Christmas Photo

This is literally what happens when I try to take one good picture. These had the lure of a lollipop at the end too….

                                                          FASBEE!!!

                                      YMCA?!? Not sure...

Macy's and SantaLand

We thought we would brave the crowds and hit Macy's to visit Santa early this year. We got there before they opened (not what I had read, but I digress). But, we only ended up waiting about 40 minutes before we got to see the big guy. Andrew made sure both boys had their letters ready for Santa.

 Dear Santa-I would like a blow up orca and a race track and a wii. We will be at my grammy's and papas. Andrew. And, I want a few surprises.
Dear Santa, Ryan wants the ninja turtle castle and Ryan wants a ninja turtle motorcycle and Ryan wants a middle sized bike and a few surprises.

 Since we were early we got to check out the windows. Very cool this year.

 You literally walk through a winter wonderland to get to Santa. Very cool and soo many things to look at.

                                       Putting their letters in! Ryan was still excited at this point.

 And then we saw him. Not so excited about that. Lots of tears and crying until Daddy picked him up again.

Andrew was very sweet and filled Santa in for Ryan though.  Maybe next year I'll have one of all 3 and Ryan won't be the one screaming!

Christmas Tree Time

Time to decorate!! We really wanted to get a real tree but it is just so much easier here in the city to use the artificial one our friends gave us last year. The boys don't really seem to care-they just wanted to decorate it. 

Ryan has to WANT you to take his picture, so most of these are examples of what he does when I try to.  Andrew was very serious about putting the nativity together.

                                                                  First ornaments!

                          DON'T take my PICTURE!!! That hand was coming out to swat

 Andrew really worked hard and I would say he put 80% of the ornaments on the tree. He makes sure now that not a day goes by that the tree doesn't get a new ornament he makes.

New Christmas jammies with a finished tree!

Three Bears Holiday Bash

 I had been reading about the Swedish Cottage Marionette Theatre and been waiting for a good show to take the boys to. Then the Three Bears Holiday Bash came up and I thought they would be able to both enjoy it. Tickets were actually reasonable ($31 for all 4 of us!) and it was a super cute show. Andrew told me he thought it would be boring before it started but then he really liked it. The theatre only seats about 100 people so it is nice and cozy. 

 We went right during nap time so Ryan made it about 3/4 through the show before he passed out. We will definitely be heading back for some more shows!

Not quite the Thanksgiving we had in mind...

After the fun-filled balloon inflation and dinner at friends, we headed back to sleep at Mary's. Andrew had had a bit of a bug earlier in the week but nothing major. Ryan had caught it, but again, just some intestinal stuff.  At about 115am he started crying that his belly hurt. The crying turned to screaming. And screaming. And screaming. I couldn't calm him down or anything. Chris finally came out around 2 and then around 220 decided he really thought we should take him to the ER. I got dressed and headed out to catch a cab and made it to the hospital just shy of 3. Of course he was asleep by this point, but we wanted to make sure there weren't any intestinal issues. Sonograms, x-rays, and three hours later it was decided that it must just be gas pains. He and I headed home while Andrew and Chris went to the parade.

 This was around 5 am, when he finalllllly fell asleep after all the test. One of the worst parts was that during his x-ray I couldn't even go in so two strangers held him down. Besides being a serious momma's boy, he was beyond tired. I felt so bad for him.

Here were a few pictures Chris took during the parade. They got out there a little before 7 and were still about 30 people deep. Andrew seemed to enjoy it though.

We ended up eating Thanksgiving just the four of us-not our normal full blown meal but it was still yummy and nice that we were at least all together. 

                    Hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving!! We have so much to be thankful for!