Saturday, December 23, 2006

Holiday travel! Joy! Joy! Joy! NOT!

Early Thursday morning, Alex left Calgary. More than 36 hours later, he arrived at our house.

His trouble started when he arrived in Chicago and the spillover Denver mess had affected flights in Chicago, plus Chicago had rain and fog. His flight was delayed, delayed, then he was bumped so he had to spend the night sleeping in a chair in the Chicago airport.

Meanwhile, Rene was waiting at the Columbia, SC airport for about 6 hours. Alex had forgotten to bring our phone number. He finally got a hold of his neighbor who looked up our phone number (thank you internet!). So Rene returned home, after spending about 8 hours waiting at the Columbia airport (an hour away).

The next morning, Friday, Alex called that he would be flying to Washington D.C. and then to Greenboro, NC, which is over 4 hours away. So Alex, flew, got in an hour later than we expected. Of course Alex's suitcase was not in Greensboro. Luckily, I called the Columbia, SC airport baggage claim and it took them two minutes to find it. Rene and Alex stopped along the way to get the suitcase. Rene left at 8 am to pick up Alex and they returned 8 pm.

But Alex was not alone in his travel woes! Just after I had located the suitcase, Richard (Rene's oldest son) called to say that he and Liam (Rene's youngest son), had an adventure. They were supposed to fly direct from Calgary to London. For some strange reason someone at the airport told them they'd need to fly to Vancouver (uh, hello, wrong direction!) So they flew to Vancouver. You guessed it, when they got to Vancouver they had to fly back to Calgary to get to London! Doh! They arrived in London earlier today.

I was happy not to have to drive, fly and just be command central at home. The girls and I picked up my parents on Wednesday. Luckily they were only 20 minutes late. Dietrich, Leticia and Andrew are due in a few hours. Cross your fingers they arrive on time!

Monday, December 18, 2006

Happy Holidays!

We're all busy preparing for Christmas. Tomorrow is Erin's last day of school. Then the family starts to arrive. First my parents, then Alex, then Rene's dad & his wife, and Rene's brother Andrew. Full house! We did a lot of food shopping yesterday!

Erin had her Christmas play, "The ABCs of Christmas" last week. It was very sweet. She performed her "D is is Decoration" part very well. The first 15 minutes of the presentation was Erin's Spanish teacher leading the class in their Spanish. The class is an immersion class, so the teacher speaks no English to the children. It was quite impressive! The week before there was a Santa breakfast at the school. Erin went right to Santa, but Lauren wouldn't go, although she did yell out "Baby Alive!", which is what she wants from Santa. Baby Alive is the doll that eats and pees. Erin requested the same.

Rene and I went out to dinner for the first time alone in well over a year on Saturday. We finally got a babysitter who worked out great! The dinner was an early celebration of Rene's birthday. We booked her for January, as well, for our anniversary.

Our extended family got a nice Christmas present: My cousin Jennifer gave birth to her second daughter, Natalie Ava. The pictures of the baby are adorable, and big sister Lara seems to be adjusting. Congratulations!

Finally, here's a picture of the girls, in their Christmas finest!

Friday, December 01, 2006

Dec 1 and it's 74 degrees

Well at times it has been cool, but yesterday and today it's hot! Crazy living in the south.

We had a nice Thanksgiving, and only have some turkey soup left in the freezer. On Thanksgiving weekend we took a Petersburg boat tour on the Augusta Canal which was very nice.

Now the preparation for Christmas begins. Yikes!