The First Haircut

Girlfriend was starting to get what looked like a White Trash mullet, so we had to cut the hair. As you can see, she was SUPER excited about that...





After that, we went for a nice walk and she recovered. Look at her super cool coat that our friend Mita brought her from London!

Merry Christmas!

What a wonderful, wonderful Christmas we had this year. After our "trip", I had to fly out to New York for a very intense work week, so my stress level was at an all time high. I came back the Thursday before Christmas and collapsed into bed by 8pm. Oddly enough, I woke up feeling so excited about hosting 18 people for Christmas Eve and wanting the holidays to be relaxing and enjoyable for everyone!

Once again, I hosted The Feast of the Seven Fishes on Christmas Eve. This is an Italian tradition which comes from the observance of La Vigilia Di Natale — the wait for the birth of Christ — in which early Catholics fasted on Christmas Eve until after receiving communion at Midnight Mass. The seven fishes represent different things depending on what your family believed ... most think of it as the number of days it took Mary and Joseph to travel to Bethlehem. I'm not Catholic, but I did marry an Italian and I really wanted to establish a tradition that Ashley would remember and maybe carry on...I just love the idea of having a house full of family with delicious smells coming from the kitchen while everyone tucks into a cocktail or two!

I really wish I hadn't been so absorbed in cooking that I forgot to take pictures of the table settings and display of food taking up every inch of the island. It really was something, if I may say so myself. In the absence of photos, here is the menu for posterity:

Ron's Antipasta Platter
Christmas Crab Dip
Scallops Wrapped in Bacon
Crudite Platter

Proscuitto Roasted Halibut
Baked Shrimp Scampi
Traditional Italian Cioppino
Baked Ziti
Fresh Italian Bread

Jenny's Fabulous Feast Fish Cookies
Coffee & Lemoncello

I loved every minute of it and was so happy to have the Swanson, DeLazzer, Larocca & Richey clan altogether again. It only happens once a year! (Unless someone gets married ... so let's get on it Scott, Trent and Paige! ...Well, maybe not Trent & not Paige for sure!)

Christmas morning was a blast. Ashley was very excited by all her gifts, but a little overwhelmed too. It really was fun to see her rip open her presents. She wanted everything out of the box immediately. The first pictures are of her riding her brand new rocking horse from Gigi and Papa ... she wasn't sure about it at first, but she warmed up to it pretty quickly! (if she didn't like it so much, I would be REALLY annoyed by the size of this damn thing! You're lucky Gigi!)

And I'm sorry, but Ashley's Christmas jammies are too cute, aren't they?! Oh ... and one other thing, I wasn't very good about taking pictures on Christmas morning either so I don't really have pictures of anyone! (which might just be a blessing since none of us had any makeup on, Ha!)

Um, No. You Cannot Do It All

So I have finally come to a realization that the "SUPERMOM" does not exist. I have tried to be one with every fiber of my being. And I really believe that if it was possible, I could do it. Let me tell you... NOT. POSSIBLE.

Oh, you can absolutely ATTEMPT to do it all. And you may even succeed for a little while, but at the end of it all, you will be left a shell of a woman with big dark circles under your eyes and not even enough energy to care.

Horrifying.

Actually, I feel much better admitting this. And I am not even sure if I am going to stop trying to do it all...but just acknowledging that this idea is unattainable makes me re-energized.

On a slightly related note, we decided to take a little family vacation the day after Thanksgiving. How relaxing it would be for the three of us ... so me, my handsome husband and my darling 13 month old jetted off to Maui for a "vacation."

It was this very event that defined the difference between "vacation" and "trip." For those of you who don't know the difference, let me share my knowledge with you ...

A "vacation" includes a lot of sleep, a lot of sun and many, many poolside cocktails.

A "trip" includes ... everything you normally do, just in a more exotic location.

There is no such thing as a "vacation" with a toddler. Girlfriend was up before the sun, hated the sand (well its anything that makes her hands dirty, really ... she's a girl, what can I say?). She is walking everywhere so there was no laying on the lounge chair. She was in the pool, out of the pool, walking around to everyone's lounge chair and smiling. And of course, there were the two naps a day...so the minute you got down to the pool and covered her from head to toe with sunscreen, you had to pack it all back up and go up for a nap.

Where does the pina colada fit into this scenario?!

We did have a wonderful "trip," but boy did I need a vacation.

Please Suh, May I Have Some More?

Happy Thanksgiving!

Hope you all had a wonderful holiday. We had such a nice visit with G-Daddy & Mor-Mor in from Miami. They brought Ashley a baby doll and she was VERY into mothering! She must get it from me! Enjoy the photos of Turkey day with the Walker's and Larocca's...

What Up Cuz?

No time to write ... super stressed, family is sick and holidays and vacation are looming! But Cousin Sylas was in town and we all had a great time! Here are the pics!

The Gangs All Here!

Well...almost. This past weekend, I attended the wedding of a dear family friend. He was the first of four boys to get married, so it was certainly a celebration! Chris was out of town this weekend, so I was lucky enough to have Aunt Jenny and Baby Chloe as my two dates! Gigi and Papa were also in attendance, as well as Great Aunt Suzy and Great Uncle Roger. With Chris out of town, Grammy and Grandpa offered to babysit Miss Ashley, so we all got to hang out together on Sunday morning to celebrate Chris's 36th birthday! Also, Ashley got to spend a little time with her baby cousin Chloe. She really loved sitting with her and wanted to give her hugs and kisses. She kind of needs to work on her finesse, as evidenced in the video below...