My parents paid us a visit from Boston over the NYE weekend. Conveniently, we had a wedding to attend, so my parents got to babysit Gavin. We had a low key NYE (though, for the first time in years, we actually stayed up until midnight). And, even though my dad and I were fighting colds (his worse than mine), we didn’t let that stop us from visiting with friends and family.

Really, I should just let some of my favorite photos do the talking.

For Gavin’s birthday party, we provided crayons for the older kids.
Lately, Gavin’s daycare has sent home some of his crayon art.
So, we gave Gavin the chance to draw at home.
He loves it so much that he throws a fit when it’s time to clean up.

We recently purchased an umbrella stroller for some upcoming travel.
As is par for the course at this age, Gavin loved climbing through the box
(and could care less about the stroller itself).
The box remains in our living room, even though the stroller has been put away.

My parents spoiled Gavin rotten.
He suckered my mom into pushing him up and down the hallway in his wagon!

 Sweets’ parents visited, too.
Gavin got grandparental attention x4.
He was wiped out – and that was before dinner!

My parents gave Gavin a table and chairs for the holidays.
One of his favorite activities is to climb in and out of the chairs.
Even if it means he sometimes falls on his head!

My dad’s imaginary friend is the tickle bug.
Poor Gavin is learning what it means to be friendly with both!

 With all grandparents in tow, we headed out to eat.
My maid of honor and her boyfriend also joined us.
There was an awesome bluegrass band that accompanied a great menu!
Gavin loved listening to the music and put up with my camera.

 After we cleared our house of guests, Sweets sat down with Gavin to read.
Apparently, Gavin started on Sweets’ lap,
but scooted until they were seated side by side.
I’m pretty sure Gavin is signing his version of “more,” which has now come
to also mean “I want.”

 Gavin loves drinking water from a (plastic) glass.
(Should it just be called a plastic, then?)
Even when we assist him, there are plenty of H2O failures!

 When I took this photo, I thought “future soccer star!”
Doesn’t it look like Gavin is focused on and running towards a ball?
In reality, he’s just clumsily walking towards me on the couch.

We wind down our days by giving Gavin a bath, one of his favorite things to do!
He gets incredibly squirmy and goofy as Sweets runs the bathwater.
Gavin even smiles for the camera, naked body and all!

So, there you have a lot of our long weekend, through a toddler’s eyes. Did I mention you might get sick of seeing photos of Gavin? Yeah, that starts right about now!

Happy 2012!

After seeing this recipe, I requested to make cinnamon rolls for our family gatherings. It started on Friday night with a trip to the grocery store to pick up some much needed staples. It was absolute madness at the store (guess I’m not the only last-minute shopper), so I grabbed a balloon to bribe Gavin into good behavior. It worked – and has provided for endless moments of excitement at home. Though, later in the weekend when we went back to the grocery store, he was excitedly reaching for another balloon – I’ve created a monster!

I’ve got to admit, I don’t usually make such complicated recipes. It’s not that this recipe was hard to follow (in fact, instructions that include comments like, the more butter oozing out the sides the better, well, those are instructions I can get behind!). But, there were a lot of steps and a lot of waiting between the steps (let the dough rise, let the dough cool, etc.). I wound up making the dough on Friday night and actually putting together the rolls on Saturday morning (which meant, I was the only one up at 5am to ensure we got out of the house on time).

Saturday was a long day for us. We went to Sweets’ parents house in the morning (they live about 45 minutes away) for a family get-together, gift exchange, brunch. We also committed to going to church and another gathering with family friends that evening … so, we wound up staying in the suburbs for the day. It was fun, but exhausting, especially since I was fighting with the ickies. Nevertheless, Gavin had fun with his cousins and playing with toys circa 1980 when Sweets was a kid (and yes, Gavin is rocking out in an Addidas track suit!).

Sunday, I woke up feeling like hell. I was up coughing for much of the night, my head hurt and I just felt rundown from the previous day. Sweets wasn’t feeling all that great, either. So, we cancelled brunch with my family, which really bummed me out as it was the only time over the weekend we devoted to spending time with my side of the family. Sunday afternoon/evening, we were expected at another family gathering in the suburbs. I bailed, but Sweets took Gavin and seemed to have a good time.

Monday was a day of rest for our family. We went grocery shopping. Organized gifts. And planted our butts on the couch for much of the day. It would’ve been glorious if it wasn’t for all of us feeling sick. Sigh.

Speaking of gifts … Sweets got me a sweet new lens for my camera. It’s one I’ve been thinking about getting for months now (probably more like over a year). It’s a fixed distance lens (no zoom), so it means I have to get up and move around if I don’t like how the photo is framed. It’s supposed to be one of the best portrait lenses, so I was excited to play with it. There is definitely a learning curve with this lens and I have only just started playing with it. But, so far, I love that you can focus crisply on your subject and blur pretty much everything behind (even if it’s only a foot behind your subject).

I love how Gavin is standing less than a foot in front of our entertainment center and yet, it’s totally blurred out. There’s no question what I (as the photographer) want you (as the viewer) looking at … my cute son, of course!

Life isn’t always rosey around here. Gavin definitely has his moments. I love the lighting in this photo … and also that his face is in focus, but his body is blurred.

And finally, a photo where I don’t want you focusing on the face. Rather, I want you to see this light-up snowman that Gavin is playing with … I love how his hands are in focus, but his face is blurred away.

Anyway, needless to say, this sick girl has had fun playing with her new toy. Hope y’all had a wonderful holiday celebration. And to those who don’t have to work this week … I’m oh so jealous!!! =)

Huh?

Well, since my house is a mix of Judaism and Christianity, I get to make statements like that. But, it does raise the question of how multi-faith homes address the holidays. Sweets and I started the conversation before we got married. How religious are we? What do the holidays mean to us? How do we want to celebrate (or not) the holidays when/if we have kids? It was a great exercise for us to go through, because I imagine it can be very difficult for families that don’t land on the same page.

Thankfully, Sweets and I have always been on the same page. The holidays are meant to be shared with loved ones. Pre-children, we really didn’t decorate our home. We might have lit Chanukah candles, mostly because I have a menorah and candles and it was convenient. But, we never bought a tree or decorated, because that would take effort and, well, we were never all that organized.

Now that we have Gavin, we have re-ignited the conversation about what we want the holidays to encompass in our home. A lot of it has to do with favorite traditions from our own childhood. We are still minimalists when it comes to decorations, but we will likely add to it as Gavin grows and expresses interests in different parts of our cultures.

I have some photos to share, but there are a couple traditions that I can’t exactly share through photos. Not yet, at least.

Though we likely won’t do it this year, in future years, we will make potato latkes (pancakes) to celebrate the eight days of Chanukah.

The next tradition is sort of a stereotypical joke about Jews and Christmas, which is that Jews go out to eat Chinese food on December 25 each year. And while we’ll never go out to eat on Christmas night, we are going to start the tradition of getting Chinese food at some point over the Christmas holiday.

One of Sweets’ favorite movies is A Christmas Story. I hadn’t ever seen it until last year (?). And then I fell asleep while we were watching it. Sweets is very disappointed in me. So, this year, I bought the DVD and we will watch it at Christmas time every year from here on out!

Speaking of movies, another tradition we’ll start when Gavin gets a bit older is actually on New Year’s Day. Starting at some point when I was a teenager, my family started doing marathon movie days. We’d go to see 2-3 movies at the theater, broken up by a meal out together. It was always a fun, yet surprisingly relaxing day. I mentioned continuing this tradition when Gavin is a bit older (i.e., old enough to go see movies in a theater) and Sweets expressed extreme excitement.

Now, onto the (crappy) photos. We got a table-top tree this year, since we don’t have much room for a full sized tree (unlike the woman at the salon I overheard who got a 9-foot tall tree that was 9-feet wide, too!). Sweets’ parents gave him a bunch of ornaments that were from his childhood, mostly ones he made or friends made for him. We picked some of our favorites for the tree. To weave in some Judiasm, we got a blue star tree-topper. OK, so it’s really turquoise and not even close to a Star of David, but whatever. It will do for this year! We also put up lights around our front windows, though it’s hard to see in this photo.

We don’t have many ornaments, though (so this small tree was actually perfect). We discussed not wanting to just buy boxes of generic ornaments. We want to organically grow our collection. So, when we were in Galena a few weeks ago, we started a tradition of buying one ornament a year. This handmade ornament hails from Seattle and we sort of fell in love with the warmth of the colored glass.

When we got married, family friends gifted us holiday stockings. For some reason, I seemed to recall where they got the stockings. So, a few weeks ago, I checked to see if they still carry them. And, they do! So, now Gavin has his very own matching stocking. What I love about these stockings is they’re festive without being overly primary colors festive. =)

As I mentioned before, we light the candles in the menorah for the eight nights of Chanukah. I actually have two menorahs. My favorite menorah is in the background in the picture below … it’s aqua in color and just beautiful. Unfortunately, the “cups” where the candles sit are far too shallow, so I’m always nervous about the candles falling out. Lucky me, I have an old-school, not-my-style menorah with deep cups, so we use that for the actual candles. Between the menorahs sits our advent block calendar. I bought it through Etsy and love it. It’s the right amount of festiveness for our house.

Last month, I saw a blog post about wrapping presents for the holidays. I saw some presents wrapped in plain brown paper with the initial of the recipient cut out of festive paper and just loved the concept. Simple, clean, festive. So, I proceeded to wrap our presents the same way this year. Kids got some extra cut-outs on their presents. It was actually a lot more work than normal wrapping presents with a bow … but, I like how they turned out. We also had labels printed, so I placed a label on each present, so the recipient knows who gave them the gift.

And, finally, as I mentioned before, we sent holiday cards this year. In October, we worked with a local photographer to take some family photos. We picked some favorites and I went off in search of a card that suited us. I’m pretty sure I found it – we were really pleased with the results. (I apologize for the coloring, which is slightly off – the scanning didn’t go as well as it could have).

Happy Holidays, blog friends!

As much as I looked forward to receiving cards, I really didn’t ever get into the swing of sending them. I felt funny sending a photo card of just me when I was single and was too lazy to get a good photo of Sweets and me after we got hitched. Last year, Gavin was fresh out of the hospital, so my focus was elsewhere. But, this year? I got organized! And just last week, Sweets and I mailed over 100 holiday cards to dear family and friends. It was no simple feat to get these cards out the door.

We started the process with the perfect family photos (tip for photographing babies or toddlers: get down on their level!). And then I went in search of the most suitable matching holiday card. Of course, I have a few guildelines to finding the perfect card (for us). It has to incorporate my Judaism and Sweets’ Christianity, but should not outright mention Chanukah or Christmas. It cannot be too cutesy. And the card should include fewer than 3 photos (otherwise, I feel the card becomes entirely too busy … UNLESS you have gobs of kids and want to highlight each of them in a photo … clearly, we do not!). =)

So, off to Tiny Prints I went in search of our perfect card! The hardest part about finding a card was picking my favorite! I don’t want to give away what we wound up using, but here are a few that made our favorites list!

In addition to holiday cards, Sweets and I have started a discussion about what Jewish and Christian traditions we’d like to incorporate into our home. So far, we’ve come up with a menorah, an advent calendar, a small tree and lights. We’re not an over-the-top kind of family, but we do have fond memories of our childhoods around this time of year and we’d like Gavin to share in the festivities.

Do you enjoy sending and receiving holiday cards or do you find the whole tradition wasteful of precious resources?!

The opinions in this blog post are solely my own, based on my own experiences with Tiny Prints. I have not been compensated to say nice things about that company. However, in exchange for linking to their holiday card selection, Tiny Prints is providing me with free holiday cards.

Thursday was Thanksgiving #1 for our family. (Well, technically, it was Thanksgiving #2, since Thanksgiving #1 took place in October.) My aunt and uncle hosted almost 20 guests. The best part about the meal? My aunt and uncle only cooked the turkey and mashed potatoes. Every guest provided another part of the meal, which was DELICIOUS! (I made a butternut squash / leek / Granny Smith apple soup with a cider cream and bacon bit topping from this amazing book and a pumpkin pie, thanks to the sassy Paula Dean.)

Friday, Sweets had to work (a travesty!), so I packed up the truck with Gavin and SoMi and we went to visit our dear friends who left the city for the far out suburbs. Gavin got to play with some girlfriends (he’s a lady’s man, for sure!). I got to catch up with our friends (and talk about future overnights at their home – fun stuff!). And we all took a fabulous walk to a local farm, where Gavin met his first horse and SoMi chased a cat into a barn (while I frantically yelled at her to come back)!

Friday night, a dear friend celebrated her anniversary with her husband while I babysat her adorable children. (I should write an entire post dedicated to the art of establishing a baby sitting exchange with friends – it’s brilliant!)

Saturday was Thanksgiving #2 with Sweets’ family. Gavin adores his older cousins, so it was fun to watch them make him laugh. Gavin also had the opportunity to learn how to play his grandfather’s drums. One day, I’ll regret the decision to let him learn the love for all things loud. =)

Sunday was our day of rest … snicker, hahaha, yeah right. (Just imagine Sweets saying, “we can sleep when we’re dead,” because that was pretty much his mantra all weekend.) We went to Gavin’s beloved music class where he was largely quiet until the last 15 minutes of class. By that point in class, he began giggling, dancing, playing with other children’s shakers, chasing bubbles, screeching with joy, playing the drum and guitar, and generally having a wildly good time.

After class, we met friends for lunch and sat at a table next to a fireplace. I think it was our first time teaching Gavin about the dangers of hot fires. He seemed to get it, though he also needed to be reminded from time to time to “make a different choice” as his course seemed to be heading straight towards the flames. After Gavin took a 3-hour nap that afternoon (score!), we went over to my bestie’s home for dinner. She made an outstanding spread (she always does) that included an early birthday cake for me (yummy!). It was a good thing we had SoMi join us, because she did a magnificent job of cleaning up after Gavin. ha.

And now we’re back to work. I’m full. Full of yummy food and time well spent with cherished people. Hope you had a most excellent weekend full of good food and good times, too!