almost here

I can't believe it. It just doesn't seem possible. I don't know when it will hit me that tomorrow the holidays start, but right now I still can't believe it.

I'm surprisingly stress free. I hesitate to say it and jinx myself, but there it is. The holidays this year have been a breeze compared to last year. Last year we were still adjusting to being new parents. It felt like from the moment we landed at Newark on Oct. 1st until after the New Year we were constantly going and just trying to fit everything in.

This year feels so different. We've been busy, but a good and fun busy. We've done all of the fun holiday things we love to do. It hasn't been rushed or crazy. We were able to sit back and enjoy it. Maybe that's why it doesn't really feel like Christmas to me? No stress.

Oliver is very excited for Christmas. He wants the hungry hungry hippo game. He sat on Santa's lap over a week ago. When santa asked him what he wanted Anthony told him that game because he knew we bought it for him. Now every day when Oliver wakes up he asks if the hippos are here yet. I almost caved last night when he said "why no hippos yet?"

Nothing to do with the holidays, but to do with what Oliver says in the morning. When I get him up I ask how he slept and how he's doing. For awhile now he'll ask how I am doing and when he sees one of the cats he'll say "good morning Sadie. How are you?" This week when I asked him how he is doing he's been saying "two". He is confusing it with how old are you and it makes me laugh.

I'm trying to remember these little things because the other day when he asked for his toothbrush I remembered when he didn't know the word for toothbrush. What he use todo when he didn't know the word for something he would call it duck. It got a little annoying and kind of strange. It made me think that I need to start writing some of these little things down because time is clearly just flying by.

I hope everyone has a wonderful and very Merry Christmas!

holidays

Mae and Joe came for a visit for Oliver's birthday and for Mae's birthday. One day we went into the city to see the tree and go to all of the shops. Everything looked so pretty. It was so cold. Joe and Anthony forgot to bring hats. Or more like they didn't think they would need them so they didn't bring them. But they were freezing. After some great bargaining by Joe they both got some warm hats. We had a fun day and it really got us excited for the holidays.

Oliver and I were working on Christmas shopping today. We went to a bunch of stores. At one point we were trying to walk quickly back to our car, but no one was letting us cross the street. We started to go and this woman came speeding past us. I was annoyed because not only did she not let us cross but she was really close. So I yelled "thanks lady" to which Oliver yelled "your welcome lady". He is such a funny silly boy. We love him so much.

Oliver is two

Actually he turned two over a week ago. I had wanted to write something on Dec. 6th, but I was too busy. This is a crazy time of year. A good crazy. We went from Thanksgiving, Oliver's birthday, and now Christmas.

We put up the Christmas tree this weekend. He kept saying "I like that Mommy". We put popcorn strings on the tree. He recently had popcorn at the movies and he loved it. You can imagine what happened. We should have figured it out, but no we didn't. All of a sudden he was spitting a bunch of food out. I saw that it was popcorn and asked him where he got it. Of course he said "I don't know". We had to have a long conversation about the popcorn on the tree being different from the popcorn we eat out of the bag. He was really funny about it. He would say "popcorns. same thing. no. tree. yucky."

We are looking forward to seeing lots of friends and family over the next two weeks. I love this time of year. I don't even mind the craziness of the mall. Although this is the first time I have experienced toys r us at the holidays. It was nuts. In the first five minutes a woman with a cart overflowing who couldn't see where she was going hit me and another woman took my cart with my pocketbook in it while my back was turned. Cut throat.

I've been doing a lot of cooking and baking. I made an incredible chocolate cake that was so easy and the recipe recommends making it ahead of time and freezing it. I'll have to post that.

I hope everyone is having a fun holiday season.