Merry Christmas!

We spent Christmas in the Twin Cities with Nanny and Grandpa, Auntie Michelle, Uncle Kevin and Auntie Keng. We headed up to the Twin Cities on Monday afternoon, after I got off work and stayed until Friday before heading home to have a day to recover and settle back in on Saturday before I go back to work on Sunday. My residency program has a "holiday schedule" so that we all get 5 days off over either Christmas or New Years. I got Christmas off! Yay!

As usual, Austin had a blast playing with his favorite person in the world, Nanny!

Austin had been talking about putting "stuff down the chute" for weeks since he discovered the laundry chute at Nanny and Grandpa's house, so he and Grandpa had fun putting things down the laundry chute or throwing towels over the banister from the upstairs into the foyer below. Austin also discovered Grandpa's golf clubs and Grandpa showed him how to hold the club and swing it.

On the 23rd, Austin helped mommy bake our family's traditional Chistmas sugar cookies...

Pouring in the flour.Licking the spoon...unfortunately for him, it only had flour on it and didn't taste very good.
Beating the cookie dough.

He also had a ball playing in the old play kitchen Michelle had when she was a kid...
Then he got his own brand new play kitchen for Christmas! He LOVES playing in the kitchen and now he has his own kitchen stocked with utensils, pots and pans, and pretend food, so he can cook while mommy and daddy make dinner.

Back to the 23rd...after Austin went to bed, Michelle made the buttercream frosting for the Christmas cookies (the best part, of course). In the process, the blender took an unfortunate tumble and broke. But Kevin took it apart and fixed it while we frosted cookies.

Before we went up to the Twin Cities, we had our Cronk family Christmas at home. The Cronks sent Austin lots of wonderful gifts and he had a blast opening them and playing with his new toys. His favorite is his new school bus. He absolutely loves it, so we had to bring it with us.What is really quite entertaining is that it plays a little song when you push the bus driver in his seat, and every time the song starts, Austin taps his left foot (or both feet) on the ground in time with the music. We have no idea why he does it, but it is quite cute. Check out the video below... (the beginning is playing with his bus, then he moves on to playing with the old kitchen, jumping on grandpa's chair, taking pictures with his play camera, etc.).



We went to Christmas Eve children's Mass at Nanny and Grandpa's church, which despite our best intentions was a big mistake! The route to get there was under construction, the place was absolutely packed, and it was a difficult hour with Austin. Luckily, someone found one free seat for Austin and I to sit down in and then the family next to us held their 3 year old on mom's lap to free up one other seat for Steve. We tried to keep Austin happy and occupied, and using bunny graham cracker cookies and reading him books, we were able to maintain sanity for a while. But by the time we went up for communion, Austin completly melted down. And I mean a full on screaming, kicking, toddler meltdown. We carried him to the car screaming and crying, but he settled down shortly after getting in the car and was fine as soon as we promised him we were on the way back to Nanny's house.

Christmas Eve, Austin wore his Christmas jammies from Gramma Cronk and was sleeping like and angel waiting for Santa to come. His jammies say "What Santa doesn't bring me, Grandma will" on the front.
And, no, I did not turn the lights on in his room. I took the picture of him with the "night portrait" setting on the camera and it makes it look like it was bright as day in there, even though it was so dark I could barely see him in the viewfinder of the camera.

Christmas morning...

Austin was too excited to sit still.

The yearly challenge of the bilz boxes.
Chart man...
Mom, after some tutorials...now a Mac user too!
Austin got a new sled!
A sugar cookie fan! Oh, I'm so proud!

Then it was off to Jenna, Michael, and Alexis's house for Christmas dinner with more family.

Cousin hug! Alexis and Austin hugged after exchanging gifts. So cute!

Austin found a new buddy in Michael's friend Brett. He thought Brett was absolutely hilarious and would double over giggling when talking to him. Austin also found a way to climb up on a stool to get to the phone and make some calls to say Merry Christmas to his peeps.

A good time was had by all.

Then we spent the next day recovering from the chaos. Here is Austin snuggling up with mommy in our jammies to watch Veggie Tales.

We headed home on Friday, so that we would have a day to recover on Saturday before I head back to work on Sunday. I had 5 days off over Christmas, but I make up for it by working like crazy over new years. On Saturday, we put together the basketball hoop we got Austin for Christmas. It was "some assembly required" and was very frustrating, but Austin loved it.

We also got out his doctor kit from Gramma and Grandpop and he had fun fixing up daddy (taking his temperature, giving him a shot, putting a bandaid on his booboo, etc.).
Unfortunately, my break time is now over and I head back to work tomorrow. I've got back to back 30 hour on call shifts on Tuesday-Wednesday, and Thursday-Friday. It'll be all worth it for the chance to spend Christmas with my family!

I hope you all had a wonderful, blessed Christmas with those you love and that you continue on to have a great New Year!