I'm really starting to hate this whole "getting older" thing. Time seems to move much faster than it did when I was in my teens and twenties. Christmas is a distant memory already, even though the temperatures have forced the outside decorations to stay up at our house. 2010 came and went.
Let me recap:
- Thanksgiving- Pretty calm this year. Mike and I cooked at home and had a nice quiet meal together. I was excited about Dillan being able to really enjoy his first Thanksgiving meal but he wanted nothing to do with it. After dinner we visited with my aunt and her family for a little while. They hadn't seen Dillan since before he turned 1 so it was fun for them to see him running around and interacting.
- Christmas- I have been much better about starting the decorating process early. This year I had the house decorated by the first week of Dec. With D being a very active toddler, climbing everything, we vetoed the use of our giant artificial tree in favor of a smaller (easily contained) real tree. I was very excited since I hadn't had a real tree in at least 6 years. We found the perfect little tree at Home Depot. Ornaments presented a challenge as most of the ones we own are either heirlooms or are very breakable. Nothing a quick $20 trip to Walmart couldn't fix! I bought an assortment of non-glass, shatterproof, ornaments for our tree. After setting up the tree we had to finagle some Super Yard panels to keep Dillan from undercoating it. In the end it worked out great. We had a cute little toddler-friendly tree just the right size for the space we had available.
The holiday season not only means shopping and decorating, but also the realization that there is too much to do and too little time. We vowed that this year we would not do all the running around on Christmas day and we would really enjoy the day with Dillan. The only concrete plans we had were to see my father on the Christmas Eve, as has been tradition every year since before Mike and I started dating. We also accepted an invitation to dinner at my aunts house. She hadn't had a big family dinner in a few years but this year her kids were really insistent on hosting one. Plans to see Mike's family were, as usual, up in the air. It was decided the week of Christmas that his family would be gathering on Christmas Eve because of his brother's custody arrangement. This inadvertently excluded us from the family Christmas altogether. Though he'll never tell his parents (men, sheesh) my husband was hurt by this. I think he feels left out a lot and I know that sometimes he feels that he is overlooked because there's always some other drama going on.
We visited with my dad on Christmas Eve as planned and I'm sooooooo glad we did! Dillan really shined! He wasn't the shy, clingy kid he usually is in crowds. He was running around and had a blast operating my dad's train set. Even though he was the only kid under 20, he didn't care. He was such a ham!! For the first time in his life he let my dad hold him and interact with him. I almost cried when I saw them playing together. I know it meant a lot to my dad too.
Then my dad surprised Dillan with his very own train set (thank goodness he wasn't scared by them like last year!) for under our tree.
When we got home from dad's I got Dillan some dinner and ready for bed while Mike visited a friend's annual Christmas eve gathering. While he was gone I prepared the present I wasn't supposed to buy him! We agreed no gifts since we were going to FL for a week in Jan to celebrate our anniversary. I couldn't resist though when I saw the VERY specific watch he's been wanting for 10 years on sale...cheap! I wrapped it in Dillan's toy mailbox as a "special delivery" from Dillan and Santa. .I thought I'd be proactive and start assembling and wrapping all of Dillan's toys. I had the idea to wrap them in tissue paper so he could easily rip it off. I learned it's very difficult to wrap large angular toys with tissue paper! I also forgot to get batteries. Doh! No worries though, Mike grabbed them on his way home. We got everything wrapped and set the train up under the tree and made it to bed just before 3am!
- Christmas morning was fun. Dillan wasn't too into opening his gifts but he did love the puzzles and toy kitchen. Mike was really surprised by the watch and a little fake mad that I got him something when I said I wouldn't.
We had dinner at my Aunts and again Dillan was an angel! He was having a ball playing with my Aunt and cousin and it was really nice to be able to sit with the grown ups and talk. After dessert we packed up and headed home. We took the long way around the beltway to stop at Mike's parents house. We had hoped to catch his brother and their twins, but like Dillan, they were ready for bed. D was pretty maxed out and wouldn't eat. He just wanted to cuddle and cry. We did a quick Christmas with them and finally made it home. Everyone was sound asleep in no time.
- New Year's- We visited Mike's twin nephews on NYE. D had a lot of fun playing "with" his cousins. More accurately he had fun playing with their toys lol. He loved the play house w/ slide and almost immediately gravitated towards their kitchen. After dinner we got all the kids together to color a card for the grandparents. We spent most of the afternoon into the evening hanging out before going home to watch the ball drop.
Between Nov and Jan we also went to 2 friend's 1st bdays. I don't have the energy to write about those!
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