Lately

Sushi by candlelight.


You never know when you'll have to go into battle.


I think it's pretty cool that long past their days of watching Toy Story, my two boys saw these Lego sets and revisited their love of these characters. I am constantly surprised at how they revisit and repurpose toys that I would have thought they had outgrown. That's why we have kept almost everything (on the few occasions we have made a toy purge, we've regretted it, remembering some toy that would be perfect for some new idea). It does get a bit cluttered sometimes, but I love to see how they mix and match to create something fabulous.


I'm not sure why anyone still uses styrofoam packing peanuts, but I am sure that the shredding of them against a trash can and the subsequent distribution of said shreds throughout the house is a good way to release some of the mad that built up inside one little boy. It is positively amazing how this stuff sticks to everything.


Showdown.

Conversation with Otto

Otto: What's the book we used to read?
Me: Um, what was it about?
Otto: I don't know...just...remember?
Me: Was it about baking?
(We were making cookies at the time, so that seemed logical.)
Otto: No!!! We used to read it a long time ago.
Me: Um...was it a Dr. Seuss book?
Otto: I don't know. Remember?
Me: Can you remember any part of it? That would help me guess.
Otto: Ugh, don't you remember?!
Me: Should we look at our bookshelves and see if we can find it?
Otto: (exasperated expression)
Me: (stalling) Um....

To Give a Vacuum a Cupcake

Tonight, to our utter amazement, Max vacuumed up a cupcake in its entirety. And by "vacuumed it up," I am not making a clever euphemism for "enthusiastically ate the fluffy sweet goodness with speed and determination." No, he actually sucked it up with our cute little yellow vacuum cleaner, and Miele (for that's her name) digested that cupcake with such speed that we wondered if she had been waiting for such a treat for her entire life. It's no surprise, really, since her usual treats consist of small Lego bits and action figure accessories.

Two Days of Sledding

We had beautiful sunny weather on Tuesday and Wednesday, and it warmed up to a balmy 35, so it felt downright tropical to be out there. We took advantage of the combination of sun and snow and took to the slopes (I always wanted to say that!) at Horner Park. The hills in Chicago are almost nonexistent, and this one is pretty modest, but it was fun, nonetheless. Max and Otto declared them to be two of the best days ever.

Another Quiet Day

More Lego building: the completed cinema.



We read all about water birds.



Doodles.



My parents gave us some plates for Christmas with the promise that we could all decorate them together. They have a pretty good selection of the paints at home, and then they take the plates to a nearby shop to be fired. We decided to continue with the chicken theme. We all consulted some books for ideas for our drawings.











My dad made a plate for each boy.



Max's finished pieces.



Otto's plates.



Martin's rooster.



David's rooster.



Some of the handiwork my mom did on the backs for the boys.




After all the painting, the boys requested a fire. ("Because we didn't even make one yesterday," said Otto.)






Chicky Boom with Grandpa.

Game Day

December 26, or the day after Christmas, has traditionally been "Game Day" for our family. I told the boys this, and they wanted to know if it was a national holiday, if other people also celebrated it. We figured that lots of other people probably have a similar day after Christmas, playing with their new games or toys, but that it was not an actual holiday. Our Game Day has historically involved playing board games and completing several puzzles (this was when we were with the whole large extended family, when there were 25 of us or more—we would typically have three puzzles going at once, and people would move about from table to table and put pieces in, or perhaps hunker down and commit to their puzzle of choice, or, if they are more like me, stop by a puzzle occasionally and try to find a piece for about half an hour before proudly declaring success and heading back to the board game area, because, clearly, that's more where your expertise lies). Since we've been celebrating with our smaller family (my parents and brother and our families), we've revised our activities to playing games of interest to our very young children. The last few years have been more about building Lego sets than playing games, actually, and that's how this Game Day started.

Martin and Otto worked on the "Town Plan" set.



Max decided to help.



The beginnings of the cinema, complete with a popcorn maker.



And now some work on the exterior.



Grandpa spent much of our visit down with his chickens, for whom he has been constructing a new coop. We all headed down there in mid-afternoon to help him with the big move: relocating the chickens from their tractors to their new home in the coop.

Otto was very cold but agreed to come down to gather some eggs. He stood ready with his basket, but there was some work to do first, and as he waited and waited, he got colder and colder and was not feeling very happy to be down there at all.



Grandma is in the future henhouse.



Max was excited to see the place.



Grandpa demonstrates how he will gather eggs in the future (we were standing in one side, where the chickens will soon be living).



Nesting boxes.



The outside of the coop.



Proud chicken owners.



We got all the pellets down and the coop is ready for its inhabitants.



But the preparations have taken so long that Max and Otto retreat to the house for the promise of hot chocolate and popcorn and a movie with Grandma.



Grandpa starts the transition. The plan is to move one chicken at a time.



Martin got to bring in the rooster.



Max came back down to help with the chicken gathering (Martin ran back up to get him when the chicken chasing began, and Max decided he wanted to come back down). Max was really excited to help with this part. We had planned to lure them one by one out of their tractors and then carry them and deposit them in the coop, but they got wise after a couple of their pals disappeared. They huddled together in their tractors and refused to come out until Grandpa crawled in and shooed them out. At this point, we were supposed to catch them all, but they snuck past us and were running amok in the yard. Max said, "Leave it to me. I'm a master chicken catcher." And he proceeded to sneak up on them and try to catch them. He has gotten quite good at this, but I suppose they were all too spooked, and Grandpa was in too much of a hurry to get them in the coop, and Max didn't catch any of them. Uncle David ended up being the most successful at this task, and he carried quite a few to the coop. Grandpa rounded up most of the rest, and he handed a few off to us to carry. Max had one in his arms for a while, but it started to flap its wings, and Max tried his best to hold onto it, but then he started saying, "Uh oh. Uh oh." And the chicken flapped so hard that it got loose. Another chase ensued, and finally we got them all inside the coop.

At this point Max decided he was ready for that hot chocolate and the movie, and we made a fast retreat back to the house.



Yeah, this is more like it.



We had another delicious meal, this time a rib roast.




So Game Day concluded with very few games played, but it was a full and wonderful day, nonetheless.

Christmas Day

We awoke to full stockings.








The Santa presents.



The family presents.












Dinner. We ate dinner at about 4:30, just to be sure we could be fed by the time any young family members (or old, for that matter) decided to fall asleep. We broke from tradition (AGAIN!) with our meal, which is usually the same one we serve for Thanksgiving: turkey and all the trimmings. This year, Grandpa made a crown roast of pork, we made a chestnut and roasted vegetable dressing (we had planned to actually roast the chestnuts over the open fire, but we had to settle for roasting them over the open flame of the gas stove), mashed potatoes, the now notorious cranberry salad of Uncle David's, and bran rolls.

Christmas Eve

Otto woke up this morning and said, "I had a bad dream. Well, it wasn't that bad. Here's what it was. I was writing a letter to Santa, and I ran out of room." We all laughed at that, and then he elaborated, "All I got to write was Dear Santa, because I made a big picture of Santa which took up the whole page."

Breakfast.



Max wrote a new comic book, which we read with much anticipation.



We usually wait until the evening to write our letters to Santa (it's a long standing family tradition to wait until the last minute for as many things as possible). But due to Otto's dream (and the fact that we have all been so tired in the evenings that we've been going to bed, or falling asleep on the couch, at early hours), we decided it was a good idea to write our Santa letters in the bright and early hours of the day. It turns out, Otto had plenty of room. (The GIGANTIC piece of paper didn't hurt, either.)



Then we went to wish the chickens a happy Christmas Eve. Max even tried to give one a hug (this is a euphemism for chased the heck out of one of them in an attempt to catch it). Turns out, the rooster didn't appreciate this, and he jumped at Max.



Undeterred, the boys filled their hands with corn and wooed the others.






This afternoon, it was Otto's turn to fall asleep by the fire.




And Max got some private reading time with Grandma.





Otto took such a long nap that he woke up disoriented and ready for bed (at about 6:30 p.m.). We were very glad we had written our Santa letters in the early hours, since we were barely able to get our acts together to put out a plate of cookies and some milk for Santa. Actually, the only letters that got written were the ones from Max and Otto, and this is truly something to note, as it is the first time I or any other members of my family have NOT written our Santa letters, EVER... But we had two very tired and sick kids, and everyone was able to just go with the flow of things.



We read "The Night Before Christmas," and then we went up to bed at the astonishing time of 7:30 p.m.



Max fell asleep within a few minutes (still obviously feeling the sleepiness that accompanies his cold), but Otto (the one who had actually insisted he was tired and ready for bed) was refreshed from his long winter's nap. There was lots of cuddling and back rubbing, and we even gave up entirely on sleep for a while and read a couple of chapters of "The Goblet of Fire."

Just when I thought he was almost asleep, Otto suddenly said, "Mom, you didn't write your Santa letter." I asked him if I should write it now, which he didn't like. Then I suggested that maybe after he was asleep, I could go downstairs and write it with all the other adults, since none of us had gotten a chance to write them either. But this distressed him further. He didn't want me to leave him at all. So we agreed that I would not write a letter, and Santa would understand. Again, we laid there, and suddenly, I heard his sweet little voice say, "But I don't want you to be sad." Turns out, he was worried that if I didn't write my letter, Santa might not leave me any presents, and I would be sad. I told him that I was pretty sure Santa would understand, given that this year everyone was so very sick.

When he finally finally drifted off to sleep, at around 9:30, Martin and I got up to have dinner with everyone else, who were patiently waiting downstairs. I was worried that Otto would wake up again, and I knew that if he did, I would not be able to come down again (and perform any other tasks that might need to be accomplished). But amazingly, they slept soundly. Grandpa was still planning to write his letter to Santa, because of course this is tradition! He has always written a Santa letter! What would Santa think? But after discussing Otto's sentiments, we all agreed to not write them. It did feel a bit strange, I must admit, to break so completely with years of tradition. But our holiday is evolving to be what it needs to be at the moment.

Speaking of tradition, the boys (the adult boys, I mean) have traditionally made soup for Christmas Eve dinner, this is something the uncles did when I was a child, so it's another longstanding ritual. But this year, we had a quick dish of fettucini with wild mushrooms. We have simplified many of our meals, in order to have more time together playing games and having fun. Even with all these simplifications, it seems like my mom spends all her time working to keep up with the dishes and laundry and vacuuming and straightening. Wow, typing that out makes me feel even more guilty than I already feel. She gets up early and does up all the dishes from the previous night's meal, then sets the table for the morning meal, and she has a way of cleaning it all up quickly while we are doing something with the kids. Before you know what is happening, a tray of snacks will appear, or I will see she has put out cheese for the boys or made them hot chocolate. She works awfully hard to make sure we all have a wonderful Christmas. My dad is also hard at work, often down by the chickens, where he is busily building nesting boxes for his brand new (and fabulous!) coop. He likes to cook as well, though, and they both, with the help of my brother, got together our delicious dinner while Martin and I were lying down with the boys.

So, we had a nice dinner together, the boys slept, and we all got to finish up some present business. And then we were all off to bed, in anticipation of an early morning with two excited boys.

At Grandma and Grandpa's

We spent our first night at Grandma and Grandpa's by the fire, playing more games of chess. Grandpa is pretty good at it, and he gave Otto quite a good game.





Max was really tuckered out and he fell asleep in his favorite spot in the house, on the fluffy rug right in front of the fireplace.



While Max slept, Otto and Grandma read together.

At the Hotel Indigo

We stopped in Columbus Indiana, at our usual spot, the exact halfway point between our house and Grandma and Grandpa's. Max is full on with the wretched cold/flu, so our energy was low, but we still managed to have a great visit. We saw Miles, the dog, we checked out TWO betta fish for our room, since the boys couldn't decide between them, and we read lots of books from the hotel's stash. Martin also surprised us all with a great new game collection, and we played our first ever full game of chess, which was, fittingly, in Lego style.




Otto loves to make us coffee in the morning, and here he sat, patiently waiting for it to finish.