Christmas Morning

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

After waking us up around 7:30, Rachel waited patiently at the top of the steps for us to tell her she can come downstairs. We like to videotape her coming down the steps. This is the first year we didn't use "caution" tape to block off the top of the steps. As far as we know, she didn't peak before we got up.

First she went through her stocking. Usually she does that last, but this year she wanted to e different. Then she really got into the unwrapping. Look! She got a doorknob!!! She had seen this at Antropologie a couple months ago and thought it would look cool when we redo her room this summer.

Of course, Ferris had to be in the middle of everything all morning!

This is a "Harrods 2009" Christmas bauble.

Yay! Another bag! Because a 10-year old girl can never have enough bags!

The aftermath. Both cats and the dog love all the wrapping paper and Violet especially loves the boxes.

This was around 10:30 a.m. She was a wee bit tired of having her picture taken. That's a new DSi she's playing with.
When we went to China in July, we left Rachel's Nintendo DS and her Gameboy on the plane, along with ALL her games. I blame myself...I neglected to put her name and address on it, and I didn't look under the seats very god when we arrived in Beijing. Fred was playing with the DS (AHA! It's his fault!!! I kid, I kid.) and I distinctly remember him handing it back up to Rachel and I watched her put it in its case and put the case in her carry-on. And she didn't get it back out to play with. I think it must have slid out of her carry-on under the seat and got mixed up with all the blankets and pillows under there. As soon as we got to the hotel I called United, both in Beijing and in Washington, where we departed from, and they took a report, but of course we never heard anything. It was pink and totally blinged out. So maybe there's some boy out there somewhere enjoying a blinged out pink DS!
So now Rachel is starting from scratch with a DSi. She got one game for it on Christmas Day, Style Savvy, and played it ALL day. A couple days later she got another game from her friend Emily.

We actually had a white Christmas! It wasn't fresh snow, but we'll take it! Fred took this picture (with my new camera) in the afternoon. Yes, Fred got me a new camera, a Nikon. What did I get him? A frying pan! I really wanted to get him a good cast iron one by Le Creuset, but I couldn't find one anywhere. I kept finding the big casserole pots that cost about $250 and I thought, he'll kill me if I spend $250 on him for Christmas. Oops! So I get a nice camera and he got a $15 cast iron frying pan! Oh, and I also got him a nice knife. But he uses his frying pan every day, and I'll get him the Le Creuset one as soon as I find one.
I stopped buying Fred tools for Christmas a couple years ago. It seemed whatever tools I'd get him were never quite what he wanted. Plus, he has just about every tool known to man. He likes cooking almost as much as he likes working on cars and repairing stuff, so Rachel and I usually get him cooking gadgets now. Last year we got him a chef's coat, which he wears quite often when cooking.

The rest of our Christmas Day was quiet. Fred made baked ziti, per Rachel's request. (Last year's request was lasagna) I baked cookies. And we watched TV and just chilled out. It was perfect. Hope yours was too!

I think Ferris was pretty happy to see Santa, don't you?

If you squint your eyes and look closely, you'll see that this is Santa on top of a fire truck. He visited our neighborhood, courtesy of the local fire department. Sirens were blaring for a good half hour before he finally made it to the corner we were waiting on with neighbors. In prior years they handed out candy canes. No such luck this year.
And I let Santa know he needs to bring me a better camera for Christmas so I can take a decent picture of him next year. :)

Jacques

Meet Jacques. Jacques is our Elf. Our Elf on the Shelf.

Jacques' current position is not a shelf. Today he is perched on a string of lights over our kitchen sink.

Yesterday, Jacques was here, on this reindeer's antlers. You see, Jacques is one of Santa's elves. Every night Jacques, and millions of elves like him, fly to the North Pole to report on the children they're staying with. They re-appear the next morning in a different spot in the house.
Well, Jacques picked a bad spot when he landed on this reindeer. You see, it's a little too close to the floor....and a little too close to Ferris. Sadly, Ferris thought Jacques was a chew toy. Santa's elves are not allowed to speak when they're staying watching to see if children are naughty or nice, so Jacques was not able to holler for help. Rachel and I discovered Jacques lying on the floor in the kitchen last night after dinner. Minus his cute little white collar. And an arm. And his head appeared to have been bitten.

Ferris, what did you do?!?!!??!?

Unfortunately -- or fortunately, depending on how you look at it -- I have no pictures of the carnage. Please rest assured that Jacques is magical (how else could he fly to the North Pole and back in one night?) and therefore he feels no pain. However, Jacques really needs his arm to fly. So after a short surgical procedure last night, I'm happy to report that Jacques is nearly 100% healed. He had no head injury after all...just a small tear in his hat which was easily fixed. His arm is a little wonky, though. (I love that word, "wonky") But I think that just makes him more endearing. And now he has a "history," a story to hand down to the next generation. I think Jacques learned his lesson and will only land on higher locations in our house. As for Ferris:

"I'm sorry, Jacques!"
It's okay, buddy. I'm sure Santa will still bring you some presents on Christmas, too.

So much for posting a picture a day!!! Some days I forget; some days it just seems there's nothing different to take a picture of.
I'll try to catch you up on the last couple weeks.

On Saturday 11/14 Fred had to go to Harrisburg for his brother Dennis' bachelor party. My friend Kim and I made plans to go to Atlantic City for dinner, shopping and gambling, and Rachel stayed over night at her house. We did shop and we did have dinner, but neither of us really felt like gambling. So we did a little more shopping. I was home by 10:00.
I had planned on getting some work done, but made the mistake of turning the TV on and saw that The Wedding Singer was on. I've never seen it before, so I grabbed the laptop to check out Facebook and watched the movie in bed. Well part of the bed. I had a little company. And I fell asleep right before the end of the movie.

One day last week we realized that our spare refrigerator was dying. This is the one we keep in the garage. It's mostly for drinks and we stock, obviously, frozen foods in the freezer. So I took all the beer I had in it (about a case of Heineken) over to a neighbor's garage to store in their extra refrigerator. Quite honestly, the beer was mostly for the neighbors anyway! Fred and I don't like beer, so I just keep it on hand for friends. We have to get something to replace the fridge. Fred wants to get a Coke machine. But how are we going to store stuff like extra milk and orange juice, or even leftovers, in a Coke machine? Not to mention the lack of a freezer.

This was Rachel working on her "Daily Geography" cards on a Sunday night.

Yesterday there was a little mini hot rod parade in our court, led by this Trans Am and followed by a few Grand Nationals and Monte Carlos. Turns out they were there to meet up with a neighbor who goes to a lot of car shows.

Also yesterday, we hung our outdoor Christmas lights. It was a beautiful day, and since we won't be around much this weekend and we don't know what the weather will be like, we took advantage of the sunshine and warm temperatures (about 60 degrees). We transitioned to all LED lights outside this year. Last year the lights on the roof line were LED and the lights in the bushes were just regular bulbs, and it drove me nuts that they didn't match. I'm old-fashioned when it comes to Christmas, so I don't like the looks of the LEDs quite as much. They're so bright! But they save on electricity. Our meter stayed the same after turning all the lights on.

Rachel climbed the ladder and got on the lower roof for the first time! It's a little harder coming back down the ladder, but she did good.

With both Thanksgiving and Fred's brother Dennis' wedding, I'm hoping to have more picture opportunities this week. Tomorrow I have a 9:30 job, and Rachel has an 8:30 orthodontist appointment. If Fred can't take her, we'll have to reschedule that. Then tomorrow night I have to make a cheesecake for the rehearsal dinner, Rachel has cheerleading, and Fred has to pick up his tux. Wednesday morning I have to clean the house and pack, pick Rachel up at school at 1:15, stop in Philly for my check, pick up Fred at work and head to Harrisburg, drop Ferris off at my in-laws and be at the church in Hummelstown by 6:00. I'm praying for few traffic delays. Yeah, right. On the day before Thanksgiving.