Christmas Vacation!

Christmas vacation is finally here! I feel funny calling it vacation since I'm not working outside the home...but with all of the grandparents visiting and Tom is on vacation until next year...so it sure feels like a vacation to me. Also...it truly is a vacation when you have five more pairs of hands to help you! Tom's parents arrived today mid-afternoon. It was monumental that their flight arrived in Dallas on time and that all of their luggage arrived with them. For some reason...this just never seems to happen. There is usually a delay (or quite often several delays)...and usually at least one bag is lost. Tom's parents fared much better this year than we did last year when we traveled to Traverse City to spend the holidays with them. See, Tom & I were lucky enough to have the good fortune of having a connection through Chicago. Since the weather was so bad (um, we're still puzzled about where exactly the bad weather was...because it wasn't really in Chicago) all flights were cancelled for the rest of the day...and they were overbooked the next three days, leaving us unable to get on another flight. We would have been seeing the sights in Chicago for 3 days...had we not had the foresight to book a rental car just in case we didn't make the connection to Traverse City since our original flight leaving Dallas was delayed leaving us a very tight time period to make our flight. We ended up driving 6 hours from Chicago to Traverse City (which was the best possible alternate plan if you can believe that)...pulling into Tom's parents drive around 3am. Mind you, I was pregnant. Oh yeah, forgot to mention our tickets were no less than $1000 for our airfare as well. Add on a rental car one way for one day (a mere $150 or so). Not to mention it was freezing cold and $1000+ is a lot (in my mind at least) to spend to get to a non-tropical destination. I think I might have forgot to mention that we didn't get our luggage for 4 days??? Just small details, you know! We had to find humor in it...Tom and both of our Dads went to the Traverse City Airport no less than 12 times in a 4 day period to check to see if our luggage had arrived. Several times there were bags just sitting on the curb outside of the airport...unclaimed...unknown to anyone why they were on the curb. I just wanted my make-up, hair straightener, and some maternity clothes...so that I could look at least human for Christmas. It made for a very interesting first few days... I have never been so happy to be reunited with any appliance (my straightener!!!!) We were so happy to see our luggage again! Sorry for the look back at history, but it was really funny... and I can't help but reflect on the laughs we had!!! (Left) Tom & I last year...under the mistletoe! As you can imagine, after all the exciting travel last year, we are thrilled to stay in Dallas and forgo traveling with an infant (and all the stuff that goes along with traveling with an infant) during the hustle & bustle of the holidays. We were ecstatic when our family agreed that Christmas should be here in Dallas every year...and not just once every three years! Yeah!!! Now...some pictures from today once our family arrived... Chloe is excited Grandpapa made it to Dallas! Twinkling the ivories for Grandma...she loves my music. Our sweet little neighbor friend, Olivia, dropped by with two of her girlfriends to wish Chloe a Merry Christmas and bring her this really special plate! How thoughtful! We enjoyed our visit... Grandma, Chloe, and mama decided to take a nice walk to our park. Chloe had lots of fun on the slide....so did Grandma! My parents arrived early evening (without a hitch as well!) and got to our house right before we started to give Chloe her dinner. Grammy & Pap were quick to get reacquainted with little Chloe. It was so nice having Grandma & Grammy there to help with her nighttime routine. Grammy feeding Chloe her favorite, peas! Enzy made his nightly appearance during bathtime!

A picture with my precious peach... Grandma got creative with the camera... Me & My Dad (He's the best...) Tom, Grammy, Grandma, Pappy, Grandpapa (left). After Chloe went down for the night, we enjoyed a nice bottle of Chianti with a delicious Walnut, Goat Cheese, and Pear Tossed Salad. I made Cavatini and Chicken Conchigli and for dessert I found it in my heart to share a few of the cookies from the cookies exchanges I have attended. We also had some of the the poppyseed roll that my mom baked and brought to Dallas. They are my favorite! We are so excited everyone made it to Dallas safe after a long day of travel. We are so very blessed to be together for Christmas.