Christmas Wrap-up

Christmas was great. Mistah A ran downstairs Christmas morning and found a beautiful blue tricycle under our tree. He loves it and is getting pretty good at the whole pedaling thing. We ate scones and tea and cheese fondue with fantastic bread and it was a wonderful Christmas even if it did rain for most of the day. It was good cheese fondue weather. It was low-key and quiet and lovely.

Post-Christmas, we managed to get up to the last year of the Wild Animal Park's Festival of Lights and see, among other things, a black light puppet show, which had one of the best anti-photo deterrent routines I've ever seen. A behaved himself so beautifully; there were many brats in the crowd and I was happy to be with my kid.

Then it was off to Colorado for New Year's, with the grandparents bestowing much spoilage and love upon yonder boy. I got a new sewing machine from C and my in-laws, and we saw many people that we did not have enough time with. I don't think there's a good way to have enough time with everyone. We ate at the Canton Palace many, many, many times and are almost done with the General Tao's we brought back. It's so good to visit with people we don't get to see nearly often enough.

A traveled well, although leaving Colorado turned into a panoply (not comedy) of errors. On the way to the airport, the "Low Tire Pressure" light came on. C stopped and got out (on one of the worst, most dangerous sections of I-25) and checked the tires. Nothing appeared to be protruding from the tires, no flats, so we stopped at the next exit with a gas station and filled the tires. Some time between the gas station and the airport, A started really complaining and fussing, pretty unusual for him in the car. We kept driving because, well, we were already late from the tire incident. When we got to the rental car drop-off, I carried A out and--oh. That's why he was fussy. Let's just say that we've traveled with all levels of sick, but toddler with diarrhea is probably my second-least favorite. Small mercies: while we had a fearsome number bunch of changes in the airport, with proper tag-team diapering to keep it fair, A was done and fell asleep on the plane while people were still boarding.

The last week's been spent digging out, resuming routines, returning A to the level of attention he normally receives and not the adoration of the masses. He's happy to be back at preschool; he was thrilled to see his speech therapist. In swimming last Monday, the heater for the air in the pool room was broken, so while the pool was warm and wonderful, getting out was terrible. The steam rose off the water of the pool. Plus they had two cherry pickers in there to fix it, which was astonishing. I hope it's fixed. My toes are curling just thinking about it.

And now I have a new sewing machine. Once A falls asleep, C plays new video games and I sew and we're ridiculously pleased with ourselves. Last night we fixed a seam of C's at midnight. That's how ridiculously thrilled we both are. And tonight will be tea and cookies (thanks, Bump Bump Bumps) and early bed. Unless the lure of sewing and video games proves too much...