A Long Blog!

We had a really great week with my grandparents - lots of shopping, eating out, and cooking!  Thank you so much for coming it meant a lot to us! Darn that weather for letting you leave though – it would have been even more fun had you been stranded here!

It’s been a while since we put anything up so this entry threatens to be a long one.  Last Tuesday Jonas worked a half day so we could all go to the airport and meet the grandparents.  They arrived 20 minutes early so that didn’t quite work out. We met up with them nonetheless in the baggage claim. Then we all came back to the apartment and rest for a bit and chatted.  Later we decided to go to McGrath’s Fish House for a late lunch/early dinner. Of course after our meal we decided to go to Harry & David’s since it was just next door.

On Wednesday we had decided to go out shopping so I brought Jonas to work so we could have the car for the day.  I think we all got up and around at 1pm.  Then we headed off to the mall.  Jonas got off work around five and I headed off to pick him up. We made an awesome dinner a little later – pasta salad with tomatoes, arugula, pine nuts and herb pesto.  Then we decided that we had to have some meat so we made meatballs in a teriyaki sauce.  Everything turned out so good!  Jonas made a Chocolate cream pie all from scratch afterwards – we were dying to eat it but it didn’t set up till the next day (it was good then too)!

Thursday was girl day!  I dropped Jonas off at work in the very early morning hours so we could have the car again.  I wasn’t in a great mood for having gotten up at the ungodly hour of 6am.  I don’t know how Jonas does it every morning!  Having a car was great though.  We all slept in till at least 11am and then my grandma, Emma and I headed out.  We went to Barnes and Noble first.  Emma was not in a good mood and being in a super quiet book store was a mistake.  I took Emma to the children’s section in hopes of quieting her down while my grandma shopped around. From the moment we arrived she began taking all the books off the shelves and she screamed her head off when I picked them up and when I tried diverting her to something else.  My grandma heard her clear across the store screaming and came running over and said she was done and I said I’ll meet you back at the car. So I took my screaming child, stroller, ringing cell phone and all out of the store.  I think just about everyone stared at me.  So when we were headed back to the car Emma was kicking and screaming and kicked her boot off at a car which then set off its car alarm! We were hoping to go out to lunch at a nice place and do more shopping but Emma was being such a pill.  So we went to Dairy Queen instead where Emma quieted right up with her first happy meal.  She ate half her cheeseburger and all her fries!  Then we headed home and Emma went right to sleep with a belly full of grease and salt.  I picked Jonas up after work and then we spent the entire night snacking on leftover pasta and we finally dug into the chocolate cream pie which turned out beautifully.  Oh and we watched the Republicans debate in Florida!

Jonas had Friday off as usual.  We had a car appointment to get the inner part of the passenger door replaced since its handle had been sticking.  So Jonas went to that appointment.  He came home two hours later having made the mistake of not checking the door before he left the dealership.  It didn’t open at all.  So we called up the dealership to let them know what was up.  Jonas left again to go get it fixed.  The dealership called him up when he was half way there and said that it wasn’t possible to get the car in today.  He went in today to get it fixed [again] and [again] they couldn’t fix it – they even had to call up Hyundai.  So it is now going to hopefully be fixed next Friday.  Anyway, back to last week: we spent the rest of the day opening the door from the inside. After the dealership mess we all headed to Costco to pick up diapers and wipes which we were out of.  We also picked up some other goodies.  Then we went out to dinner at “Si Casa Flores.”  We had a wonderful dinner and enjoyed some really tasty Pina Coladas as well. Later we watched “Pirates of the Caribbean 2” which my grandparents hadn’t seen.

Saturday we woke up to a beautiful, sunny, warm, 60 degree day.  So we took the grandparents to Ashland to show them the sites.  We walked through all of downtown and grandma and grandpa spoiled Emma with a ton of cute clothes at a fun store called “Bug -A- Boo” which is the cutest little organic, hippie, children’s store (for example, one of her shirts is made from recycled tea leaves!)  Then we rushed back to the house to find out the results of the Democratic primary in South Carolina.  No surprises there.  For dinner we ordered up a bunch of pizza from “Papa John’s.”  We got two free pizzas out of the deal since they forgot about Jonas sitting in the waiting area for about half an hour.  We watched “Judge Dredd” which is an awesome Sylvester Stallone movie.  My grandparents enjoyed it for the first time.

Sunday we woke up to a fairly warm day which was great since the weatherman was calling for snow.  As we were getting ready to go the temperature began to drop and it began to rain. It dropped ten degrees in an hour and the rain began to turn into snow.  We quickly drove to Jacksonville to do some shopping and looking around.  Then we went to the mall and when we came back to the car we found it covered under an inch of snow and the snow was still coming down – hard!  The flakes were huge; like the size of Emma’s palm!  We made our final stop at Target and then headed home quickly, because the blizzard was getting really bad and the roads were awful.  Later that night, however, Jonas and grandpa went to the theater to see “Atonement.”  Us girls stayed home and watched the last Pirates of the Caribbean movie.  The boys said the movie was interesting but nothing special.

On Monday, Jonas just took the car to work instead of having me brave the roads which were covered in snow and ice.  Once we got up and around my grandma and I took Emma to play in her first real snow.  We were out there most of the day.  Emma loved the snow and kept off her gloves so she could touch the snow and make snowballs with it.  Then she would cry because her hands would get all red and cold.  Jonas arrived home around five and made us all chocolate soufflés with a vanilla crème anglaise sauce.  They were soooo good that we each ate two!

Tuesday morning, bright and early, Jonas took my grandparents to the airport for there flight out at 6:30.  We had such a wonderful visit and even though they were here a week, it’s just never long enough!  Jonas went right to work after the airport and put in 12 hours of work on his timber sale analysis he’s always working on.  Emma and I were spoiled and got to sleep in, but awoke to an empty house which didn’t feel so great.  I made a tasty dinner though: Farfalle with zucchini and parsley-almond pesto.  It is so tasty and is now my new favorite pasta dish!  When Jonas got home we watched the Florida primaries.  It was a fairly interesting race between McCain and Romney.  We love watching the debates, primaries and caucuses!

EMMA UPDATE

 

• Emma can know say “Grandma” and “Grandpa.”  It was so cute hearing Emma point out and say their appropriate names.  Precious!

• Emma says “Hi There” and “Hey There.”  Emma says this out of the blue and sometime to actual people.  It is so cute!  She also loves waving at people in public places like the grocery store.  She also waves at the TV when we turn it on or off. 

• Emma says “Uh huh.” and “uh oh.”  She says this when she makes a mess or just while she’s babbling.

• Emma says “What’s this” and “What’s that.”  She says while pointing to things she wants to know more about. 

• Emma says “Baby.”  She has this word down well – she sees a baby in a store or on TV and there is a constant, “Baby, baby, baby, baby…” that comes out of her!

• Emma says “Chicken.”  Emma got a puzzle book for Christmas from Grandma and Grandpa Parker and she just loves to take all the farm animal puzzle pieces out and back in again.  Then we read the book to her and say the animal’s names and she puts the puzzle pieces back according to the right animal.  Anyways one of them is a chicken and she now says “Chicken” perfectly!  As for the other animals, she’s getting better at making their sounds (moo, quack, etc.) 

• Emma “Hisses” like a snake when she’s playing with the snake puzzle piece from a different puzzle of hers.

• Emma sings the “Me” song “Me, me, me, me, me, me…” She sings this all the time.  It is by far the cutest thing she is doing lately. 

• Emma can color match socks.  I was doing laundry today and Emma had a huge pile of clean socks and she started to match them and then put them in piles.  Dark pink ones, light pink ones and white ones!  Amazingly she paired them by twos too!

 

TO THE INJURED...

 

Uncle Bob we wish you the very best in the healing process.  You will have your handsome looks back before you know it!

Sister April we wish you happy healing and warmer weather.  It is no fun to have a broken collar bone as Ben and I both know well.  You will be back to your running and dancing before you know it.  Stay off the ice!

JANUARY BIRTHDAYS

 
January 24th: A big happy birthday to Grandpa Galbraith

And on the 31st: A big happy birthday to Uncle Don!