Santa Baby

Well, our first Christmas came and went in a flash! The days leading up to were filled with a flurry of activity; cooking, cleaning, shopping, wrapping, eating, repeat, repeat, repeat.

Now I just feel bloated.

All of the effort is well worth it though. We had a fantastic 1st Christmas with the little man. He received way more presents than any one kid would ever need. We had countless laughs with friends and family and plenty of good food and drink were shared.

Christmas Eve was spent at my Aunt's house with my dad's side of the family. Kudos to my Aunt for hosting 35 of us for dinner (and that was with some people missing!) as that is no small undertaking. Jax had a great time with all of his "older cousins" making a fuss over him. He stayed up until a whopping 10:30 before finally passing out from all of the excitement.

Christmas Day was spent at our house where Jax got to see all of the great presents that Santa left behind for him as soon as he woke up. A highlight was his spanking new exersaucer which has way too many sounds, lights, whistles, etc... completely one of those items I swore I would never buy but did anyway- and my son simply could not love it any more. Just another example of ways in which our kids change us. Pre-baby I had visions of a house filled with beautiful wooden toys that made no noise and beautiful stuffed classic things, that my son would cherish. Post baby, all of those beautiful items are stashed in Jackson's toy basket because he couldn't care less for them, as his interest goes directly towards the loudest most obnoxious looking thing he can get his hands on. I am left with no other choice than to concede and buy him those items myself, because the smile on his face when he discovers something new is worth more to me than any beautiful baby toy fantasy that I had. Looks like I'll be stocking up on Excederin in the months ahead, all in the name of love.

I would say my first Christmas dinner was a success, judging from the compliments. The hubbs did a great job as my assistant helping me prep before everyone got there (shoutout to Jax for the 3hour nap which enabled this to happen.) Rob was the master sous chef, chopping and dicing for me as well as setting up special wine pairings for each course of dinner, his area of expertise. This year's menu included: white truffle risotto with prawns and proscuitto crips, crown rack of pork with spiced chutney, potato-leek gratin and brussel sprouts with pancetta and chestnuts. Sounds ambitious but most everything except the risotto was prepped in advance so everything came together pretty easily, allowing us to enjoy a very relaxed evening. Just the way I like it.

We capped off the night with a traditional Bouche de Noel and old fashioned Nutcrackers filled with paper crowns, trinket toys and jokes, which gave everyone a few laughs. High fives all around to a family that doesn't take themselves too seriously as evidenced by the crown wearing that lasted well into the evening.

As we look forward to a week ahead of fun holiday filled activites before 'dad' heads back to work , I just want to say thanks to our family for making it a truly Merry Christmas. We are one lucky group.