The great Christmas visit of 2011

Bjorn's mom rallied the troops and brougth everyone to Texas for Christmas. It was awesome to have everyone under one roof. The kids, in particular, had a blast! It was so fun to have us all together although I think by the fifth day, everyone was itching to get back to their own places, and not just because the stomach flu made an appearance. Since then, we've been busy washing all the sheets and towels and hot water, folding up the air mattresses (and buying new ones since half the ones I borrowed broke this week) and finding left items in random

Here's Fafa giving out some presents.

Simone, Meg, Andy and Zane.

Bjorn, Tor and Erik and Zane. We went to my parents' for Christmas dinner. They were fantastic to host 15 people!

All the "BBs" on the stairs. Barnbarn is Swedish for grandchildren so these are all the BB generation.

Up in Dad's new office where he was showing off his guns.

Out of sequence but so damn adorable - this is Meg's hoilday pageant. Is was so damn cute!

Andy and Mrs. White at his school holiday party.

One of the dad's reading a story at the holiday party.

Erik and Fafa on Christmas Day.

Fafa and Jennifer making fantastic Swedish cookies. I ate all of them.

Jennifer in the "Forever Lazy." She really rocked it.

The obligatory bathtub picture. Zane is far too mature at 9 to have any part in this, but the other kids had a blast.

Zane and his glow in the dark mouthpiece.

Fancy pants camera

I am still loving my fancy pants camera (and the fancy pants husband who gave it to me). I'm now coveting a new device that will let me post pictures even faster. In the meantime, here are some recent fancy pants pictures.

This girl can move! Here she is jamming at Andy's soccer game.

Classic father-son photograph. Classic picture of Mark refusing to smile.

The "boys", our boy kittens Perry and Mittens. I thought they were so cute asleep like that.

How good looking are these folks?

Our friends Jenny and Sean who were kind enough to ply me with wine and let me stay at their house last time I was traveling.

Andy getting a badge for his work at the last Cub Scout meeting. The whole Cub Scout business is really adorable. It also satisfies Andy's need for outdoorsy stuff that's not necessarily a competitive sport.

Mark really needed a haircut.

Dad in Arizona. We climbed "A" mountain in Phoenix right next to Arizona State University. It was a nice hike, and short, but staight up. I really dug Phoenix. Next time Mary does a triathalon, I want to bring the family and stay for a few days.

Sun Devil stadium from "A" Mountain.

Mary and Mom before race day.

Mary's car all decorated. Elizabeth and I did this after a few drinks and a $100 win at the casino. We are very cool and have fantastic talent.

Mary after the 1.5 MILE swim. That's right, 1 1/2 MILES in the water. And that's just the first leg of this Ironman triathalon. Seriously, it was amazing and inspiring. And naturally, I haven't exercised since.

Cool picture of the bridge and all the bikes.

The bridge at night. As you can see, I was really loving the fancy camera. I thought it turned out really nicely.

Mary after 1 1/2 miles in the water, 112 miles on the bike and 12 miles running. I was tired and I walked a mile. Seriously, it's amazing.

Bjorn putting the star on the Christmas tree.

Andy doing his spelling "sort."

Santa

My cousin had a fancy Christmas party and sweetly invited the children (nice as she was to invite them, I won't do that again. Far too fun of a party to waste it keeping kids from smearing mustard on the white bookcases). She even invited a Santa who was adorable and so totally gay. Of course, he also totally relished the part he was playing and seemed to really enjoy himself. Here's a picture of all four kids together in one frame with Santa.

So Blogger is still giving me trouble uploading through Internet Explorer. I had to go to Mozilla to get the picture upload function to work. On IE, it keeps trying to make me go through a Google "Cloud Picker" and then tells me my photos failed to upload. Weird.

Oh, the loot

Here are the kids on Christmas morning. Note the matching pajamas. When Dad and I went shopping, we got four pairs for all four little cousins that matched. They are more boyish than girlish, but while the girls can wear blue, Andy would cry and whine (more than normal) to wear pink.

Here is Meg attempting to ride her balance bike. This is about as far as she's gotten on it. See the cookies and milk for Santa in the background. Santa was too tired (and maybe even a little drunk) after cooking his beef stew all day that it was actually a struggle to make sure to consume the cookies.

Bjorn's new shoes that despite my best efforts, were not exactly like his old ones.

Here's Dad in front of their house attempting to ride Mom's pogo stick. As you can see, he's wearing the back brace and suspenders he got for Christmas (I imagine he picked them out himself) as well as his Christmas sweater. It's a miracle we didn't end up in the emergency room.

Merry Christmas!

Wow. After weeks of planning, plotting, purchasing, stressing, listening to the whining choruses of, "I want it right now," and , "But what if I don't get any presents!" Christmas is over. Bjorn made his Julia Child beef borgonionne for everyone on Christmas Eve, and damn, it was amazing. Bjorn was a champ in that the recipe calls for about 25 different steps, including cutting and drying about 100 different pieces of meat, and takes about eight hours to make start to finish. Damn it was worth it though. I consider that one of the Christmas presents to me!

We had 12 people all together for dinner, including four children. It was awesome to get to use the full range of our house for entertaining, complete with using every dish in the house. It took four loads in the dishwasher to get everything clean. So fun to have room to get out all that wedding stuff and entertain on such a grand scale.

Dallas did get like two inches of cold rain that day, the first precipitation of any kind all month. I was insanely jealous of all the snow throughout the rest of the South and blizzard warnings on the eastern seaboard. Fortunately good wine, good food and good family eased my jealousy.

It was a lot trying to keep our family traditions from Virginia and merging them into the new world order here complete with my cousin from Sydney, my sister on crutches from knee surgery and my uncle in a wheelchair. Like I made the mistake of hauling all our presents to my parents which meant Christmas morning was more bare with just a few Santa gifts. We also tried rushing over to their house to open presents after stockings and Santa, but we managed to annoy them by being late and I annoyed my own family by rushing them. We'll figure it out.

Of course, what works this year most certainly won't work next as we are thrilled that Bjorn's two brothers, his mother and all the kids are planning to come for the holiday. That would be the five of us (plus or minus Jennifer who isn't sure), four siblings and their spouses, four kids aged four to 15, plus Bjorn's mom. I am glad to have a year to get enough sheets and towels for everyone, but that's a good problem to have!

So far, winners for the holiday:
Bjorn's homemade Swedish glogg
Meg's new Yo Gabba Gabba bath toys
Andy's Nerf basketball hoop
Bjorn's beef stew
This iPad from Dad (Bjorn is insanely jealous)
Mom's egg nog
Dad's wine selection
Meg's dress up clothes (Andy also uses the shoes for "tap dancing"
Meg's new kitchen
Super Mario Galaxy
All the new puzzles

Surprisingly, the biggest duds are what I considered the biggest presents for the kids. Andy got a remote control helicopter that's harder to operate than it seems. Meg also got a cool "balance bike" that she can't figure out at all.

P.S. I have discovered Boardwalk Empire. Damn you, HBO. That's good stuff.

The bike I spent weeks researching. I was so excited to see her take off on it and she just can't figure it out at all right now. They did spend an hour fighting over my uncle's stocking stuffer, an old school magnetic toy. Typical. I am so getting these kids a box next year instead of the toy that goes in it.

Enough, now

 

As if the Christmas season wasn't enough, Andy went and lost a tooth (his third) last night. We were already at a party too late and then my niece, Megan, was coming to spend the night. After I'd read three stories and was tucking them in, finally, at something ungodly like 10:30, he pulls his tooth out. The going rate this time? Two dollars.

Damn you, NPR

I listen to a lot of NPR these days. Part of this is because the local radio stations in Texas seem to want to lynch all the Democrats and Obama himself. It's not like there is a legitimate debate here, but people screaming at me through the radio about how evil Obamacare is, how he's not a citizen, etc. etc. So I listen to NPR.

A few weeks ago, I heard a review of a book, "As Meat Loves Salt."

I remember when I first idly opened this book over my morning coffee. I had other plans for that day, yet after about 10 pages, I put those plans aside. Indulging myself, I curled into the living room armchair and galloped on as the sun rose high. I don't, alas, often say this of any novel as an adult, but I could not put it down.

High praise, right? So I checked it out of the library. I went so far as to ask for an inter library loan (which is friggin awesome. Seriously. Any book in the country except new bestsellers is available for this inter library loan. If I work this right, I may never have to buy a book again).

So I read it and it's terrible. Well, I'm sure it's got artistic merit, maybe even be a classic, like Faulkner. But by golly, it was dark, sad, depressing, violent and, unbelievably, erotic, if you consider gay rape erotic, that is.

In a change of subject, my sister survived her knee surgery and is recovering slowly and painfully, but recovering. My mother returned to Dallas with my Uncle Bobby who is also recovering from his stroke slowly, but at least he's here where we (well, my mom) can look after him and his care properly.

Also on the health front, Andy and I are recovering from the stomach flu. Fingers crossed we are better by tomorrow as the party circuit starts tomorrow night and goes through Christmas. I. Can't. Wait. I hope to start feeling better so we can properly enjoy the merriment of the holidays in our new hometown.

The barfs

So, what's the protocol when your daughter vomits all over the bathroom at Wal-Mart?

Poor Meg. We went Friday night to the super Wal-Mart so I could get a few groceries and some stocking stuffers (I also need to enjoy that she's still young enough I can slip those past her; Andy is starting to ask some serious questions about Santa). We hadn't made it past the produce section.

"My tummy full. I need to pee."
"Really? Because I just asked you before we left. But okay..."

So we abandon our cart and go into the bathroom. For some reason, I picked the handicapped stall. The toilet's too tall, but there's room for me to stand with her.

"I can't go!" She whines. And I start to get annoyed because she's doing this a lot lately when she wants a change of scenery. Not this time.
"Meg!"
"My tummy...." And then she proceeds to throw up forward all over the floor. Fortunately, she spares my clothes, but I'm looking around wondering how in the world I'm going to handle this. She then throws up another time. The first was all red, compliments of the "red" party at her school on Friday where everyone brought in something colored red. I know, good times.

By now, she's crying and I'm trying to comfort her without covering myself or stepping in the mess all over the floor while wondering if the barfs are done. After a brief assessment of the situation, I hang up my coat and purse, take off all her clothes and start cleaning her up in the sink. Naturally the other lady in the bathroom at Wal-Mart is as nice as she can be and is talking to Meg helping calm her down, too. I take off my sweater after I wipe her down and put it on her. I sneak out to get a plastic bag and put all her stuff in it -- clothes, jacket and shoes - and we make our exit. I do tell the manager at the check out that my daughter threw up in there. "It's okay," she says cheerfully. Clearly she's not going to be the one cleaning it up.

After we get home, she throws up a couple more times, mostly dry heaves. By the next morning, she's back to normal. Go figure.

Lots going on this week. My sister is having her ACL fixed tomorrow and my uncle with lung cancer is leaving his occupational rehab on Tuesday and my mom flying out to Odessa, Texas, and driving him him back to Dallas so she can better look after him. Please keep them in your thoughts. Oh, if that wasn't enough and then we have Christmas. I am mostly prepared. Mostly.

Edited to add that since I wrote this at 8:33 p.m., she went and threw up again. This time, all over Bjorn and the bathroom off the kitchen. I am hoping it's just that she drank some old milk she found (don't ask) but it could be an extension of Friday, strep or just one of those things. She doesn't have a fever, for now anyway.

Happy holidays

I'm totally biased, of course, but this is pretty darn adorable. Here's what he said when he handed it to me when I picked him up this week, "Here, Mommy. This is for you. It's a Christmas ornament. It's breakable so don't let me touch it. Okay, Mommy?" That kid is sadly as subtle as his parents.

To cap the holiday festivities, Andy has strep. I got a call from the school nurse that his was complaining of being really tired and presented with a 101.5 temperature. By the time I arrived 15 minutes later, it had spiked to 102.1 even with him lying on an ice pack. The adorable nurse who is at least 10 years younger than me insisted I take him to the doctor where a quick strep test was positive for strep. Some omnicef and Motrin later, he's bouncing off the walls again. Modern medicine simply rocks sometimes.

Fa-la-la-la-la

Meg's school had a Christmas carol event tonight where all the classrooms paraded out one by one to sing songs for the families. Thankfully it's Texas so it wasn't cold. Meg is second from the last. Mom came with me and caught it on video. Too cute! Well, too cute if it's your kid. To anyone else, not so much probably.

We have been digging out the Christmas decorations here. It's been so fun to have a new house to decorate. It's definitely got more room for decorations and the formals here really lend themselves to it. Plus, I turned on the gas fireplace. So awesome! I was a purist before, insisting to anyone who would listen (probably obnoxiously, which can be my style) that wood burning was the way to go. I was wrong. This is so much cleaner and nicer and without the smoke smell.

What's no so great? The eight cavities the dentist says I have. I know, EIGHT. Who knew that was possible? I just went to the dentist last year! Two of them are replacing two old silver fillings that appear to be decaying, but the other six? Geez. I am going to have to get serious about flossing probably. Shit. In response, see the video my sister Elizabeth sent me. She better be careful. I have some incriminating photos and 600 friends on Facebook.

For the record

* Andy's gone nine days with a dry pull-up/underpants at night. Certainly a record.
* I am bitter at Toys R Us in Fair Lakes. I returned Andy's defective Razor Carvr scooter. They were out and not only refused to sell me the store model, but wouldn't call other stores to see if they had it in stock. "You can order it online," isn't a fair response for a Christmas present for a four year old.
* Bjorn found it at the one in Manassas.
* The kids and I trucked out to find it, for $20 less than what I'd returned. That that Toys R Us.
* Mark is home from college and isn't going back.
* This house has gotten very crowded, very fast. We've gone from four people to six people in two months, including four adults.
* The non-BCS bowl games are a joke. Who cares about the EagleBank bowl with Temple and UCLA? It's just an exhibition game really.
* We are three months away from March Madness. By then, hopefully the adults in my house have some kind of plan.
* Seriously, Blogger? No spell check in the new editor?

Babies and their guns

Meg loves her baby dolls. I find it so fascinating that she's so into them. We certainly didn't have any laying around from when Andy was littler (Jennifer's doll days are certainly far behind). But sure enough, she gravitated to one at her babysitter's house and wouldn't put it down. This all started over the summer when my parents were visiting. We had just checked out the National Rifle Association's joke of a museum in Fairfax (although the museum itself was puny and not well done or designed, the gift shop was fantastic and resulted in some excellent NRA gifts and t-shirts). My mother decided Meg's first baby should be named Daisy, after the Daisy bb-gun, which was the first commercial air gun (for children, naturally.)

Naming all her subsequent dolls after guns was a really fun inside joke for the family. So we now have:

Callie (short for calibre)
Remy (short for Remington)
Winnie (for Winchester)
Spider (well, that's not a weapon, Andy was just fascinated by spiders around Halloween and it stuck)

And now that she's amassing quite a collection of dolls, I've run out of ideas for names. We've thought about Glock, but that just seems to obvious (and frankly not that fun to say), Bullet, 30-06, Rifle, Bolt -- but really, nothing clever is coming to mind. I need help! Suggest your favorite weapon-related baby doll name. (Come on, it's not that subversive.)

 Meg pushing one of her new Christmas dollies in the stroller she got from Santa (who goes by Grandmother).

Christmas!

Wow, we must have been good this year because the Jul Tompte and Santa were both very good to us all. The kids all have more toys than they possibly need, which is fantastic. Meg got an assortment of babies and their accoutrements and spent much of the morning taking them from the stroller to the baby pack and play to the baby swing and back again. Sometimes you could even tell what she was saying. She also got a lot of clothes, which is great for me, including some adorable winter type outfits and shoes. Exactly what she needed. Andy also got clothes and is to an age where he even knows to mutter, "Aw, more clothes," just like every other kid under the age of 18 in America. Those of us over 18 got a lot of clothes, but those were considered very good things. The only casualty thus far is the Razor scooter Bjorn got Andy from Toys 'R Us. It's got some problem with the spring so Bjorn couldn't open it and ended up jabbing himself in the cuticle with a screwdriver. Indeed, suboptimal. Both kids also got a lot of books that I look forward to reading with them. Bjorn also got a lot of books that I intend to read. Perhaps in return I'll even let him eat some of the bread I will make with my bread maker that my mom got me that I'm totally jazzed to try out. I had one right after college that I used for years until it finally broke. My biggest present is an attic ladder that Bjorn's having installed tomorrow. Yes, kids, that's what happens when you get old. You want home improvements instead of toys, but I am personally thrilled about it.

It was great this year having all four kids in the same house over Christmas -- no waiting for someone to drive over, no competition for another Christmas. Just us at our house. I really love it. Course, I'm not sure how it would be with all six of us living here permanently, but for a few weeks it's pretty great.

Edited to add: Sorry the pictures are all out order. This new Blogger photo editor is a lot more flexible, but it's so flexible it was moving pictures around in a way I wasn't sure how to get them back without deleting them all.