My Jewish son's first Christmas

Okay, maybe I'm a few weeks late in posting this but better late than never.  We went to Kansas City to spend Christmas with my family and stopped in St. Louis going and coming.  Road trips are always soooo much fun, what with the two adults, two puppies, and angry baby in the little Corolla.  There is always much singing of Old MacDonald and listening to a CD of baby dance tunes.  The baby dance tunes is basically techno/polka instrumental versions of kid songs.  It's horrible, and Eli loves it.  Even the baby techno was not working on the way to St. Louis so we broke out the laptop and Baby Einstein DVD.  Eli watched it for a few minutes and then finally passed out.

Meanwhile this is going on in the front passenger seat.

And this on backseat passenger's lap.

We spent a night in St. Louis, visited Kenny's grandparents and had lunch with his parents.  Then we headed to Columbia for a quick visit with some friends.  I discovered they had a stock pot bigger than ours so I of course had to put Eli in it and take about 40 pictures.

I just love babies in stock pots.  For dinner, we went to the 'Berg.  It's a bar that's been in Columbia for a million years.  It burnt down while we were seniors and they rebuilt it to look exactly the same, only cleaner.  Love to take the baby to bars.

 That night we drove the rest of the way to Kansas City.  Apparently Eli wanted to stay in Columbia because he screamed non-stop for about 75% of that drive.  We stopped at Stuckey's for a diaper check and to see if nursing him would help.  We'd stopped at the Stuckey's a bajillion times while we were in school and driving back and forth.  It was funny to think of what a different place we are in our lives now.

When we got to my mom's house, she immediately began unleashing the stash of garage sale goodies she'd been amassing for him.

The spoiling continued the next night at my Dad's house.

Grandma is smiling so big in this picture because Eli is actually letting her hold him.  He's just working on coming out of a big stranger/separation anxiety phase.

He wasn't too happy while his Uncle Zack tried to hold him.  We even tried placating him with Kenny's glasses (his all-time favorite object).

On Christmas Day Eli agreed to be happy in my dad's lap too.   

No trip to KC is complete without some barbecue.  Since he loves meat so much, we didn't feel right eating it in front of him and not letting him partake.  Questionable parental judgement?  Maybe.

We also went to Winstead's and had lunch with his cousin Harrison and Harrison's mom, Erin.  Eli went on to eat half of Harrison's lunch.  Apparently we need to start ordering him kids' meals when we go out.

When we got back to Chicago, we unloaded all our bags and such into the living room.  Eli spotted his box of Cheerios and decided to help himself.

While in Kansas City, Eli picked up a cold which he was kind enough to share with me.  We ended up canceling our NYE plans with our friends who have an itty bitty baby.  Eli did not stay awake to see the ball drop.

Better luck next year.

My new holiday

Today is my first Mother's Day. Eli helped make me and his grandma eggs benedict for breakfast. I think his role was mostly supervisory. He also gave me some perfume which is quite thoughtful since because of him I lately mostly just smell like breastmilk and regurgitated breastmilk.

His father surprised me with the kind of surprise only I could really love. While I was at work last week he organized our linen closet--complete with labeled clear plastic bins. I went to find my hair dryer there the next day and found the loveliness accompanied with a sweet note. He once gave me a trash can for a birthday present. Many people tried to talk him out of that present, and I bet this present would sound similarly misguided to others. I couldn't have been more excited about the trash can and couldn't have been more excited about the closet though. He knows me so well.

If all of that wasn't enough, my dad also made a special lunch for me and the mother of his children (my mom). Today was just wonderful.

We came to Kansas City for the weekend mostly because I NEEDED to meet my friend Megan's little Milo and thought Eli should make his Kansas City rounds while he was still an itty bitty baby. Speaking of him being an itty bitty baby--he grew out of some of his 0-3 month clothes today. It's very upsetting for me seeing as how I'm still due two more weeks of him being 0-3 months old. I've decided to blame it on his big cloth diapers. During his Kansas City adventures he has proven once again that there is no scheduling this guy. He was completely content and happy when I though he'd be fussy and completely fussy when I thought he'd be happy. He likes to keep us on our toes. He's currently swaddled up and sleeping on the ottoman in front of me. He fell asleep all by himself for the second day in a row in that same location. This has not happened before and we are quite impressed with his brilliance. Also, we may need to steal this ottoman just in case the behavior is ottoman-specific.