December 2017, Part III

This time I’m just going to sum up the last bits of the holiday, even though I pretty much skipped a week or so.  I mean we did lots of shopping and had 3 holiday parties and saw Star Wars?  I just didn’t have my camera in tow, so…  Sorry, no pictures.

So yeah!  Let me set the scene here, we are talking the start of a nice, looong holiday weekend.  Linus had his evening Christmas program at his preschool to kick things off. So we first had a quick dinner at Zuzu Cafe, which is pretty close to the school/church and is also across from the city zoo, so it caters nicely to the kiddos.  Linus had a nutella sandwich on pita, I remember this clearly because it was clearly delicious but also a royal mess, and we had to desperately wipe Linus down all sponge-bath-style and also change ALL of his clothes before heading back to the school for his holiday program.

Also he insisted on eating at a table alone which is Very Much Linus.  Embrace that Introvert, son.

After dinner we headed back to the school, dropped Linus off in his classroom to get ready for the program, and then scouted out seats in the church.  We got crappy seats but whatever, we’ll live.  Peter was bored and antsy so I showed him a few tips on my camera and handed it over to keep him busy. Below is what he captured.

He had a split-second with some bad settings to take a picture of our sweet friend Nora, but capture her he did, and he was pretty exciteed to tell me about it.

Sweet baby Nora.

At that point I took my camera back because MINE and took a few pictures of my own.

Linus’ class was first in line to sing. Probably for the best, as the preschoolers are the antsy-est of the bunch.

They were supposed to be “gum drops”.  I didn’t realize we were supposed to buy their outfits on our own until it was way too late to order something online, so he ended up a green gumdrop wearing a ca. 2007 Von Dutch beanie I found in the bottom of our winter clothes bin, paired with a green raglan shirt I found by the grace of God somehow online and it showed up the day before the performance. God Bless.

I will say: the other parents who were in the same boat did a fantastic job as well.  I especially feel endeared to the gal in black, all Johnny Cash style.  LICORICE GUM DROPS ALL THE WAY.

We stayed for approximately 2 more performances, then our dear spazzy Linus decided to loudly fart while I was holding him up to see (MULTIPLE FARTS DIRECTLY IN MY FACE OMG HALP) and he proudly talked about barking spiders and all the junior high kids around us were dying laughing and JUST GET US OUT OF HERE.  The end.

The next thing I took my camera to, was our annual day downtown. We usually go close to Christmas, and visit the capitol tree then brunch it up.

Before we headed downtown we stopped to see Erin and she gave Linus a big ole smooch that stayed on his forehead for a day and I can’t even complain because her haircuts are the best and also she has great lipstick.

So we saw the tree, officially.

And we also explored the Capitol all over the place.

Momo came along!

After the tree we brunched it up hard at the Old Fashioned.

The Cheese Curds there, friends, are no joke.

After  brunch we headed to the Children’s Museum, where the kids ran off all their energy (or so I told myself).

Linus is big enough for the huge tall climbing area and I’m totally in denial that he’s That Big Already.

So they have this new Frank Lloyd Wright exhibit, and it’s pretty killer and you need to check it out if you’re in the area.

(Scott and I totally stayed at FLW’s only skyscraper-now-hotel for our one-year wedding anniversary.)

Meanwhile Peter was mesmerized by the phone booth that parsed out small sweet secrets of the universe.

And that, friends, brings us to Christmas Eve. We looked at lights, we had soup, we went to bed after a holiday-themed movie. And then, it was Christmas morn.  The kids were up at the ripe old time of five-fucking-thirty in the morning (because parenthood is nothing if not a huge test).

Anyway.  Scott and I tried not die, after being up until well after 1AM prepping for the day, and just kinda blearily went with the flow.  The miserable, exhausting, coffee-bandaged flow.  The kids loved everything, especially the giant fish reminiscent of our trip to Michigan this summer, in which they both started loudly screaming over and I can only really share this photo because it’s the only one where Pete’s underwear aren’t visible (because BOYS).

We were home alllllll day and busy playing with new toys/Mad Libs and snuggling while watching holiday movies, so sorry for the lack of photos.  Usually we go out for dinner on Christmas Day, but it was a snowy mess and no one felt like leaving our cozy house, so Chinese delivery it was.

Full holiday spread, yo.

Then a nice fire to end the day, and that was that.

Fast-forward to New Years Eve, the next holiday on the list. Linus was sick and lethargic most of the day, but he was a good little soldier and showed up for a New Years toast and some (fake) countdown to the New Year.

Sweet Peter – he was adamant about staying awake for the actual New Year. He still fell asleep. At least he made it to the Las Vegas version?  Halle Berry still stuck by him no matter what.

Aaaand there you go. HOLIDAYS!  That’s the end of 2017, friends.  So much more to come for 2018, you just wait.