It's Beginning to Look a Lot like Christmas...

Well, I guess as the old saying goes, better late than never, right?  Here's the long awaited and much anticipated Christmas time blog and pics.  And besides, we have another foot of snow on the ground, so technically it does still look like Christmas!! 

But first an update...

Today is a very special day in our lives!!  Our little Miss Ella is 2 today!!  We had a great day hanging out with her.  We went to the pool this morning, had "roni and cheese" for lunch, cupcakes and presents this afternoon.  Ella and I have always had a very close relationship and she continues to amaze me everyday!  She is one of the cutest, smartest most fun little girls I've ever met in my entire life.  Happy birthday, Ella!!!  I can't wait to see what this next year brings :) 

For those of you keeping track Dylan was supposed to have his surgery on Monday (Feb. 8th).  It has been postponed to Feb. 15 because the surgeon couldn't do it this Monday.  Of course, Dylan is perfectly healthy right now, so I'm really hoping he will avoid catching a cold this next week and we can get this surgery out of the way! 

We're also anxiously awaiting the arrival of new baby Morris.  Andrea isn't technically due until the end of February, but Ella was 5 weeks early, so we're all prepared for her arrival any day.  I can't wait to meet the new baby and Dylan is excited not to be the littlest one anymore! 

I have a TON of Buenos Aires and Ella's birthday pictures and stories to post and will try to get them up soon!!

Dylan is getting so big and fun.  He's not officially crawling but he can scoot on his butt, roll and pretty much get wherever he wants to go.  He loves pulling himself up and standing and I'm guessing will be walking within a few months. 

So without further ado, here's Christmas!!!

First up, here are some pics for the Christmas cards that we took a few weeks before Christmas.  Ella and Dylan are SO cute together. 

  

  

The week of Christmas, we went over to Eric and Polly's house (Kris' brother and sister-in-law) and hung out with the Thomas family.  Dylan LOVED getting to play with Owen and meeting Linda and Greg T. 

We celebrated my birthday the week before Christmas.  My dad, Nicki and I made a 4 layer cake which was quite delicious.  Everybody came over to my house and we played a little rock band and Wii fit.  Thanks to everybody for making my 30th special...it was a hard day for me, but nice to be surrounded by the friends and family I love.  A special thanks to JoAnne and Jeremy for driving all the way down from DSM.  It was great seeing all 2 1/2 off you!!!  (yes, for those of you curious, JoAnne is pregnant and Dylan can't wait to meet his newest playmate this summer!!)

 

Jamie gave me a chia pet for my b-day which was awesome!!  Here's Jo and I planting the seeds.

We had a great Christmas with lots of presents and fun.  Obviously, it was pretty hard because I missed Zach so much, but it was nice to be around family.  Christmas Eve we opened presents at my parents' house.  Dylan got lots of new toys, but was mostly interested in the boxes and tissue paper :)  (a special thanks to Kris and Matt for his adorable Christmas Eve sweater!) 

Opening presents with Mommy!

So cute with Papa!

I love Uncle Billy!!

Ella with Namma in her new Dora Christmas pajamas!

Ella showing her new doll off to Dylan!

Dylan says, I'm so cute!!

Big smiles with Aunt Nicki!!

Mommy and me!!

We had a TON of snow on Christmas Eve, enough to pretty much shut down the city.  Billy very sweetly drove Nicki, Dylan and I home so I didn't have to drive in it!  Luckily, Grandma Toni and Grandpa Karl weren't coming until Christmas morning, so their flight still made it!

Christmas morning, we opened presents with Toni and Karl.  Dylan got a bunch of other very cool presents and was very excited. 

Dylan says, I can get used to this opening presents every day stuff!!

Dylan loves his animal pop up toy from Uncle Dennis and Aunt Beth!  He's so good at closing all of the animals after we open them!

Opening the calendar we made with Grandpa Karl!

Later on Christmas Day, we went back to Craig Street to have a family dinner.  My dad made a great Turkey with all the trimmings and we had an excellent time!! 

Toni, Nicki and Karl got Ella a play kitchen for Christmas!  It's one of her favorite toys!!

The box the kitchen came in was also a big hit!!

I got Dylan some balls to play with and he absolutely loves them!!

Beth made this adorable bib with Dylan when she took care of him one day.  The antlers are his handprints!!

The next day, we enjoyed playing with the toys and even made it out in the snow some.  Dylan wasn't quite sure what to make of the snow and seemed a bit concerned on why we were outside when it was so cold!

Riding on his new lion!

Playing with Grandma!

Getting ready to go outside with Papa!

Dylan and a snowman just his size!!

A bittersweet part of Christmas time was having to say goodbye to Aunt Nicki who was leaving for her adventure in Buenos Aires.  We had a great time hanging out with her for a couple of weeks before she left!  We miss her a ton :)   

Dylan making a masterpiece for Nicki, Piper and Rich's apartment in Buenos Aires!

One of the most exciting presents I got was a jogging stroller.  Unfortunately, it has been way too cold and snowy to break it in yet, but Aunt Nicki and I are very excited for it!!

We had a little going away party at the Morris house before Aunt Nicki left.  Morris made his famous chili and we had a nice time :)

Ella and Nicki saying Yabba Dabba Dooo!!

Dylan and I went with Nicki to the airport.  Nicki and I stayed up late packing and making chocolate chip oatmeal cookies for the trip.  The cookies turned out to be key...we went to the check in with all of Nicki's luggage.  She brought her fancy hiking back pack and asked for a bag to wrap it in for the flight.  While the agent was getting the bag, we put Nicki's big suitcase on the scale...it weighed over 60 pounds (which the limit is 50 and you have to pay a ton if you're over).  The agent came back and we quickly took the suitcase off the scale hoping she hadn't seen it.  We offered the agent a cookie (which she took) and she checked Nicki's bag without weighing it.  So, even though we were a bit tired, staying up late making the cookies was definitely worth it!!

Aunt Nicki and Dylan decided to dress alike for the goodbye!

We celebrated New Year's Eve over at the Morris household.  We had a nice time and most of us even made it up until midnight!!

We had a great time cheering the Hawks on to victory in the Orange Bowl!!  Dylan and Ella looked so cute all decked out in their Iowa gear :)

Grandpa's sidekick!

Sooooo cute!

¡Feliz cumpleaños!

Happy 10 month birthday, Dylan, Argentina style!!! For those of you not up on Argentinean soccer, Dylan is wearing the official jersey of Boca Junior, the Buenos Aires team. We're having a great trip...have taken over 300 pictures so I need to sift through them before posting more...but couldn't resist this one for now!!!

Adios!!!

Buenos Dias de Buenos Aires!!!!

Buenos Dias!!! We made it to Argentina!! It's thrilling to be back in shorts and flip flops! Especially as winter is hitting KC again! Here are a few pics from the journey so far!!

(yes, I know I am WAY behind on updating the blog! I actually have a post started with all sorts of Christmas/snow etc. pictures but work has been crazy along with getting ready for this trip. If I have some down time, I'll try to get it up while I'm here).

The adventure started with a very full ride to the airport on Sunday morning around 9 a.m. Toni flew into to KC on Saturday night so I didn't have to do any of the legs by myself.

Not room for much else here...

We had a 7 hour layover in Dulles which is kind of overwhelming with a 10 month old...luckily my Aunt Kathy and Uncle John live close to the airport and came and picked us up. We had a GREAT time at their house, hanging out with the 10 adults, 7 kiddos and 4 dogs. It was like a mini-vacation within the vacation. We don't get to see that clan very often, so it was super nice!! Julianna made me promise that we'll do it again this summer :)

All the great-grandkids!!

Toni used miles to get us business class seats which were awesome on such a long flight! They said they had a bassinet for Dylan which was key. Turns out the bassinet was more along the lines of a bag...that Dylan was way too big for. But we put a couple of blankets down and a sheet and Dylan slept at our feet. He did GREAT!!! He stayed up until about 10 p.m. KC time, but was in a great mood. He finally fell asleep and then only woke up once, but went right back to sleep after I fed him. They started serving breakfast around 6 a.m. KC time, so he woke up for good but was in a great mood! All of the flight attendants and people around us commented on how cute he was and how great he was. One of the flight attendants told me he looked just like the Gerber baby and should be in commercials! Toni and I managed to get a decent amount of sleep as well which was nice!

Would you call this a bassinet? The weirdest thing was it didn't unfold all the way, so it really just wasn't practical. However, Dylan did sleep like a champ so it worked perfectly!!


Sleeping like a baby!!!

Once we got off the plane, Toni headed into the terminal to find a cart for our luggage while I waited for the car seat and stroller with Dylan napping in my arms. After the car seat and stroller came, I headed towards the terminal, only to be encountered with an escalator. I could see Toni at the bottom, but there was no way down. I asked where the elevator was, and of course it was on the other side of the airport in a different terminal. Dylan and I headed that way, thinking we would be able to meet up with Toni. This super nice porter befriended me and showed me the way. He took me to this area at customs with no wait (all the other places had huge lines). Luckily, Toni had given me my purse (she had the rest of our stuff) so I had our passports and a credit card for the visas. However, I was trying to explain in my broken Spanish that Toni had my customs declarations. My helpful porter friend went and found Toni, she paid for her visa and he whisked us to the front of the next line. We were getting some dirty looks from the people waiting in line, but hey, I'm not complaining. We went and got our luggage (when we had to wait for the umbrella stroller (yes, I brought two) even though the rest of our luggage was out, my friend the porter went behind the area and got it for us). Then he escorted us through all the lines at customs and out to where we were getting our car. We actually didn't ever give the people our customs forms, so not sure how legit it was, but it was awesome because a process that normally can take hours took us about 20 minutes!!

The car ride in was uneventful. Dylan started to get a bit hungry/cranky at the end, but was in a great mood as soon as he got to see Aunt Nicki! The apartment we are staying in is great :) Dylan is upstairs napping as we speak (I think I might follow when I'm done here). We're super excited to be here and mostly excited to get to hang out with Aunt Nicki. I'll try to update more later!!!

All smiles once he saw Aunt Nicki!!

Let's Go Hawks!!!

I-O-W-A!!!

(sorry for the less than stellar quality of the pics, they are both camera phone images. I will take some better ones tonight as we cheer Iowa on to victory!!)