watching the game and cheering for Kyle. He'd yell, "Go, go Daddy!" He would also clap when they scored. Unfortunately that wasn't too often and Kyle's team lost the game.

After the game we went home and had lunch and put Peyton down for a nap. We had Kyle's company's Christmas party to go that evening. I took a nap too! When I went to get dressed for the party (30 minutes before we had to leave) I realized that I didn't have any dress shoes that fit me. I wear them so infrequently that I didn't know my feet grew! I had to run to the store really quick to buy a new pair of shoes. Then when I got home, I also realized that none of my dressy shirts fit me either. I didn't expect that at all because all of my regular clothes still fit me fine. Luckily I had purchased a few maternity items a couple of weeks ago and had a shirt that was dressy enough to wear to the party. The crisis was averted.

We took Peyton to my parents' house so that he could spend the night with them. Then we headed downtown to check into the hotel. Kyle's company (ACES) got everyone that wanted one a room for the night so that no one had to drive home after the party. There are about 10 people that work for his company out in Denver and they paid for all of the employees and their spouses to fly out here for the weekend to attend the party. This bad economy means nothing to ACES!

The party was at Ruth's Chris. ACES arranged for shuttle service to take everyone from the hotel to the restaurant. The party began with happy hour and hors d'oeuvres. They had crab balls, shrimp, and crab stuff mushrooms to eat. After happy hour, the sit-down dinner began. The first course was a choice of either seared tuna or shrimp cocktail. I didn't eat either because I don't like shrimp and didn't think I should be eating semi-raw seafood right now. The next course was salad. They chose the field greens salad, which was ok, but last year they offered a Cesar salad, which was better. For the main course, you could choose from either fillet mignon, salmon, or a NY strip. We got the fillet mignon (of course!) We both like our steaks well done. The past two times we've been there, the steaks have been cooked perfectly. This time though, the outsides were so burnt that the steaks were a little crunchy. I also got a lobster tail with my steak, but it was so tough that I couldn't even cut it with the steak knife, so I didn't each much of that. What a disappointment. The sides were sauteed mushrooms (yuck), broccoli that was barely cooked (I like raw broccoli, but not for a side dish), and a baked potato (which they didn't give out any butter or sour cream for until like 20 minutes after the food was served). Dessert was the chocolate sin cake, which is so rich and impossible to finish. Overall, I was disappointed with the food.

We still had a really good time at the party though. Kyle was drinking Jack and Coke all night and "was feeling pretty good," as he said several times. The people that Kyle works with are very friendly, fun, and easy to talk to.

Here's Kyle and I at the party.

And this is Kyle and his BFF Karl.

ACES spared no expense for the party. They raffled off 10 gifts to the employees. The prizes included a PS3, a Wii, a netbook, a GPS, an iPod Touch, and iPod Nano, a fancy coffeemaker, and other expensive stuff that I can't remember right now. Each employee that didn't win got $50 in gift cards to various stores. And, they're buying each employee an L. L. Bean coat with the company logo on it.

We shuttled back to the hotel and I passed out from exhaustion. I can only imagine how tired I would have been had I not taken the nap. We got to sleep in on Sunday morning, which was nice.

When we got home Sunday afternoon, I turned right around and headed out to Arundel Mills. Kim, Bo, and Dougie were going to visit Santa in the Bass Pro Shop there. They invited Peyton to come along too. Since they live very close to my parents, they picked Peyton up from there and brought him with them. I got there before they did and got into the line that was really long. Even after they got there, we ended waiting almost 45 more minutes until we finally reached Santa. Peyton was pretty grumpy because he was woken up at 6:30 that morning which is super early, and he hadn't taken a nap yet. It was 1:30 and he usually lays down at 12:00. When it was finally our turn to see Santa Peyton didn't want to have anything to do with it. I know it was just because he was tired though. Dougie sat on his lap and gave him his list. Then we were getting ready to leave the store and I had Peyton's coat on and everything when he decided that he wanted to see Santa after all. Kim asked the guy taking the pictures if Peyton could go up there again, and he agreed. Peyton sat on Santa's lap and we got this picture.

We didn't get home until about 2:30. Peyton fought us when we laid him down for his nap, but eventually fell asleep. Kyle woke him up at 4:00 so that he would still go to bed at normal time, and he was not happy about that. He came downstairs and fell asleep on the living room floor. Eventually, he woke up and was back to his cheerful self. We made some peanut butter cookies together that evening.

It was a super busy, but very fun, weekend.

It's Beginning to Look A Lot Like Christmas

Last weekend we decorated our house for Christmas. This process was much to Kyle's chagrin. However, I am not a Scrooge like him, so I won and we got all of the decorations out. Kyle and I did most of the decorating Saturday night while Peyton was sleeping.

When Peyton came downstairs Sunday morning, he ran over to the Christmas tree and said, "Woooow!" Then he proceeded to walk around the house checking out each set of decorations. He uttered many more "Wow's." I guess he didn't get the Scrooge gene from Kyle. Whew!

Grandmom bought Peyton a special ornament this year. It is a firetruck, which Peyton is really into right now. We let him hang it up on the tree.

This picture is really crappy, but here's our Christmas tree.

And here's our fireplace mantel and stockings. All of the figurines on the mantel are Christmas mice. My Aunt Bev would buy me a mouse each year and give it to me on Christmas Eve. I have quite the collection!

We have a ton more decorations, but Peyton's favorite one is this Mickey Mouse snow globe thing. Jeremy gave it to him as a gift for his first Christmas. It plays two songs and Peyton plays them over and over and over. Gee, thanks Jer, hehe.

On Sunday afternoon, Peyton helped me make some chocolate chip cookies. He loved pouring the ingredients into the mixing bowl. After each ingredient, he'd ask, "More?!" Notice the big pile of flour next to the bowl. He tried! The cookies tasted really delicious though, so I guess Peyton did a good job.

We have a few more types of cookies to make, and I'm sure Peyton will help me with those too. I love my little helper.

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas and I can't wait for the big day!

Baby #2

Well since the cat is out of the bag, I thought I would go ahead and make the official announcement on the blog that we are expecting baby #2! I'm due on July 13, 2010. Peyton is very excited to be a big brother! Kyle and I are quite excited about the addition to our family too.

Here is our baby's first picture. Cute, huh?! (Just like it's Mama!)

Play Dough and Snow

On Friday night, Peyton, Kyle, and I played with some Play Dough. It was Peyton's first time ever playing with it. He had a good time rolling it into a ball, rolling it into a log, and pounding it flat into a pancake. Kyle and I made Peyton necklaces and bracelets to wear too. I think we all had fun.

On Saturday, we had our first snow fall of the year. It was only raining when Peyton and I woke up, but it soon switched to snow. The flakes were huge and it was snowing pretty hard throughout the day. It snowed for a good 10 hours. The grass, cars, and sidewalks were covered, but nothing laid on the roads. When Peyton woke up from his nap, the three of us went outside to play in the snow. It was the first time that Peyton has ever played in the snow. (We only had one snowfall last year, and we just didn't take him out in it.)

Here's Peyton as soon as he stepped outside into the snow. He loved it!

Kyle and Peyton immediately got into a snowball fight. Peyton had a great time picking up snow, making it into a ball, and trying to hit Kyle and I with it. Thankfully, he wasn't too successful.

Kyle, however, was successful at hitting his target. He threw a snowball at me and it was packed so well that it hurt! Since the snow was packing so well, we decided to make a snowman. Here is Peyton and I with the finished product. Our snowman is a Lions fan, I guess.

Kyle made one more giant snowball. He and Peyton were taking turns standing on it. Peyton really enjoyed that too.

We also tried to show Peyton how to make a snow angel, but he didn't really understand. He tried though.

The rest of the time we were outside Peyton just ran around in circles with a big smile on his face. He also kept picking up and throwing handfuls of snow. He was having such a good time. We had to make him go inside though because he was clearly freezing. He didn't want to go inside at all. Neither did Kyle...

Thanksgiving

Peyton and I started off Thanksgiving watching the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade while Kyle slept in a little. Peyton enjoyed seeing the Sesame Street float, the Abby Caddaby balloon, and the Mickey Mouse balloon (shocking, huh?). He was also excited to see Santa Clause come at the end of the parade. After the parade I made an apple pie and the death by chocolate to take to dinner later on.

This Thanksgiving, I am thankful for my family!

We went to my cousin Nadean's house for Thanksgiving dinner, as we do every year. Here is the annual picture of everyone before we started eating dinner.

Dinner was delicious. There were all of the usual suspects: turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, my mom's cracker corn, green bean casserole, sausage and sauerkraut, and bread. Everyone ate until they were stuffed.

We took a little break before dessert to make some room in our stomachs for more food. Here's Jeremy and Jill relaxing.

And here is a picture of Pop-Pop and Peyton.

Peyton entertained us with some piano playing and singing before dessert. We heard such classics as "Sing" and "Jingle Bells."

Next, we ate dessert. There was lots to choose from including Death by Chocolate, apple pie, pumpkin pie, sweet potato pie, eclairs, 7-Up cake, peanut butter tandy cakes, and some cookies. Everything was so yummy!

After dessert, Peyton played with this bank for a really long time. He'd put all of the coins in, then Nadean would get them back out for him and then he would do it all over again. He doesn't need toys for Christmas, just a bank and 5 pennies. That would make him happy.

Austin is always nice and lets Peyton play with his old toys. Last night they played with this pirate ship. Peyton liked that too.

We headed home around 7:30, just in time for bedtime. Happy Thanksgiving!

Giving Thanks

For Thanksgiving, I thought I'd make a list of things that I'm thankful for, so here goes!

I'm thankful for:

• My very cute, very smart, very loving son, Peyton
• My wonderful and supportive husband, Kyle
• My awesome parents
• My super cool brother, Jeremy and his beautiful girlfriend, Jill
• All of my other family and Kyle's family, especially my sisters-in-law
• Our house
• Our health
• Peyton's daycare teachers
• My friends

I'm a lucky girl!

Surprise Party

Saturday morning we went to the Maryland game. They were playing Virginia Tech and there were so many Hokie fans there that it was more like a Tech home game than a Maryland one. Maryland sucked as usual and got blown out. Needless to say, it was not a fun afternoon.

In the evening, we went to a surprise 70th birthday party for my cousin's mother, Miss Sis. It was in the banquet room of OPI. Here's a picture of Miss Sis when she arrived. She was definitely surprised!

Peyton had a great time at the party. He mingled with everyone. Here he is with Kim and Dougie. As you can see, he has a cracker in his hand. He ate pretty much constantly all night.

This is actually a good picture of Kyle and I.

The party started with hors d'oeuvres of cheese, crackers, and vegetables with dip. Dinner consisted of turkey, london broil, green beans, roasted potatoes, and bread. Peyton ate like a champ. After dinner, Dougie helped Peyton send his very first text message.

Next it was time to sing Happy Birthday. Peyton, of course, sang along too. After we were finished singing, he knew it was time to eat birthday cake. Peyton loves birthdays.

As a party game, each person got a raffle ticket. The kids' tickets were entered into one drawing and the adults' tickets were entered into another drawing. Peyton won the first kids' drawing! He got a gift card and lots of Ghirardelli chocolate (which I will gladly help him eat!) I think the contest was rigged though, because Peyton is the one that chose the winning ticket. What a smart kid, picking his own ticket! Haha.

After dinner, it was time for dancing. Peyton is a DANCE MACHINE! He danced with everyone. I don't think he sat down at all, except to eat some cake in between dances. He needed to get a little more energy from all of the sugar in the icing so that he could get back out on the dance floor.

Here is Peyton and I doing the Electric Slide together.

Then we slow danced together.

And he danced with Grandmom,

and Nadean and Vester,

and Aunt Bev.

Peyton danced to Cotton Eye Joe, he danced to Friends in Low Places, and he danced to everything in between. At one point, he got a little angry at the number of slow songs and said, "New song." That was pretty funny. Everyone at the party got a kick out of Peyton. The party started at 7:00 and we didn't leave until after 10:00. Peyton wasn't tired at all, but he was wheezing from all of that dancing, so we had to get him home to give him a treatment.

I can't wait until there is another party or wedding so that Peyton can show off his dance moves again. He is a party animal! We had a really good time at the party.