Fifteen.  It seems impossible to me that Curtis is fifteen today.  Oh my goodness, he’ll have his license in a year.  It freaks me out to think about that.  Fifteen years ago on Christmas Eve, I met Curtis for the first time at Grandma Jane’s house.  I can remember sitting in her rocker by the phone holding him for the first time ever.  It was an awesome Christmas present.  But now my little Beasty boy is getting his driving permit.  Man.

Happy birthday, Curty!  We can’t wait to spend time with you in Florida at Christmas.  Hope you had a great day today!!

I knew I should say that we were hoping this sickness didn’t catch the whole family!  Now I also have a miserable cold, and I can certainly understand why the kids have been so crabby the last few days.  I had been a little bit stuffy earlier in the week, but yesterday afternoon my voice started to get all raspy, and by the end of the day today I could barely make a sound.  Today was day 2 of Grandma Kerber daycare at our house, because both kids are still battling fevers and full of congestion.  It’s not pretty.

Please, oh please, let this mean that we’ll be healthy for our trip to Florida.  We really don’t want to spend that drive down being all coughy, sneezy, and sniffly.  Really.

Today was the second annual Mother/Daughter Christmas shopping day in Bloomington/Normal.  Unfortunately, because we were having 40 mph winds and it was snowing up in Sycamore, Mom and Nancy decided they better not brave the elements and come down.  We were all so disappointed, but it really wasn’t a good idea for them to be on the road when the weather was so ugly.  So much for our “annual” event…it lasted one year!  But I had taken a personal day off of work, so I was determined to get through my shopping list today.

I was uber-organized, which of course everyone thinks is hilarious.  I’m sure that not many people make detailed spreadsheets for their Christmas shopping lists.  But it’s the way that I work best…planning everything out before I ever leave the house.  Because the weather was so crappy I wanted to be as efficient as possible, too.  Being out in it as little as possible was a definite plus. 

I started with a few stops at department stores like Wal-Mart and Target, and then headed to the mall.  It was hard to make some decisions by myself, but I really did well overall.  By 1:00 pm I was close to being done with all the big presents.  I just had a few gift cards and some stocking stuffers to get, so I was feeling great.  Then I hit the book store and everything came to a screeching halt.

Each year Santa brings each of my kids a nice, hardcover book.  So far, Dave and I have gone together to pick these out, and we really try to pick books that we think the kids will like.  This year, it was really hard for me.  I swear I looked at every picture book they had on display and again as many that were on the shelves.  I did find two great choices, but it seemed to take me forever!  Finally I was out of there and just had a few more stops to make before heading home. 

I spent a lot of money and had to call Dave about a dozen times, but I did get done with my list and really enjoyed my day.  I do love buying gifts for my family and friends.  Now to get them all wrapped…

Unfortunately, Ben is now hacking, too.  I had really hoped that maybe we could avoid the whole family getting sick before vacation, but it doesn’t seem like that’s going to happen.  Emma did go back to daycare today, and she wasn’t feverish or feeling too badly, but she’s definitely not healthy by any stretch.  Her cough is just so bad.  And, as I type, I hear Ben coughing as much or more as his sister.    I’m really hoping that the fever won’t come back for Ems and Ben will avoid getting it at all.  Keep your fingers crossed for us!

Emma barfed again this morning, so she was home from Danielle’s today.  The poor little girl had 103° temperature at one point, and she was just so droopy that it really broke my heart.  Dave stayed home in the morning, and I came home from work in the afternoon to stay with her.  We pumped her full of Motrin and Tylenol trying to keep that stinkin’ fever down.  Luckily, she had a really good nap and seemed to be a bit perkier after that.  I don’t think it’s anything more than a bad cold, so we’re not planning to go to the doctor anytime soon.  Hopefully it will run its course, quickly, though, because she was pretty miserable today.

Ryan stayed over last night, and the kids were so excited to see him this morning.  Ben wrestled and wrestled with him, and to Ryan’s credit, he just let it happen.  It actually brought back so many memories of me playing with Ryan when he was that age.  Ben reminds me of him so much.  I can still hear Ry Ry shouting, “Wrestle!” as we rolled around on the floor, and then this morning it’s like I was reliving the past as I heard Ben shouting the same thing.  It was awesome.

The kids are lucky to have a cousin like Ryan.  Although it’s tough having him so much older than Ben & Emma, he really seems excited to be a part of their lives, and they will certainly learn a lot from him.  If our kids turn out to be like Ryan, we would be very fortunate parents.

Although seeing Santa would make for a very full day for us, we weren’t done.  The Atherton family was having a holiday get-together at Bob & Marla’s in Earlville, so we headed North from State Farm to attend.  Ry Ry hadn’t planned on attending, but at the last minute he got a ride over to Normal and hopped in with us.  Grandma Judy and Nancy were surprised to see him when we got there.  They were both so excited that he came with us, that I think we scored big-time brownie points bringing him! 

The most unfortunate part of the evening was when Emma barfed all over herself while we were eating.  I think that she just gagged because she’s been coughing some today, but regardless of why it was pretty gross.  Thank goodness we had thrown jammies into the diaper bag…her cute Christmas outfit was covered in vomit and she had to be changed.  As usual, she recovered fine, and had a really good time with all the kids.  Ben struggled to deal with Digger, Bob & Marla’s dog, most of the night.  But a couple of the older kids were big helpers with Ben.  Reiss, my cousin Lisa’s 8th grade daughter, finally got Ben to pet Digger a couple of times, and he wasn’t freaking out quite so much when Digger would run by.  The poor kid is just scared of dogs, and as much as he doesn’t want to, he just is.

We certainly don’t see that side of my family often enough anymore.  It was fun to visit with my cousins and it was definitely great to see Grandma Jane.  It had been way too long since we had.  She looked great, by the way, and seemed to be pretty coherent tonight.  It’s difficult for her when there’s a large crowd, but at least she knew my kids, which was great for me.   Even though it made for a very busy day, the party was fun and I was glad we went.  It’s nice to keep the family together as much as possible.

Today was Santa day, and it pretty much went exactly as I thought it would.  About three days ago, Ben started saying that he didn’t want to talk to Santa.  You could hear in his voice that he was not going to be talked into this.  He did not. want. to talk. to Santa.  So Dave and I thought we would have him write a note, and maybe when we got there he’d change his mind.  Wishful thinking, but one can always hope.

Just before we were ready to go, I asked Ben to come help me with a note for Santa.  He was way more into the Christmas show we had on, and really didn’t even want to do it, but I insisted, and he finally half-heartedly dictated to me.  He even signed his own name, although I’ve seen him write it so much better before.  Like I said, he was very distracted by his show.  I got Emma all dressed up in her Christmas outfit and she loved it.  In direct contrast to Ben, she was dancing all over the kitchen and was so excited to go.  We were all set.  Ryan ended up coming with us, because we were going to a family Christmas party afterwards and he was riding with us.  So off we went to State Farm to see the big guy himself.   

When we got there Ben started in right away insisting that he didn’t want to talk to Santa.  I tried to get a few pictures of the kids at all of the photo spots while Dave was in line, but as usual both of them were pretty wild running to each one like maniacs.  At least I got one very cute shot at the fireplace, though, so I was relatively happy with that.  That atrium is a crazy place on Santa Day, so I can’t really expect them to be calm when they’re so excited and around lots and lots of other wild kids. 

Finally we were next in line.  Ben was behind me and didn’t even want to hand his letter to Santa, so I finally convinced him to hand it to the elf who was helping.  After that, he hid behind me the entire time…most of it with his head buried beneath my sweater.  Meanwhile, Emma walked right up, sat on Santa’s lap, told him she wanted “a toy” and then posed for her picture beautifully.  She loved it!  Santa did read Ben’s note while we were still standing there, so at least Ben was pleased to know that Santa knew where to leave his gifts.  

I shouldn’t say that I knew exactly what would happen with Santa, because Emma actually surprised me.  I figured as soon as she actually got close to Santa she would chicken out, too.  I should have known she would talk to him, though.  She told me she would do it, and when that little girl makes her mind up about something, not much changes it!

Tonight we partook in one of our favorite winter traditions…going to Alexander’s for steak.  We went with our friends Buck and Amy, and it was a really enjoyable night out.  The reason I call this a winter tradition is because at Alexander’s you grill your own steak.  They have giant brick enclosed grills that are constantly hot, and you get to pick your own piece of meat and cook it the way you like it.  In addition, they have a big pan of potatoes all wrapped in foil, loaves and loaves of Texas toast, and a giant vat of butter with brushes so you can add as much or as little to both items.  Add to that the many seasonings that sit around the grill and you really end up with a seriously good meal.  To be honest, none of this is that fun in the summer heat.  But in the winter, there is something about standing around a giant grill holding a cold beer that works.  If you’ve never been, I highly recommend you visit one soon.

One of my favorite Christmas traditions is making Christmas cookies and candy.  Now it’s something I look forward to even more since both of the kids love to help.  Tonight we started with something very easy, the circle pretzel treats.  In case you’re not familiar with these, it’s a very simple recipe…you lay circle pretzels out on a cookie sheet, put one Rolo or Hershey Kiss (I really like the candy cane kisses) inside it, pop it in the oven for a very short time, top each one with a Christmas colored M&M to squish it down into the pretzel, and then let them cool.  They are super simple, super cute, and very yummy. 

Both Ben and Emma were very serious about helping.  Basically all they did was unwrap candy and set it in the pretzels, but it was enough for them.  They were super excited.  Shockingly, though, the next night after dinner, neither one of them really liked the treat they got for dessert.  Go figure…my crazy kids!

I’m sure we’ll make much more before we’re done, but it was definitely fun and helped me get into the Christmas spirit even more tonight!