<p>Wow, emilybee, that is one huge preemie! Was the mom diabetic? It sounds like he is in good health if they are planning the bris on time. My baby brother was a 31-weeker and his bris wasn’t until about 2 months after he was born. Hope all is well with mom and baby and best to all during the holidays!</p>
<p>Mathmom, no she wasn’t diabetic just the daddy is 6’ 2" and she is tiny - 5’1". They knew months ago the baby was going to be too big for her to deliver naturally if she went anywhere near her due date. </p>
<p>She gained a total of 11 pounds of which the baby was 7 and change!</p>
<p>Best wishes to AvonMom. ShawWife is recovering nicely. She took off the soft cast today. She drove yesterday and is doing many things. The doctor said it went as well it possibly could and it was much better than ShawWife feared. Not clear how soon she’ll be able to paint, but we’ve got a week here and a week in Mexico (rented a house on the Sea of Cortez). Then we’ll see.</p>
<p>We’re waiting with bated breath for ShawD’s Biology grade. If she has a B or higher, then we have some interesting decisions to make and another set if she doesn’t. It’s a good subject for her but she said it was a very tough exam and grading is much harder up in Canada.</p>
<p>Great news for ShawMom. </p>
<p>Also wonderful to hear that AvonMom is home and recovering nicely.</p>
<p>Merry Christmas to those celebrating! Coffee is on here for those who want to escape for awhile. Come on over for a minute, an hour, or a day. The door is open and the coffee pot will be bottomless.</p>
<p>Thanks for the coffee, Bajamm. Merry Christmas to those celebrating. I hope you have a wonderful day with your families. We will observe the traditional Jewish Christmas with movies and Chinese food.</p>
<p>Merry Christmas to all who celebrate! And Momjr - enjoy the movies and Chinese food - sounds good to me!</p>
<p>I have my cappuccino maker revved up and ready to go (I’m addicted). All who want can come by.</p>
<p>We did some shopping in empty stores yesterday afternoon, returned to find ShawSon home, had dinner, and went to see Mission Impossible (fun but mediocre; as ShawSon pointed out, the plans they came up with were probably the stupidest of all time). But, when we take the kids, we have to thread Action and Relationships. If we do one without the other, one kid won’t go. Superhero movies work well.</p>
<p>Tonight, momjr, we’re doing Sherlock Holmes followed by Sichuan. (See [Chinese</a> Food On Christmas - YouTube](<a href=“Chinese Food On Christmas - YouTube”>Chinese Food On Christmas - YouTube) for the Chinese Food for Christmas Song).</p>
<p>We want to see The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, but are going to wait for ShawD to read it or just see it ourselves. Are there any other good films out there.</p>
<p>Are there any other good movies out there?</p>
<p>^^really want to see My Week with Marilyn…and The Artist…but we are actually doing a family Chanukah tonight at a local kosher deli (can’t do Chinese with gluten free)…</p>
<p>Merry Christmas to all celebrating! Doesn’t really feel “Christmasy” here in the NY area without one millimeter of snow since Snowtober…</p>
<p>FYI…the new Kutschers Deli in NYC is doing a “Chinese Christmas menu” today…lol</p>
<p>Merry Christmas and Happy Chinese Food Day! I got a kick out of all the chinese food posts. Warm wishes to all my CC friends!</p>
<p>Happy Christmas to all who celebrate! I also love the Chinese food tradition; we’ll get ours on New Years Eve.
It is a typical Christmas here: no heat. Our boiler has a habit of going out at the holidays, so it was no particular surprise to wake up on Christmas Eve to a cold house. I have a service contract, but after making H talk to the plumber on the phone, it turned out they don’t have the part we need in stock. Plumbers may run emergency services, but parts-supply houses don’t have weekend/holiday hours so we are out of luck until Tuesday. So, fires in the fireplaces and layers of sweaters. I’ll put the roast in the oven soon, which will warm the
kitchen. Oh, well, at least we don’t have any infants or elderly people here this year!</p>
<p>I finally got my Christmas wish and had all my kids home at 1:40 am- this morning, very long story. Parenting is not for the faint of heart. We did get to have gifts & breakfast this am. They are headed to the x’s for dinner. </p>
<p>Merry Christmas to those who celebrate or Happy Holidays to y’all.</p>
<p>Thanks to those who share your wisdom on dealing with holiday stress/challenge. It helps me a lot to go through this season. We have spent some time with my MIL today and H was glad it went well.</p>
<p>^^^Oh dear. Highhead hope you get your heat back soon.</p>
<p>Shaw-Spy movies work for us as family activities. We saw Ghost Protocol two days ago. I thought it was better than what I had expected. Love those spy gadgets. Sherlock Holmes is also on our list.</p>
<p>I was so touched that S1 bought us Christmas presents this year! Old war movies for H (his favorite), Lego for S2 and his U mascot pillow throw combo for me. In addition, he made to the university honors list. I could not be any happier!!!</p>
<p>Highhead, booo for no heat; hope that’s remedied quickly!</p>
<p>We had a hot water crisis this morning–my shower was almost-but-not-quite as hot as usual, and then DS said his shower was just lukewarm. It’s been a while since we’ve had three morning showers on the schedule in relatively quick succession, but we think the water heater should handle it just fine so DH thought maybe an element has burned out.</p>
<p>Later, though, we seemed to have hot water, and DH said, “Oh, yeah…I forgot, I did a load of laundry right after I got out of the shower so…maybe that did it.” Bless his heart. ;-)</p>
<p>Wishing you all a wonderful holiday season with your families!</p>
<p>Wishing all a very Merry Christmas. :D</p>
<p>Highhead - hope they get that part in soon. </p>
<p>sunnyday - how nice of your S! My S bought “gag” gifts at a thrift store for everyone. I gave him sweatshirts from his school to give to H & 11yoD because I figured he would have nothing. His sister expressed delight at the sweater he gave her but later told H that she was disapointed with it. She spent a lot of her money on his gift and tried to make it special. I think he still has a lot of maturing to do. </p>
<p>Shaw _ H and I saw girl with dragon tatoo a few days ago. I liked it despite not so good reviews. We both had read the book though and I am not so sure it you havdn’t read it it you would get it all. Glad Shaw wife is making a nice recovery.</p>
<p>Emilybee - congrats on the new baby! </p>
<p>We have had a couple of whirlwind days and I can say that even though I have enjoyed visting others and having others visit us, I am glad we are done. I am looking forward to some down time next week. </p>
<p>Hope everyone had a great holiday.</p>
<p>An almost belated Merry Christmas greeting to all (seeing as it is nearly midnight).</p>
<p>We were able to have both older S and D and their spouses and the 4 grandkids for lunch and a holiday gift exchange today. Older D is an ICU nurse who was scheduled to work but had the good fortune of being called off so she got to enjoy the day with her family and us.</p>
<p>I had to chase AvonMom out of the kitchen a couple of times as she is finding sitting and resting and not working in the kitchen the hardest part of her recovery. :eek: We did just fine as I managed to coordinate a buffet of New England clam chower; honeybaked ham; penne pasta bake with meat sauce; a green bean casserole; a salad of fresh field greens, spinach leaves and strawberries; baked cinnamon apples; fresh peas and corn; and DIL brought a big pot of mashed potatoes. We finished everything off with fresh apple pie and a rum cake along with Reisling and a Zinfandel wines. AvonMom and the kids were impressed. :)</p>
<p>Lots of leftovers for tomorrow! Hope eveyone has a great holiday week!</p>
<p>sounds like you had a great day, avondad. I am glad!</p>
<p>We are still celebrating Christmas here, we will be off in an hour or so to see my side of the family today. They live 3 hours from here, all of them within 30 minutes or so of each other. I will be glad when it’s over. I much prefer going to see H’s family, even though they are 6 hours away and require an overnight stay.</p>
<p>All here had a very nice CHristmas Eve and all except me had a very nice Christmas Day. I got one of the worse migraines I have had in a long time and missed just about everything. Feeling cautiously better today.</p>
<p>Oh, MM - hugs to you! Maybe people can do a little Christmas again today for your benefit.</p>
<p>I’m glad to hear of the nice times, and sympathize with the rough ones. We had a nice holiday, very action-packed since D1 didn’t arrive until Friday night, and we’d waited to get the tree until she was here. So we got up early, cut the tree, H and I came home and put it up while Ds did the shopping they always do together, had our Christmas Eve dinner and gift exchange among the 4 of us. Yesterday we drove 2.5 hours and back to spend the traditional hoo-hah with H’s huge family, and today we all just get to kick back and and relax.</p>
<p>We’ll also return to Hanukkah and finally have out great latke feast. H cooks them, because as a non-Jewish Midwestern he is Mr. Potato Man.</p>
<p>rodney - I want to see those movies, too.</p>
<p>sunndayfun - I have to tell you that your laundry room incident has continued to make me chuckle for days. I can’t imagine the looks on all of your faces when you walked in and saw the glossy white laundry room. It must have been priceless. I hope the right color sticks easily to the white!</p>
<p>D2 has been saying at intervals how amazed she is that she has completed 1 semester of college. She says she is right on the edge of feeling like here or there is her “real” home. Yesterday she said she is so glad she has a month until she goes back - she thinks by then she’ll be ready to start working that hard again. And she has lots of wonderful and exciting plans this spring! She got lots of Visa gift cards to help pay for the 14+ plays she “has” to see.</p>
<p>Lots of life going on around here - my best wishes to you all, and highest hopes for the journeys yet ahead.</p>