Christmas Eve 2009

We had a fun and relaxing Christmas in Long Beach. Lyla and I headed out to Long Beach right after the STB party on Wednesday and Mark joined us Thursday afternoon. We spent Wednesday night and Thursday morning just being goofy and playing around. In every picture, Oakley can be found somewhere in the background (kind of like Where's Waldo). Lyla was loving the Oakster and he was pretty patient with her. On Christmas Eve, we went out to dinner with my parents, nana, Maggie and Tony and Tony's dad. With this crowd, everyone was pretty much in agreement that Lyla was the best behaved at the table. She sat in her little booster seat in between her equally sparkly mom and grandma and ate her meatballs and mashed potatoes like a little doll. (Grampa tried to swipe a meatball but we caught him just in time ;) Four generations Looking back on it now, there were signs of what was to come but she was in such a good mood all night...who knew? (cliffhanger, huh?) Kisses back and forth She was well entertained by her grandma and nana all night long. Doing her tricks...How big is Lyla? In her fur coat and ready to call it a night.

STB Christmas Party

We took Lyla to the children's Christmas party at my office on December 23. It's a really fun little party when you get to see all the kids. And everyone is a little bit lighter when the kids are around. There was a visit from Santa, face painting, arts and crafts, balloon animals, and an arcade room for the big kids. But the best part is that the cafeteria is filled with food just for kids (my favorite kind of food...) -- mac and cheese, chicken fingers, pizza, pigs in blankets, and pb&js -- yum. I had to work that morning and Mark was going to pick her up and bring her to my office. I left her "party outfit" for Dahlia to put her in. Unfortunately, her cute white velour pants were way too tight and she could barely squeeze her bottom in them (I guess I should have tried the outfit on first...) Mark and Dahlia managed to get them on, but they were not comfortable. I call them her "going out to the club" pants...But Dahlia is the best and sent a few back up pants with Mark so we could change her asap. Do you think she looks uncomfortable? If she was curious about Santa last time, this time she was sure -- she did not like him one bit. She would hardly sit on lap when we were near Santa. Mark says she has a general skepticism of men, which he is in favor of :) I think Lyla's favorite part of the party was just hanging out in my office and crawling through the hallway and visiting some of my co-workers. Here she is sitting at my desk.

Christmas Card Outtakes

It was so hard to pick a picture for the Christmas card this year. Lyla is so darn cute, everyone was card-worthy. I think the picture we chose really captures her goofy personality, but here are some other that were in the running.

My Little Snow Bunny

Here's Lyla in Dylan's old snowsuit ready to check out the fresh snowfall after getting more than a foot of snow in NYC! That bugaboo really is all terrain!

Oh Christmas Tree!

We decorated Lyla's first Christmas tree the weekend before Christmas. I was feeling a little bad that we waited so long to put up a tree, but it turned out to be the perfect weekend to stay warm and get into the Christmas spirit. That weekend, we got about 15 inches of snow and we were all bundled up and hunkered down in the apartment. Mark went and picked up the tree before the snow arrived. he bought the biggest one on the lot, but it still looked teeny weeny when we put it up in the apartment. He called it our Charlie Brown tree :( Lyla was really eager to help with the decorating. She helped get the tree up. She helped with the lights. The tree turned out great. Mark thinks it has too many snowmen...but that is what I've been collecting over the years. He says that it gets pretty boring telling Lyla "This is a snowman... This is another snowman." Lyla was exhausted after a hard day of decorating. She also got her first tooth that day and was a little under the weather. She was more than happy to snuggle with Daddy at the end of the day.

Merry Merry

Just hangin' out on Christmas Eve

Lyla Meets Santa

On Saturday, we bundled up in the frigid weather and headed over to the Winter Garden to introduce Lyla to Santa Claus. It was sooo cold, but Santa was only visiting for the day and I needed to get a picture :) We arrived just as Santa was leaving for a lunch break, so we took a lunch break too and went to P.J. Clarke's. Lyla and I split a burger and Lyla was in awe of all the other kids at the restaurant (whose parents apparently also arrived just as Santa Claus was leaving). After lunch, we headed back to Santa's village and saw a line already snaking around the room. The sign said "wait time -- estimate one hour." Mark was less then thrilled, so I got on line and Mark and Lyla went off to play. They hung out on the steps of the Winter Garden and listened to the carolers sing. The Winter Garden is decorated beautifully for the holidays. Once we got to the front of the line, we were told that the one hour wait was just to register for a chance to meet Santa. Once you registered, you were given a buzzer and when the buzzer went off, you were allowed to get on another line to wait for Santa. So, we had about another hour to kill. We did a little shopping, a little playing and tried to take some pictures of Lyla. Mom, when is this darn buzzer gonna go off?? (oh yeah, did I mention that I dragged her out when she was sick? Notice all the snot on her face?) We tried to get a picture of her by one of the Christmas trees, but every time I put her down, she crawled away faster than I could snap the picture. So we have a lot of pictures of her behind :) Sorry mom, I have too many places to go. I eventually gave up on the picture attempts and just let her crawl around the Winter Garden. She was in heaven! She loved the wide open space and just crawled and crawled and crawled (and was absolutely filthy when I picked her up) And then...the moment we were all waiting for...we buzzed! I didn't know how she would react to Santa -- laugh, cry, generally freak out. But, in typical Lyla fashion, she was simply curious. What is going on here? Who is this guy with all this hair? Does he have a chin under that beard? Why is his hair so white? Will I ever have this much hair? Will I ever have any hair? Maybe this is my Uncle Mel? So many unanswered questions for my little girl...Alas, we could not get her to look at the camera, but got some cute pics of Lyla and Santa checking each other out.