Monday, January 11, 2010

Christmas in NM & West Texas-Part 1

This year we spent Christmas with Randy's dad in NM. Andrew, Kristi, and Bella met us at our apartment. We loaded their SUV and headed out to Odessa. After a few bathroom breaks, and dinner at Sweetwater (restaurant shall remain nameless), we finally pulled into Odessa around 10:30. We all were so ready to get out of the car. If we only knew what was ahead.

We went to bed, only to wake up to a very sick Andrew. Let's just say, he was the only one of us who ate the pizza and he's the only one who got sick. We quarantined him to the bedroom and the rest of us hung out, enjoying the short time we had together. After a yummy dinner of brisket, it was time to open presents! Bella got to go first, of course. We didn't get to see her on her birthday this year, so she got an extra one from me and Uncle Randy to open first. This was her birthday bear (complete with handmade tutu!).

And because every little girl needs a tutu too...

Bella got one too! Thanks to Tiffany, I got this last minute gift finished just in time. I think she likes it. :)

Bella got lots of other fun toys/stuff from Mim & Papaw Bruce. It was fun to watch her open all her gifts, she knew exactly what to do and would go right from one to the next one!

We did our stockings next. Randy & I had a lot of fun this year trying to figure out what to put in the stockings. Who knew they made Fruit & Nut candy bars?


Sunday morning we headed out very early to New Mexico. Andrew was feeling better, finally, and all of us were praying we didn't get whatever he had. The drive was good, long, but good. And we ALL were ready to get out once we got to Ronnie & Lupita's house around lunch time.

Monday, Kristi woke up sick and was in bed all day. Lupita and I went grocery shopping and that afternoon the guys went shooting. Bella and I hung out by ourselves that afternoon. Poor baby girl wasn't feeling the best. By Tuesday afternoon, she had a very high fever. High enough to warrant a trip to the ER. The doctor just told them it was a high fever with unknown origin, gave her Tylenol and Ibuprofen, and an antibiotic and we headed home. By that time, it had started snowing! We stopped at Walmart to get some last minute necessities (if we got snowed in) and Bella and I stayed in the car. We were playing with her toys, and she was feeling better after getting some meds in her system. All of the sudden I hear this loud noise and look at Bella. She looks at me and says, "Stinky!" Lets just say, this was one of the worst diapers I have changed so far! I know I have lots of these to look forward to. :) Thanks for breaking your Aunt Rachel in, Bella!

Wednesday morning we woke up to SNOW! It had snowed all night and everything looked so white that morning.

After breakfast we all bundled up and headed outside to enjoy the snow. One of the few times I've seen snow anywhere close to Christmas!

For some reason, it was decided to build the snowman on the porch. This is what we ended up with:

The snow was so fluffy it was really hard to pack into anything. So this was the best we could do.

Oh! Katrina and Caleb arrived Monday night too! I hadn't seen them since Caleb was 6 months old and he is 2.5 now. It was fun to have the whole family there together for Christmas.

For Christmas Eve, we decided to go to City of Rocks. Turns out State Parks are closed on Christmas Eve. Who knew! So we headed to the city park instead. The park still had lots of snow on the ground, so we built another snowman. This one was a little bit bigger!

And in typical guy fashion, a day at the park wouldn't be complete without a climb on the climbing wall.


Since this post is getting so long, I'm going to put the rest of it in another post.

2 comments :

Amy said...

You look so TALL in that pic of all of you and the snowman!

Love the pics of Bella and her tutu! Soooo cute!

Rachel said...

I wish I could say pregnancy has made me grow in height, but the rest of them are really just short. Shorter than me! Randy and I both noticed the same thing and thought it was funny!