Friday, December 30, 2011

Christmas Eve

We celebrated with our immediate family, my daughter Amy and her family, oldest son Robert and his family and youngest son Patrick in from New York on Christmas Eve at my daughter's house.  Every year they seem to gravitate towards one toy, so this year I bought all five of the in-town grandkids the same thing--PlasmaCars.  They were a huge success, as you can see from the pictures below.   They opened other gifts and we adults did, too, and had a lasagna dinner, but the cars were the favorite.


Waiting for the evening to begin

                                                      Sara going for a ride.



Riding through the house on their cars.

 Michael driving his car.


Abbey driving her car
Parade of cars
Daughter-in-law Kathleen taking a spin
 Michael & Erin running in to Patrick, who's trying to ignore them.

Erin taking off
Sons Robert and Patrick with grandson Michael
Katie playing Wii

                                    Rob and daughter Abbey


Teddy Bear Tea

On the 23rd we went to the Teddy Bear Tea at the Ritz Carlton

The kids got their faces painted--or in Katie's case her hand painted.  Katie got a menorah; last year she got a menorah on her face, this time on her hand.

Sara was a reindeer--the same as last year.

Michael got presents painted on his hand.
They decorated Christmas cookies.
The tea ended with a story, read next to the fireplace.


Katie turns 10

Now that I've sort of figured out this blog thing, I'm going to post more pictures of the past week, so I have a record of it all.  It started with our first granddaughter, Katie's, tenth birthday on Dec. 21.  I think the day she was born was one of my happiest--I had looked forward to being a grandmother for years.



Katie blowing out candles on her ice-cream cake.
Papa and little sister Sara and brother Michael.




Doll house I found for Katie on Craigs List  .

    
Inside of doll house.  


      




Michael and Papa playing Wii.
Katie playing with her new toys
Sara anticipating some birthday cake

Thursday, December 29, 2011

Still Waiting for Grandbaby #8

Well--no baby yet.  My d.i.l. went home from the hospital last night and is on total bed rest.  They go back to her doctor tomorrow morning, and they'll see how she is doing with her blood pressure and water retention.  She is not due for three more weeks, but she' really uncomfortable and the baby seems to be big enough--and I want to be able to go and spend some time before school starts up again.  They are about six hours away from us, so we'll drive there when she goes to the hospital.  I would like to stay a week to ten days, but husband will probably drive back after a few days and I'll fly back. 

Our semester does not actually start until Jan. 17th, but we have meetings the whole week before starting on the 9th.  I wouldn't mind missing the meetings--I'd much prefer being with my new granddaughter.    Here are a few pictures from their baby shower in November:  

                                                            Mommy and Daddy to be:
                                                                                              
                     
                          You can see they had quite a bit of help, from granddaughters and nieces.


It wasn't long until all seven grandkids were there--the two boys had gone out for a boys night out with dads and uncles, but they wanted to come home and join the party.


                           Trying to figure out how they are going to get all of the gifts back to Ohio.

The shower was a success!

They also had two other showers, so now they are ready--can you tell I am anxious???

Wednesday, December 28, 2011

Computer frustration!

I've been trying to make a header for the past week, using Picasa.  I'm having difficulty reducing the size of the collage.  I'll keep playing with it until I can figure it out.  Everyone says it is easy to use, but I'm computer challenged.  We're anxiously waiting to hear if our eight grandchild will be born within the next twenty-four hours.  She is due Jan. 20, but our d.i.l. is in the hospital with high blood pressure, and they might induce her.

Tuesday, December 27, 2011

Christmas-2011

We had Christmas with our daughter Kate and her two children, and son John and his wife Chellie, the day after Thanksgiving, since they were not able to come for Christmas this year.