Merry Christmas

From the four of us to all of you. Love, The McGregors

Happy Christmas Eve

Sunday Styles

But Wait, Where Are The Children?

With other absolutely 100% capable LIFE SAVERS, that's where. Well OK maybe there wasn't any actual life saving going on, but there was a fair amount of sanity saving and some seriously needed time away, together. We love our children, we really really do, but they make finding time to spend together as a couple a wee bit difficult. So when the opportunity arises we jump - high and fast. And it arose twice this week. TWICE. As in, if you see us walking down Broadway tomorrow we may not even be twitching. We might look... chill.

Opportunity #1 came about when we both decided to take a day off of work and hire a babysitter so that we could spend a random weekday playing hookie. We basically restaurant hopped all day, tossed in a visit to MoMA, and wrapped the evening at an art auction. Pristine. Opportunity #2 came in the form of our child-swapping weekends with friends who have 2 children the exact same age as ours. They take ours for a night then we take theirs for a night. Not just pristine, AWESOME. No, DOUBLE AWESOME. We spent our night away at a friends holiday party eating unbelievable BBQ and not having to worry about spilling red wine on a child. Then we spent our night with the four kids playing "where should we fly the magic rocket ship to next?" and listening to endless giggles from the bedroom where two of the world's most adorable 3 1/2 year olds told each other stores till nearly 11PM.

So if you were concerned about the children, don't be. They're fine. Wonderful even. And so are we.

Dressed For Snow In NY

Dear Santa

Best Big Brother Ever

Taking After Daddy

You'd Never Know One Has The Flu And The Other Is Teething

She Speaks

So I admit to sucking at this lately. If it makes any difference I have at least 2-3 blog posts daily run through my mind, word for word, that just never seem to make it to here. And they're good ones too! Brilliant even! Well, maybe not so much, and perhaps that's why I haven't taken the time to put them to writing. That said though, I'm not giving up. As infrequently as I post here it's still pretty much our only hope at having any sort of life book / baby book / family album for keepsake purposes since I also suck (even more) at doing any of those things in their non-computer form. So I forge on...

We switched Leni's formula to Earth's Best Organic Soy (we were on their dairy version) and her monumental puking after every feeding seems to have subsided. Hallelujah. We've also started feeding her apples, pears, carrots, and sweet potatoes - sometimes mixed with rice cereal, sometimes not. Ash still eats pretty much anything you put in front of him, or at least he'll try a bite or two before making the "this is the grossest thing on Earth WHY are you feeding this to me?" face. His latest favorite is the spicy cold noodle dish from one of our local Japanese joints, and not too far off in the running would be daddy's spicy chicken - the boy is kicking his taste for spice up a notch and this makes us all smile.

We're coming off a week of daddy being on a zillion airplanes and gamma coming to visit to make sure mommy's head doesn't pop off, and I'm happy to report it didn't. Thanks to gamma and the one flight of daddy's that actually landed on time - the important one, the one that landed him HOME. 3 work weeks left in 2010 then we get to spend Christmas in MN and New Years in Mexico. And then? Then we're going to be entering the year where our son turns 4 and our girl wraps her first year of life and holy hell SLOW IT DOWN. Well, slow it down AFTER we get to the Christmas in MN and New Years in Mexico part. But the next 3 weeks can fly by as fast as they very well please.

We.

We train'd, we subway'd, we Brooklyn'd. We lunched. We Radio City'd. We Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade balloon'd then we diced, chopped, and wrapped things in bacon then we cooked cooked cooked. And we ate ate ate. There was wine, there was bacon. There were people singing, playing, and dancing to We All Live In A Yellow Submarine - again and again and again. It was so very happy. Then we ate apple cake for breakfast, prepped a days worth of bacon snacks, and set off to cut down this year's Christmas tree. Twas truly a Thanksgiving to give thanks.

Just Another November Day In NY

Of Thee I Sing: A Letter to My Daughters

My new favorite bedtime story. I ordered it from Amazon months ago before it was released so it was a complete surprise when it showed up at my doorstep last week. I love finding new favorite bedtime stories. I also love that Ash now insists on being a part of Leni's bedtime stories and even reads them to her himself sometimes. And then he sings songs to her (granted Twinkle Twinkle Little Star often becomes Twinkle Twinkle Little Baby Puke, but hey, he's 3 1/2). I love that when we Skyped with Daddy he asked which airport Daddy was in and when Daddy responded Texas he asked "but where in Texas?" And of course, when Daddy told him he was heading to CA his only interest was if he was going to see Lightning McQueen this time. And I love how excited he is to have a sleepover with his BFF on Thanksgiving, and how he remembers cutting down our Christmas tree the day after last year. But most of all I love it when he randomly looks at me and says, "Mommy! We're a family!"

In Their Own Language

Wordless Wednesday

When I Was A Baby Did You Name Me Ashton?

I'm not sure where/when he started wondering this, but it's been a fairly common question for the last week or so. He's been quite concerned about confirming that we did in deed name him Ashton when he was a baby and seems quite relieved when I answer him "yes". He knows that his Ethiopia mommy gave him the name Wondemu, and he loves saying his whole name really loud 10 times in a row...ashtonwondemumcgregorashtonwondemumcgregor.... but for the time being the fact that we gave him a name when he was a baby seems to be on his "things to make sure of" list.

Other things on that list recently...

We're staying at an African/safari themed hotel in Disney World and many of the staff members are from Africa. Ash has been hugely annoyed when he asks where they're from and all they say is "Africa". He quickly follows that up with "But WHERE in Africa?". They quickly get over their surprised reaction and go in to detail about which country, what it's like, etc etc once they realize we are actually interested. Sort of sad that this comes as a surprise to them, that tourists in this area would actually be interested in an answer beyond just Africa.

Another thing he's been keen on making sure of has been his swimming abilities, namely the ability to jump in to the water as far and fast as he can for the sole purpose of soaking mommy. And I'm sure there are quite a few other items I could add to this list but unfortunately our hotel does not have wifi. Yes, you read that right. No wifi. In Disney World. We have to plug in using a 2 foot cord that remands me to the far corner of the room when accessing all things Internet. As I type this I still find it hard to believe, I mean way back in 2003 when we rode camels into the Sahara while visiting Morocco and slept in small tents in the sand with nomads even they could tell us which sand dune to climb in order to get the best signal to check the scores on that day's futbol game. But no, Disney World 2010 and still no wifi.

The Giraffe Outside My Window

Tonight we put the kids to bed, which was pretty simple seeing as they both just tipped over the moment we finally put them in their PJ's for the night, and then moved ourselves out on to the balcony. With a glass of wine, and 4 giraffes, and 3 zebras, and 2 of an animal yet to be identified. These were the same giraffes that just hours earlier caused Ash to (seriously) sprint into the glass sliding door with such excitement he hardly realized he had just slammed his entire body against the glass and then made for dang sure we knew there were giraffes outside his hotel room window. Then we scooped his slightly bedazzled self up and wrapped his sister in the 2 sizes too big diapers daddy packed and whisked them away to the Magic Kingdom's special evening event titled "A Very Merry Christmas Party" where we rode, we danced, we played, we sang, and then eventually, we tipped over. Which brings me right back to that stellar glass of wine on the balcony. And the giraffes and the zebra still outside. And the sleeping babes who promised me just prior to the aforementioned tipping over that they'd sleep soundly till at least 8AM tomorrow. Cheers to all of the above.