Merry New Birthday!

The odd title of this post is my way of foreshadowing that this is going to be the fastest synopsis ever of what we've been up to since November 28th (how embarrassing that that's the last time I blogged).

I'm sure I'll leave things out.

I plan on going back and elaborating on certain topics, and including pictures.

Here we go.

December 5, 7 - 9: I attended rehearsals for our church's Living Christmas Tree.

December 10 - 13: Living Christmas Tree performances (seven in all).  (It wasn't until the evening of the 13th that I realized I hadn't been home to help put the kids to bed since the night of December 6th!  Good thing Chet is so capable...)

December 12 - 17: Didi and Papa Dave came to visit, and celebrate an early Christmas (they, and Chet and the girls saw the last performance of the Living Christmas Tree on Sunday evening).

December 14: Chet and I both were able to volunteer at Sydney's Christmas (I mean, Holiday) party at school (thanks to Didi and Papa Dave for holding down the fort at home).  Syd was thrilled to have us both there.

December 17: Didi and I attended both Sydney's and Lorelei's Holiday/Christmas performances at their respective schools.

December 17/18: Lorelei's and Sydney's last day of school for winter break.

December 19: Chet and I went on a date, thanks to our church's monthly babysitting program.  Ford also received his first "bad" haircut.

December 21 - 23: Nonstop rain, and the kids and I barely survived without a schedule at home, waiting for Christmas.  (This included a fun trip to the dentist for Sydney with everyone in tow on December 23rd.)  I grocery shopped with all of the amateurs/other procrastinators on the night of December 23rd.

December 24: Chet thankfully only had to work the morning, so we had family time at home (inside the house, because it was still raining) on Christmas Eve.

Christmas Day: Happy birthday, Jesus!

December 27: We left early in the morning, headed for North Carolina (the Charlotte area) to spend time with Chet's family the week after Christmas.  (It was a 6-hour drive; we made it in 9.)

December 29: Morning Christmas celebration with Chet's family.

December 30: Early birthday celebration for Ford with Chet's family.

December 31: I actually stayed awake until midnight.

January 1: Happy 2016!  We departed North Carolina and made it home in 8 hours.  We discovered Ford was running a fever, which always makes things more interesting.

January 2: Unpack, unpack, unpack.  Also, I cut Chet's hair for the first time.  (The day after Ford's bad haircut we bought clippers from Amazon so that I could give him bad haircuts for free.)

January 3: Church, unpack, cut Chet's hair a little more, go to the store for milk and other bare necessities after going on a trip.  (Target was all out of bread.  How is that possible?)

January 4: Girls go back to school, I go to the dentist at 9:30 for a routine cleaning, and Chet's coworker complements him on his superb haircut.

Here's what's coming up:

Tomorrow, January 5: Our baby boy turns 2!  (I should really blog about his birth...)

January 6: 32-week OB appointment (it's getting close!).

January 7: Ford's 2-year doctor appointment (no more doctor visits this week, please!).

January 12: Chet's birthday!

January 27: Sydney's 6th birthday!

January 31: Yours truly's birthday!

Whew.  I'll share just enough pictures to keep you reading this blog, and then I have to help Chet wrestle the kids into bed.

Our birthday cake for Jesus.  Sydney was really adamant about putting His "age" on the cake, so we had to improvise (look closely and you'll see we had to use a "5" for the last "s" in His name):

Ready to hit the road on December 27th:

More cake.  Syd did about half of those decorative dots herself:

The boy's not shy.  He'd have us sing "Happy Birthday" all day, every day to him if any of us had the stamina:

What I lovingly refer to as the post-trip bomb.  It only got worse after this (it's slightly better now):

The girls playing happily Saturday morning with their new Calico Critter treehouse school (thank  you, Aunt Carol!), while Chet and I dealt with the downstairs mess: