Ketchup

I am playing major Ketchup here! Please scroll down as I have added MANY posts in the last two days. I'm also trying to keep things in order. The next big event is:

William is 11 Months Old


Click the link above to read about our day or to see the new pictures I just put up!

PS Can you believe I am already planning a 1st birthday party?

Christmas Day with the McGarry Family

Our family tradition calls for us to spend Christmas Day with my dad's family. Lucky for us, both sets of my grandparents live in the same town. Everyone was feeling a little better with the exception of the new flubies (Great Grandpa Tom, Aunt Kaye). We opened gifts with Great Grandpa Tom and Great Grandma Gerry and then had a wonderful breakfast of homemade caramel rolls. Unfortunately, we had to pack up and head out early in the day so we could be back in time for Uncle Mike's flight back to California early on the 26th. Mike's travel plans and some weather concerns meant we were on the road by late morning. When we stopped by the Wennersten's to say good bye, we found Santa had come for us again! (He must be getting old, that Santa!)

William helping Mama with her presents: rubber scrapers! Weeee!


Getting more wear out of his "Baby's First Christmas" shirt! Staying out of trouble with Aunt Megan.

We sure enjoyed our time in Grand Forks as it has been part of our family tradition for so many years now. Having William be there with us just made this Christmas very special to us. There were a few things we didn't get to do like: put the double bladed skates on William for a turn around the rink at Wobbly Park, take William sledding at the park and bowling at Red Ray Lanes. We were able to check off the list : William eating Mexican food at La Capana, eating Christmas dinner with the Wennerstens, eating Christmas breakfast with the McGarry's, and lots of play time in between.

Merry Christmas Eve with the Wennerstens!

This one is kind of long, here is a summary. Feel free to read the short version and then skip ahead to the pictures.

Short version: We spent Christmas eve with my mom's family. It was wonderful being together again after several years apart on Christmas. Out of my 28 Christmases, there have been only 3 years I wasn't in Grand Forks for Christmas. We didn't eat because we were sick. We took pictures and opened wonderful gifts.


Long version:
Growing up, we have always spent Christmas Eve with my mom's side of the family and that was the plan this year also. However, it turns out we were packing more than Christmas cheer when we left Rochester. On December 23, John came down with some kind of flu bug. He rested and rested and was sick for the majority of the day. We all stayed clear and tried to enjoy our time with the family and our traditional lunches at La Capana. The evening of December 23rd, the bug spread and took down me, my dad, my sister and eventually my mom*. It was terrible to be sick far away from home on such a special holiday as my baby's first Christmas. So, we spent most of the day laying around and trying to feel better. We were all miserable. Poor John wasn't feeling great yet and had to entertain one very busy toddler by himself in a house full of sick/moaning/whining people. It was a tough day.

We all managed to pull it together for an appearance at the Wennersten's Christmas dinner. I won't say we did much more than that. It was the longest I was upright all day long - and it was hard work. Needless to say, it wasn't the first Christmas I had been planning! I'm a little disappointed with the pictures/lack of pictures, but I do have to say that John is AMAZING. He still wasn't feeling great and was in charge of both photography and keeping William out of trouble. Those two jobs don't really go together!

It spite of the yuckiness, we really enjoyed being together with family for William's first Christmas eve. He enjoyed having lefse again, playing with the wrapping paper, and climbing the stairs at Great Grandma and Grandpa's house.

Cleaning up after dinner: Kevin and Scott clean up the dessert plates.


Great Grandma and Grandpa in front of the tree. Please note: Budd actually DOES know Santa.


Great Grandpa and Grandma with their kids!


Grandma and Grandpa with all their grandkids AND great grandkids.**


Mike is holding William here because I...just couldn't. I was so Very tired!


After the grandchildren picture, I sat down and wasn't feeling like getting up again. So, the McGarry family picture (minus John?) happened on the couch. And yes, I am a little crabby this is the best shot we have.


Wennersten family


I'm calling this one "McGarry Children, in Profile". Nice job John!


Luckily our little boy is brilliant and occupied himself by reading "Ole and Lena" jokes during the photofest.

Kaye & Scott in front of the tree

Again, this is our best shot :( The Heidt family! On the flu!



William playing with one of his favorite Christmas presents. Too bad it wasn't his! It was a rug that is all rolled up with a tag holding it together in the middle. He loved rolling it around!

*It is interesting to note the only people who did not get sick were Michael and William. Interesting, huh?

**The shirt Mike is wearing was ironed by HIM before dinner. During dinner, he managed to spill some sort of sauce on himself as per the Mike McGarry Effect (if you are wearing a shirt, you will spill on it). This shirt was purchased recently when his ship (boat?) sailed from Maine to California. I once knew exactly where it was purchased (somewhere in the south Caribbean?), but I am getting old and feeble and have forgotten.

Christmas Morninig with McGarry's (December 20th) followed by long drive to ND

Wow! I'm so glad we brought our stockings to Minnesota with us because Santa came last night! We must have been good this year because they were full of great gifts for each of us!

Just for fun, we then packed up and were out the door on our way to North Dakota before 10 am! I think we are crazy! We did pretty well, but realized we forgot Will's winter jacket in the closet in MN after it was too late to go back and get it. We got to have wonderful chicken and noodles for dinner and then got to visit with Great Grandma Nona and Great Grandpa Budd. Here are some pictures:

But, I like reindeer! William admires Great Grandma Gerry's Christmas tree.


Grandpa tries to distract reindeer boy.


Click on this one to look at really big - it is too funny with both of them laughing! Also note the climbing is beginning as Will stands on someone's present (Sorry!).


What makes us laugh so hard? Throwing Elmo off the chair onto the floor.

Uncle Mike takes his turn keeping Will out of trouble.


Helping Grandma with her crossword...

The past few days, the amount William eats has dropped dramatically. I wasn't sure what was going on - here is a toofer check in progress. The verdict? I can feel the spikes of four (4) molars coming in!

Here, let me help you with that. William loves all things with buttons that make noise. Cell phones, remotes, computers, and hand held games.

McGarry Family Christmas (December 19)

I'm so far behind, I can't even talk about what we did this weekend! I was just going to skip all the stuff about our trip, but I think I will be sad later if I don't have it there to remember in later years. So, time for a trip back!

We celebrate Christmas with my family on December 19th as it was the only day we could all be together. We were very excited to have Uncle Mike with us on leave from San Diego. William hasn't seen Uncle Mike since he was 3 months old! We usually celebrate Christmas together after Christmas, so it was a little different, but good to be together. We had a dinner of calzones and then opened presents. Will was much more interested in the tree, the wrapping paper, and the plastic garbage bag than the presents - but we still enjoyed watching him play with the toys once they were unwrapped!

Helping Uncle Mike pass out the presents


It looks like he has some presents to open, but really he wants to play with the Christmas tree


More Christmas tree admiring


Showing Aunt Megan our new car!

More cars!

Helping Grandma

A Drum!

Playing Peek-a-boo with Uncle Mike

More cars!

Reading a new book with Grandma

Uncle Mike trying to read Will's new book


Grandpa showing us how not to use a plastic bag. Oh yeah, and trying NOT to smell Will's diaper! Yuck!

Reading with Grandma


Giving his new car some love!

Yeah! Mama got a jogging stroller!

The Makings of A Christmas Card

Here are some of the "options" from the McGarry Christmas card photo shoot. This was never our favorite part of the Christmas tradition, but it sure is fun to look back at the pictures from previous years!

So, the way it worked is by putting the camera on a "tripod" of carefully balanced toys including a wagon, board books, duplos, and a puzzle to capture the family. The camera timer was used by remote - which helped to capture some of these lovely images.


Boys in green, girls in red!


The Winner! And the picture my parents sent out.

The best family picture we had in front of the tree.

Cutest thing ever

I am really truly planning on putting up our Christmas pictures and stuff soon. I was just putting William down for a nap. I was holding him and arranging the blankets in the crib and getting things ready while he was snuggled on my shoulder when he took his hand and gently patted my back twice and said "mama". I patted him twice back and he did it again. Several time, in fact. Then, I thought it was best that I put him down before he cuted me out of his nap entirely.