Christmas Eve

Because I am working over Christmas this year, we celebrated Christmas on Christmas Eve.  It was a great day!  I did have to go to work for a little while but then was able to get back and spend the rest of the day with my boys.  We opened presents, went to church and ate a lot!  Jackson has gotten so many wonderful gifts that we are spreading opening out over a few days so that he doesn't get quite so overwhelmed.  Today he opened a present from us- a Ball Poppin' Dino which he really seems to like.  He is very focused on figuring out how it works.  He tries out a variety of things to stick through one of the holes in it, he wants to know what makes it turn on, etc.  Very cute!

 

His absolute favorite toy of the day (I think) was from Queenie and was a drum and variety of other musical instruments.  He LOVED beating on the drum with the drumsticks and was also into shaking the egg-shaped maracas!  He liked placing the maracas in the Ball Poppin' Dino because it made extra noise :)  He is definitely very musically oriented- he loves anything that he can make noise with!  He also loved the use the drum as support to walk around the room- he would push it in front of him while he walked!

We also got several wonderful books to share with him.  He loves "The Little Blue Truck" which is a board book I found at Target and that Santa put in his stocking :)  It's super cute!

He was such a busy boy that it didn't take much for him to take a nap (starting out on me).

We went to church after lunch which was wonderful.  He did great throughout service!  When the pastor made jokes and the congregation would laugh, he would start giggling about 30 seconds after everyone else had stopped :)  We thought it was coincidental but in the truck on the way home, he started giggling after Del and I laughed at something.

Before church :

 

At home after church (note minimal snowfall):

We finished the day with our Christmas dinner.  We had stuffed beef tenderloin, mashed potatoes, chorizo and apple stuffing, corn casserole, grilled bacon-wrapped asparagus with gruyere in the center and a peppermint chocolate roll cake to finish it.  We were stuffed!  Jackson tried everything but was more a fan of corn casserole and stuffing than of steak or mashed potatoes :)

 What a change from last year:

We want to say thank you to all of our friends and family that have been such a comfort to us in the past year!  We are beyond blessed to have had such a happy year!  After the fear and anxiety that surrounded last Christmas, this Christmas is the exact opposite.  Del has been released from having his blood counts checked regularly and now only needs to have them checked if he gets sick!  This is very exciting news to us.  He will have to continue to take antibiotics every week for the at least the next couple of years to hopefully prevent a recurrence of the Campylobacter.  Small price to pay though for being otherwise healthy.  

 Merry Christmas!!

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas....

I haven't blogged in forever but here are some new pictures of us to catch you up....

Del and I went to see the Zac Brown Band a few weeks ago in Minneapolis and got all geared up!  We had a great time!

From a photo shoot to show off one of the pairs of leggings I made him from a pair of knee socks :)

Jackson had his first Christmas Pageant a week ago.  His class was brought up on stage and shook bells to "Jingle Bell Rock!"  It was so cute.  Jackson was the only one that actually shook the bells, since that's basically his favorite thing to do :)

 From our 10 month photo shoot one day when I was post-call.  He's such a big boy!

Right after he discovered the tree.  It was up for two days before he suddenly noticed it was there.  He enjoys shaking the branches, shaking the lights and shaking the bell ornament I have (handily) hanging at the bottom of the tree.

Helping me decorate the tree :)

Finally....the best part of the post.  We visited Santa today for the first time and he did awesome!  He sat right down in his lap and only briefly had a look of terror on his face which then resolved when he saw that I was going to sit down right in front of him.  He then immediately smiled when I pulled out the camera!  He enjoyed looking at Santa and relaxing on his lap :)

Stationery card

Hand Drawn Joy Religious Christmas Card

Visit Shutterfly.com for classic photo Christmas cards.

View the entire collection of cards.

Trip home and a visit from Aunt Rachael!

We have had a lot going on in the last few weeks.  I have been working nights this month and so I have had little time to update the blog until now. 

Jackson has become substantially more mobile in the last few weeks.  It seems like overnight that he was not only crawling but also cruising.  He really only crawls (preferentially army crawls, I think because of my hardwood floors) when he wants to get somewhere fast- and boy, is he!  He can be across the room in a second :)  He has mastered a trip around the room with a combo of cruising and crawling.  His favorite things are to pulls all the DVDs out, pull everything off the couch (especially if it's newspaper) and stand at the baby gates and shake them!


We had a wonderful time during our visit to Tennessee.  We stopped in Indiana on the way down for Lauren and Jared's wedding which was beautiful.  I, unfortunately was unable to remember to get anyone to take pictures of the three of us together.  We then went on down to Tennessee and got to spend a great week with our families.

Jackson showing Aunt Beenie and Queenie his favorite toy (Leapfrog activity table)

Pulling all of Queenie's books off the shelf

 

Eating breakfast with Memaw

Spending time with Memaw on her 70th birthday!

Three generations

We survived the drive back despite an increasingly sick child.  We got back and I took him in to clinic the very next morning and found out he had his first ear infection!  So sad.  He was such a trooper though.  It was really hard to tell he was even sick except that he was a little clingy to me. 

Jackson LOVES the cat!  He is typically the source of split-second army crawling across the room :)

After some recovery time we had a playdate with KT.  He and J are one week apart.  His mom and I worked together (she finished her pediatric residency this past June).  They are definitely getting to the age where they are able to interact a little more.  It was pretty cute!

 Sharing the table

Patting KT's head, much like he does to the cat

This past week we got to have a visit from Aunt Rachael!  We were all three so excited to see her!  We had a wonderful time together and did so much fun stuff including checking out Rochester, eating sushi, an evening Target run, massages, cooking and a trip to the Mall of America.  Unfortunately I am an idiot and did not remember to take pictures until the very last night she was here.  We made an awesome dinner that night (steak, butternut squash risotto, sausage-apple stuffin' muffins, bacon wrapped Gruyere stuffed asparagus and chocolate pie)!  It was a wonderful pre-Thanksgiving meal and a great end to a fantastic visit! 

 

Post-chocolate pie face :)  He kept coming back for more so despite the look, he must have liked it!