Cat Nap

Luke is laying in bed crying right now because Baby Cat Gertrude and I just left his room so he can take a nap - by himself. I first put him down for a nap half an hour ago, went to do a load of laundry, did some dishes and was just about to sit down to read my book when I heard Luke saying, "Meow! Meow!" in his high-pitched cat voice. That's when I realized I hadn't seen the cat since lunch. I stealthily crept into his room, hoping he was just talking in his sleep, but this is what I found:

And so they begin

The Christmas gatherings began in earnest on Saturday night. We have another Thursday morning, Thursday evening, Friday morning, Friday evening and Sunday evening! I gotta admit, meeting with a bunch of people who love me and my kid, to eat delicious food that somebody else put a lot of work into is pretty much my ideal way of life. The positive forces in the universe don't nearly often enough conspire to bring these elements all together at once.

First Dentist Visit

This little guy visited the dentist on Friday to have a look at his chipped tooth. The dentist seemed to think the remaining bit of tooth looked healthy and wouldn't need to be capped or removed surgically. We will just wait for it to fall out and a new one to grow in.

Last night I was saying to Derek, "Is it strange that it doesn't feel like Christmas yet?" Four days to go before Christmas and I am in fact feeling a bit Grinch-y, especially when other people are exuberant about the annoying flashing lights that flash in time to a private radio station on Duster Bay (seriously, cars line up along the street and block traffic all the way out to Prairieview Drive until ten or eleven at night! I'd like to say I think it's tacky, but I've driven by once myself and wished I was cheap enough to park and watch like all the other gawkers). Or when Doug mentions he's got two weeks off and I remember the good old days when I had "days off". Yes I'm a little bit grinch-y. But today, listening to my new Christmas CD from Mom, and having picked up some gifts from south of the border wrapped in familiar Christmas paper with tags on them like, "To the best boy in the world, From Grandma", I am, perhaps, starting to feel a little bit of the Christmas spirit.

Connie Nona's Christmas Cookies

What a wonderful visit with Connie Nona yesterday! We stopped in, "For five minutes only" she said, which turned into two hours of visiting. How lovely. I love when Luke gets loved on by his grammies.
Yessir, and you can bet I got the recipe for the delicious morsels of waffledy goodness.
I will share it with you after I've tried it out and have some comments to add.

What HE said

Catch You Up

I've been terribly unmotivated to do anything other than read my book this week (Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett) and haven't been on the computer much. So I apologize for my absence. Today however, was busy. I had Wendy over for coffee and then the neighbor girls came over to make sugar cookies after school. After they left I baked a chicken and made peanut butter balls (I still owe some baking to those burly men who moved our piano!). Now I am tired.

We've been laying low this week, staying out of the cold wind. But today was warmer and we went outside and played in the snow. The snow is very dry and acts almost like sand, so with the help of Jenny and Eileen we buried the lower half of Luke in the snow. Sadly, my camera was inside and by the time I got back out he'd rolled over and out of our snow hill. Luke is also keeping busy taking the vent covers up off the floor and putting things down the pipes like shredded newspaper, the head of the broom, blocks, wipes, socks, and his face. He's also enjoying getting down on all fours to drink out of the cat dish, and climbing up and standing on the kitchen table. Now that we have the piano, we are also spending a significant portion of our day singing and playing.

We were over at Mark and Katie's for dinner last night and their son Jack went to bed before we left. Luke said, "Ni-Night Yuck!" I got a kick out of that. His talking is just amazing. He will repeat entire sentences after me now! When he's on a time out I ask him to "Repeat after me. Don't" dote "Touch" tuch "The" da "Tree" tee. "Don't touch the tree" don' tuch da twee.
I also ask him to repeat nice things like, "I love grandma" and he does it with joy! This evening I made a grumpy Derek smile by asking Luke to pray after me, "Dear God" dear gut. "Thanks" tens. "For" fo. "Sunshine" susha. "And" an. "Daddy" dadd-n. "Amen" A-men!

Sewing Projects

Last week I did a LOT of sewing. This new diaper bag was a rough draft which I am loving just as much as a finished bag. And the other sewing I have to keep a secret until Christmas! But in the New Year I will definitely let you in on the fun we've been having. If you want an easy (seriously - 1 hour from start to finish and a total of $3 spent in materials), fun, cute Christmas sewing project just email me and I will tell you what I've been up to.