Phew!

And so, the holidays are officially over.  Paul and I are back at work, LP is back at day care, and our house is slowly getting back to order.  Unfortunately we still have quite a pile of Christmas cookies and other treats so if anyone is interested in a tin of buckeyes, cake balls, candied ginger shortbread, sugar cookies and saltine toffee PLEASE let me know! 

We had quite an eventful time over the past couple of weeks.  Christmas Eve and Christmas Day were spent with my in-laws, opening what seemed like a mountain of presents.  Paul surprised me with not only a fancy bounce-flash for my camera but also a serger sewing machine! I surprised him with a steering wheel attachment thing-y for the Xbox that actually makes racing games pretty fun.  LP was given more clothing and toys from Grammy and Papa than he knows what to do with, along with a beautiful toy box and a Leapfrog riding/pushing train that he's obsessed with.

The day after Christmas my parents and brothers arrived, along with my brother Nelson's fiance San- who he'd proposed to just a few days before Christmas- yay!  So we started the festivities off with a champagne toast to the newly engaged and oh-so-schmoopy couple. 

And then the usual Walters family shenanigans really began. 

There was some showing off of the bling:

And everybody took a turn posing with the Christmas elf:

There was some beer drinking (way too much for one person in particular who probably shouldn't have had so much knowing that her baby wakes early in the mornings... ugh).



Some chilling with Pappy Wawa...



And some photos taken with the new camera lens my parents surprised me with...



(the photo below is only posted so that you can see how wonderfully color-coordinated, completely on accident, our family is- please disregard the fact that we all look like crap- it was early and I hadn't blow-dried my hair).



LP and Uncle Nel attempted matching hairdos...





And LP showed off the robe his mama made him for Christmas.

After my family left things were starting to get back to normal.  Then my in-laws were babysitting LP one night while Paul and I were out with friends when he developed a sudden high fever and had a febrile seizure.  My in-laws called an ambulance and then called us and we all met up at the hospital for what became a very long stay in the ER and then an admittance to the hospital for observation and iv fluids for our little guy.  It was very scary but everything is fine now- he had a double ear infection that caused his high temperature.  Fortunately febrile seizures aren't as serious as they sound; while scary they don't cause any sort of brain issues.  The doctor's instructions were to keep future temperatures under control with baby tylenol. 

Needless to say after spending all night in the hospital on Dec. 30 we didn't quite feel up to heading out to a New Years Eve Party so we stayed in, ate lobster and shrimp cocktail, and watched some guy jump over a river in a car on television.  It was almost as exciting as last year when we stayed in, ate lobster and shrimp cocktail, and watched some guy jump over a building on a motorbike on television.  Wonder what we'll do next year??

This week Paul is out of town on business so I'm holding down the fort as a single mama- which of course meant that the dogs had to misbehave, necessitating an emergency trip to the vet last night for one of them.  I'm hopeful that the rest of the week goes quickly and that all of us survive!

And with that, I'm off to race home, meet a delivery truck delivering a snow blower we bought after the last big snowstorm, attempt to get it out of the crate and into our garage by myself, and then run over to pick up LP at day care. 

I guess hectic is the new normal.