O Christmas III

Ainsley's parents returned Monday from two weeks out in snowy Seattle, and I was able to pick them up after work, saving them the $50 Super Saver charge and the 3 hours it would take for them to get someone to wander around Northern Virginia before dropping them off at our door. Ryan was quick to show them every single thing he got for Christmas, particularly the illuminating elephant on a stick. I think it also has a propeller of some sort.
Tuesday we awoke to Ainsley's oven-fresh cranberry pecan bread, then opened the remaining kilotons of Christmas presents among the six of us. I drove up to DTRA at lunch to see a friend's promotion ceremony, seeing old compatriots, eating the same teeth-staining blue-frosted cake we all get at these things.
Cooped up all day, the rest of the family wanted to go out to eat, so we decided on TGI Friday's to avoid the mall traffic. Erin ate loads, including an entire chicken strip, several platefuls of fried green beans, and some cucumbers and croutons, before being full and fed up enough to require me to carry her around the restaurant, pointing out the crap on the walls (astronaut, picture of JFK, Rod Stewart album covers, Darth Vader helmet) while people commented how cute she was. Which was true, since Ainsley had changed her outfit from whatever pink-on-polka-dotted-orange concoction I had come up with.
Went in for a half day on New Year's Eve (to a sparse office anyway), but I was grumpy most of the day on account of being up since 4:24 when the garbage men woke up our daughter and then me shaving the tip of my cheek mole off in groggy bathroomed stupor. But I made us nice big fire, and the ladies whipped up a yummy fondue for us all (Ryan was more interested in the forks than the cheese), before popping some bubbly and watching the second half of "Mamma Mia!", now Ryan's favorite movie in the history of time. Plum exhausted, the can-do Foulds-types kept us up chatting till near 11, but for the second straight year (at least?) the ball dropped in our sleep.
We need to move out west again. New Year's comes MUCH earlier out there. Live-TV wise, anyway.

La La Land

The strangest thing happened yesterday morning: I asked Ryan to go get his slippers, and he said, "Okay."
!
No "No", no "I don't want to wear slippers," no "Will you help me?", no going to do something else. I asked him to be sure to get up on that side of the bed every day.

We were able to open just a couple more presents before needing to get out of the house on a warmish December day. We strolled up to the park and threw the kids in the playground, Erin discovering that she's a big fan of slapstick, laughing uproariously by me pretending to get kicked in the face by her swing.
Barely able to get some soup and grilled cheese pita sandwiches into the kids before nap, which was rudely interrupted by fire & rescue sirens. I was able to get Erin back to sleep, who lasted another 45 minutes...before more sirens woke her up (new rule: if you don't see emergency vehicles coming, they get to shoot you out of the way with a bazooka. No need to keep waking up my daughter just so they can get through intersections faster).
Erin and I watched some TV and ate raisins until her mother got up, then I offered to take Erin with me to go get some take n bake pizza. She chatted away in the car, and when we had to wait in a small line, I bounced her around the foyer, her singing away the whole time, a lilty, lovely "la-la-laaaa.." over and over again. I just wish Ainsley could see her like this. Of course, we get home, and as soon as Erin sees her mother, she starts crying, reaching out for her, wanting to be held, wanting to nurse, don't let me go. As terrible as they may end up being, I can't wait for her "two"s, since then at least she'll be able to communicate what she's feeling.
We ended up having a very fun night, as we gathered around the living room table to eat the pizza and watch "Mamma Mia!", which my wife got for me. When the first song came on, my daughter started dancing like a crazy luauer, clapping and swaying, while Ryan just furrowed his brow, mouth agape, wondering why this girl was suddenly singing (Oh, because the Wiggles never do that). He eventually got into the spirit of things, dancing by the table, waving his new construction equipment utensils around in the air, while Erin climbed around on the floor, going "la la laaaa" whenever a song came on. And I would swear she's making air-guitar-like movements, too.
Able to get them in and out of the bath, and both kids crashed hard...Erin even slept six and half hours, no doubt helped by her new Metallica "Rockabye Baby" CD. She was up for an hour between 3 and 4, then slept until 7:30. If we could get the dogs to start using our toilet instead of wanting to get up at 7, we actually might get some sleep around here.

A Long December

I was a little off with yesterday's prediction, as Ryan and Erin got a mega-early start on Christmas -- 2am! Neither Ainsley or I could get Erin back to sleep after getting herself up, and Ryan started a hacking, every-three-seconds cough that had us pulling out strange options like Chloroseptic (he said it tasted 'yukkie') and cough drops. The saving grace was that Ryan didn't seem upset about the events, a sweet smile on his face while we gave him medicine. He seemed generally happy to see us, which contrasted from the attitude of little miss gotohell next door.
I finally laid down next to Ryan on the floor and he fell asleep a little before 5, while Ainsley got Erin finally down around the same time. She was up again at 6, but I was able to get her back down in just a couple minutes, then Ryan was up crazy-coughing by 7:15. Ainsley brought him into bed with us for a bit, but when he wouldn't stop coughing in my face, she took him into the shower with her, after which Erin was crabbily awake, around 8.
Thankfully, we were able to tell the kids that Santa had used that small window between 5 and 6am to stuff himself in our house, fill stockings, eat cookies, and leave Ryan a 6-foot rug with town painted on it, roads, schools, pizza places, and four new cars from Cars to go with his others (Erin got a small doll with a stroller and a little baby bottle she kept slapping up against its forehead).
Managed to get through stockings before Grandad and Tim arrived to start on theirs, then took a break from all the festivities to have a small parade around the downstairs, Ryan the Conductor out front, telling who needed which instrument, when to start, when to stop, huge grin on his face being in charge. We then opened a handful of presents before getting a few bites of lunch into the kids, who then both enjoyed the heartiest of naps either of them have had in a while. We were able to get all the Big People presents opened before getting everyone ready and out to the Boivins', where the usual spinach dip and cheeseballs awaited, not to mention a Newcastle Brown Ale, opened and ready at my spot on the coffee table.
Throwing tradition to the wind, we opened presents right away, while everyone was still in a good mood (Erin more so thanks to the spinach dip), then despite the small grease fire and spilled water glass at the table and Erin spinning and clonking her head on the leg of a chair, we enjoyed a lovely family gathering.
Erin fell asleep on the way home, and I was able to transfer her into her crib, where she stayed asleep until past one (then four, then seven, if you're sensing the pattern). Ryan's cough was better, thanks to the kiddie mucinex pop rocks we had him swallow allowing him to get to sleep relatively quickly, and Ainsley and I even got to bed before midnight for a change. Our little present to ourselves.

Yes, Woodbridge Virginia

Took a day off from the family and went in to work today, but we were magnanimously released just after noon anyway, giving me time to get home and get nothing accomplished except hold my daughter and walk around so she'd stop itch-baying at ommy-bay. I then started my traditional Daddy-surprise Christmas Eve meal, which as usual took about thirty more minutes than planned, as well as requiring two additional skillets to hold all the stupid eggplant, potatoes, peppers, and tomatoes in the Suksaka or whatever it was called, obviously designed to feed a boatful of Ottoman sailors. Thank goodness my brother helped peel and seed the tomatoes, or we'd still be there with no fried egg to stick on the hand-breaded chicken cutlet a la provolone e prosciutto, which actually didn't have a recipe, just a picture. I was well complimented by the adult members of the family, though Erin just complained until I picked her up, and Ryan was in no mood to not be three (I'm not sure the boy's eaten much of anything since June). Still, you gotta feel for the lad, snorting through his sinuses, calling his mother "Bobby" and Uncle Tim comes out "Unkl Tub."

So, if you ever need your kitchen seriously @&*# up, you know who to call.

Despite (or because of) Ryan's 'tude, we took a stroll down the street to look at the multitude of holiday lighting attempts, and tried to explain to Ryan that he should probably be good for at least fifteen seconds if he wanted Santa to bring a present (on top of the thirty-eight thousand he already sees under the tree). But it's actually fun going through the 'Santa' motions, seeing the amazed disbelief when we talk about him landing on the roof and coming through our chimney, and even leaving out cookies and milk by the fireplace for the first time.

Unfortunately, this also meant that we'll have to unwrap stockings in the morning, and what with him still coughing away up in his room, it probably won't be an early night.

Last present wrapped in 2008? 10:58pm.

Well, except for the stuff that I knew was already going to be mailed late, so why bother?

A Man of Few Skills

I totally have no idea how women put tissue paper in gift bags and make them look halfway decent.

World War 3(year-old)

The Russians could go ahead and attack, since our own little wolfette's near-constant cries sound like an air raid siren anyway.
It's simply exhausting, and I've only been experiencing it for seven days. I seriously don't know why Ainsley isn't in a bell tower somewhere shooting bystanders who don't look like they want to go to sleep, either.
Ryan's joined the bandwagon, as he didn't nap for the third straight day. His cold may have something to do with it, and we're still amazed that he stays in his bed for 2, 3 hours, yammering away, yawning loudly, singing songs, without getting up and working that doorknob thing or just pulling out a bunch of books or destroying his clothes hangars. But we'd still prefer just a smidgen of sleep from the lad. Tonight he was an unholy terror (for him), running around like a tornadic idiot, especially after finding a fifteen-foot-long strand of packing paper in an amazon.com box. Luckily, Erin was able to duck and weave for the most part, avoiding the dragon's tail, but still -- with all his carrying on, we're considering changing Ryan's name to the slightly less conventional but infinitely more appropriate Not In Her Face.

The Fall of Fall

We needed to get the kids out of the house on Friday, a dreary, drippy, grey day, and decided to take Uncle Tim to his favorite haunt, which Ryan likes to call the "Cow Store" but we all know as Chik-Fil-A. Got the kids to bed that night and took off to a friend of Ainsley's for a short holiday gathering with people I barely know, but it was good to do adult stuff (even though I was more interested in playing ping-pong or Wii with the numerous kids running around) and play "guess the meat ingredient" in the dips and random balls of puffs sitting in the kitchen. Unfortunately, Erin was a bit of a fusspill for her grandfather, so we were glad we had called it an early night.

Saturday I worked on more presents and even took the dogs for a walk with Erin on my chest, before heading out with the whole family to the Bull Run Festival of Lights, a nice 2.5-mile rolling trail past and through a multitude of Christmas- and Fairy Tale-themed LED arrangements. We then stopped at "Santa's Village", which turned out to be almost the exact same fairground setup as the Fort Belvoir Octoberfest, only with fire pits for roasting smores (even Ryan talked about "the music in the tent" -- the German oom-pa-pa band from the last event).

Sunday we noticed Ryan's Ya-Ya level pinging, so we got everyone dressed to go visit Mr. Cheese (Charles Edward) to dance to the animatronics, play whatever age-appropriate games, and turn in 169 game tickets for a 5-cent piece of plastic. To no avail, though: Ryan didn't go down for a nap at all, while Erin oddly napped for over 4 hours, nearly three times her usual length. Turns out she had a temperature of 103 degrees (accompanied again by a cold), so she just felt dreadful during the Redskins-Eagles game. Ryan didn't even go to sleep that night until well after 10, while Erin was up every twenty minutes or so between 8 and midnight. So we're just going to leave most of our gifts unwrapped, what say?

Today, despite the fever subsiding and reappearing in the middle of the night, it was finally in the high 90s/low 100s at breakfast, so I didn't feel as guilty to go on the planned jaunt with Tim to the newly renovated American History Museum up in DC. Good thing to do on the coldest day of the year (4 degrees with the wind chill), though the venue itself wasn't as grand as I'd hoped. The new Star-Spangled Banner display is pretty cool, but the rest of the museum looked mostly the same. Hit lunch at the Old Post Office, then came home to an again un-napped Ryan, sporting a Niagral Nasal passage himself, and a red and whiny 1-year-old girl who still obviously felt like crap. It was all we could do to enjoy Carraba's take-out and play with Erin's new musical instruments (Ryan on the tambourine, Erin on the bells, Daddy and Uncle Tim on the maracas) before getting everyone medicated and to bed. Here's hoping everyone is semi-coherent for Christmas...

It Just Hurts

So today, after eleven months and three doctors and lots of gaps between appointments due to their only being one hand specialist in the entire military (the Navy, as it turns out), I learned that below the dorsal aspect of the third carpometacarpal joint, just deep to the MRI marker, there is osseous prominence at the junction of the base of the third metacarpal and the capitate with a spur compatible with a carpal boss. There is

Wait there's more

There is abnormal signal within the overlying extensor digitorium and indices tendons, with abnormal soft tissue thickening and enhancement surrounding them. Now I know what you're thinking, and no, there was no discrete soft tissue mass identified.

I certainly appreciate all your cards and flowers.

She Made It

More specifically, Ainsley let her make it.

After 366 days (stoopit leap year), we were able to celebrate the second "December 16th" in Erin's life, complete with Mimaa and Grandpa support and just a silly number of presents, including a doll from Japan, books from Indiana, and a spoon from West Virginia. Let alone an uncle from England.

We kept the celebration going all week, with Ainsley's parents Tuesday, Tim on Wednesday, and adding Grandad for birthday cake #2 at the Boivins'. Good excuse to take leave for a week.

Tim was actually a late arrival Tuesday night, but since it was 3am his time, we let him sleep in rather than come over for breakfast at 5:30 when our household rattles the cribcage and shakes the collars. We instead met him and Dad down in Occoquan to mail last-minute packages, look at ducks (since it's the sign Erin knows) and eat lunch at the granola-esque Blue Arbor Cafe.

It's very weird to have kids around my brother. I mean, it's just odd to Be A Father, when he knew me as a punk-ass 9-year-old being a dork reading Archie comics eating Ho-Hos by the handful. Hard to explain.

Thursday we picked up to-go manhole platters of hummus and shish so the Boivins wouldn't have to cook for us Yet Again, allowing us more time to hang out and open Erin's multitude of overly generous gifts (including a Metallica lullaby CD which I have no idea how it appeared on Erin's amazon.com wish list). The Boivins were also nice enough to sequester the dogs downstairs, so Ryan was a lot more relaxed and himself, meaning we had to yell at him a lot more often to not be so rambunctious around the delicate Christmas tree ornaments. Ainsley had made a second (!) birthday cake for the occasion, a double-layer affair with kid's blocks all around it, "E", "L" and "G" at the top. I would seriously like to know where she finds the time.

I also don't know how we're going to explain to our children that most kids only have one birthday every year.

Amphibious Assault

I told him it was heavy. I told him to be careful. I told him I'd be right back.

But lo, I get downstairs to feed the dogs and I hear the boy crying above the kitchen, and run upstairs to find him lying on the floor, head on a pillow, comforter over him, holding his forehead, and the offending object lying a few feet to the side above his cranium.
He'd decided that the ceramic frog I'd given him to hold would be more interesting held at arm's length while lying on the ground, and I'm sure he lost his grip and a sharp corner of the 'lillypad' it sits on got him right smack two inches above the bridge of his nose; he had a wee little pin-sized blood spot there, making him look like the Virgin of Calcutta.

An aside here to point out how a 3-year-old's mind works as he formulates language. He'd also asked for the other frog trinket, the one wearing a crown for some reason. Together, they were the "frog with no crown, and the frog with yes crown."
Makes sense.

Anyhoo, Mommy came in, as she does when she hears her first-born in tears, wondering what the hell I'd done, but when she asked him what happened, I just started cracking up, since I knew the answer was, "Mommy, I dropped a frog on my head."

I need a leap month

Astounding how far behind I am for the holidays this year. I mean, really? December 13th, and I'm wrapping my first presents? Honestly? Where did November go?
It's not that it's hard to get into the Christmas spirit -- we had some good, crispy cold weather there for a stretch, and everyone has their lights up and music singing and random gift nuts and cookies and calendars are appearing at the office, not to mention the near-daily hallway parties one organization or another is throwing.
My unit's was last night, a cozy affair at the Club at Bolling AFB, with the highlight being the USAF's Strolling Strings, a 15-piece orchestra whose members walked around our tables, mariachi-like, playing a slew of Holiday tunes. They even had an accordionist, which made me think my Dad followed the wrong career path.
Ainsley's dear friend Kim watched the kids again, with Dad's help once he could get down the beltway in Friday-night traffic. Apparently Erin was her typical split self while we were gone, neither wanting to be held nor let go of. We learned that she crawled all around the house looking for Mommy, until she finally got to the door to the garage, pulled herself up into a standing position, put her head down on the door, and cried and cried, looking every bit like Charlie Brown at his empty mailbox.
Kim really is an awfully lovely person, don't get me wrong. Erin just prefers the Mom that Feeds.

O, Tannenbundt

Confused, the boy was, as to why his toy box had been moved from under the big office windows to the dining room.

"Well, let's go see," I said, guiding him back to the office, where sat the large white cardboard box with the artificial Christmas tree inside. "What do you think is going to go in that spot?"

Ryan contemplated a few seconds before responding excitedly. "A big cake!"

I received Wednesday off to try to squeeze October and November's forgotten shopping into one day, but ended up restringing the porch lights (with the right sets this time) and teaching my son how to "pump".

I'm sure this is legal.

Despite a long list of people I need to buy for (though I don't shop based on lists -- I'm more of an impulse shopper), I only found a few things to buy later at the mall, so this year's presents may consist of a lot of small, unique intangibles, such as "Your Name in a Limerick" or "Coupons Redeemable for Moral Support."

We did get most of our Christmas cards folded, stuffed, and labeled, continuing a two-year trend of being unable to personalize them, what with the little hand already well past the 1. But at least we got them out before Groundhog Day.

Fun Fact

My son is officially too tall to put on my shoulders in the basement.

The stitches come out next Thursday.


*Kidding! He's fine! 'Twas but a minor beuummp.

It

The Boivins invited us and my Dad over to sit in for my brother who usually helped with the outdoor lights, tree decorating, and cookie frostinging, but he conveniently scheduled his inbound flight for late enough in the season to require substitution.

Ainsley has been steering Erin towards no morning nap, but despite our best efforts, and Beth busting out her flute for a holiday tune, she zonked out post-lunch at the suckle-pod.

She didn't last to the car, though, and we couldn't get her back to sleep at home, either. At least Ryan took a nap, which was important because

***drumroll***

I Was Left Home Alone

***cymbal crash***

Ainsley was invited to celebrate a friend's 40th birthday at a resort in Maryland, so we arranged for me to have some backup bottled bodily bounty, a grandad to help run the "cover 2", and a hope that she could actually get more than 3 straight hours of sleep for the first time in nearly 2 years.

We had a good night, with Erin devouring a plate of saffron rice, green beans, and leftover stuffing, while Ryan and I added some frozen fish. (Dad, stuffed from an extended stay at the Boivins', didn't partake.)

Got them* in and out of the tub, and thanks to Erin having but that 20-min snooze since 5 o'clock int he morning, went down easily after some books and a bottle.

*not Grandad

***tuba***

Dad had equal success with Ryan, and then he helped me bust out our own Christmas decorations before leaving me to my lone recognizances.

The fun began at 9:50, though I was able to coax her back to sleep in my arms (despite kicking over a stack of puzzles that had been under her old bed), and I got her down a little after 10. I was running around in the basement until midnight, hitting the hay, and...

woke up at 4:38, stunned that I my sleep hadn't been interrupted. I could still hear the lullabies playing through the monitor, so I knew it was loud enough. I fell back asleep until she woke up at 5:05.

She had slept 7 hours straight.

She's my best friend, don't you know.

Got her back to sleep twice more in my arms, but she wouldn't stay asleep once down, so we had an early breakfast together.

Ryan got up at 6:34 (sadly asking after his mommy), but cheered up with some bites of orange and the prospect of Wiggle-Watching and surprising Grandad with birthday doughnuts; as it happens, he went to church a half-hour earlier than he'd planned, so we missed him. The three of us went Christmas shopping at Lowes and Bed, Bath, and Out There in Mid-Air Three Stories Up.

Unfortunately, Erin didn't last, falling asleep in the car literally a block from home. Despite my attempts to sing louder, snap to the music, throw random bits of garbage on her head, etc. The garage door didn't wake her, nor did the automatic van door. I got Ryan in and settled, and found her still snoozing in her seat, so I pulled off her shoes and put her in her crib, jacket and all. She snoozed about an hour while Grandad came over again to help put up our tree and watch "Toy Story 2" and eat his doughnuts already.

After Ainsley got home, we got everyone down for naps and I started putting up lights outside in teen-degree windchill, before taking the gang out to go see Santa at the mall. When Santa asked Ryan what he wanted, he said, "I would like a green...." (long pause) "...I'm thinking." Which cracked Santa up. When Santa asked Erin what she wanted, she said, "AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH."

Like brother, like sister.

The Chief Master Sergeant of the Air Force Likes My Wif'e's Fudge

I don't remember there being a Christmas party at the Pentagon when I was there in 2004, but there seems to be one every day this month in some corridor or another. Today's was the "Command Section" party, with the CSAF and SECAF and a BANDAF and some PORKAF. Our office was asked to bring in desserts, so my wife took it upon herself to make the most fantasticful yummilicious pistachio cranberry white chocolate fudge in the shape of a wreath.
My boss sampled an early sliver before the official start.
Apparently, this will reflect positively on my Performance Report.
It stood out partially because some other folks brought in pre-packaged cookies or store-bought pastries -- granted, everyone's busy, but my wife's raising two munchkins and doesn't sleep and still gets up to run downstairs at 6:15 in the morning to find a decorative bow for the right-lower quadrant of the wreath.
Everyone raved about it, especially since I kept pushing people towards it, there in the front of the desserts in front of the mousse and next to the doughnuts.
Seriously. Kripie Kreams.
Zipped home to meet the rents-in-law at "On the Border" on us, as they were gracious enough to come in to town to grab the twin bed in Erin's room, taking up valuable walkin'-around space.
They also got some leftover fudge.

Sarcasm: The Lost Art

"Ryan, where is your napkin?", I ask for the third time tonight, knowing the answer.

"On the floor," comes his earnest reply.

"Blow me down."

So of course, *whooosh* comes the puff of air from Ryan's side of the table.


We've been the Sick Family Robinson this week, with Ryan needing cough medicine at 4:13 this morning, Erin, with her low-register, throaty wail from the crib sounding like a cross between Bette Davis and a giraffe giving birth, and Ainsley with the nonmedicatable sinus/chest/face/nose/inseam/everything cold. Even I have succumbed, but at least I can take some Bennadryl. Which, for some reason, Ainsley doesn't like hearing.
In fact, Erin was looking like she was feeling a lot better today, so Ainsley found the time to teach her how to find everyone's nose. "Where's Daddy's Nose?" *Honk* comes the little gripper. "Where's Erin's nose?" *Oh look a picture of some flowers on the computer*, her finger and expression seems to say.
We'll work on it.
It's just wonderful that we've reached the stage of actual communication with our daughter. Her 'more' is phenomenal, and she can identify the hell out of a dog. She just seems to be understanding more and more each day. Plus she can pull off her own socks on the changing table, as she grins and hands them to me so I can drop them on her face with accompanying bomb whistle.
It's a guy thing.
I'm also getting to experience the heart-melting two-pronged attack of the "Daddy's Home" twins, with Ryan running over and asking how my day was, and Erin patpatpatpatting behind on all fours like a miniature charging rhino, readily tugging up my pantlegs, a gaze to the sky.
"Up?" I always ask.
And up, yes please, go the arms.