Adventures of Andre and Harper: Christmas '09

This is going to be a long post, covering our entire Christmas vacation. So if you have time - stay tuned.

We were supposed to leave mid-afternoon on December 23rd, but due to hold up at Jeff's work we were only able to leave at 6 PM. Which (if you know LA traffic) is perhaps the worst traffic hour - and so it was - it took us 2 hours to go 50 miles!!! Luckily as soon as we reached I-15 we picked up the speed, and did not encounter much traffic. We knew it was going to be a long trip when Andre asked, with downtown LA still in the view asked: "Are we a Grandma's house yet?"

The boys did better than expected thanks to our newly acquired (early Christmas present from Jeff's parents) portable DVD player. It was a lifesaver. The boys must have watched 9 movies each way and for most part stayed relatively happy.

Here they are in the back watching a movie - this picture was taken on the way home. And yes - Harper's nose is red because he fell off the hotel bed at night.

So the first day we drove all the way to Cedar City, UT and spent the night at Days Inn. On Christmas Eve we made it all the way to Idaho Falls, arriving early in the afternoon. We lucked out with the roads, as they were dry and we didn't encounter any snow. However Idaho was freezing!!! It was about 20 degrees! Brrr...

In the evening of our arrival, we tried to stage a little Nativity scene with the kids. It lasted all but a couple of minutes, if that. Harper did not want to keep his towel on, in fact he didn't want it put on. Andre took a little longer to get annoyed with head piece. The patience award definitely goes to Piper, who probably due to all that dress-up experience lasted the longest.

This is the best picture I took of them

We then opened our early Christmas present - which were PJs for everyone. And only minutes after we dressed the kids in their Christmas pajamas - Santa knocked on the door.

Piper and Andre were excited to see him.

Though Harper didn't have any problems with Santa at Disneyland, he decided he was not fond of this Santa. And was only semi-ok with Jeff holding him next to Santa.

Can you tell, Andre is done with the pictures?

Jeff and his brother Rick with Harper and Simon on Christmas morning

Cutie Piper

Andre and Piper were partners in mischief. They managed to get in trouble about every half hour. They also happened to raid a few closets for some Christmas candy.

Grandpa

Jeff's family has a tradition that you have to drink orange juice before heading into the basement to open presents - so this we did:

Andre chugging down his juice

Harper is finishing up

And Santa did indeed come.

Is that enough presents?

Andre asked Santa for Lightning McQueen, and so he found one in his stocking along with a bunch of candy.

Who said candy needs to be unwrapped to be eaten?

Andre got a pirate ship from Mom and Dad.

The boys also got a couple of new Christmas matryoshkas and cars from my parents. Their big gift (from us and Jeff's parents) was a play kitchen, which they play with on daily basis. They also got animal flashlights, and Harper got a pop-out Elmo toy. Andre also got a Handy Manny toy and Harper - a shopping cart from Piper and Simon - and they absolutely love those! (thanks)

I guess I really didn't take too many pictures of present opening, since I was in charge of distributing presents to everyone. You will also notice that there are no pictures of me, that's the fate of a photographer I guess.

Andre was excited to play in the snow. On his to do list were all the things about winter he learned from his TV shows: make a snow angel, throw snow balls (Andre called them throw-balls), build a snowman, go sledding. I am happy to report we were able to check them all off the list.

Harper's first time in the snow

The first time we went out - it was really freezing, around 20 degrees, and so Harper wasn't too sure about it. Toward the end of the week it snowed a lot more and it warmed up to above freezing, and so he liked it a lot more.

Andre: "Piper, go faster!"

Piper: "No Andre, you are too heavy!"

Having fun sledding with Piper

Making snowman's head

"Once there was a snowman - tall, tall, tall..."

The end result - notice all the edible facial features - broccoli for the eyes, carrot for the nose, Hershey's kisses for the mouth.

Grandpa was very nice, and built Andre a fort and taught him how to use it in a snowball fight.

My favorite picture of Simon

Uncle Rick with Andre

We got snowed in, this is what it looked like after we plowed

Uncle Ryan and Andre getting ready to leave

Harper shoveling the snow

Andre did a much better job

And, no, that is not how my kids were dressed for outside during the whole stay. These pictures were taken right before us getting into our car to go home.