Tuesday, December 27, 2011

Christmas 2011

How was your Christmas? Ours was really good.
Lucy was really spoiled. She got lots of new toys.
But this one was her favorite:
Yes, she played with the box more than she did with her new toys. Why we even bothered to buy her toys at all is still a mystery.
Hope everyone had a Merry Christmas!

Friday, December 9, 2011

Today is Mike's Birthday.


His 30th birthday. The big 3-0. As this is a huge milestone (and one that totally SUCKS, by the way (not that I know, being only 21 myself)), I was going to throw him a party. But . . . alas . . . life and promises made to others happened instead. (Plus, he told me he didn't want a party. The big party-pooper.)

So . . . I took him to Ruth's Chris Steakhouse last night. Yeah, that's the steak we ate last night (half-finished). The thing was bigger than my face. (Face? Try bigger than my whole head!) We got the Porterhouse for 2. I've never seen so much meat in my entire life. Although, Mike told me he could have finished it himself.

Have you ever been to Ruth's Chris? We never had before and we were very impressed with the service. (The food was good too, but not really worth the $$$$.) (Although, I highly recommend the Lobster Bisque.) I had made a reservation and they had asked me if we were celebrating anything special. So, when we arrived at our table, there was a little birthday card from Ruth's Chris sitting on the table for Mike. How nice.

So, we're sitting there, enjoying our 600 ounce steak, and all we can hear is the lady at the table behind us talking. LOUDLY. Seriously, a the fire alarm wouldn't have drowned her out.

So, Mike and I are pretty much sitting in silence, because it is impossible for us to talk over this lady. And I must have had a weird look on my face or something, because one of the waiters came up to our table and said to us, "Don't worry, I think their leaving soon."

It took me a minute to process what he was saying.

I was mortified!

I felt awful that my face must have registered my disdain for this loud woman and the staff felt that they needed to say something to me about it!

Although, Mike might have been right, that the wait staff was probably making fun of her too, so they were just letting us know that they felt our pain.

I was still mortified, though.

Anyway, since it was Mike's birthday, our waiter "bought" Mike dessert: He wanted the chocolate bread pudding. YUMMY! Although, we discussed it and we think Ruth's Chris needs to serve this dessert with whipped cream. It is really rich and we needed something to cut the sweetness.

Happy Birthday, Baby!
(If only this were true from Mike to me.)
P.S. Congratulations to Ed & Jen on the birth of their beautiful new baby girl! She's gorgeous!

Friday, December 2, 2011

A Christmas Tradition


It's my favorite time of year! I love, love, love Christmas time. Love, love. LOVE.

LOVE.

Lucky for me, I grew up in a family who loves Christmas as much as I do. My mom always turns the house into an absolute fairyland! (And some years that is literally a fairyland. My mom does "themes" for Christmas. Each Christmas, she picks a different theme for the year. Santas, snowmen, nutcrackers, gingerbread men, and her favorite, fairies. (YES, she has enough Christmas decorations to decorate with just that one theme each year. YES, storing all those Christmas decorations drives my dad nuts.) And my mom loves glitter. To her, glitter is her prozac. Mike always says he knows when Lucy has been at Grandma's because she comes home with glitter on her. And her Christmas decorations have tons of glitter! My dad always says everything is glitter-covered at their house until July.)

Anyway, one of our traditions has been to visit the Festival of Trees. And this year, it means that Lucy met Santa for the first time! We had a hard time getting her to smile, because she really needed a nap, but she didn't scream, so I'd say it was a win. I've got to say (and Mike will laugh when I admit this) the trees were a little disappointing this year.

Except for this one: The "U" on top lit up. It was awesome. I must try to find one for our tree. I'm betting Mike would prefer that to the purple butterfly that adorns our tree now.

And this "Tangled" Gingerbread House was pretty impressive: But, mostly, it was a disappointment. Seriously (and I'm not sucking up so Santa will bring me more presents!), my mom's Christmas trees are a lot better than most of the trees we saw.

I'm so excited to be able to share my favorite time of year with Lucy this year (yeah, because an almost 8-month-old really knows what's going on, right?!)!

Right.