On the Eve of 2012

Although it's been a mini-tradition for Meghan and I to go out somewhere for New Year's Eve, we thought this year might be the first one in a long time where we stayed home, but yesterday Mom and Ron offered to keep the kids at their house so we could go out for the evening. So Meghan and I went out to eat at Pachamama's and then went out on Mass. Street to celebrate the new year. We had a lot of fun, and it was really great for us to have a night out together on New Year's Eve again.


Editor's Note (1/4/11): Haha, that's makes me sound way more official and important than I am. But "Author's Note" or "Note From The Guy Who Writes Stuff On This Blog" didn't seem to work either. Anyway, stay tuned for our end-of-year posts which will be up in the next couple days.

Vehicular Decision

I love my RX-8.  Love it.  Love love love it.  But for as fun as it is to drive, it's not so great as a family car, as we now have two children who are in rear-facing car seats.  If it's just me in my car, and if there's only one car seat, I can make it work.  But if someone needs to ride in the passenger seat, or if I need to have both car seats with me, it won't work.  Granted, that shouldn't happen very often, but the point is that my car isn't part of our family's long-term plans, and at some point in the near future we're going to have to replace it.  We don't have to do it immediately, but since the end of the year is a great time to buy a car, I've done some research and am in the process of test driving some cars.  I'll be sad to give up my car, but I know it's for the benefit of our family, so I'm okay with it.

An Offer We Couldn't Refuse

Meghan and I hadn't been out on a date night since we got Clara, but tonight my mom volunteered to come over and watch Joshua and Clara so we could go out.  We went to Jazz, which is one of our favorite restaurants.  She also offered to stay over and take care of Clara through the night and then get up with Joshua in the morning, which was an amazingly generous offer that we couldn't turn down, as that meant for the first time in a long time, we will be able to sleep through the night, and perhaps more importantly, not have to get up early.  We're really looking forward to it.  But first, we're off to enjoy some delicious Cajun food. 

Merry Christmas Eve, Happy One Month Birthday

Today we had a nice and relaxing Christmas Eve. During the day we just hung out at home. Today is Clara's one month birthday. Last week at the doctor she was 6 lbs, 4 oz, which is a full pound heavier than she was when she was born.



This evening we had our traditional Christmas Eve meal of Shrimp Bisque (Joshua doesn't eat soup and doesn't like shrimp so he had the less traditional baked ziti) and, at 11pm, we went to Christmas Eve service at Church of the Resurrection. We go every year and debated going to an earlier service this year, but we like going late. Both kids did pretty well. Joshua did have a brief tantrum over not being allowed to crawl under the seats, but he and Jason were able to come back into the service later and participate in the candelight part. Here is our family with our candles at the end of the service.

Christmas Rock

My favorite Christmas music is Trans-Siberian Orchestra.  I love their combination of classical and orchestral music with hard-driving rock, which when it all comes together is both awesome and beautiful.  I also really love going to concerts.  Meghan likes TSO quite a bit, but she's not really a fan of going to concerts, as they tend to be too loud for her.  I've seen TSO in the past, but I didn't get to go last year, so I decided this year I definitely wanted to go.  Both of my sisters like the band, so I decided to invite them in hopes we could make it a fun siblings outing.  It worked out with everyone's schedules, so tonight Julie, Joanna, and I had a siblings night of Chinese buffet followed by a trip to the Sprint Center to see some rockin' Christmas music.  We had a lot of fun and decided we definitely need to have siblings events more often.

We Wish You a Nicholl Christmas

Since it'd be nearly impossible to get all of us together on Christmas day or Christmas Eve, we tend to have the Christmas on my mom's side of the family a week or so before Christmas.  This has worked really well, as pretty much every year we have everyone, including Uncle Brent and my grandparents, in attendance.  This year was no different, and it was great to have everyone there to celebrate Christmas as a family.  Every year we take a photo identical to this one, except for adding in any new spouses or babies.  This year Clara joined the party.  Fortunately, she doesn't take up a lot of space, because as you can see, we're nearly out of it.

Plan B: Wings

Here's a quiz.  What am I doing in this photo?

A) Standing in front of Buffalo Wild Wings
B) Half-heartedly smiling
C) Taking a picture of myself
D) Wearing a hoodie branded with my company's name

Answer: All of the above, I suppose, but there's a much more important one: Not playing bocce.

Jeremy, Jason H., Nathan, and I were able to meet tonight, and I suggested we do something different and meet at Bocce Basement in Olathe to play some bocce and eat some food.  I had never been there but wanted to go since I saw that it opened.  To my extreme disappointment, it was closed.  I love playing bocce but hardly ever have the opportunity, and this was going to be the perfect time.  I don't know if it was closed permanently or just for the night.  BWW, our backup plan, was good, but it's no bocce.  Hopefully they'll reopen and we can go sometime soon.

Sharing a Snack

Joshua likes most of the food that he's given.  But he also likes whatever food someone else happens to have.  Recently I bought some apples, and Joshua saw me eating one, and he wanted some.  So I let him take a bite out of it.  He's still learning how to take bites off of food, but he did it, and he liked it a lot.  Since then, every time I'm eating an apple, he really wants it.  As I was on my way out the door to work today, I was eating an apple but was carrying it in my mouth since my hands were full.  Joshua saw it and really wanted it, so I knelt down and let him take a bite out of the opposite side.  He loved it and was happy to get a small bite of apple as a bonus morning snack.  Natalie, who also likes apples, looked on enviously.

An Evening With Talking Vegetables

Tonight we decided to have a family movie night. The ones we tried in Colombia didn't go all that great (partly due to us thinking it would be reasonable to give those kids pop in the evening. Lesson learned.).  Joshua is old enough now that he can watch things on TV if we choose to let him.  Because it's the Christmas season, Meghan ordered Veggie Tales: The Little Drummer Boy for us to watch as our family movie.  It was actually pretty good, and it was long enough to be a movie, but not so long that Joshua quit paying attention.  He especially enjoyed the separate song they did in the middle of the movie, which caused him to break out his little baby dance moves.  Clara didn't seem to get as much out of it, due to her being sound asleep the entire time, but we didn't blame her.  The pugs had the same plan, though Terrence woke up briefly to pose for this picture.

Two Guys and Two Babies

We invited our friends Tony and Christa over tonight to eat dinner and watch the K-State game.  They have a new baby, Hunter, who's a little more than a month old.  So while Tony's brother Jason and I have children who are very similar in age (Joshua and Hadley), now Tony and I have children who are very close in age (Hunter and Clara).  And Nick and Cassie's kid Macyn is only about 10 months older than Joshua.  I'm really excited that my friends and I have kids that are really close in age.  

Iguana Winter Olympics

I still go to a dentist in Lawrence, and when I go, I try to find time to hang out with my mom.  Usually we try to go to lunch together, and today we decided to go to Salty Iguana.  Meghan and I have been to the locations in Prairie Village and Olathe, but this was my first time at the Lawrence location.  The restaurants are known for their iguana murals, and this one was no exception.  The one near our table had the iguanas doing winter-related activities.  I was amused that while most of the iguanas were successfully carrying out their activities, the one who was having problems (the ice skater who was in the process of falling flat on his back) was the one in KU garb.  Maybe it was a metaphor for their football team...

A Tale of Two Hodies

I watched a lot of Mister Rogers' Neighborhood when I was a kid.  One of the puppet characters in the Neighborhood of Make-Believe was named to sound nearly identical to Don Quixote: Donkey Hodie, who was of course, a donkey.  One of the first Christmas ornaments I had as a kid was a blue and white rocking horse.  Being a big fan of the show, and knowing of Donkey Hodie, I apparently decided the ornament should be named Horsey Hodie since he was a horse, not a donkey.  I wasn't exactly aware of the literary context of the puppet's name, so it seemed to me like it was just a simple switch of animal types. 

Regardless, Horsey Hodie became an important ornament in our family growing up, as he was always the first one on the tree.  I don't know that we will necessarily always continue that with my new immediate family, but for this year anyway, Horsey Hodie was the first one on the tree.  Here Joshua helps me begin the process or decorating our tree for this year.   

Finally Back Home

I had an unavoidable business trip this week that unfortunately caused me to have to leave town the same day we all arrived home from the hospital.  I was originally supposed to be gone one more day, but I was able to trim one day off the trip and get home tonight.  With Joshua, I had a lot of work travel build up while I was doing the adoption, so I had to be gone a lot in the weeks after we got home, but it was really great to finally come home and see him, and the same situation is happening now.  I miss everyone when I travel, but it makes me really happy to be able to see them when I get home.

It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like...

We've been just a tiny bit busy over the past few days since Thanksgiving, so haven't decorated for Christmas yet.  I'd sort of almost forgotten that the Christmas season is fully underway, but I was reminded for sure by my travels yesterday and today, as the airports are all decked out, and now tonight here in Chicago, many of the streets have the trees lit up.  Here are some of the many trees I passed on my way to dinner that proved that the city of Chicago is not afraid of paying a hefty electrical bill in the name of keeping everyone in the Christmas spirit.

Party of Four

We have big news! Last night we got a call about a newborn baby in Wichita who needed a family. We decided to adopt her and drove down today to meet her. This is our first picture as a family of four with Clara Madelyn.

Happy Thanksgiving

We had a very good Thanksgiving this year. My parents (and later Christine, who wasn't able to make it for picture time) came and we had a lot of fun spending time together and had a great meal.

Mesa Por Seis

Since my parents are in town for Thanksgiving we decided to go out to dinner. We decided to go to Chapala and had a fun time eating good food and catching up.

Leaf Wranglers

We don't have that many trees in our new yard, but we have enough that plenty of leaves have fallen in the yard, so today was raking day.  I brought Joshua out to help me.  He got to wear his sweater from the Becks for the first time.  He looked super cute in it, and we had a fun time making and ruining piles of leaves.

Mini Mariachi

Tonight we went out to dinner at a new restaurant we hadn't been to before.  They had a 3-man mariachi band which moved about the restaurant.playing for the patrons.  Joshua was very interested in them.  They noticed, and between songs they gave him a small maraca.  Here Joshua and I play the maraca with the band.

Doggie Dentist Time

Today Terrence needed to go get his teeth cleaned. I really hate having that done, but pugs tend to have major plaque issues because of their small mouths so we do it from time to time for both dogs. Here are Jason and Terrence as they leave for the vet.