New Years

We've never been really big on celebrating the New Year holiday. It's kind of silly really. So as our own tradition mandates, we kept it fairly simple this year. New Years day we had a nice, lazy day, then had my parents over for dinner. We had salmon with teriyaki and macadamia nuts, lemon rice, and a salad. Not to toot my own cooking horn, but it was FANTASTIC! We spent the rest of the evening playing games, and being entertained by the kiddos.

Did I mention that Kaiden is crawling? Crazy kid.

Christmas!!!

Christmas morning we did the usual present opening thing. Noah wasn't really sure how he felt about it at first, but then he really got into it. The tent that Santa gave him was a little scary for a minute, until he figured out that it was his, and he got to keep it and play in it. Then we couldn't get him out of it to open anything else! Grandma and Papa Patterson joined us for the morning, since their house was in pieces. It was a lot of fun to have them with us! They stayed for breakfast, games, and overall Christmas morning fun.


Later in the day all the Patterson's got together for lunch. Since the parents house wasn't exactly a suitable venue for a dinner, we all went over to Mi Ranchito. Always a good place for eating!

Christmas Eve

Christmas Eve is solidly an Indo day. It's when they do all of their traditional eating stuff, and it's worked out really well for all of the kids to be there all at the same time together. So here's what happened with all of it this year.

We had a nice and lazy morning laying around (since Z and boys were still sick), and then headed over to Grandma and Papa's around 11. We went through the motions of putting Noah down for a nap, but he knew that there was a party going on, and Eva was there, so he sat there jumping in his bed and laughing instead. So we let him out and hoped and prayed that he'd make it through the rest of the day.The afternoon was spent eating, playing games, eating, hanging out, eating, making empenadas, and eating. There was a TON of food sitting there for all of us all afternoon long.

The empenadas were done around 6, and that's when the last of us arrived, and the real 'festivities' began. As always, the elves brought the little kids new pajamas, and all of the adults had fun fuzzy socks in their Christmas stockings. I've always been a big fan of Christmas, what's not to like, but Christmas with little kids around is so much more magical! Everything is a big deal and amazing to them. Noah and Eva had a BLAST playing with all their new toys, K was happy as can be charging after everyone's wrapping paper, and there's something inherently childlike about all of the Indo's getting together. It was a fantastic day/evening.

Christmas Eve Eve

For Christmas Eve Eve my brother and his family decided they were going to go see the lights up at Temple Square, and they invited my parents, and us to go with them as well. So off we went around 5 to meet up for dinner real fast first, then go see everything else. Since Z is working downtown and has a pass to the parking garage by his work, we figured we'd just park there and take trax to get over to temple square. Noah was excited about this idea, considering how obsessed he is with trains lately. So we parked, hoped on Trax at the courthouse. Thankfully people were really nice and understanding about us having a stroller on a train that was really really full, because Trax isn't very stroller friendly. We got off at the end of the line and took the short walk up to the Crown Burger on North Temple.

Evidently EVERYONE else decided that would be a good place for dinner as well. I've never seen a fast food restaurant that packed before. The employees did a really good job of getting orders out as fast as they could though. Noah was too busy playing with his cousin Jared to eat his food, and K was seriously over-stimulated by the noise, but Z and I had a few moments to eat before we were all ready to head over to Temple Square....

Which was also PACKED. I've been to see the lights a handful of times, and there's usually a good number of people up there, but I've never seen that many people at one time before! It was pretty crazy. Thankfully people were in the holiday spirit though, and there wasn't a lot of pushing and shoving. It was, however, freezing cold, and we had two tired and sick kids. We really wanted to stay and hang out with the grandparents, and James and his family, but it wasn't worth risking the kids getting more sick than they already were. So we headed back to the train to go home.

I forgot to mention how much Noah loved being on the train! Even just those two short little rides were really exciting for him. And while we were walking to and from the stops, if a train went by he was all sorts of delighted. We're going to have to go up there again some time and just ride around downtown with him.

Noah-isms - December edition

12-21
This morning Noah came out of his room wearing his Superman costume. I didn't even know he could put it on by himself.

N - I wanna drive the car.
E - You wanna drive the car? (making sure I heard him right
N - YEAH! I'm 16 now.

12-20

E - Do you wanna go somewhere today?
N - I wanna go to the store
E - What store do you want to go to?
N - I wanna go to the Target!

'Cooking' with a bowl, whisk, and colander.
N - It needs more cheese!

12-18

N - The goobers are all gone!
E - Where did the goobers go?
N - In my tummy!

12-16
I couldn't get the sound on Z's computer to work.
E - Daddy has to fix it
N - (runs to talk to Z in the shower) Daddy computer broken daddy
Z - Tell mommy to fix it
N - Mommy can't fix it
Z - Where is your mommy?
N - Right there (points at me) she can't fix it
Z - Why don't you watch it downstairs?
N - oh....OK!

12-13
Didn't hear Kaiden wake up. Evidently Noah did and went in there to give him some toys to play with. And by some, I mean ALL of the toys that were in the toy basket.

12-9
Noah pulls an empty Mary Kay lotion bottle out of the trash in the bathroom...
N - buy a new one at Wal-mart?
E - No, they don't have that kind at Wal-mart.
N - Oh, buy it at Target? Probably yeah.

Moral of the story: This kid is just a little bit nuts.

Army Crawling

Guess who figured out how to army crawl? It takes a lot of effort, and he looks like a fish flopping around, but he's consistently moving forward!