Santa, Turkey, Family, and Life as a Single Mom

The week of Turkey Day, N and I took Audia and A to have their photo taken with Santa. We did this last year, and hopefully it will be a tradition for years to come. It was quite the spectacle; A started screaming as soon as N put her in Santa's lap, and Audia sat there, looking at A as if to say "what is the problem?" We got a great photo (note the sarcasm), which I'm sure we will hear about when the girls are older :-)

We had a very nice Thanksgiving here at the C/H/C-B house (yes, we have three last names living under one roof. Legally, we actually have four. Ah, the complications of strong, independent women being married to understanding, forward-thinking men!)

Chris' parents drove up from Illinois to join in the fun and spend some quality time with the most adorable, sweet, and all around entertaining granddaughter on the face of the planet. Audia seemed to thoroughly enjoy herself, and we were all pleasantly suprised that she did not have any sort of meltdown despite staying up 2+ hours past her bedtime. The food was, of course, DELISH! Smoked turkey, wild mushroom dressing, cauliflower soufflé, green bean casserole, sweet potatoes, mashed taters and turkey gravy, crescent rolls, pecan pie, and pumpkin pie....all made from scratch. No canned soups or boxed taters for this family. 'Twas fantabulous. My cousin and his family stopped by for dessert; it was really nice to see them. When I was younger, we used to get together with all the cousins on my dad's side of the family pretty regularly, but as time has gone on and people have moved out of MN, we've seen less and less of them. Quite sad, really.

Black Friday was spent avoiding shopping venues of any sort. We went with Chris' parents to the Como Zoo and Conservatory. Audia loved it even more this time than last time; now that she's a pro walker, she got to walk almost the entire time, and had so much fun picking up leaves off the walkway and handing them to Chris. She is proving to be quite a good picker-upper; she puts laundry in the hamper without being asked to, and puts garbage in the garbage also. She even likes helping put her toys away; that is until she gets distracted by a toy and forgets that we're cleaning up :-)

On Tuesday, Chris left for Illinois again to work for his dad. He'll be gone until a week from yesterday....11 days total, which feels like FOREVER! But things have been going well so far; Audia's maturity level allows for a much easier time for me than the first couple times Chris went out there. She's overall much more independent, and listens a lot better when I ask her not to do something. It also helps that I have such great friends out here, all offering to break up the monotony by meeting up for coffee, lunch, dinner, and drinks. It certainly is nice to have such a large group of cool people to hang out with!! :-) XOXO to every one of you.

Well, Christmas is just around the corner, so I've been crafting up a storm lately. I'll post some photos of said crafts here in a day or two....nothing too amazing, but all things that make me happy. You know what they say about idle hands!