· A Little Ditty ·: steroidal weekend update

after a couple of lazy weekends, this weekend was jam-packed. ah, yes friends, it's beginning to look a lot like christmas.

first ... freaky friday:

as mommy and daddy had holiday parties to attend, jack welcomed grandad over for a "play date" and the guys had a grand old time. when mommy called home to check on them, grandad asked, "jack's gotten 'nilla wafers out of the cupboard -- is he allowed to eat those?" as mommy gave dispensation, she overheard, "oh, wait, stop jack, slow down! he's pulling everything out of the cupboard!" yeah. welcome to our world, grandad! it's been like that ever since jack stole the cupboard lock (we still haven't located it, but believe it to be inside the subwoofer).

during this visit, jack also pretended to go to sleep, learned how to operate a ball-point pen and, knowing grandad, may have learned some basic princples of physics (remember, jack: f=ma). sadly, no photographic evidence exists of this visit, so i guess jack's time with his grandfather was like being in las vegas ... what happens with grandad stays with grandad!

silly saturday found jack and mommy headed off to playgroup for a chance to hang out with our many friends. all of us save one gathered at bea's house for a great time. bea has a great playroom in her basement with lots of fun toys, so playgroup was a huge hit!

after a much-needed nap, mommy and jack braved the holiday crowds at the mall to take jack's 18 month photo. more on this to come tomorrow, but suffice it to say that jack looked a-*dor*-able!

the guy taking the photos, miguel, was a spanish speaker. when he blew bubbles to get jack engaged, jack responded with "¡mas!" miguel got a real kick out of our little blondie ordering him around en español.

while waiting for the photos to be ready, we sought refuge in starbucks. mommy had a half-caf latte and jack had "coffee milk" (in the parlance of his cousin). within about 42 seconds flat he had charmed the woman next to us, waving to her, saying "hi" and doing "cheers" with her. what a flirt!

with our cute (free) photo in hand, we headed home to dinner and to daddy and to a good night's sleep.

and then dawned sunday ... and that's our funday

after a morning at home, we set out to get our christmas tree. we went close to home and probably paid too much, but we found a good one that jack was happy with (complete with bird's nest!):

feeling moved by the holiday spirit we headed to a local toy store where they were having a visit from santa. kids were encouraged to sit on his lap and tell him their wishes while parents took photos. we waited patiently ... and not so patiently ... until we were at the head of the line. and then jack took his turn with old saint nick.

yes, it was a disaster. if you're not sure, here's a close-up of jack's face. note the actual tears rolling down his cheeks.

so, we beat a hasty retreat from that monster kris kringle, made our purchases and headed for home.

we tried to salvage what was left of the day with a late afternoon/evening playground trip. mostly jack just burned off some energy in the cold, damp dusk while mommy and daddy tried to stay upright through their exhaustion.