34 Weeks, and a Lovely Holiday to Boot

Just a brief update before I go make some more goat milk formula.

We had a truly lovely few days around these here parts. First, we had a great Christmas dinner at our neighbors' house. Barbara and Chris had picked up a package for us (well, for Hallie) on Wednesday and I stopped by their place on the way home to retrieve it. When Barbara heard that we were laying low and staying home for Christmas rather than going to Aunt Laura's and Uncle Bryan's to be with the family, she asked us to have dinner with them. And so we did. Hallie had a blast playing with their engaging three year old, Adam, and his two older brothers Conor and Benjamin, and we had an excellent time (and fabulous dinner) with Barbara, Chris, and her parents.

Our Friday plans with Jake and Gina, alas, fell through because Jake came down with a cold (which is a horrible thing to get on Christmas, especially when one's mommy has taken the whole week off and has planned lots of fun activities), but we're rescheduling for January 2nd, and hopefully Jake will be better by then. Nevertheless, Hallie had a great day with us and was in a terrific mood. She enjoyed playing with her new toys (a wonderful feeding set and high chair from Mark, Vanessa, Karina and Ariana and this highly engaging set of eggs and her dress up Disney gear from Jake and Gina, as well as tumbling on her mat and reading some of her new books).

Then, today, her cousins, Uncle Bryan and Aunt Laura, and Grammy came down to celebrate the penultimate night of Chanukah with us. We had yummy sandwiches from Sarcone's Deli on 9th Street in the Italian Market and equally yummy cookies from Isgros, as well as other assorted local delicious snacks. She loves all of her new toys (among other things, a doctor's pretend play set; an easel and accompanying art supplies; a Little People Farm; and a toddler karaoke set) but enjoyed the company of her cousins even more. She had a blast playing when they arrived and then tuckered herself out and fell asleep on Uncle Bryan's chest; after a brief snooze she was up and running again and continued to play until she collapsed with happy exhaustion at around nine pm.

Hallie has also been feeling incredibly well lately and this shows in her mood. We're not sure what happened, but her tummy is emptying nicely right now, and consequently she's eating and drinking really well (including a few stolen sips of Diet Coke and Diet Birch Beer, which she seems to really like a lot...of course, since it has no calories, these would be drinks of choice for her!). But whatever is going on, we're really enjoying it and we're now at 171 days of spew free existence this year. We're hoping this is just the start of a trend, but whatever it is, it's a great holiday present for the whole family, whose existence has become much less stressful this week relative to the past few months.

And, if this were not enough, Sharon is now 34 weeks pregnant and is still feeling great. The baby occasionally jabs her in an uncomfortable place (a nerve, perhaps) but otherwise seems quite content to stay inside where she should be. Just six weeks to go, more or less, and that seems a tad bit surreal to us right now.

I did take some pictures today but have yet to upload them, so stay tuned for a picture update later on this week!