2012_12_22 Saturday

Santa Claus came to our house this morning. He knew that it would be easier on him to deliver our things to our house before we left for the Barony. So, Jonathan wrote him a note:

"Dear Santa, the carrots are for your reindeer. The cookies and milk are for you. Love, Jonathan and Elise"

and the kids enjoyed their spoils in the morning.

By the afternoon, I was slicing and dicing in the kitchen in anticipation of the family arriving for Christmas dinner! While it was a little stressful for me to pull it off, I think it was a grand success, and it was very nice to have the family together before the holidays.

2012_12_18 Tuesday

Thus far, Jonathan hasn't brought up anything about the CT school shooting, so I'm going to leave it be. I asked him tonight at bedtime if there was anything he wanted to talk about, and he said no. I hope we can preserve his innocence just a little longer.

That said, he got to talking about how a tooth hurts. Well, it turns out that the one next to the 'hurt tooth' is really wiggly!!! He thought I was going to tear it out right then; it's not THAT wiggly. Dr Uncle will need to inspect, but it sure looks like the first wiggler to me! And, we'll need to make a nice pillow for it while at the Barony. That was really exciting!

We also put up our fake Christmas tree in anticipation of hosting Christmas dinner. And, Jonathan and Elise (and her friend) were in the annual WF fashion show. As always, they did terrific!

2012_12_14 Friday

Although I wholeheartedly apply the FreeRangeKids lifestyle at home, I can't help but find my heart in my throat today. Today, 27 elementary school kids were killed by two gunmen in CT, making it the worst (by #s) school massacre in history. While these incidents are rare and the news tends to overly report on them when they do occur, it's the first one I've heard of since Jonathan has been in school. So, my brain started to wander, and I realized that I don't know what the school's emergency (for any emergency) plans would be. I know they have had practice drills, but I don't know how the parents play into the school plans. If this had been his school, I don't know how/where/when I would have found him. Very sobering. And, now do I talk about it with Jonathan; not sure there's much to discuss with him, unless they talked about it in school first.

On a lighter note, Elise and I visited the zoo today. We had the whole place basically to ourselves. We were so bundled up that Elise couldn't actually climb on things and had a hard time getting up when she fell down. But we were warm! She rode the dolphin on the carousel.  We heard one wolf howl and the other three chime in; it was cool. She told me that "Jonathan has a donkey, mom. It's his stuffed animal on his bunkbed." She wanted to see the reindeer (aren't any), elephant (statue), donkey (for Jonathan), alligator, peacocks/hens (found 2 small feathers for J), and bears (which weren't out). She still isn't a big fan of the pteredon in the reptile house. Mildly successful, but the girl sure did run her heart out.

2012_12_10 Monday

I spent last evening getting Jonathan's old Tag Jr reading device transferred to Elise and updated. I gave it to her today at breakfast. And, she was shocked that it said, "Hi, Elise" (or whatever). That's all she can talk about when she's playing with it: Mommy, it knows my name! She's figuring out that the machine scans over the book to read to her -- sure didn't take her long to figure that out.

2012_12_08 Saturday

Gosh, it's been awhile! It's hard to believe that life is calming down now as we ramp up for Christmas! After the Superstorm came a nor'easter, then Thanksgiving roadtrips, and another snow"storm" (which I'd call more of a sprinkling). Dave was also in ATL for some of those times. I'll have to backfill the blog once I upload pictures.

Today, Santa and Mrs Claus came to town via fire engine. We waved them in, and then the kids sat on his lap for a short chat. Elise seemed to be in awe, but she was fully on board. Then we came home; Jonathan and I decorated our false holly shrub that Dave plans on planting in our yard in the spring. We put a bunch of old, family balls into vases to display around the first floor and hung less fragile things on the shrub. I discovered that the dough ornaments have molded and broken apart; I presume from wetness in the basement (outright water or dampness). He and Jonathan also hung lights outside (a first in the Hardwick household). In fact, they are off to my favorite box store to get more.