White Christmas!

We had a great Christmas!  Christmas morning we were at our house.  Derek and I woke up before Eli and we were very anxious for him to wake up and see what Santa brought him.  He was kind of half asleep when we first took him to see, but when he woke up a little he was pretty excited about his powerwheels mower and the treats in his stocking.  After a little play time and breakfast, we made the snowy trek to my parent’s house.

 

When we got to their house we had lunch, opened presents, talked to Doug in Argentina, and then my brothers and I went sledding.  We spent the rest of the weekend with the fam and it was lots of fun.

Christmas Eve

We had a quiet Christmas Eve at home while Oklahoma’s first ever blizzard was going on outside.  The missionaries stopped by for a visit and we watched Mr. Kruger’s Christmas.  We also finished our 12 days of Christmas scripture reading.  Then the three of us had dinner (rotisserie chicken, mashed sweet potatoes, cheesy brussel sprouts, rolls, & gravy) and opened a few small presents we had gotten each other.  After Eli went to bed, Derek and I played phase 10 and had hot chocolate and of course got things ready for Christmas morning.

Christmas Excitement

We took Eli to Bass Pro Shop to see Santa.  He was excited to sit on his lap and he was even practicing his smile while we were in line, but then he got a little serious when he was actually up there.  He told him he wants a bike though and gave him five.

On Sunday we had our Gastaldo family get-together.  Eli was well taken care of by aunts and cousins.  When he first started opening presents he would tear off one little piece of paper and say, “trash” and run off to the kitchen to throw it away.  We could see that that was going to take a while, so we gave him a trash sack to put the paper in.  He was still pretty slow though.  Marcus & Jake were done and he still had like four presents to open.  He loved everything though.  Monday morning I had to work at it to convince him to come eat breakfast.  He said he was hungry, but he was just having too much fun playing with his new stuff.

This is our first Christmas in our house, so we had fun decorating.  It was a little stressful too at times.  I guess I’m kind of picky and Christmas decorations are expensive, so I had to get a little creative with burlap and free holly clippings etc.         

Salami Day

 

A few years ago the Wardens started a tradition of making the Gastaldo family salami on the Saturday after Thanksgiving.  They have it down to a science now and we help.

The men butcher, grind, season, and pack the meat.

The women (mainly Aunt Mary & Lee) make homemade ravioli and and sides for lunch.

Eli and Marcus played inside and out.

Thanksgiving

Mom and I cooked Wednesday and Thursday and we ate lots of good food.  I thought it was extra yummy this year.  The empty chair is Derek’s of course because he took the picture.

It was nice spending the weekend at the folks with everyone.  Monday when we were back at home Eli said several times, “Grandma’s house [in]stead.”

We also did a new thing this year.  We all wrote at least one thing we are thankful for on this pumpkin.  Then, after we ate, we read the pumpkin.  There were some serious things and some funny ones, but it was fun.  Eli was thankful for honey, eggs, books, and grapes.  He must have been hungry when I asked him.

It’s a girl!!

My big ultrasound was today and it seems pretty certain that our little one is a girl.  The pictures are kinda cruddy compared to the fancy ones we got in Hawaii, but we are very excited none the less.

Halloween

We dressed up as large fries, small fries, and of course the cutest 384 oz bottle of Ketchup you’ve ever seen.

Derek putting Ketchup on my fries.

Eli & Jesse liked playing with the pumpkins more than posing for pics.

Aunt Perina made Eli a mini loaf of homemade bread just like she used to do for us when we were kids. Of course she had cookies and candy too. He loved it all.

We had a fun Halloween visiting neighbors, family, and friends. Eli loved trick-or-treating. We convinced him that people wouldn’t give him candy if he didn’t leave his hat on since it was part of his costume. When we would leave one place some times he would try to veer off course, so we would tell him, “Let’s go get more candy.” He would respond, “Get more candy!” and then he was right back with us. He didn’t really understand the saving candy for later business though, he was all about now.