December. All of it.

This is our December in something slightly larger than a nutshell. If you make it to the end, you may need to do some finger stretches to recover from all the scrolling. I hate to photo dump on you like this, but I'm ready to be done with 2013!

Now that he's home, I feel safe announcing to the world wide web that Eric was gone from November 13 to December 21, and it sucked! The kids and I got into a routine, and we had a TON of help from our community, including Jessica who came for the dinner and bedtime routine every Tuesday and Amy who took care of us when Hannah and I battled super high fevers.

The good news is that he got a break in the middle for Thanksgiving and got to come home and eat turkey and pumpkin pie rather than being alone in his hotel room on the other side of the country.

We rolled right from turkey day into Christmas in that one short weekend, starting with tree trimming.

Then we walked down to Rocket to Venus for dinner and sat on the enclosed patio where we could see the 34th Street lights when they came on for the season. After dinner we strolled over for a closer look and found that the lighting ceremony included a Santa who was taking lap requests from neighborhood children. Hannah was thrilled. Her interest in Santa really peaked this year, and although we've always let her know that Santa is imaginary, this year she stopped believing us.

While standing in line to sit on Santa's lap for the first time ever, I asked Hannah if knew what she was going to ask for. Her reply: "yes, but I'm not going to tell you." I explained that her odds of having her wish come true increased exponentially when she told me, but she kept silent. The only clue Santa would give me is that it walks on four legs...Since she's been obsessed with those Buddies movies about the golden retriever puppies, I'm assuming she asked him for a dog. She confirmed my assumption on our walk home and explained to her again why we can't have a dog right now. She said, "It's okay mom, that wasn't the real Santa."

Amy came the next weekend to take Hannah to the BSO for a family concert, and we walked down to the lights again later that evening, this time stopping at The Charmery for some of their super awesome hot chocolate. This time Hannah sat on a different Santa's lap. He was just for picture posing to raise money for a charity though--he wasn't taking requests for the big guy up north.

On the following weekend, we got very, very sick. We had all kinds of activities planned including tickets to the Holiday Cirque at the BSO but instead Hannah and I took turns sitting in lukewarm baths, crying and shivering and begging to get out, in an attempt to bring down our high fevers. Amy came to take care of us and help with Jacob who managed to avoid it all. Prior to the fevers, I had reached burned out status from single mama mode. Throwing fevers on top of that accelerated me into something far greater than fatigue. I was counting down the minutes until Eric's return and had every intention of retiring to my bed for a few days when that happened.

Amy came again a few days later on the eve of her birthday and brought presents for Hannah: a globe!! That's what Hannah told Amy she wanted, and of course the jet-setting, world-traveling Amy was happy to make that happen. She also bought her a children's atlas so we can point to a place and then read about it.

We celebrated Amy's birthday the next day with some vegan chocolate cupcakes with pink candy cane icing from Goldenwest. Yum!!! None for Jacob, but he was a good sport and wore the hat.

 

Eric's first flight home on the 20th got canceled causing him to miss his second flight and be re-routed through DC so instead of getting in at 8:00 on that Friday, he arrived at 3:30 a.m. We let him sleep in the next day, and then we spent the afternoon at Cylburn enjoying the crazy welcome warm weather. Almost 70 degrees in December! Yes please!

Grannah and Granpah arrived later that evening, followed by Justin and his girlfriend and dog. We made a big dinner the next day for Eric's birthday, and I baked a chocolate cake with coconut icing that turned out amazing thanks to Kathryn and Caroline who supplied me with awesome recipes for each.

Photo courtesy of Jeannie Kellogg

Photo courtesy of Jeannie Kellogg

While he was cleaning up, I took the present out of its basement hiding placed and set it on his chair until he noticed. I can't tell the world wide web what the present was, but he cried. It was very sentimental and exactly what he'd been wanting. It was also very expensive and took the collaboration of many wallets, including mine, his parents, his brother, our neighbors, and my mom.

Photo courtesy of Jeannie Kellogg

Photo courtesy of Jeannie Kellogg

We all got fancy pants the next day and went to lunch. Check out Jacob's hand-me-down super slick outfit.

 

Photo courtesy of Jeannie Kellogg

We got dressed up again the next day and had our pictures taken by Laura at various local settings, including a hotel lobby across from Hopkins. This was mine and Eric's Christmas present to his mom who has been wanting family photos for a very long time.

Photo courtesy of Laura Mae Socks

Photo courtesy of Laura Mae Socks

Photo courtesy of Laura Mae Socks

Photo courtesy of Laura Mae Socks

And then it was Christmas!

Photo courtesy of Jeannie Kellogg

Photo courtesy of Jeannie Kellogg

Hannah got a new backpack that she'll be able to fit a library book in without having to leave it unzipped.

Photo courtesy of Jeannie Kellogg

She got a cooperative board game and some fun new accessories from Uncle Joel.

Grannah and Granpah got her a ton of stuff, including this really cool knit hooded sweater that she loves and wears constantly.

They also got her this awesome fort building kit that I am loving because it means the couches don't have to be torn apart to make a bear fort. 

She also got a foam letter floor mat set from Uncle Justin, the yellow lab Calico Critters family, the new Ladybug Girl book, a bunch of new Stella books, and probably a lot of other stuff that I'm missing.

Eric picked up some more fake mustaches so we took another mustache shot. Looks like this might become a very fun annual tradition.

Present-opening occurred during Jacob's nap time so he missed most of the hoopla, but we had round two when he woke up. Babies are hard to buy for and really don't need anything (or know the difference if they get nothing), so he didn't get much. I picked out these textured critter balls for him that he seems to like, and he got a new starry turtle from Grannah and Granpah since the one Jessica and Todd got him when he was born had some sort of electric malfunction and would only flash on and off creating a less-than-restful starry strobe effect that Eric was unable to fix.

Jacob and I slept through Christmas dinner. Here's the rest of the gang.

Photo courtesy of Jeannie Kellogg

We drove to my brother's house the Friday after Christmas to celebrate with him and my nephews and my mom. In spite of that one Christmas day nap, I still hadn't recovered from the 6-week single mom streak, so I spent most of my time laying on the couch rather than taking pictures. My mom got this cute one of Eric, the human jungle gym, reading to Hannah and Clay.

Photo courtesy of Bonnie Errico

A few days later, we drove back to Hagerstown to celebrate with my dad and Sondra. They have a new golden retriever puppy who Hannah LOVED! Oddly enough, I didn't get that many pictures of Ginger...I'm still using the "I was tired" excuse. I'm beginning to wonder if I will ever not feel tired... I did snap some pictures with my phone though which is more than I managed at Chip's. 

Sayonara 2013!! And happy very belated holidays :)

Hannah's 4-year birthday extravaganza

I fully intended to catch up on blogging while we were on vacation, but alas, no wifi. We were forced into an unwanted but surprisingly nice sabbatical from technology. Well, I was. Eric still used his phone to stay keep current with the all things Facebook and Zillow related.

Up first on my "to blog" list is a 20-days-late post regarding Hannah's birthday. Her 4th birthday fell on a Monday this year so we decided to celebrate in true Terri fashion: for 3 days. In my pre-mama life, I started celebrating my own birthday on Cinco de Mayo and kept up the partying until my actual birthday on the 7th. I like birthdays; what's not to love about having your own personal holiday in which most things revolve around you and the people who love you are required to make some time to do fun stuff with you?

We bought Hannah three presents and let her pick one to open each day. On day 1 of the 3-day extravaganza, she donned the birthday crown and a halter dress that Eric and I have decided looks far too mature for her and should be disposed of immediately. After breakfast she opened the Groovy Girl doll we bought her.

Grammy showed up shortly after with a Nabi 2, a tablet designed for kids (but with adult features as well) in a far more reasonable price range than an iPad. It comes stocked with games, books, music, and a lot of learning apps. Hannah is loving having her own "iPad" so if anyone has any good kid games/apps, please recommend! I'd rather have using that than staring blankly at the TV.

My brother and his boys showed up next with some foam magnetic blocks that you can use to build 3D structures off the fridge (unless your fridge is stainless steel like ours, in which case, you can use the radiator covers) and a Brave sticker book.

After the mandatory birthday pizza, I frosted some miniature strawberry cupcakes and set them on fire. They were tiny so we had to put one candle in four different cupcakes. I used this recipe for the cupcakes but cut some of the sugar (of course), and for the icing, I just tossed a brick of cream cheese into the KitchenAid with some of the strawberry puree that was left over from the cupcakes with a little bit of sugar. They turned out pretty good but would have been better as a layer cake with the puree tucked in between the layers. I tried to swirl it into the cupcakes but they were just too tiny.

We had planned on spending the day at the pool but that parade was rained on, literally, so we packed up and went to the moon bounce place which happened to be open that afternoon. Those crazy kids move too fast for me to catch them with the camera, but here's Jacob enjoying the inflatables.

 

My dad and Sondra were here when we got back from moon bouncing, but I was tired by this point and had ceased carrying around the camera so I have no evidence of their presence. They got her an Aqua Doodle (great in the car), some princess dress-up dolls with magnetic gowns, and a cute twirly skirt that Sondra made.

After that Hannah wanted to play Pin the Tail on the Donkey which my mom managed to find at the party store (I couldn't find it at ours when she wanted to play it on my birthday).

After all that, day 1 of the birthday extravaganza was finally over.

On day 2, she opened a second present from us (this book) after breakfast. In the afternoon, she had a video call with Grannah and Granpah in Michigan and opened the package from them that had arrived the day before. She got clothes, pajamas (a nightgown that she immediately put on and some shorts and t-shirt pajama sets which she wore to camp the week after because she didn't believe me that they were pajamas or she just didn't care), a Spiral Art kit, and this really cool kit that lets you create your own books. 

After the video chat she flew kites in the parking lot at the bottom of the block with Kylie, and then Kylie came back to our house for dinner and cupcakes. Zoey came over from next door too and we all sang again.

Then the girls went back upstairs to add to their costumes. As usual, Hannah gets points for crazy.

Day 3, her actual birthday, was the least celebratory day. Since Eric was gone in the morning she waited until dinner to open her third and final present from us: a really great cooperative board game called Hoot Owl Hoot! We ate cupcakes again and sang to her one more time, and then the celebration was over...

...until the following week when she took some of her birthday money to the toy store. My two aunts sent Hannah birthday cards with $20 each in them and both of her grandmas sent her a few dollars too. She picked out this giant bag of ball pit balls which we dumped into her plastic pool out back. She sat down and started kicking them everywhere and laughing hysterically. Eric and I grew tired of picking them up within about 5 minutes so now there are little plastic balls scattered all over our deck and patio and our neighbors' patios, and I've found some in the house too...

Oh, and that's the skirt Sondra made her in the pictures above. She was wearing it with boots and a ton of jewelry which made her look like some pop star country musician. I have a ton of really silly dress-up photos of her in which she strikes similarly silly poses like the one above which I will hopefully get around to posting before her next birthday.

Happy 4th birthday Hannah!

Christmas with my dad and the start of a new year

We rang in the new year today by tearing down and packing up all the holiday decorations and deep cleaning the whole first floor of the house for the first time in about a year and a half. We even mopped the floor. I swear we haven't done that since the summer of 2011. When we were about 3 hours into it and pulling pile after pile of dried up food out of the microwave it occurred to me that the true sign of getting old is when you spend New Year's day cleaning instead of recovering from a hangover....hello geezer-ville.

My compulsion to ring in the new year fresh is carrying over into the blog. I'm probably not going to get around to posting the pics I took on my phone when we went to see The Nutcracker at the BSO  or the pics from Addison's birthday party (none of which are that great anyway), but here are pics from our third and final Christmas at my dad's house and, aside from the previous mentioned, our last pics from the old year.

We drove back to my dad's a couple days after Christmas, the day after all that snow and Hannah's debut on TV. It was beyond freezing, but that didn't stop Hannah and Pappy from hopping on the tractor for a ride.

Hannah and Pappy and Grandma Sondra did a ton of building after defrosting from the frigid weather. They bought Hannah these super cool Twig blocks.  Sondra made the blocks in the foreground of the pic below--she is incredibly handy with a wood saw! They are Clay's present, but he hadn't been over yet so we got to play with them. She also used her woodworking skills to make Hannah a really nice wooden puzzle.

When Hannah started losing steam and curled up on the chair with Pappy, I took a few pics and then we hit the road back to Baltimore.

Au revoir to Christmas--all three of them--and 2012! Happy New Year all!!