Christmas Highlights

I'm ashamed that it's been so long since I've posted an entry but there was so much activity going on at Papa & Gigi's residence that I just didn't have time. The trip was fantastic and we were, in fact, very fortunate with the way our travel plans worked out. A few hours after we arrived on Friday morning 12/19, it started snowing and continued to do so until Sunday evening. Sigh of relief! Since I don't have time to recount all the highlights of the trip, here are some bullet points of the main events.

• We were thrilled with the snow! On Friday evening, we dressed Calleigh up in all of her snow gear and took her outside. She loved it. The men took turns running her around in a little sled and every time they stopped, she would say "more." When we finally took her in (the rest of us were cold and tired), she had a complete fit. Also, for some reason, she kept calling the snow "dirt" despite the fact that we kept telling her it was snow.


• Sunday evening was the annual Pops event with a pre-Pops meal at Vinny T's. We had a smaller group than usual at the restaurant since it was snowing and slushy out. We got to watch the Jets lose to Seattle during the meal which was exciting but of course, a moot point now. Calleigh was fairly well behaved during the concert although I did have to take her out in the hall a few times especially when she started saying "Silent Night, Holy Night" just a little too loudly. That song became one of her favorites while we were there.


• Duncan and I were able to get our shopping done although it was quite a challenge when we had Calleigh on tow. Fortunately, Gigi was able to watch her a few times and we could get out on our own. Much easier!


• Duncan and I celebrated our sixth wedding anniversary on the 22nd by going to the Cheesecake Factory courtesy of a Toni & Terry gift card. Thanks guys!!


• My parents, Duncan, Calleigh, Kathy, and Bruno made a trip to Edaville Railroad on Tuesday night. I have great memories of that place as a kid so I was quite excited to take Calleigh. There were tons of lights, a train ride, and the highlight of probably the entire trip up north for Calleigh, a pit full of balls that you could jump around in. Boy, did she love that.


• Christmas Eve consisted of the usual group of Bill, Mel, Duncan, me, Calleigh, Ricky, Shawn, Camille, Bob, Aunt Lori, Uncle Charlie, Kelly, Steve, Mimi and Dorene (actually, she's a newcomer). Only one was missing - - Rad. That's what happens when you get married! We missed you man. We had a lovely evening of food and games. At around 9:30 pm, the power went off for a couple of hours so that put a new twist on things.


• We started Christmas festivities at around 9:30 with the stocking exchange (I had Camille this year) and then started the gifts. Calleigh wasn't really interested in opening anything so we gave her a new baby stroller fairly early on to distract her. It worked as she enjoyed pushing that thing around for almost the rest of the gift opening. Aunt Toni, Uncle Terry, and Kathleen came over late morning to spend the day which consisted of an awesome brunch, game playing and movie watching.


• My BIG gift from my parents was this entire blog, from when I started in March, printed out and bound in hard cover. I was completely surprised and completely thrilled! It's amazing to see how much I have written.


• Friday evening turned out to be interesting. I started feeling sick to my stomach on Friday morning and I'm certain it was unrelated to pregnancy. Believe me, I know pregnancy nausea and this wasn't it. I barely ate anything all day and by early evening, I was starting to vomit. Around 7 pm, Duncan was taking Calleigh by the left arm into another room to change her diaper when she abruptly pulled away and did something to her arm. She immediately started crying and it was apparent that her arm was just hanging there. It wasn't at a weird angle or anything but she wasn't using it at all so we knew something happened. We didn't know if we should go to the ER or what and I certainly wasn't feeling up to it as I kept running to the bathroom. She finally calmed down where she wasn't really crying unless we touched the arm. We gave her some Tylenol, put her to bed, and decided to assess in the morning. Fortunately, we have a good friend, Cassy, who is a pediatrician and she made a house call on Sabbath morning and quickly determined that it was something called "Nurse Maid Elbow" that is fairly common in young children. She was able to twist the arm just so and it popped back into place. She didn't really start using the arm again until that evening but she's eventually now back to completely normal. So that's a relief. Meanwhile, my nausea lasted all the way until last evening (although no throwing up since Friday night) but I managed to also pass it on to both my brothers.


• We got back on Saturday night at about 10:30. Since then, we watched the Patriots get eliminated from the playoffs, I won $371 by taking first place in the football pool, and I've done a boatload of laundry that is sitting on my bed waiting to be put away.

So there you have it. It was a fantastic trip that was everything we had hoped for. Our Christmas is not over, however, as we celebrate with Ron and Elaine on New Year's Eve. The other good thing is that although it was very difficult to part from my parents at the airport, they already have a trip booked down here for January 24 - 29 so we have something to look forward to. Yippee!