Play Date with Willie

On Sunday Harrison had a play date with Willie and mommy had a play date with Anne.

Harrison and I made our way all the way out to Chaska to see Willie and Anne. We got a bit lost on our way there but we got there just about 10 minutes late. Not to shabby. I think Harrison thought I was going to leave him there becasue he got all sad but I kept telling him that I was staying and he was just going to play. After a few minutes I think he believed me.

He was very quiet for quite some time after we got there, but he was having a good time. He liked seeing the dogs in their kennels and playing with Willie's train table (not to self - he loves train tables - this is the 2nd one he has played with and he can't keep himself away). We played for about a 1/2 hour and then had lunch. Anne served the boys Hot dogs, green beans and cheese sticks. Harrison actually ate the green beans (I also got some for home and gave it to him for dinner...I couldn't believe it...he usually doesn't like them...). he also ate almost all of his hot dog and cheese stick.

Then the boys had play do time and all Harrison wanted me to do was roll the clay into balls and he would then smell them while Willie had Anne making turtle sculptures.

Then we went up to Willie's room and he had a slide in there. Harrison had a ball going down the slide like a million times. Willie was really good about sharing his toys with Harrison.

All in all it was a great play date and we will defintely make the trip out there again!!

Shoes and Makeup

Every girl loves shopping for shoes and makeup. Well at least I do and that is what I did on Saturday. After gymboree I took Harrison with me over to Nordstroms. I had some $$ to spend from a gift I returned and I wanted to spend it on Shoes. I had an idea of what I wanted and I thought that Nordstroms would be the place.

We started our shopping by having lunch first. I knew Harrison was hungry and I also knew if I didn't give him lunch first I would never be able to get any shoes. So we had lunch at my favorite place to have lunch with my little man, Nordstrom Cafe. The food is good and they bring it to you so I don't have to balance pushing the stroller and hold a tray of food. I enjoyed a salad with a salmon cake (like a crab cake but with salmon) and Harrison had his standby, hot dog with chips. He ate everything, even the bun.

After lunch I made a bee line to the shoe department. I was looking for a sporty shoe but that was cute-er than a sneaker. I found what I was looking for in a pair of Cole Hahn's - it is a mule like sneaker/shoe...tan, white, green and yellow. I like them and they are very comfortable.

Then I needed more pressed powder and since I was in Nordstroms and they had a Stila counter I thought I would take advantage. Harrison was in a good mood so I went for it. I started talking to the makeup lady and she suggested we play with some eye shadow. I looked at Harrison, gave him another chocolate/mint candy and let the lady try some new colors on me. Harrison even helped pick out the color. I asked him which eye he liked better and he chose the one I liked also. So in addition ot the pressed powder, I got a new shadow.

I really love shopping with Harrison, he is such a good boy, usually.

What will Harrison be?

What will Harrison be when he gets older is a game that I think most parents play with their kids. Anytime Harrison shows a prelonged interest in anything I assume that is what he is going to be when he gets older. For example, Harrison has a major obsession with doors. Opening and closing them. It doesn't matter what kind of door it is, a front door, an indoor door, the bathroom door or a cabinet door. He loves opening them and then closing them, slamming them and keeping people out. So it is my conclusion that he will be a door man at a very exclusive hotel.

He also loves playing with water, turning on and off the sink and running his hands under them. He loves the hose. (but surprisingly he dosen't like the bath or the pool). So I think he may work with sprinklers.

He loves singing. He sings all the time. We can't get him to stop sometimes. He main song list includes Wiggles tunes. His favorites being "Lights, Camera, Action Wiggles!". and "Choo Choo Chugga Big Red Car". With American Idol on now, I think he could eventually be an"American Idol". Better yet, they should just have an "American Idol - Toddler" version. He would win hands down!!

The long weekend

On Saturday Harrison and I spend the day together because we wanted to let Cliff rest because he was still sick. I took Harrison to Gymboree and then over to Neiman Marcus to return a sweater. Neiman's is only in downtown MPLS so that is where we went. After we returned the sweater I took Harrison to lunch. I found a food court nearby so we went and had McDonalds. Harrison enjoyed his chicken nuggest but continues to not like fries (YAY!!).

Later that afternoon I went and got some soup and movies for later that night. I knew Cliff would be feeling better and chicken soup would be the best thing. So I rented 40 Year Old Virgin, Wedding Crashers, Must Love Dogs and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. I watched Must Love Dogs right way and really liked it. It was very cute. But that night Cliff and I watched 40 Year Old Virgin. We laughed alot.

On Sunday we took Harrison to Eden Prairie Center to play at the indoor playground. He really loved it there. He ran around for 40 minutes straight. It was great. We then had lunch at the mall and ran some errands. I just love that mall. It has everything, the playground is awesome, there is a target, barnes and noble and Old Navy , not to mention all of the other mall stores. It really caters to moms. When we got home and put Harrison down for his nap after successfully preventing him from falling asleep in the car, we watched Wedding Crashers. That was really good also. Very funny. I think it was a good movie for both guys and girls.

Cliff and I both had Monday off. This was the first time ever that I had MLK day off. It was a new holiday for West. So we put Harrison in Day Care and cleaned the house. I also watched Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. I liked it, not as much as the original but it was very entertaining. We also made the first of many donations to good will. We will be back several times in the next few weeks. I am trying to purge everything we don't need.

The sickness

Last Wednesday night Harrison woke up at around 10:00 pm because he had thrown up all over his bed. I always feel so bad for him when he throws up because I know he just doesn't understand what is happening to him. So we cleaned him up, changed the linens, and I sat with him for 20 minutes. He was really tired so I put him back down to sleep. But 15 minutes later it happened again but this time I heard him make some noises so I ran down and got to him before he threw up in his bed so instead he threw up all over me, and this time it was a lot! I called Cliff down to help. Cliff cleaned up Harrison while I went to clean myself up. We sat with him again for about 20 minutes and then thinking that had to be the last of it set him down to sleep again. Oh but we were so wrong. He threw up again in his bed. I wasn't quick enough this time. But it wasn't as much. He threw up only one more time after this and then it was over. I rocked him to sleep and he slept soundly all night.

I had thought he ate something that didn't agree with him because he was acting fine in the morning and never ran a fever, so I brought him to day care but told her to call me if anything changes. I called at around 11:00 to check in and found out that every kid at daycare had the same thing and that it was just Harrison and Darby there, I told her I would leave at 1:00 and come get him. As I was on my way home Carol called to tell me that Harrison had fallen asleep and I could come get him when he wakes from his nap. At 2:30 she called again to tell me that Darby had just gotten sick and Harrison was awake. I left right away and was there in about 2 minutes. Harrison came over to me and told me that "Darby threw up".

At this time I also was starting not to feel very well but not bad enough to be sick. I just stopped eating. That evening Carol called again to tell me that her and Kenny were sick and that she was closing on Friday because of it. So I stayed home on Friday. Which was a good thing because I was really not feeling well that day. I never actually got sick but I tried and felt horrible. I just layed on the couch and dozed all day.

Yes, Harrison was there with me, but he was the best kid ever! He played quietly all morning lling. I was able to get up and give him breakfast and lunch (although I almost got sick each time) and put him down for his nap. Cliff finally came home and I fell asleep on the couch for a great nap. When I woke up I felt much better.

That night Cliff was up all night throwing up and that lasted into Saturday. This virus moved fast and spread quickly.

I spent Sunday disinfecting everything and washing all of our linens to make sure it was gone.

Chanukah

Harrison celebrated his third Chanukah. This time he really liked the candles but thought it was his birthday and he tried to blow them out. But he did know the Chanukah song so he got to sing it alot. Our family tradition is to hide the presents so every night harrison would get a different present. He really got into opening the wrapping paper. He got 3 puzzles, a wiggles microphone, a Wiggles colorforms book, a fire engine locking puzzle, Thomas trains and a Wiggles piano. I think he loved his presents. We were even able to get it all home on the airplane and not ship anything.

Children's Museum of Manhattan

On Monday, Mom, Harrison and I met Hilary in the city. We were going to take Harrison to the Children's Museum of Manhattan. This is the first time Harrison has even been in Manhattan. There is a Wiggles song called "Central Park, New York" which I told him he would see. He seemed really excited about this.

When we got out of the car and onto the sidewalk Harrison's eyes were so wide. He couldn't believe all there was to see. He kept pointing out the Taxis. When we got to the museum he didn't know what he wanted to do first. The first floor was all about Alice in Wonderland. He put balls through shoots and watched them come out the other side. Saw a bunch of doors and and played in this glow in the dark area. On the second floor it was a Dora the Explorer exhibit. He loved this. The funniest part about this floor was this foot bridge. There were foam blocks that kids can assemble to build up the sides of the bridge, but as soon as Harrison walked up the bridge he found he could knock them down. He loved doing that and some of the kids got sad that they had to start over again.

On the third floor was the toddler area. Here he could color, paint, play with puzzles and go down a slide and climb up alot of stairs. He really liked this area. Especially when he got to the top of the stairs, he could put these balls down the pvc tubing and they would spiral down until they got to the bottom. But Harrison couldn't see where they went so he would put them in the tube then try to look in the tube to see where it would go or stick his hand in it to get the ball back. It was great watching him try to figure it out.

After the museum we went to lunch at Arties Deli and met my friend Risa. It was great to see her. Harrison was extremely tired so Lunch wasn't very relaxing. I ate my food really fast and then got up to walk him around. But I got to eat yummy food....Cheese Blintzes, Potato Kinish and a hot dog...yummmm.

New Years Eve

New Years Eve was very uneventful. We put Harrison to bed at his normal time. Brad and Merryl were coming home from their cruise that night and were going to come over and spend the night. We found out that their flight was later than we thought so we decided to eat dinner without them. We all had lobsters, except Cliff who had crab legs. YUMMMMMM Lobsters! This is my all time favorite food. And I have been having lobsters almost every New years for as long as I can remember.

Brad and Merryl finally arrived at 12:15. Too bad they had to ring in the new year in a cab on the way home from the airport.

We spent the next day with them. It was nice to spend time with them. Harrison was excited to go downstairs in the morning and wake them up. We had to wait until 10:30am. You really can't tell a 2 year old to wait, but somehow we managed. But when he got to see them, he was so happy.

Hilary, my grandfather and his girlfriend, Adele, came over in the afternoon. Popper and Harrison played for a while in the basement. Well, actually, Harrison would bring Popper all of this play food and Popper pretened to eat it. It was quite sweet.

That night Hilary and I went to see Memoirs of a Geisha....amazing movie.

Visiting Norman

Our next day in Otis we were supposed to Ski again. But Cliff and I, being extremely old, or at least feeling extremely old and sore from the day before decided against it. We, instead, went to the Norman Rockwell museum. We told Harrison we were going to visit Norman. He got excited to see Norman and wasn't at all disappointed that Norman was a picture and not the man himself. When we walked into the museum there was a giant model train set with a train going around the track. Well, if you have, or had a 2 year old boy, this is the best thing ever! He absolutely loved watching the train go around and wanted to touch it so bad. I did let him touch the track but not the train. It was very difficult pulling him away from the train. But I tried to get him excited to see Norman. He eventually did get excited and really liked looking at the self portrait of Norman Rockwell.

They were having an exhibit if paintings done from pictures from the National Geographic. It was really cool. Harrison loved looking at the pictures of the bugs and dinosaurs. But nothing compared to looking at pictures of the Mayan Indians. He absolutely loved the pictures of the men with the feather headdresses on. We had to keep coming back to those pictures.

After seeing Norman we headed to Friendlys for lunch. This is a great kids place to eat. Harrison got his usual, hot dog and apple sauce and he ate it all. But the best part of Friendlys is that the meals come with ice cream, so Harrison was super excited when the waitress brought his icecream. He ate the whole thing.

The day before, mom and Eddie took Harrison shopping at the outlets. While they were there Harrison got a set of Jay Jay the Jet Planes. He loves these planes. They are like Thomas the Tank Engine, but airplanes. So that night when we went to dinner they became our savior. We all went to the Dakota. This is another great restaurant. They have all of these stuffed (real) animals around and a lobster tank. When you walk in the first thing you see is a giant black bear. Harrison loved this. He ran up to it and gave it a hug. Then he found a smaller wood carved bear that he wouldn't leave alone. At dinner there were deer and elk and other animals stuffed and on the walls so Harrison really enjoyed looking at them. All the while playing with his airplanes. We didn't get home until 9:30 pm, it was a very late night for Harrison.

Skiing

After we arrived in NY we went back to Mom's house for lunch. At around 1;00 we left for the 3 hour drive up to Otis (in the Birkshires). The drive was nice, I was very tired and so was Harrison so we both slept. I also had uploaded a book to my iPod so I was listening to that on the way up there as well (The Undomestic Goddess by Sophie Kinsella (author of Confessions of a Shopaholic)). We didn't do much that afternoon. We made dinner and just relaxed.

The next day Cliff and I went skiing at a small hill right in Otis called Otis Ridge. It has been quite a while since I had been skiing, 6 years to be exact. For Cliff it was about 2-3 years. But the last time I was skiing I had injured myself, tore my ACL in my knee. It was very painful and I had months of physical therapy afterward. So I was a bit nervous to ski again. My plan was to take a few runs down the bunny hill to get my self warmed up and then go up the chair lift to the green hills. So after we rented skiis and bought our lift tickets we headed out.

When I approached the bunny hill, there was this incline up to the tow rope. Well, I was having a hard time just getting up to the tow rope, I kept sliding back down the incline. There was a huge line of kids behind me, so I let them go ahead while I attempted to awkwardkly make my way up the incline. By the time I got up there I was going to wait until there was a break in the rush of kids, but that wasn't coming any time soon, so I inserted myself in the line and got my self set up to grab the tow rope. I reached for it...and then fell. My ski came off when I did so I was able to get up fast. I then decided I was going to bad this idea and go right for the chair lift.

I couldn't have been more wrong. I got on to the chair lift with no problems. Easy peasy. But as we approached where we needed to get off, I started to panic. It looked like a steep srop off to go down once you got off of the lift. Well Cliff got off with no problems and I hesitated a bit too long and didn't get off. I was now about 4 feet off the ground and the operator stopped the lift. Thank goodness there wasn't many people skiing that day. The lift operator came over and told me I couldn't go down the lift that I had to get off. He told me to jump. I looked at him like he was out of his mind. I told him I absolutely couldn't jump, and if I was going to he had to take off my skiis. He took them off and I still felt I couldn't do it without breaking my leg. So he told me he would lift me off. I again looked at him like he had 7 heads. I told he I was too heavy. He chuckled and said he was a big guy and to just slide into him. I didn't think I could do it but I trusted him and slowly began to slide off of the lift. He did in fact lift me off and place me safely on the ground. I thanked him profusely and appologized like a gazillion times. Cliff, meanwhile, was totally speachless, he couldn't believe I didn't get off.

Well that little experience didn't boost my confidence. I was very anxious and skiied very slowly looking for the green hill. Half way there I went to move my hair out of my eyes and my pole hit my eye and my contact lens popped out and I lost it. So now I am extremely anxious and half blind. It was a spectacular day so far. Well, I finally made it down the mountain. I didn't hurt myself, but I wasn't going to go up that chair lift again.

I waited for Cliff at the bottom of the hill while he took some runs. After about 40 minutes he wanted to get something to eat. We went into the chalet and realized we only had $3 and they didn't take cards, so we shared a sprite and rested. The rest of the afternoon I mastered the bunny hill and became more confident in my skiing.

I need to try it again, hopefully at a place where I feel more comfortable.

Our Holiday Trip to NY

As travel goes, flying on a holiday week/weekend has never been a problem. I have been flying for thanksgiving and/or christmas for years. My trick, take the earliest flight in the morning. Generally there is no lines, you sail through secruity and there is usually no delays. So that is what we did for our trip to New York on the 26th. We left the house at 5:30 am for our 7:00am flight. We should have gotten to the airport by 6:00am and had an hour to check our luggage and go through security and head to our gate. Normally that all takes all of 15-20 minutes. Well I knew we were in for it when we pulled into the airport, the line to go up to the departures drop off was very long. I kept looking at my watch and panic started creeping in. Oh my god...we are really cutting this close. But it is so early. Could everyone have figured out my holiday travel system? Well the cab driver asked if we wanted to bypass the departures and be dropped off at arrivals. He thought becasue we had so much stuff we wouldn't want to do it, but we have a system and thougth it was a great idea. So we got dropped off very quickly at arrivals and made our way upstairs to check our luggage. Inside was evenworse, the lines to use the e-check in were huge, and I mean huge and so were the security lines. I knew we couldn't wait on both lines and make our flight.

Being the New Yorker I am, I snaked my way through the crowd and went outside to the curb side check in...and zoomed passed 2 or 3 of them before I found one with hardly a line. One lady thought I cut her in line, but there were 2 lines and my line moved faster. I just ignored her because we were late and we had to get out of there. Luckily our luggage wasn't too heavy and checking our luggage only took about 15 minutes. So now it is about 6:20 and our flight leaves at 7:00...so we do the same thing we did for our luggage for security...we ran through the airport looking for the shortest security line and found it. We were in line for about 10-15 minutes. So at 6:30 we were finally headed to our gate.

Our gate, normally on the G concourse...was on the B concourse. I have never been to the B concourse but it is very far away. We first took the monorail as far as we could, then we went down an elevator and back up another elevator and walked forever. We finally got to the gate assigned at 6;45 and notice the gates changed. Luckily it was just a few gates down and not on another concourse. When we got to our real gate we noticed that the flight was delayed a few minutes so we had time to catch our breaths. I was planning on getting breakfast at the airport because we usually have time to do so. So we didn't do that and I didn't bring anyting but snacks for Harrison. I am the worst mom. So for breakfast he had fruit snacks, raisins, cookies and milk.

When we got on the plane, I was so excited because we were in row 11. I thought finally the front of the plane. Normally they stick us in the last row.... If you weren't aware, the back of the plane is commonly called "the family section"...translation....the place where we stick the babies. But boy was I mistaken....row 11 was the last row in the plane and it was 2 seats on each side, so Cliff got to sit accross the isle from us. The flight it self was very smooth. I was a bit apprehensive because the size of the plane, I thought I would get sick, but luckily I didn't.

The fun didn't end there. When we landed in NY, there was no jetway. It was like we landed in the Caribbean. We actually got off the plan on the tarmac. We walked down the stairs and were outside right next to the plane. Normally, no biggie. But try doing this unexpectedly, Carrying a 2 year old, your winter coats, purse, a lunch sack and your carry on bag. I had a feeling I was going to fall down the stairs. I saw there was a airline worker at the bottom of the stairs helping people, so I gave him all my stuff and walked down only with Harrison. Cliff had to menouver with the car seat. Harrison was absolutely stunned that he was so close to an actual airplane. His eyes were huge and he screamed..."that airplane" and pointed to our plane.

We were very happy to finally be in NY.