January 2010

For New Year's Eve, we invited my family (just the adults and any kids Mack's age or younger) over for games and food. It was fun, and so nice for me to be able to put Jonas down at bed time and still get to party. Usually, if we get together at another person's house, we leave early to get the boys into bed. I think I like being the hostess.

My birthday was on the 21st, and I think this was definitely one of my most favorite birthdays. Two others that are really memorable for me are when I turned 7 and when I turned 14. For my 7th Mom took me to the store to pick out my own gift. I picked out Michael Jackson's Bad album on cassette tape. Was I a cool 7 year old or what? On my 14th I told my parents I wanted to try riding the CAT bus (Las Vegas' public transit at the time - I had never rode it before). My Dad kindly obliged. He got a bus schedule and we figured out our route. We went to this cute 50's diner themed restaurant, and then to the movie theater. There wasn't a good selection for movies, so we ended up seeing Stargate. It wasn't too bad! On the way home, we missed the bus and ended up having to walk a ways down Boulder Highway (I think we were near Tropicana). I remember Dad had to use the bathroom real bad, and he ended up hiding in this huge bush to take a leak. Ha! We caught the bus at the next stop. It was a fun night.

For this birthday, we found out a month or so before that Gregg would be leaving out of town the morning of (which was a Thursday). So, I just assumed we'd celebrate my birthday when he got back in town the next day. Instead, he surprised me by coming home early from work on Wednesday. He picked up some steaks from the grocery store and a cheesecake from The Cheesecake Factory on his way home. So, he grilled the steaks while I made some mashed potatoes, and steamed some broccoli. It all turned out so good, and of course the cheesecake was delicious. Then I got to open my presents from him, too!

All we had were 6 blue candles.

Of the three of us, I can't tell who was most excited to open those presents. (Gregg is starting to get wise to my present snooping, so I had no idea what I was getting!)

Mack taking control of the Legos.

I was laughing so hard right here because he was so excited. He just kept asking me over and over to open each little bag.

My presents! I was so excited to get both of these gifts - Gregg did an awesome job. It was also pretty fun to be completely surprised. Maybe this will cure me of my snooping tendencies. (Probably not.) Now, I can't wait for Mack's birthday so we can get more Legos!

The next morning Gregg left for the airport and it was just me and the boys. My sister offered to take me to lunch, and I was surprised when I met her at Panera Bread to see Ashley, Stephanie, Janine and Christen (some of my sisters-in-law) all came too! Thank you again Bec for the wonderful lunch - it was really fun. Late in the afternoon, the boys and I went to my parent's house to hang out (my mom had a broken knee and couldn't leave the house or couch for that matter - poor mommy). They were so kind and got me some movie tickets - I'm looking forward to using them! After we got home, I rushed around getting the house clean, and the boys in bed in preparation for an impromptu girl's night! I got the boys in bed just minutes before the first guest arrived. I invited my sister, sisters-in-law, and a few friends over - thank you, again, Shannon for the tasty birthday brownies! We watched American Idol and The Office. We had so much fun that we did it again 2 weeks later, and we'll be getting together again this week! It was so fun getting to celebrate 2 days in a row, and both days were just wonderful! The boys and I were happy to have Gregg home Friday evening.

A few more pictures from January:

The two pictures above are both of Jonas getting up from a nap. I keep his room really dark, so I couldn't see what his face looked like until after I snapped these. He is so cute.

Mack is starting to try to go without a nap each day. He definitely still needs one, but if I let him nap as long as he wants, he goes to bed later, and I can't handle that. I need my alone time with Gregg. (For tv watching! Get your mind out of the gutter!)

So sometimes, we get to wake him up. This day, Jonas was helping out.

A few pictures of the house:

The formal dining/living room.

(You can see the start of the stair rail to the right, and the wall on the left is the wall behind the fridge in the kitchen.)

The kitchen (obviously). We painted it green. Ain't it purdy?

View of the family room from the kitchen. On the other side of the left wall is a hallway that leads to the laundry room, garage, toy room and downstairs bathroom.

No pictures of the upstairs, yet. I'll try to remember to take some next time it looks presentable.

Yea for being caught up on the blog!