Finally, that Christmas 2013 post... in 2014

It was recently brought to my attention that not only did I wait to write the Christmas 2013 post until February 2014, I promised a Part 2 that never came. Well, it's Christmas Eve 2014 (on the day I start writing this), so let's not hold our breath, shall we?

Still, I do feel a little bad about that, so a quick recap of last year.

Starting last year, we changed things up a bit in order to spend Christmas morning at our own house instead of traveling. Thus, my parents'/grandparents' Christmas Eve/Morning celebrations were moved up a couple of days, and we traveled the weekend before the holiday. This had the added benefit of allowing the kids to see Santa the way I used to: in a tiny cabin on my hometown's square.

It was unseasonably warm.

Note the lack of a line to see Santa. I swear this is a popular thing, but last year, we were the only people visiting at that moment.

So here's how it went down. LG was just fine with the big guy in the red suit, despite the fact that the year before, we had to bribe her with a cookie.

Though she may have realized she was getting potato chips when it was all over.

G2, on the other hand... better to let the pictures tell the story.

These two shots were snapped within a half-second of one another.

This was probably the height of G2's stranger danger phase. He was scared of strangers for about one week in December, and it happened to fall over Christmas. Frankly, I don't think it could've gone better. These days, he's as likely as not to walk up to someone he's never met and demand to be picked up.

The rest of G2's Christmas Eve can best be summed up as follows:

He never met a present he didn't like... to eat.

As for Christmas morning, to reiterate, this was the first holiday we spent waking up in our own home as a family. This meant we could start our own traditions. For instance, we left cookies for Santa, but we also made "sparkle bread" for the big guy's reindeer. This is important, as it helps the reindeer fly.

So for all the rest of you NOT leaving sparkle bread for the reindeer, you're welcome.

We also decided that Santa wraps his gifts in fabric, which we mail back to the North Pole so he can use it again the following year. Santa delivers a lot of presents, so he's doing his part to save the planet by recycling.

Santa also leaves dinosaurs. Rawr.

All in all, 2013 was a great Christmas. If you're all very good, maybe Santa will bring a Christmas 2014 post some time before Christmas 2015.

Incidentally, this was the best picture we could get of the two of them together.
Their cooperation hasn't gotten better in that last 12 months.

Christmas, a welcome respite from sickness, part 1

Better late than never, let's talk about Christmas 2013. As is something of a tradition, we'll break this into two posts.

First off, let's recap where we stand. This is LG's fourth Christmas and G2's first. G2 is six months older than his sister was for her first Christmas, so he was at least nominally aware of the changes to his environment and slightly less lumpy. LG knows the deal this time around: decorate house, select Christmas tree, decorate tree, watch Christmas movies, see the Dickens Village and Macy's Light Show, get dressed up, visit Santa, visit grandparents, open presents. Traditions are being built and memories made. So let's tackle each signifier one at a time and compare LG and G2's experience.

1. Decorate house
As previously mentioned, November took the Griffatolos down a peg. Coupled with the fact that Thanksgiving was so late, we didn't even get outdoor Christmas decorations up this year. We did manage to get the interior suitably set for the holidays, if a little bit late. As with many things, LG is actually sorta-kinda helpful at this point. Or at least not completely unhelpful.

G2, on the other hand, is somewhat less capable. So we decorated him instead.

He's clearly more useful as festive inspiration.

2. Select Christmas tree
It was an open question this year whether we were all healthy enough to go tromping through a field of trees at all, but late one Saturday afternoon, we just went for it. I'm quite glad we did.

I'm pretty sure we didn't take LG to get a tree for her first Christmas. Considering she was only three months old at the time, I think we just picked up a tree in a pharmacy parking lot. It was far less exciting. So G2 was already having a better first Christmas just by virtue of seeing the tree farm.

Regardless of age, there was much carrying of children.

LG is even at the point that she can help pick the tree.

Though her enthusiasm still outpaces her skills in this area.

3. Decorate tree

LG was pretty good at this part last year. So no surprise that she was a big help this year, too. 

Though it's altogether possible she's only in it for the cookies.

And if you're wondering about the differences between a three-month-old LG and a nine-month-old G2 when it came to decorating, then here you go.

Pretty sure she couldn't have grabbed an ornament if she wanted to.

4. Watch Christmas movies

We didn't make the connection until we watched a few Christmas specials this year, but LG has been doing something for a while now that initially struck me as strange. 

LG's favorite part of Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer? The Abominable Snow Monster. 

Favorite part of How the Grinch Stole Christmas? The Grinch and the moment he's just about to chuck the presents off Mount Crumpit. 

Favorite bit of A Muppet Christmas Carol? The Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come.

It took a holiday full of fun and joy for us to realize that LG loves things that scare the bejesus out of her. But it sort of makes sense. What's the best way to take the power away from something that frightens you? Embrace it. I'm not the sort of person who sees a great deal of wisdom in the actions of children, but there's a kind of innocent cleverness in that.

Next time: Visiting Santa, Christmas Eve, and our first Christmas morning in our own house.

Christmas, Take Three: The Year It All Came Together - Part 2

As promised on Monday, here's Part 2 of the Best Christmas Ever (so far).

10. LG helped pick out the Christmas tree. I actually took her on a practice run to the tree farm with her cousin and Hollie's Dad a week earlier than when we chose our tree. This primarily served as an opportunity to hide behind various Norway Spruce and shout at things. But it was gratifying nonetheless that she had a good time, and she did eventually give her approval to the tree you see below.

Mostly, she ran around and shouted at goats, but hey, what more do you want?

11. Unlike last year, she took an active interest in decorating the tree. Look, I fully recognize that I'm lucky. LG, while as clumsy as you'd expect from a being composed of equal parts Hollie and Matt, is a relatively careful and conscientious kid. She doesn't want to break things, and rarely goes out of her way to do so. Even so, she really wanted to help decorate the tree and was extra careful when doing so, without much prompting from us. Granted, it helps that we laid out all the kid-appropriate ornaments for her to choose from, but it still makes me proud that she was so careful.

It doesn't hurt that I have a giant box of tin ornaments like the one in the lower left picture.

12. Cookies fix everything. By this point in our excursion to see Santa and Christmas lights at the farm, LG's patience for the entire endeavor was wearing thin. Solution? Cookie. As I've stated before, I am an excellent father.

The only appropriate caption is "Om nom nom."

13. LG loves her cousins, second cousins and rabbits. We went through the phase when she loved everyone. We went through the phase when she was scared of everyone. We're currently in the phase when she's shy for 5 minutes, then she won't stop climbing on you. This was especially true of her cousin in the upper left and my cousin in the upper right. But it didn't take long before they were her favorite people in the room on Christmas Eve. 

Until the bunny came out. At that point, no one mattered.

And of course she has no problem stealing whatever Alissa is holding in the lower right.

14. Trains are wonderful things. When I was young, one of the highlights of our visit to my Uncle Charles & Aunt Nancy's house was Charles' massive train layout. Multi-tiered, intersecting tracks with tunnels and at least one train that blew smoke: it was amazing. And trains are at least as entertaining to LG. It doesn't even need to be that complicated. If it goes round and round and makes a whistling sound, it's okay by her.

Occasionally, you may need to provide your own whistle. This is fine, too.

15. Christmas Day was by turns wonderful and exhausting. I wish I could say that the exhausting portion of the morning resulted in a longer nap in the car on our annual 2.5 hour trip back to New Jersey. Alas, we only got 45 minutes of sleeping toddler. But still, look at how much fun she's having!

She looks weirdly surprised to be wearing an apron. 

16. Sometimes, Christmas lasts 'til New Years Eve. And sometimes, your friends dress your daughter like a princess. They've been threatening it since LG's birth, but our friends Kristen and Don doubled down on the frilly and glittery when they came to visit for our annual New Year's outing. I'd be more upset at LG's girlification if the things didn't make her so stinking happy.

Also, wand, sword, what's the difference? Either way, someone's going to get smacked in the head.

So yeah, Christmas was fun. I'm sure I've left out some ridiculously cute or amusing story, but in a season so full of fun and excitement, it's hard not to. And I've got to save something for next year, although I expect that blog post to be full of pictures of LG covering G2 in wrapping paper.

 BONUS PICTURE.

Nope, still not shiny enough.

Christmas, Take Three: The Year It All Came Together - Part 1

LG's first Christmas was fun, in that she wore a lot of different outfits. But she was sort of a lump, in that she just kind of sat where we laid her, and occasionally chewed on stuff.

Her second Christmas had its moments, too. She liked to look at lights; she opened presents with a little prompting; and she knew that Santa said "Ho, Ho, Ho."

But this year? This year we took the Holidays to a completely new level. Despite at least seven bouts of illness afflicting the three of us over the course of a month, it honestly might have been the best Christmas ever.

What's that? You'd like this explained in list form with helpful photographic proof? Here you go.

1. She took a much more active role in making wrapping paper for her gifts. Yes, we did do this last year, but you'll notice that she's being way more deliberate about it. You can even see individual footprints. Dexterity is a wonderful thing.

Most of the paint was on the paper or her feet, too. At least, in these pictures.

2. We finally managed to keep up with the Advent Calendar. Every morning before school, she carefully pulled an ornament out of one of the pockets, and just as carefully placed it on the tree. This is absolutely the first year that we didn't skip two or three days at a time because we just forgot about it. Plus, she only broke two or three of them, which puts her basically on par with Hollie and I in terms of how many we've had to repair each year.

And every day, we'd count the ornaments and point out every one we already hung.

3. She actively appreciates Christmas music. Seriously, we're going to be singing "Jingle Bells" and "Frosty the Snowman" until June. Prior to Christmas, she did know the words to a few songs, like "Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star" and "Mary Had a Little Lamb." But we hit some kind of memory milestone just as we started playing Holiday music around the house. My only regret is that she loved The Chipmunks Christmas and The Muppets' Red & Green Christmas albums so much that we didn't really listen to the more standard songs. Yet she somehow still knows the words to "Jingle Bell Rock" anyway.

4. She made her own gifts, and handed them out. In case it's hard to tell, we dipped pretzels in chocolate and then covered them in various toppings. LG handed them out individually to every single person in our family on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, and it was just as adorable as you'd imagine. So cute, in fact, that we forgot to take pictures of it.

I promise, no one was sick when we made these. But we sanitized constantly anyway.

5. While I'll readily admit that this is related to Christmas only inasmuch as it was on our visit to Johnson's Corner Farm to see Santa, my elation at seeing her play with all these carpentry toys knows no bounds. And it completely justifies the kid's tool set we bought for Christmas.

I love that she's using each tool more-or-less correctly. She clearly pays attention when I fix things around the house.

6. Anything even remotely Christmas-related held her attention. Here, we were watching Mrs. Claus read Twas the Night Before Christmas. Granted, she didn't want to go sit near Mrs. Claus, but given our history with her husband in years past, this was a stellar improvement. She just loves stories so much; it doesn't matter who's reading.

Granted, once she started the next story, LG wanted to go get some cookies. In fairness, it was dinner time.

7. She adored Christmas specials. We're judicious about TV at our house. Half an hour of whatever she wants after her bath (unless she's sick, in which case all bets are off). But we did make exceptions for Christmas specials these past few weeks (though, to be fair, most of those were after bath, too). She can tell you the plot of Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer backwards and forwards. LG is particularly fond of Bumble's redemption by the end of the show. She loves to tell you how he puts the star on the tree. Come to think of it, she also likes to tell you how the Grinch gives all the toys back, too. 

But giving these animated specials a run for their money is the Muppet Family Christmas from 1987. There's almost no plot, but it's wall-to-wall Muppets. And you really can't go wrong with that. It doesn't hurt that halfway through watching it the first time, a group of carolers made their way past our house, stopped, and serenaded us with poorly played trumpet accompaniment. It was awesome.

8. Our visit with Santa went much better this year. We're not entirely sure why, but our theory is 1 year older + tractor - lap = tolerable Santa experience.

The cookie probably didn't hurt either.

9. The Macy's light show was just as fascinating the third time around. After three trips to the light show, it's officially a tradition for LG now. Add to that the fact that she could follow along and sing the songs as they played, and it was just glorious. Last year she wanted to run around halfway through the show, but this time, she didn't want it to end.

Ask her about it, and she'll still tell you how Frosty waved his arms.

Thus ends Part 1 of the Best Christmas Ever (til next year). Tune in later this week for Part 2.

In Sickness and in Health

I don't know that I've bragged much in this space about LG's crazy immune system. Or rather, I can't be bothered to check the archives to see if I have. We've been extraordinarily lucky with respect to her health.

In the 27 months she's been around (yup, today is the 27-month birthday), she's gotten sick a grand total of five times. AND the first time wasn't until just before her first birthday. AND at least two of those bouts of ill health were over in 36 hours. I was beginning to think her mutant power was enhanced healing factor. If bone claws suddenly popped out of the back her hands, I wouldn't have been as surprised as you'd think.

So it's probably with no small amount of karmic payback that--after six weeks of daycare--the universe has seen fit to smack LG with her first, honest-to-god, nose-running, stuffy-head, hacking cough (sweet holy moses why don't they make nyquil for kids?), prolonged fight with a cold.

To my friends and acquantainces whose children have been sick more often than mine: I'm sorry. I didn't realize what you were going through.

To everyone else: this sucks.

So without further ado, here are the top 7 things I've learned in the last 10 days of having a toddler with a wicked cold.

1. Blowing your nose is a learned skill. Much like using the bathroom or tying a pair of shoelaces, a child doesn't know how to blow her own nose. And I don't mean she doesn't know proper tissue placement for maximum de-stuffification. I mean she literally does not understand that she can exhale forcefully through her nose into a tissue and make herself feel better. Hollie has walked in on me exaggeratedly breathing in through my mouth and exhaling through my nose in front of LG trying to make her understand. To her credit, Hollie did not find this strange. To LG's credit, she sort of gets it, but then forgets the next time I ask her to do it.

2. A toddler's hoarse voice, is simultaneously sad and really funny. I don't want LG to have a cold, but if she's going to have a cold, I prefer that she sounds like Elaine Stritch after a pack of cigarettes and two balloons worth of helium.

3. Toddler coughs in the middle of the night in a dark house are among the saddest sounds in the world. Probably second only to infant coughs, but we didn't experience that, so I have nothing to compare this to. Granted, fast forward a couple of months to LG inevitably infecting G2 with another one of these colds, and I'm sure I'll find out.

4. As much as you might think otherwise, you don't have to respond to every cough, sneeze or wheeze. Up until last night, at the cold's low point, LG coughed once or twice an hour overnight, and it didn't even phase her. Slept right through the whole thing. Kids: they're stronger than you realize, and they just don't care what's supposed to make them feel bad. (Granted, last night, the phlegm started waking her up, and consequently, me.)

5. Just cuz she's sick, doesn't mean she's going to stop moving. Along the same lines as my previous point, LG doesn't care that she's sick. She wants to run, spin, twirl, flip, climb and kick, and a little mucus isn't going to stop her. It's going to freak me out as I'm chasing her around with a tissue to wipe her nose, but then, that's probably half the fun.

6. Just because she's sick, doesn't mean that other kids don't have it worse. At least seven of her classmates at daycare were absent on Monday because of a stomach bug. So it could be worse (and it might still get there). I've got my fingers crossed the cold bugs are fighting the stomach bugs and winning.

 7. Just because she's sick doesn't mean we have to stop having fun. It's Christmas for crying out loud! Runny nose or not, in the last 10 days we've: visited the Macy's Light Show and the Dickens Christmas Village; picked out a Christmas tree and decorated it; bundled up and walked around the neighborhood after dark to look at Christmas lights; went shopping for gifts; made presents for family and friends; and pretty much didn't let it stop us from celebrating the season.

Think of this as Santa's runway.

So take that, rhinovirus. You're not the boss of me or my kid. (But please go away soon. I would like to get some sleep before G2 shows up and wrecks that whole thing.)

Christmas Time is Near

Earlier this month, in much the same manner as last year, we took LG to G-Boys Garden & Christmas center to visit Santa. Every year, the good people of G-Boys build an animatronic Christmas village-y thing. It's fun, in a slapdash, trademark-infringing kind of way. What am I talking about?

Behold!

 Yes. One significant scene in this Christmas village is a recreation of a McDonald's drive-thru staffed by a mouse. No. I have no idea why.

 And then, of course, we have non-licensed Winnie the Pooh and Rabbit.

Finally, we have Batman. Or rather, a mannequin in a Batman halloween costume circa 1995. What does any of this have to do with Christmas? Well, we go see it in December. I guess that's close enough.

At the end of all these shenanigans, you get to meet and have your picture taken with Santa Claus.

Things that worked in our favor this year:

1. LG is way cuter this year than last year. If you recall, she was kind of a lump.
2. Cute outfit. We had a tough time finding an outfit we liked this year, but in the end, I'm proud of it.
3. This year's Santa was a Real Bearded Santa.

Things working against us.

1. LG has been very hesitant about meeting strangers of late. And the bearded fellow with the bright red suit? Very strange.
2. The photographer was dead set on getting a picture of LG's happy face, and WOULD NOT start snapping until we got her smiling. It lent itself to more hysterics, rather than less. Eventually we got him to take a picture while she wasn't wailing. The picture below is the result of that compromise.
3. Four hours later, we realized LG had a fever, so the earlier fussiness could also be blamed on that.

Without further ado, here's the Santa picture we managed to get.

 

Sure, it's the whole family, which was not our original intention, but I like it.

Makes me laugh every time I see her little face.

Christmas Fashion Show 2010: Casual Division

I did not anticipate the sheer breadth of outfits that would present themselves this past Christmas season. So for this first holiday post (ironically posted after the holiday season is over) here is a selection of casual Christmas outfits.

Here we are decorating Little G's first Christmas tree. All in all, I think she enjoyed the experience.


And in its natural habitat, we see the the Holiday reindeer. Little-known fact: reindeer need to be restrained in a 5-point harness, for their safety and the safety of those around them.

Another little-known fact: most reindeer are actually Christmas donkeys with antlers and fuzzy costumes.
This was Little G's first Christmas present, a few days before the holiday. For those keeping track at home, yes, that is a stuffed Opossum.


And here she is on Christmas morning, enjoying her first pile of presents. Well, maybe "enjoying" is a bit strong. She's intrigued by the paper, at the very least.Stay tuned for another post covering the fancier side of Christmas.

Christmas Fashion Show 2010: Fancy Division

I'm trying to remember how all this started. One day back in October, Hollie and I asked each other, "What will our daughter wear for Christmas?"

Our first thought was this dress, given to us by one of Hollie's childhood friends before Little G was born:

It's cute, it's red, albeit not terribly Christmas-y. And based on Little G's ever-lengthening frame, she wouldn't be able to wear it much (if at all) past the holidays anyway. She wore it to my office Christmas party.

But of course, we realized that having just one dress probably wasn't going to work, since we'd have multiple parties and functions through which to parade our daughter. So we got this cute sweater dress from Old Navy.
You'll note that the tights, socks and bolero are the same for each of those dresses. It's important to have versatile separates, or so I've been told by various and sundry fashion reality shows. We had planned for her to wear this to my parents house on Christmas Eve, but that changed, as you'll soon see. Instead she wore it to a housewarming for some friends.

In any case, the purchase of that cream-colored sweater dress opened the floodgates. All of a sudden, dresses were raining down on us, like manna from heaven, or, you know, rain.

First Hollie's sister surprised us with this little number, which you may recognize from Little G's session with Santa. I really liked the tights.
Hollie had actually planned for her to wear it again at her office Christmas party, but when I ran it through the washer and dryer (my mistake) it shrunk a bit. I will swear, though, that in addition to the dress shrinking slightly, Little G grew an inch between December 5 and 16, rendering my drying mistake slightly worse than it might have been.

So, the morning of Hollie's office party, she went shopping and found this getup, which turned out to be a pretty big hit, both at the party and with Hollie's family late Christmas Day.

The addition of the leggings from the elf outfit really completes the look.

I'm not exactly certain when it happened, but at some point, my mom decided that she was going to buy Little G a Christmas outfit, and so instead of wearing the sweater dress on Christmas Eve, she wore this.
It's like she's Santa's Little Helper, so long as the only thing Santa needs help with is holding down small objects by laying on them. She's sitting rather nicely with my grandma in that photo, illustrating that baby + plush collar = no neck.

Lastly, Hollie's mom bought Little G a dress for Christmas dinner at their house. Admittedly, she wasn't awake for much of it, but she looked fantastic nonetheless.
So there you have it. What was one dress became six. It's like the loaves and fishes, except with infant wear.

Christmas FTW!

Christmas isn't quite here yet, but we're already having a great holiday season. I managed to get most of the house lights up the weekend after Thanksgiving, despite regular breaks to defrost and play with my daughter. Hollie got just about all of the interior decorations up at the same time. We tracked down (with some help from my dad) a Bedford Falls Christmas village and set up a nice little tableau.

With all that in mind, we decided that after Hollie got off work on Saturday, we'd risk taking 12-week old Little G to see the Wanamaker Christmas Light Show. There's no way for us to know for sure, but she seems to have a pretty long gaze for an infant, and, no surprise here, she likes flashing lights. As long as we could keep her calm and fed, we assumed she'd be fine at the light show.

And lo and behold, she was!
The show started at 5pm, which is just about when she wakes up from her afternoon nap these days. She woke up a few minutes before it started, and stared at all the people around us for a while. Once the show got going, she shared her attention between the gathered viewers and an area of space in the general direction of the lights, which as far as Hollie and I are concerned is a rousing success.

But the real test was yet to come. On Sunday, we were going to get pictures with Santa.

Things that didn't quite work out:
1. Naptime: We tried to do schedule the visit to Santa right after she had eaten, which is usually happy time. Unfortunately, we neglected to consider the soothing nature of a full belly and a short car ride. She passed out and we had to wake her up to get her on Santa's lap.

Things that worked out in our favor:
1. Line Timing: We walked right up to Santa with no one in front of us. About a minute after we chose our portrait package, there were three or four families behind us.
2. Great outfit: Hollie's sister bought us the little elf costume, which looked fantastic against the red suit.
3. Nice Santa: We didn't actually take that long to get the picture taken, but Jolly Old Saint Nick was a good sport during the three attempts to calm Little G down enough to get a non-crying picture.

All in all, we were really thrilled.

Oh right. I suppose you'd like to see the picture.
And now the bragging... Man my kid is cute!