Welcome, 2013!

We had a really wonderful Christmas this year.  Zane is old enough to anticipate it and really enjoy the whole experience.  In the week before Christmas we baked Christmas cookies, but somehow it wasn't as fun as last year when we had candy eyes to put on the cookies.  The Cookies store which had been in Ballard for many years lost their lease last year, and I didn't know where else to buy cookie eyes.  It was good we had cookies to leave for Santa, though!  We found Santa at the mall, and this year Zane had the courage to talk with Santa.  He expressly forbid the camera folks to take his picture, and then he relaxed.  He asked Santa for an enormous yellow mobile crane, and Santa said he would see what he could do.

Last year I tried to interest Zane in Christmas songs to no avail.  This year he liked the Rudolph sound track and I also sang him Jingle Bells, Frosty, some carols, and The Twelve Days of Christmas ("She has a lot of stuff!").  I would often hear him mumbling bits of the songs, and he tried some singing with me.

On Christmas Eve day Zane came down with quite a fever.  He slept twelve hours the night before and woke up at about 100 degrees.  He had quite a low key day and a long nap, but was luckily starting to feel better in the afternoon.  It would have been a bummer to be out of commission on Christmas!  Finally I said we could demolish the gingerbread house.  This was a highly popular event.  All the sugar stuff in the house this Christmas has helped me learn to relax about it a bit with Zane.  I have rarely seen him eat much.  He really wants it, but it can take him three days to finish a good sized cookie.  He seems to have some pretty good self-regulation.  At bed time we got cookies and cider out for Santa, and peas and carrots for the reindeer.  Zane was not quite old enough to be too excited to sleep, which was good for us!

Christmas morning came, and Santa had come through!  There was the most amazing mobile crane.  This puppy is taller than Zane when fully extended!  I asked Zane if he was surprised that Santa brought the crane, and he was not in the least.  He seems to expect Santa to fill orders on demand.  We'll see how that develops in the future.  Zane also got basic Hot Wheels tracks and lots of candy from Santa, plus lots of good stuff from Mama and Daddy.  I'm pretty pleased, too!  I got some nice jewelry from Michael (he's good at that), but my favorite of all is a black cardigan with an aqua octopus on it.


In the afternoon we headed to Zane's Grandpa's house to visit with the Gibson clan.  We gave the cousins a bunch of cool presents which went over well, and Zane opened a couple more from us as well.





The day after Christmas was a bit of a letdown for Zane.  I think he had a bit of Post-Christmas depression.  He was lying on the floor looking at the tree, and he said in a small voice, "When will the next special day be?"  It was a bit sad.  I think he was still feeling under the weather, too.  In fact, I would say he was sick with the same mysterious thing for just about all of vacation.  He would seem fine for an afternoon, and then be very tired again the next morning.  Unfortunately, at the very end of vacation he got his first ever sore throat along with a deep barking cough, and that kept him from a long awaited play date with a friend.  That was very disappointing for all of us, because Michael an I had planned to see a movie!  Oh well, c'est la vie.  Zane did get a few visits with friends earlier in the vacation, though, so he wasn't totally lonely.  I also took him on an outing to the Science Center and the Aquarium.  He went to the Zoo with Michael.

I also got to go out!  I went to see the King Tut exhibit at the Science Museum before it left, and I also got to see the Hobbit on the day Zane was too sick to see his friend.  It was very exciting for me to go out!

The weekend after Christmas Zane helped me take down the tree.  It was really dry since we got it pretty early this year. I thought Zane would be sad about taking it down, be he really got into it!  Unfortunately he tumbled head over heels down the stairs while backing up to take lights off the tree.  Luckily he wasn't hurt too badly, but it was plenty scary.  Now that the tree is gone our living room seems huge, and I feel guilty that I ever complained we don't have much space.

We've been having a pretty extra soggy winter, but New Year's day was clear as a bell, and cold enough so that the sun sparkled on frost in the morning.  I had hoped it was a portent, but now we are back to sogginess.

Zane is also back to school, which is marvelous for all concerned.  I'm getting back to the gym (ow), and also getting some stuff done.  Oh, except that Zane seems to be entering another no-nap phase.  I sure hope he goes back to sleeping, because he is not very nice to be around when he skips his nap!  When he gets bad we just hook him up to the crane and WEDGIE!  Just kidding.


I hope you all have a wonderful 2013!