Playing at the museums

Monday we ended up taking things pretty easy, since unfortunately I was struck by food poisoning Sunday night.  I ended up eating about two croissants in 36 hours.  By Tuesday things were much better, however, and we headed up to the DuPage County Children's Museum with Erin, Kadence, baby Mayah, the boys, and Brendan and Mrs. Lawler.  It was really noisy there because it was about 15 degrees and a vacation week for otherwise school-age kids, so everyone decided to show up -- but I thought it was absolutely fantastic.  There were a few different toddler rooms and Michael just made himself right at home, picking up everything he was supposed to pick up, climbing, running, and having fun with Kadence and his grandma.  The exhibits and rooms were set up really well for kids.  After lunch, our family all fell asleep and enjoyed a great, long, finally restful nap!  We went to the Bolingbrook mayor's party at the golf club that night and enjoyed seeing people and walking around.

Playing at the DuPage museum.

Downtown was fun too!

Wednesday we headed downtown to try out another museum, the Chicago children's museum at Navy Pier.  Traffic was pretty light, which we definitely appreciated, although the Pier was incredibly crowded.  We were able to meet up with Michael and Hillary and had a fun time walking around the museum.  Hillary had fun talking to Malcolm and Michael showed little Michael a few shadow puppets.  Michael didn't get the shadow exhibit at first, but eventually he figured it out and it was really cute to watch him counting his fingers in shadows :)  He also "drove" his Uncle Mike in a CTA bus.  He looked like a natural pushing all the knobs.  Overall this museum was not as nice as the DuPage one, but it was geared towards older kids and a bit older physically too.  We got to visit with one of my former co-workers, Emily, afterward, which I really enjoyed.  Finally, that evening we were able to visit Erin's new house, which was fun, and last night we visited Mike's boss and his wife, who have a home in Chicago (or way out west, anyway).  Doug is a really nice guy and we had a great time.

Little Michael has had a blast this week I think.  He walks around the hotel very comfortably; he knows how to push the call and floor buttons on the elevator and walks to the correct room every time we get off the elevator on the third floor.  They all look identical to me, but he isn't confused at all.  He also has made friends with the front desk and cleaning ladies.  When we pull up to the Lawlers' house he knows Grandpa will be there.  And he's been so good with naps, sleeping, and being at restaurants.  We are lucky to have children that we can take places!  I have been packing a little this afternoon while watching the ND game, while the boys nap.  Mike will be back after the game and we're going to a New Year's party, then we'll go to Mass in the morning for the holy day, pack up and hit the road.  The only regret I have this week is that we didn't get to see my friend Whitney and meet her little baby due to illness, but we did get to talk some -- we'll have to visit next time!  Otherwise, grateful for a nice trip and looking forward to heading home.

A merry, sleep-deprived Christmas

When we ran the numbers for this year's Christmas trip, it looked like driving to Chicago came out well over $1200 ahead of flying: figure saving the cost of three plane tickets, baggage fees, and a week of car rental, plus the less-quantifiable but still significant benefits of avoiding multiple shuttles, car rental facilities/parking lots, security lines, and O'Hare, and having our own strollers, car seats, etc.  So, even though it was going to take two days to drive, we geared up for our first major family road trip.  It went pretty well, considering!  We made it to St. Edward, MO on the first day, having stopped about four times to stretch legs, eat, and change diapers/get gas.  Neither boy was thrilled with being in the car so long, but Michael liked his new toys and we managed to save breaking out the DVD player until late afternoon.  Fortunately, the driving was smooth all day.  That night was rough, though, because Michael flipped out about sleeping in the pack-n-play at the hotel -- major meltdown.  It was not very restful trying to sleep with him!

Day 2 was more challenging.  We were lucky there wasn't much traffic on the roads, even driving through St. Louis, and we stopped for a nice lunch at Cracker Barrel.  Michael sat in the kid-sized rocking chair, arranged some checkers carefully around the outside of a checker board, and tried to make snowballs outside.  We should have made it to Chicago by 4:30, even with snow, but for at least 100 miles in southern Illinois, there appeared to be no snow plows.  You'd think these might be important to have, but apparently not.  We were delayed at least two hours because of having to crawl through the snow single-file at 40 miles an hour for what felt like forever.  We finally made it to Bolingbrook and enjoyed a few hours of time with Grandpa.  ("Tah-pah" is what Michael calls him ... we could not figure out what in the world he was doing, as he kept touching his forehead and saying this half the trip, until finally we realized, when he saw Mr. Lawler and did the same thing, that he was trying to do the sign for grandpa.  Sweet :)  Mike and I loved Mr. Lawler's chili and ice cream with fudge for dessert, and Michael just had fun spinning in circles and running back and forth between the couches.  Free at last!

....Which brings us to Night 2, Christmas Eve, in which we got no sleep again.  Poor Michael, who eats pretty much everything we do with no problems, reacted badly to the chili.  We were up with him a few hours in the middle of the night as all that came back up.  (Yuck.)  He was so tired he didn't wake up early like normal, and Mike's alarm didn't go off for some reason, so getting to Mass was a hectic affair!  We were late but everything went really nicely (even though I personally was even *more* late because Malcolm needed another diaper change as soon as we arrived) -- a beautiful, quiet Mass that I was very grateful for.  Back at home we opened Christmas presents and had a wonderful time.  Dan and Kelly announced that they were engaged!  Everyone was surprised to hear the news, and more surprised that they had managed to keep it quiet all morning long!  :)  We are very happy for them.

Later in the day we headed to South Bend for more Lawler family time.  It was great to see everyone and meet some of the newest second cousins.  All of the great-grandchildren on this side are girls except for Michael and Malcolm, and four of the little girls were born this year, so there were lots of babies around!  Michael again had a great time with his cousins, although he was still having a lot of tummy problems.  So Night 3 turned out to also be tough because he was really hot and feeling sick all night.  (Notice I haven't said anything about Malcolm sleep issues?  He sleeps like a champ ... I don't even count waking up with him multiple times a night to eat because I pretty much sleep through those myself :)  I kept waking up to check on him when he would cry a little :(  Nothing was open, so we had to wait until after Mass today to get him some Tylenol.  (This morning we went to Mass at Ss. Peter and Paul in Naperville, which we really like; this morning I appreciated a great reflection on the Holy Family relating to today's readings.)  Fortunately, after three challenging nights, Michael seems to be back to himself .... which is why I should get some sleep!!  Good night, and Merry Christmas!

ETA: So much for that.  Malcolm and I are now sick.  Ugh.

Future Irish

Between stops at Mike's aunts' houses in South Bend yesterday, we had to swing by campus for a quick photo opportunity.  No one was around at all, it was pretty cold, and we really only had time to jump out of the car and back in -- but when you drive the whole way from Dallas to South Bend, you can't miss the chance to visit, right?  I was happy to introduce the boys to campus -- maybe they'll be back someday!

Early Christmas

Before we got on the road on Thursday, we had an early Christmas with the boys and Elizabeth. She had taken the boys over to her house for breakfast in the morning while we loaded up the car, and she brought them back after lunch (Michael ate quite well over there!). My parents sent a lot of little things for Michael and Malcolm, some of which they had said would be good for the road trip, and we had a little exchange with Elizabeth, too. It was very sweet and everyone enjoyed it.  Michael liked each present so much it was hard to get him to open any subsequent ones.  We were very thankful.

 

You did pick the wrong line

I would never have guessed math theory was involved in this ... then again, that's why I went to law school! Fascinating.

Headline of the Year

(Source)

Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary

In honor of today's solemnity, here is a clip of Stevie Wonder singing "Ave Maria."

Growing boy

Malcolm had his four-month checkup this morning. He is still on the curve at 27.5 inches tall and 18 lbs 12 oz, both the 98th percentile. The doctor said his weight was more in line with the average seven-month-old, which fits with what we'd guess with Mr. Canon. His head in the 95th percentile too, but I could have told you that! Malcolm was a little wary of the doctor checking his ears and mouth, but he calmed down when he was holding my finger and barely fussed at all when he got his shots. Such a sweet baby!

Family pictures

We did family pictures the other week -- Mike's idea was to try something different than our usual Target, and some friends from the ND Club have photographers they really love from McKinney who are really reasonably priced *and* give you the digital pictures with no fuss.  Their pictures looked great, so I was sold.  Things got off to an inauspicious start: Scheduling hiccups meant that we ended up having to go on a Sunday morning at 8 a.m.  Michael was only just starting to get better from a bad cold he had all week, so he was under the weather.  He also dropped Snoopy in the dirt on the way in.  And he was *not* smiling for the first ten minutes.  But somehow everything started working out and I was thrilled with how they turned out.  Link to the album below :)  (Mom and Stef, we'll get you the ones you liked!)

More letters

A few days before 25 months for Michael ... It is so much fun to watch him learning things while he plays.  Some days he just growls every ten seconds -- which is not particularly endearing -- but for the most part he is good-tempered and enjoys babbling a lot while he plays.  He can entertain himself for quite awhile, going back and forth between letters, blocks, books, and random toys.  You can pretty much see the wheels turning while he studies new things.  Last month we asked Amanda how we could teach him lower-case letters since he knew the upper-case ones pretty well.  She showed us a website, starfall.com, which has flash animation for all the letters.  He announces what letter he wants, we click on it, and it shows upper- and lower-case letters, a few words, and says the sounds.  Amazingly, he really gets it.  Last week he would pick up his new little magnet letters, say "p!" and then turn it upside down and say "d!"  (That's not on the website.)  Yesterday he was doing the same thing with "u" and "n" and "w" and "m."  A couple of days ago he figured out that if he presses the letters on the website it makes the sounds the same way as if you click on it (he can't move the mouse/cursor).  It took him awhile to locate each letter but by the time I got home from work on Friday he seemed to have it down.  So I think he's figured out the QWERTY layout too.  Letter order, not so much.  He knows B-O-Y is boy and C-O-W is cow (the only two words I think he knows how to "spell" by picking out the letters from his puzzle), but he usually arranges them for me as BYO and CWO.  Well hey, he only just turned two :)  I want to get him started playing with the awesome globe T got him for his birthday.  He recognizes the shape of Texas from a wooden state puzzle but that's all so far.  I love geography so it will be fun whenever he picks that up.

Other things with Michael lately: I find it amusing when he pulls Malcolm's blankets over his head and tries to walk around that way.  He usually ends up walking into walls.  He pretty much loves Charlie Brown Christmas and reads all three book versions of the story we have.  I have to sing Hark the Herald Angels Sing whenever he gets to those pages.  He definitely gets overwhelmed/afraid of some things -- when we went over to the neighbor house with a little train for the kids tonight, he freaked out and didn't want to ride, so we just stood on the outside of the fence and watched for a few minutes.  He respects that he has to hold your hand to cross the street, but he doesn't make the distinction as well in parking lots, which keeps me worried and vigilant.  He still gets jealous of Malcolm on a regular basis (and mad at me) but for the most part he is pretty affectionate when he pays attention to him.  He still loves music and likes to select specific songs on the CD player.  Current favorites include "Joe Cool" on the Vince Guaraldi CD and "Elmo's Song" on the Sesame Street one :)