Its...

a baby!! The verdict from the 18 week ultrasound is that the newest Lacroix is of sound body... all the little parts that are supposed to be there are there and they look the way they are supposed to. The ultrasound was really cool. For whatever reason we didn't do this mid-pregnancy ultrasound with Evie and it is really nice to know that so far everything is going the way it should. Of course this is the point where most people find out if it is a boy or a girl, but we decided to keep it a surprise (and you'll notice Nicole none of the pictures reveal sensitive parts :) Patrick's boss asked us this week why we didn't want to know. I came up with a couple of reasons... the surprise got me through those last few weeks when you just want the whole thing to be over with, its one truly wonderful surprise you can have in life and it doesn't really matter for us anyway because all of our 0-3 clothes are gender neutral anyway because we didn't find out with Genevieve either. But really I think it boils down to Patrick's rather honest response "It drives people nuts when you don't find out." Regardless I promise y'all will be among the first to know when Baby Lacroix (who I lovingly refer to as Lentil) joins us.


The most interesting part of the ultrasound to me was how Lentil's legs were sooo long compared to the rest of her/him. Throughout the whole thing the feet were either in his/her mouth or up over Lentil's head. Not exactly the fetal position.

Evie came along with me for both the appointment with the midwife and the ultrasound. She was uncharacteristically shy with people who wanted to talk to her but I think she enjoyed it. (I know she enjoyed getting to leave school early, its all she could talk about for a day before and two days after) I don't think though that I'll bring her along for subsequent visits, not too much to see and she, being 3 (oh my gosh almost 4) is definitely of the class of if I can't see it it doesn't interest me nearly as much.


I think this has got to be the best part of pregnancy. I have enough of a belly to look like a pregnant lady and I am regularly feeling the baby move, which is both comforting and fun.

Valentine

Evie and I had a great Valentine's Day! Genevieve, who now lives from holiday to holiday, spent time last weekend making valentines for the kids in her class. (Luckily it was a small class... if it were much bigger we would have had to start a few weeks ago because I found that she was interested in making maybe three at a time before she was off to do something else) For each valentine she decorated the outside and inside and gave me something to say on the inside. The captions ranged from "I am so glad your birthday is the same as my birthday" to her friend with a birthday just 3 days away from hers, to "I really love you" or "I super duper love you" There is one boy in her class with whom she has become really good friends. She wanted to do his valentine first and I had to cut her off on the pirate sparkles for fear that there would be none left for the others.

Also last weekend Patrick cryptically informed us that we needed 50s outfits for our Valentine's Day outing. The three of us went down to 4th avenue to a thrift/costume shop and found just the thing. I picked up a red poodle skirt and leopard scarf and Evie found a poodle sweater and white skirt with a crinoline. Then on Monday when I got home from work (eking in right on time from a 12 hour day in Phoenix) Patrick informed us that we were going up the street to the Loft cinema for a valentine's day sing along presentation of West Side Story. It was a lot of fun! Especially because without the lyrics I wouldn't have been able to sing more than one line in "I feel pretty" or "Tonight" I am afraid we were in such a rush to get there on time there is no pictorial evidence of our fun, but take my word for it, with my now obvious pregnant belly I looked pretty awesomely ridiculous in a red poodle skirt!

Tintin

The obsession du jour in our house is the Belgian comic Tintin. For Christmas Patrick's mom bought us a beautiful pop-up version of a Tintin story. Evie started requesting it as an every night reading (it was in French so Patrick was on the hook as the storyteller) and so Patrick decided to branch out and pick-up another one to see if she would like the stories as much with more words and less pop-up bling. It was a resounding success. Over about a week they read all of Tintin in Tibet and have in subsequent weeks moved through an Asterix and Obelix (another Belgian comic) and then Destination Moon. They are now almost finished with the Broken Ear. They have become such voracious readers of them we may have to augment our Tintin library soon. Now those who have read these before might note that they are not exactly material for a preschooler, among other offenses, Captain Haddock drinks too much whiskey in just about every volume, with the worst being the circa 1950s depiction of race and foreign cultures, but I think Patrick feels it is an important part of her heritage. :) (I think for now we'll avoid some of the more un-PC volumes like Tintin in the Congo and Tintin in America) Regardless, it is now a morning, noon and night activity in our house to sit around and read Tintin. I calculated it the other day and the two of them are spending upwards of an hour each day reading the stories. But the interest goes beyond reading time, Evie even likes to go back through them and "re-read" them herself. More than once in the past few weeks I have found her in her room giggling to herself at some aspect of the slap-stick humor from the cartoons. She tries to get me involved by bringing me the English versions we have "Mommy, you can read English can't you? Good, you can read this Tintin with me." I guess my lack of french won't keep me from comic reading/bedtime reading for long :) As Evie likes to quote "It looks like I am in the soup again"

Sedona

Last weekend we went on our what has now become annual trip up to Sedona. Patrick has a conference there every year so we get a free (and swanky) place to stay and it gives Evie and I a chance to hang out and have fun just us girls. Last year I had so much fun taking her to the Gap outlet and then hiking that I had my heart set on a repeat. The first attempt, on Friday night, to walk over to the outlet was thwarted by Evie's rather upset tummy and other unmentionable tummy issues. I was a bit disappointed but not too much so because I was still living off the wondrous happiness and calm from the massage I received that afternoon. Fortunately on Saturday Evie was feeling better so we were able to make a trek over to the outlet where Evie picked up a new super girl shirt and crazy pink skirt (the shirt made it out hiking... the skirt I vetoed).


After our shopping jaunt we hopped in the car and drove to bell rock where this year we decided to hike up instead of around. Evie did a good job hiking and rock scrambling. She got really excited when higher up on the rock she found "snow" (aka ice) and decided to try her hand at ice skating. She did OK for a bit but then, not surprisingly, fell on her bum. A late lesson for the small child, ice is slippery, but hey in her defense she does live in the desert. All in all it turned out to be a lovely trip (as it has been for the past three years now) and I think we are all looking forward to next year already :)

Notes from Home

About 5 months ago Evie told me that sometimes at school during the day she gets sad and really misses home. She also indicated (and I was a bit dubious I must admit given she is the queen of excuses and negotiating) that this is why she is sometimes not such a good listener... she "was just too sad to listen well" In search of a solution we had a talk about what I could do to make her less sad and be a better listener at school. She thought about it for a few minutes and then came up with the idea that I could put a special note in her lunchbox every day so that "I know you still love me". I imagine there is another kid at her school who gets notes and that gave her the idea. Regardless, I thought it was a great solution so for the past five months I have been putting notes in her lunchbox (almost) every day (Yes there have been a few harried days when I forgot, and needless to say she noticed their absence...thus proving that I am indeed not a super mom). The best thing about it is that many of the notes make it back home and so now I have a fair collection of them and just reuse them from week to week. This, if she has noticed, she doesn't seem to care about because I haven't heard anything about it. She has a new teacher this semester so I lost a bunch in the first two weeks of school so I am having to replenish my supply. But the best part about it is that she came up with the solution and it really seems to help her. She has had fewer "bad listener" days and will frequently comment on how happy the little notes make her. I must admit that they make me happy too.

Holiday

Monday was a holiday for Patrick and I but not for Evie. We took advantage of it to spend the day on a date (of sorts.. parts were decidedly practical and un-date-like) It was a lot of fun but it made us both realize just how much we genuinely enjoy having Evie around too. Certain elements were more fun, breakfast out and the trip to Home Depot to exchange an electric dryer for a gas one (yes we have lived here for 3 years and didn't realize we have a gas dryer until we had already bought an electric one and brought it home). The real highlight of the day was something that would have been just as fun, if not more so with Evie. In the afternoon we took a 6 mile hike in Sabino Canyon. Patrick and I took the tram to the end and then hiked back along a lovely trail along the side of the canyon back to the visitor center. It was pretty far up along the side of the mountain so the hike itself was probably best done without her but during the afternoon out she was certainly missed. I remembered at about this point in my pregnancy with Evie taking a hike on Mt. Lemmon so I thought I'd have Patrick take a picture of me on this hike... I do think though that the belly at this point still just looks like I had too much for lunch...or maybe just too much to eat over the holidays :)

Pregnancy 1 versus 2 (Edition 1)

So even though it has been a few years now since I last found myself in this state I have already identified some definite differences between a first and second pregnancies. Some of these are likely due to inherent differences between the current and former inhabitants of my womb and the others are because the former resident is decidedly a factor in everything I do. The first, and unfortunately most notable, is just how much sicker I have felt this time. Now some of this could be post-delivery amnesia because I'll admit I didn't take very good notes the first time....I am this time... there will be no convincing myself that the whole pregnancy thing is all NA beer and roses after the fact again. But I really do think that this babe is rougher on me than the last. At my appointment with the midwife today I was telling her this and she asked me if it was the same father as last time (which it is Patrick, don't worry) because she had a few moms to be recently swear that this is why they felt more sick with one versus another and she thought that was interesting and has been asking around about it.

The other major difference has to do with dealing with a second pregnancy while parenting your previous one (aka the first born). For the most part Evie is delightfully helpful and understanding but there have certainly been some adjustments and fewer "peaceful" pregnancy moments thus far. The best example is yoga. Just this week I have started to feel better and have decided it was time to get my act together and start doing yoga again. When I was pregnant with Evie I did yoga just about every day at home and went to a class at least once a week. My home practice was this wonderful calming experience, quiet and generally involved nice smelling candles and the like. My yoga practice this week looked something like this:


In case you cannot discern what that is... that is my yoga mat in my office with all the couch pillows piled around it and numerous dolls thrown into the mix. I suggested to Evie that I was going to take a few minutes to do some yoga and she enthusiastically requested to join me. For some reason in her mind the best venue for this exercise was my all too small office and I didn't think it would be too crowded. Little did I know that her version of yoga involved a multitude of pillows and dive-bombing onto those pillows with my yoga mat as the launch pad. So there we were, me trying to do downward facing dog and Evie belly flopping onto her pillows... ahhh peace and serenity. Now I recognize that if I want peace it really needs to be between the hours of 8 pm and 6 am but the problem is I want to be sleeping then too. Oh well, even though it wasn't the most serene yoga experience it did leave my heart feeling light and happy because I was able to stretch, and quite frankly Evie is such a cutup that I laughed more during that 20 minutes of yoga then I did for the whole of the day leading up to it.

Difficult subject

How do you discuss death with a three-year old? This, unfortunately has been a difficult question for me these past few days. We have all been touched in some way by the recent tragedy in Tucson and it doesn't seem appropriate to even try, as if I could, keep it from Evie. I, like many of her constituents, have personally met Representative Giffords on multiple occasions and, also like many others, consider her to be one of the brightest stars in an all too cloudy sky of Arizona politics. She is an inspiration and role model for me. When I found out what happened I couldn't function I was so shocked and sad.

But my question remains how best do you explain such a thing to such a pure and innocent soul? Ironically she has provided me with more comfort than she knows. She is not unfamiliar with death because of a beloved cat that past away last year. At that time we tried to give her comfort by talking about souls and some general description of god. This seems to have helped and stuck with her. On Sunday when I was particularly upset, I couldn't mask my emotions at all. Her response was to come up to me, hug me and tell me that it was going to be OK because "all of those poor people who were hurt are now having a party with god." I am certain that it is just one of many times in life when my daughter will teach me something.

Look out world...

Consider yourself forewarned... About 10 weeks ago something "happened" to me. It's presence has been suspected for a few months now and was confirmed last week. Exhibit A: a fuzzy picture of a semi-amorphous being floating in a black sea somewhere in the vicinity of "mommy's tummy"


This small life has been the source of much fatigue and nausea in me and much excitement and planning in Patrick and Genevieve. At this time I am pretty sure the condition is not catching, but it is most certainly expanding. The little life is expected to arrive in the heat of summer, round about mid-July. I guess we had better finally invest in AC.

Oh and in case your interested I have discovered the "best" method for returning to your pre-pregnancy weight... pregnancy! For the first time in three years I am the weight I was when I got pregnant with Evie... What?! you don't want join my weight loss program? I can't imagine why not...

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year! Ours started off on the right foot with a trip down to San Carlos Mexico with some friends. None of us in the group made it til midnight to actually ring in the new year but I for one really can't remember the last time I did :) It was a bit cold but Patrick managed to get in a brief swim (after which he couldn't feel his extremities but hey..) The kids got in plenty of beach time and a massive sand castle/volcano was even constructed.


Here is to hoping that 2011 is as fabulous as 2010 was!

Merry Christmas!

Christmas was a blast this year! Although we stayed in town we ended up spending two nights at my parent's house so it was a bit like going away. On Christmas Eve we took Evie to see the Nutcracker ballet. It was a definite hit! She tried really hard to be quiet but just couldn't help herself and there were a few hushed whisper questions. After the ballet we packed all of the presents into the car and headed up to my folk's house for dinner. Evie tried to wait very patiently to open her one Christmas Eve present but in the end dinner was interrupted ever 5 minutes or so with, "Is everyone finished yet?...How about now?" Evie had a tough time getting to sleep and our warnings that Santa wouldn't come if she were awake fell on deaf ears. She at one point, rather frustrated, told me that she had enough presents and didn't care if Santa skipped her house, she just wanted to stay up with us. In her typical logical fashion she just refused to believe that if she shouldn't be awake it was OK for the rest of us to be. She did finally (around 9:30) make it to bed and of course Santa didn't skip the house...

Christmas morning was a fun with Santa bringing Evie some doll accessories. The best gift though came from Mina and Papa. A new (to Evie) barn and animals that have been lovingly restored by my parents over the last two years. The barn was originally my dad's. My grandmother Lillian designed it and then had the town doctor make it for him for Christmas. It has seen many years of Mott family play and was in need of new paint, a roof, a new floor (I think) and some other repairs. My dad did all of the carpentry and my mom repainted all of the animals, two of which are made to look like horses my dad had on the farm in Iowa.


After morning Christmas it was time to make the trek up to Phoenix. We all piled in my parent's car and drove to my Uncle's house. The most excited about the trip up was Evie because she remembered from last year that my Uncle (well really his kids) has a trampoline in the back yard. Genevieve spent 3/4 of the time there on the trampoline and we were forced to take turns with her on it. One adult would tire and another would be called to duty. (Patrick at one point tried to jump with his glass of wine... I don't recommend that to the folks at home) When the time came to take a family photo Evie really wanted to have the picture taken on the trampoline so we figured we'd give it a shot. Not the most in focus pictures but pretty fun nonetheless!

Cookies and Winterhaven

I forgot just how nice it is to be in school and have close to a month off! In all fairness I worked this week too but between the furlough day yesterday and the holiday today it wasn't much of a work week. Evie and I have been taking full advantage of our time off to be both productive and utterly slothful. Productivity was Tuesday when friends came over to make cookies with us. Evie had not seen her friend in quite awhile and was so excited to see her that she made her a card and a comic strip (through a game on PBS kids) that day to give to her. The girls played and played for over three hours and, not surprisingly, most of the decorating of the massive amounts of sugar cookies actually fell to the motherly set.

On Wednesday Evie and I tried out her roller skates... for a first attempt it went pretty well for her. She even managed to skate a few feet on her own before toppling over. Then we went out so that she could pick out her annual Christmas tree ornament as well as buy a gift for Patrick, my mom, my dad and my brother. My favorite part of the day was the long luxurious nap that we both took. Thursday was even more lazy. The day started off dark and rainy so we decided to do a movie day. Of course by 10 am, this being Arizona after all, it was beautiful, warm and sunny, but having started down our slothful path we decided to see it through.


Then last night we went to my personal favorite Christmas activity... Winterhaven! I brought the camera with me and then realized its a bit silly at this point because I just take pictures of the same houses/decorations every year. And by the time I realized that really the only point in bringing the camera is to take pictures of Evie we were practically on our way home. The big hit this year (aside from the water display which is always number one with Evie) was the (I kid you not) Caroling for Jesus karaoke set up in one of the front yards, complete with a stage made out of bales of hay. Evie really wanted to get up and sing like her big friends that we were there with, but given that she can't read, and there was no way I was getting up to sing with her (no one wants to hear that) I told her it would have to wait until next year. (Or maybe the year after)

Zoo Lights!

The week of Christmas fun continued on Monday with a trip to the zoo to see zoo lights and the S-man (that would be Santa) It has become our tradition that this is where Evie gets her picture taken with him every year. My folks watched Evie on Monday while I worked and as we were leaving we asked my Dad if there was anything Evie should ask Santa for him... he said he'd really like some Phillips screwdrivers. So when the time came to sit on Santa's lap Evie excitedly jumped up and when he asked what she wanted she replied, "Well, my Papa would really like a screwdriver." Santa thought that Papa was Patrick and smiled at him and said, "Not the type with orange juice right?" Evie gave him a "duh" look and said, "No the real kind." She then proceeded to tell him what she wanted, which just happened to be a new stroller for her dollies because the other one keeps breaking. Sweet! Two years in a row she has asked for exactly what Santa had already procured for her!

We met a bunch of friends at the zoo and had a blast talking and drinking hot chocolate. Evie didn't see much of the lights because she became fixated (big shock) on the band and all she wanted to do was dance. She must have danced for an hour and a half of the two hours we were there! Unfortunately she just moved too quick for me to get any decent pictures of her busting a groove...

Nutcracker Take 1

On Sunday the week of Christmas fun began with Evie's dance studio putting on a very informal dance performance that included songs from the Nutcracker ballet. It was a cute little party of sorts on the big stage so all the dancers could get used to it before the real show this June. Evie of course relished the opportunity to wear a tutu and be on stage both for warm-ups and for her 15 seconds of dancing fame. She then sat in the audience with me and watched the rest of the dances. At the end all the kids came on stage and took a bow and received a little baggie of goodies. It was really sweet and totally worth the risk of missing her nap, which turned out OK for us... but of course it is always a gamble.

The second chance at the Nutcracker will come this Friday when we take her to the "real" ballet... her very first. Needless to say she is just a little bit excited.

Ohh Santa

Whew emerging from the finals fog... How the heck did I think it was a good idea to pick three classes all with huge 20+ papers as part of the final? It was either hubris or stupidity... or maybe they are truly one and the same. Anyway I am happily on the other side of my very first semester as a PhD student and also happy to say that it was pretty darn awesome and I can't wait for next semester (Although I am choosing my classes next time in so small part on the presence of a final paper...) I am so very fortunate to have Patrick and my parents to help me, without them this simply would not have worked at all.


Anyway we have been slowly but surely getting into the holiday spirit around here. The first of the holiday wonders is always the visit from Santa at Patrick's work. You may recall that Santa generally arrives on a Harley, well this year the Harley was "in the shop" (aka Santa's girlfriend no longer works at Patrick's firm) and so Santa came in an ice-cream truck. Oh yesss not only does he bring presents for the boys and girls but some real frozen sugar treats straight from the north pole. His truck even plays calming classical music to call the kiddies for their treats...


Well generally Santa requires the assistance of Patrick to pick up a toy for Evie (he is a busy guy at this time of year you know) and Patrick had bought Evie a pillow pet (a strange obsession around here that I don't quite know the origin of) a totally reasonable little gift from Santa. Well on the day that the presents had to be well present, Patrick forgot said pillow pet and ran out to get a substitute. In a moment of utter weakness and ridiculousness he purchased a life-size groovy girl complete with little bands on her feet so that she can dance with Evie. Wrapped up it looked a bit like a sarcophagus. As you might imagine this toy was quite well received and has since needed to go just about everywhere with us... buckled into the car next to Evie, tucked in at night next to her etc. etc....Ohh Santa.

Invention?

They say that necessity is the mother of invention (right? don't "they" say that?) Well the lack of a hairbrush in the Lacroix household (don't think were that bohemian, its not that we don't own one, just I can never seem to find one when I need one) has led to a great discovery. Evie's quite fine and rather snarly hair, even after a nice bob haircut, gets these nasty tangles that are very hard and rather painful to sort out. The other day I couldn't find a hairbrush, so in a feeble attempt to make my daughter quasi presentable I reached for a hair curler that I bought many moons ago at the suggestion of my hairstylist and have yet to really use. Well they have a use now! They are brilliant for painlessly getting out Evie's tangles. Granted it takes awhile, but given how much time I used to spend fighting her protestations, I would say I have gained a good five minutes on my morning. Not to mention one less battle to be fought. Awesome.

Thanksgiving and more...

We had a great Thanksgiving dinner over at my parent's house. Lots of family and tons of yummy food.(My favorite as always was the mashed potatoes). After our nice big dinner we took a nap and then headed downtown to see Cirque du Soleil. It was a late night for Genevieve but she, just like the rest of us, thoroughly enjoyed it! As we were leaving we were all talking about our favorite part and when asked Evie told us her favorite part was "All of it". I'll take that as a good decision to bring her along. We went back to my folks house and camped out there for the night.

Patrick had volunteered to get up at 4 am and get in line at the one and only Kmart in Tucson to acquire 40 mp3 players for kids in foster care at St. Nick's here in town. They were on sale for $10 a piece and a first-come first serve basis necessitated the early morning land-standing fun. Somehow he convinced me that he just had to have my assistance and so I hauled myself out of bed too. We arrive at Kmart about 10 minutes until 5 am just as they were passing out the last of the fliers for the "super-deals". When the guy came past and said "Last coupon for the super deal on a camera" I just couldn't resist and took it. Patrick gave me a crazy look but hey if he was getting me up so early in the morning I was going to have some consumer fun too. So they open the doors and the mad dash to the electronics began. Some people were just a little too crazy but most were pretty nice (for 5 am). It was chaos getting into the mostly blocked off electronics section and when we did, the mp3 players were nowhere to be found. Patrick fought his way to the front to ask about the players (and get my cameras... uhh yes cameras) for me. When he eventually made it to the front the first guy told him he had no idea what he was talking about and the other said the sale wasn't until Saturday. Now Patrick had received his marching orders from very well-researched folks so he was pretty sure it should be Friday. I grabbed one of their fliers and found the mp3 player that was indeed supposed to be on sale that morning. Well armed with this evidence Patrick fought his way to the front again and sweet-talked one of the clerks into going to get it. Not just that but going with him to the backroom to count out his forty and get it.... Ahh nothing like persistence.

That experience was so exhilarating, and seeing how it was only about 6 am, we decided to go to the mall that was nearby just to check it out. We started in a favorite shoe shop of mine (I actually got Patrick to go in a shoe shop... clearly he needed more coffee or less adrenaline) where everything was 30% off. Then, having picked up some lovely new shoes for each of us, we wandered until we found Banana Republic where the whole store was 40% off. We both went a little crazy and must have tried on half the store (I can't remember ever trying on something that wasn't on sale there) and as our piles of stuff added up we looked at each other and pretty much simultaneously proclaimed our Christmas shopping for each other finished in one fell swoop of exciting new clothes. To top it off I opened up another credit card with them (I am a serial opener of these cards.... I have found if you open them, pay it off and then never activate the card you can go back about once a year and do it all over again...) which ended in a whopping 55% everything. Wahoo. Totally ridiculous.

We made it back to my folks house by 8 am and decided that we mine as well continue the day of gluttony by going to a movie and mom was amenable to watching Evie more so that morning we also went out to see the new Harry Potter movie. Too fun. We made it back home around 3 pm and everyone crashed and took a nap. Patrick ended up napping right until this morning.... about 17 hours... I guess all the excitement took its toll.

East Coast Fun

Last Wednesday we headed East to DC (and then Baltimore too) to visit with Patrick's family. I had veteran's day off from school and cheap tickets were found so we just couldn't resist the opportunity! It was a lovely time both in terms of the company and the weather! Evie now gets just as excited about riding on the plane as the trip itself thanks to a little (and oft reoccurring) holiday we call Plane Day. Plane Day involves complete attention from Mom and Dad, periodic presents and food that would not normally be part of the diet, what kid wouldn't get excited?


On Thursday I had the opportunity to meet up with friends from when I lived in DC and meet their newest additions. We chose the National Zoo as our forum and as is per usual it did not disappoint (although I didn't manage to make it to the reptile discovery center, my favorite part of the Zoo) Thursday afternoon I met back up with Patrick and Evie who were hanging out at Patrick's Mom's great new place in SW near the waterfront with Patrick's sister Vivian and our two nephews Pete and Dylan. That evening we took the bus (which turned out to be a bit of a long ordeal... long enough to merit a taxi ride home) to Georgetown so Patrick could show Evie where he went to school.


On Friday morning Patrick, Evie and I headed down to the mall (which we walked to from Nicole's place... how cool is that) and took Evie to the National Gallery. If you ask her what sort of paintings they have there she'll tell you "Pictures of Mary and baby Jesus" (We didn't make it much beyond the Renaissance paintings before it was time to meet up with the rest of the family) We then met up with the rest of the crew and went to the Air and Space Museum. We spent an hour or so checking out the planes and even took Dylan and Evie on a flight simulation. As soon as the door closed Evie freaked out and wanted out of the simulator. It took 3/4 of the ride for me to convince her that it was OK. Then, the moment the door opened she turned to us and said, "I wasn't really scared, I was just pretending." Awesome.


Friday evening Patrick and I took Dylan and Evie on the train to Baltimore which was a lot of fun. It felt like pretending we had twins for a few hours....two quite well behaved ones I might add. That night in Baltimore Dylan introduced Evie to his favorite babysitter and we went to the Baltimore Museum of Industry for a benefit. On Saturday we went out to a wonderful brunch at Uncle Eric's restaurant and then down to the harbor for dragon boat rides and fun. Before we left I tried to do a photo shoot of the kids with their cute matching outfits we bought in Georgetown but failed pretty miserably at the great Christmas card shot. Better leave that to the professionals in the future. Although I did get one really good one of Pete. (I'll send them along to you Vivian) (You know, having tried to take photos of the cousins before you'd think I would have learned my lesson) By 2 it was time to hurry back to DC to make a dinner and see my old boss Jay and his wife Carol and Patrick's good friend Cameron. The next morning we were up bright and early for another round of "Plane Day" It was a whirlwind tour but a fabulous one!

Ohh Groupon

About a month ago I finally jumped on the cool-kid bandwagon and signed up for groupon. Up to this point my purchases have been pretty practical, movie punch card for Casa Video and a family membership to the Desert Sonoran Museum. Last week I made a decidedly impractical purchase, a coupon for Build a Bear. This purchase was motivated as much by my own curiosity as a desire to provide my child with another stuffed animal. So on Sunday we printed the coupon (Evie carried in her purse) and headed off to the mall for a bear-building extravaganza. I must admit it was pretty fun. Evie got to pick a bear, put a heart in her, give her a giggle sound and then press the peddle to fill her with fuzz. Once fuzzed she took her bear, now named Suzianna, to the wash station and then, and this was clearly the best part, to pick out an outfit. No great surprise, we now have a Cinderella (complete with glass slippers) bear residing in our house. We then filled out the birth certificate, put Suzianna in her box and headed home. On the way out to the car we were talking about how Evie just made a bear all by herself and she commented "Wow, Mommy that makes me like god."

Digits

One of the first things I remember from after Evie was born, upon discovering that our baby was a girl, was a totally sleep deprived and deliriously happy Patrick commenting in his best Texan voice, "Well I guess I'd better get a gun." I remember chuckling to myself, too tried from the whole birth thing to protest.

Well a firearm has yet to be acquired (and its OK Gerry, no Christmas gifts required :) but the boys are already knocking. Yesterday when I picked Evie up from school she ran up to give me a big hug, and then before we could leave rushed back to the table and grabbed a little piece of paper. The teacher told me that a little boy named Michael at her school had torn a piece of paper out of his notebook and then came running up to her for a pen. On this little slip of paper he wrote out "his number", gave it to Evie and told her to call him. Apparently (I learned this from Evie on the way back home) the two of them hit it off because he has a boy bear that matches her girl bear and they need to arrange a marriage between the two bears. Oh my.