Holiday Wrap Up

The past week has been crazy and so to try and catch up with everything we'll do the full holiday wrap up in one post - of course complete with pictures!

The Wednesday before Christmas, I got a call in the morning that Parker was sick. By the time I got to go pick him up, he was have some major issues - fever, high heart rate, oxygen not doing so hot. After a trip to the doctor and a nap...

We ended up at home for two days on our usual rotation of meds and treatments because the doctor gave us a diagnosis of tonsillitis, sinus infection, strep throat and aggrivation of all his airway and lung problems. I told the doctor he had a couple days to get him fixed in time for Christmas.

Christmas was lots of fun this year. While they don't really understand what's going on, they are able to participate more and tear open presents. They got so excited about everything, there was constant squeals and laughter. They played and played and played and played. We stayed in jammies for the weekend, took a couple naps, ate, and they were completely spoiled rotten. And now it's up to us find somewhere to put everything. We could open up another Gymboree or Toys R Us (so if anyone wants to come play, come on over!).

For New Years Eve we had some plans. We started our morning at the zoo. We met Kristin, Sydney and Ava and had a GREAT time! We checked out the pavilion, got a few party favors, then headed to the jungle restaurant to use a table. The girls brought muffins and cupcakes and cards to celebrate my birthday with me. Love you guys! When we were done, we headed to the gorilla house. Parker and Payton squealed every time they saw a gorilla. And every time a monkey moved, they both pointed and made more noise. It was hysterical to everyone within ear shot. Once we were done there we headed back to the pavilion for the ball drop at  noon. Very fun...and it was absolutely packed. Sydney and Ava made a dive for it when they dropped and came up with an elephant and a giraffe beach ball for the kiddos to bring home.

Later in the afternoon, we checked out the First Night party at Bloomer School. We danced around to a drum circle that some students were playing in and doing battle on the drums. We got balloons made - a smiley face guy for Parker and a flower corsage for Payton. Payton even got her picture in the newspaper with her fancy balloon! We even tried face painting for the first time. Payton liked it but Parker got one spider leg drawn on his cheek and that was all he was going to take. Maybe next year. We also got to meet a real live reindeer, got to pet him and take our picture with him. Parker was a little more into her then Payton was, but she was so sweet.

Chris went and got take out for dinner when we got home. The babies were asleep at their normal time. We had some chocolate birthday cake after that and were out early. We got our first look at 2012 when Payton started the new year at 3:00 a.m. for the day.

We hope everyone had a great new years! Here's to an even better 2012 - more steps forward, more laughs, more milestones, more inspiration, and more love. Thanks to everyone that had helped with even one of those over the past year - you're appreciated more than you know.

Stay tuned...more to come!