Here I Am!

So yeah... buried under Christmas stuff and family stuff and oh yeah... PINTEREST. Curse you people who lead me to this evil place. Now I have a list of ideas I'll never have time to execute. However, I practically have a whole category of meals I can make using a muffin tin, so there's that.

I'll work backwards here. Yesterday was a pleasantly quiet day. Tom watched football with his dad and they entertained the kids all afternoon so I got to the grocery store and the Hallmark store, put together Jonathan's Cozy Coupe and make some sugar cookies ALL by myself. So nice. All was well... until Jonathan woke up from his second nap with one bright pink cheek and I thought, foolishly, "Oh, he must have just slept on something." Then his other cheek joined the party. Add in a little uncharactic fussiness and a total meltdown when presented with dinner... when I picked him up from the highchair, he was burning up. Sure enough,, 102.8. I gave him a bath and some Tylenol and then he wolfed down a ton of food and Tom and I passed him back and forth on the couch for awhile while he lounged on us. When he started to doze off around 6:45, we just put him to bed. I dosed him all night long with Motrin and Tylenol, taking his temp each time. It spiked as high as 101, but mostly stayed in check with the medicine, so he got some much needed good sleep.

This morning, he was back to 101, but then, by an hour after he got up, it was down to 99.4 on its own and he was mostly himself. I dosed him with some Motrin before his nap and all seems well, although he does have a gross crusty nose... so, hopefully just a cold.

Saturday, we wanted to do something Christmasy with the boys. It was a tossup between the train garden and our local "Santa Arrives by Firetruck!" event. We opted for the close, less crowded option. We didn't tell the boys why we were standing around in the shopping center... just kept them guessing until the big moment.

Here's Jonathan enjoying the view from Tom's shoulders. He's so bundled up, he actually looks like Simon as a baby for a change. ;)


Ben was cold and complainy... but humored us with a brother moment.


We saw a bunch of school friends from both boys' schools... so that passed the time for a few minutes and the boys were excited to see people they knew.

Then came the firetruck. My children were underwhelmed to say the least. Didn't help that we kinda really couldn't see Santa from where we were standing.


Eh. Oh well.

Ben immediately asked, "Can we go have lunch now?"

So lunch it was.

We abandoned the Santa scene and grabbed a table at the bagel place before the idea of lunch hit the rest of the crowd.






We finished up and in came the rest of the people who had stood in line for Santa FIRST. HA! Off we went to snag a Santa pic with practically zero line.

Free cookies! WAHOO!


The big guy and the big boys. Santa actually "oooooof"ed when he hauled Simon up on to his lap. LOL!


Jonathan wanted nothing to do with Santa, mostly because there were shiny sparkly garlands lining the path to Santa that seemed more interesting to him.

The boys both forgot what they wanted for Christmas. D'oh. I was hoping to get some confirmation that I've secured their #1 wishes. Oh well... guess we'll find out on Christmas morning!

We skipped the glitter tattoo line and the face-painting line and back home we went to sit by the fire and watch Elf. :) YAY!

Friday we had a Christmas party at a friend's house which was SO fun. The kiddos went in their jammies and just had a blast together. :)

That afternoon, I made my annual batch of these heavenly yummy things...



During this time, Jonathan systematically trashedd the first floor.


And just generally got into stuff...


Simon built Star Wars ships out of Legos.


And asked me to take his picture.






Ben had a good week at school and only had to recopy a handful of things. He's learning cursive and is developing the most interesting handwriting... it's kind of cute watching it evolve. ;) I'll have to scan something in later so you can see.

So, there... I think we're all caught up. Right? Oh who am I kidding. I am too far behind to REALLY catch up. So let's just start from where we are, shall we? :)