Busy, Busy, Busy

Well, the past week or so has flown by, and we've been like a thousand different places. Last weekend we had Robert cat-sit for us and we drove down to Springfield and spent sometime with Dad and Chris. Our first night there we spent several hours at Incredible Pizza and we accumulated enough tickets for Ell and I to get our own sweatshirt and get a few toys to take back for Robert. Elliott ate at Lambert's Cafe (The home of the throwed rolls) for the first time and he loved every minute. We also checked out the local Toys R Us/Babies R Us while we were down there and we were surprised by all of the the cute little outfits and things for a baby girl that weren't pink (hallelujah!). We also set up and played Dad and Chris' new Wii and helped them get familiarized with it. We came back on Monday after a trip to Bass Pro Shop and recieving our Christmas gifts.

Tuesday I did some laundry, but we had another Doctor appointment that afternoon. We keep being told that everything is great and that the kid's heartbeat is around 150 bpm which is perfect. After making a trip to Wal-Mat we gave Tiger his Christmas Gifts, 12 neon colored mice and a ball with a motorizedfeatherthingy on it.

Wednesday I finished up our laundry and did some house work before we headed to Sterling to stay at Mom and Frank's so we'd be closer to all of the get together's that would take place over the next few days, and we were also expecting a horrible winter storm.

Thursday (Christmas Eve) there was no horrible storm in our area or around Hutch where we went that evening to do Christmas with the Swain's. Dinner was at 5pm at the Airport Steakhouse and then we atttened Ell's Grandparent's church before heading back to open gifts and chit-chat.

Friday (Christmas Day) we slept in till around 10am before going down stairs and opening gifts with Mom, Frank, Robert and all 3 cats and the 2 dogs. Elliott had fun programing his new LED name tag. After getting around we headed over to Grandma and Papa Klein's and had lunch and opened gifts with a few of my cousins and aunts. Grandma was being a pain in the butt and had a major problem of kissing up to Elliott. We tried to get out of there as soon as we could just so we could put all of the dysfunction behind us. We went back to mom's and watched National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation and packed up and loaded up the car. Then we headed over to Nanny and Papa Ricker's house. I helped mom and Aunt Charlotte cook and Elliott and I set the table and poured the water glasses. After dinner and dessert we sat around in the siting room and exchanged gifts (this year we all drew names). Elliott got the hilarious, but informational, Baby Instruction Manual. We then came home and relaxed with Tiger before heading to bed.

Saturday we slept in and lounged around and watched the NFC Championship game from 1982 on the NFL Network before heading over to Tom and Nancy's for dinner. After dinner and dessert we opened gifts and played Taboo and Trivial pursuit.

Sunday (Yesterday) we woke up around 10 am to several text messages on my phone from dad asking if we'd meet him with Robert. I alerted Bob to get ready and after picking up some snacks at the grocery store in town we drove down and picked Rob-Bob up and headed to Parsons to meet dad. We meet at Sirloin Stockade and dad treated us to an early supper around 4:30pm. After making the switch and getting gas at the north edge of town we headed back home. We arrived home around 10pm and after lounging in front of the TV for a few we went to bed.

There isn't much on our agenda today except Laundry today and tonight we're going on a dinner and movie "Date night," which will probably be the last one we'll get in a long time (props to mom for thinking of the gift cards for this).