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I couldn't let the year end without at least ONE post in December, lol. Even if it is barely 1.5 hours until 2010 and January.
Tristan and Naiyah had their first non-family babysitter tonight. I have to say, it was pretty odd being on the parent side of things when leaving the house. I can remember so many times where I was in the exact same situation, only I was the babysitter. It was SO weird to be on the parent end of it! It's very different from dropping them off with my mom for an evening or overnight.
The reason for the babysitter (and not grandma and grandpa) is so Tom and I could go to dinner at Cafe Juanita WITH my mom and stepdad. It was amazing. It was a seven course prix fixe menu, so we were able to try several new things we wouldn't ordinarily choose. It was less like a meal and more like an event, almost a pampering. I even found a wine that I loved enough to drink the whole glass AND want to buy it to drink at home! I just hope it's remotely affordable. I'm sure we'll go back there sometime for a nice dinner out again. It's less than five minutes from where we live, which makes it a lot more convenient.
After initially freaking out when I left the house, Naiyah did pretty well considering her shyness lately. The girl who babysat for us is a cousin of one of my good friends, and is a nanny for her day job. The kids LOVED her, and she was fantastic with them. Hopefully she'll come back, considering that Naiyah came down with a stomach virus shortly before we were finished with the dessert course. I was really really hoping to get away with not having EITHER kid be a thrower-upper, but no such luck I guess. I threw up ALL the time as a kid, so the odds were against my offspring to start with. One out of two isn't bad, I suppose. Anyhow, we added a little "hazardous duty" bonus into the babysitter's pay. In my opinion, anything involving vomit warrants something extra.
Overall, it was pretty good. A little traumatic for a first babysitting experience on my end, but I'm sure the memory will fade with time. And I think she liked the kids enough to come back. :) Happy New Year to everyone, I hope yours is starting with less regurgitation than mine is. Or at least if regurgitation occurs I hope it's for a more fun reason!
Well...apparently I only have three readers, not five. Guess I won't be putting ads on my blog anytime soon. Lol. =) But, I guess I'll keep blogging anyway. No promises as to any sort of regularity though. Although I will aim to blog more often than once every two months. Cross my heart.
As it stands, I also have a funny story to share this time. We get the Sunday paper, and it is currently STUFFED with holiday ads (as I'm sure you can imagine). So yesterday Tom was flipping through the ads and the Toys R Us ad caught his eye. Now, being the brilliant daddy he is, the light bulb in his head flashed on and illuminated a GREAT idea. Here is what ensued, in the form of a screenplay:
Tom - handing Tristan the ad booklet and a pen: Tristan, look in this book and circle anything you would like Santa to bring you for Christmas.
Tristan - eyes wide, clutching the booklet and pen to his chest: SANTA?? I get to pick ANYTHING?
Tom - nodding: Yep, anything you want. Circle the things you like and when you're done bring it over and show me.
Tristan - scrambling into his seat: Yaaaaaaaaaaaay!!
--5 minutes pass--
Tristan - climbing down and running over to Tom: Daddy, look! I'm all done! Daddy! DADDY! DAAADDDDDDYYYYY!
Yes, our son has only three volumes. Loud, louder, and loudest. Anyhow, I'm sure all you parents out there are pretty darn sure you know what was circled in the booklet. EVERYTHING. Just like I was certain of that very fact when I saw Tom trying to stifle his laughter as he was flipping through the ad.
But apparently I was wrong (and you too, haha!). The reason Tom was laughing so hard is because Tristan had carefully looked through the entire booklet, methodically looked at each toy, and only circled the ones he actually would like! I was amazed. I'm pretty sure at that age, I would have just circled EVERYTHING and been done in two seconds flat.
I love my kid. He's so adorable and funny even when he has no idea he is entertaining us. You can rest assured, that meticulously canvassed ad booklet is destined for his memory box.
Fact: It has been two months since I last posted. Long enough for blogspot to go changing things on me again.Fact: Blogspot is a giant pain in my ass when I try to post photos.Fact: I have no idea who really reads this blog, or if in fact ANYONE does.Fact: I seem to be pretty darn bad at blogging, seeing as how I constantly aim to blog, make promises to do so consistently, and then fall off the blogging wagon shortly thereafter. Conclusion: Maybe I should give up blogging? I post all my photos on FB now anyways, and I think anyone who knows about this blog also has FB and so sees them there. AND I have very limited time these days, and don't usually get around to posting cute stories anyways. Hypothesis: If people want me to continue blogging, they will post a comment to that effect within a week from today. (And then I'll know who exactly all five of you are that read my blog mwahahaha!)Hm. I'll postpone d-day a bit and see what happens. But in the meantime here's this year's Santa photo for your amusement.
Yes, I realize it's been over a month since I posted. What can I say, life gets in the way. And just as I refuse to be chained to a tv show, I also refuse to be chained to the computer. So, my blogs might be a little sporadic now and again despite my best efforts. Lol. I have photos of Tristan's first soccer practice, and other random stuff stockpiled to write. Coming soon to a blog near YOU! (Aka this one. Lol).
Anyhow, just a quick plug for me: I submitted an essay to the Polar heart rate monitor's "Journey to Wow!" contest that they posted on facebook, and actually made it into the top 7 entrants! Now comes voting on who you find most inspiring, so I'd appreciate any votes that you in cyberland want to send my way! Every vote I get is a vote against diabetes and the nasty reputation Type 2 diabetics have of being fat and lazy. So step on over and add your voice!
Polar Journey to Wow!
The evening before we left, Tom and I decided to check out Madame Tussaud's Wax Museum. Luckily we were in Vegas, because I am positive that in any other city a museum, tourist attraction or not, would be closed by 10:30 on a Sunday night! We managed to slip in before they closed at 11, which was awesome because we pretty much had the place to ourselves. I didn't realize that you could actually go up and TOUCH the wax figures and take pictures with them! I loved the celebrity section - anyone who really knows me knows that I am a daily visitor to People.com so this shouldn't be a surprise. Tom's favorite part was all the sports figures. Our little camera definitely got a workout on this visit. Madame Tussauds was probably the one time I really wished I had brought my Canon along. But oh well. I still love the photos we got, and it was very nice to keep the trip simple. The odds are not great that I would be printing out enormous photos of me at Madame Tussauds anyways, haha. Hope you have as much fun looking at these pics as we did taking them!
Posing with Heff...the closer I got, the creepier it got, but I had to do it!!
Indiana! One of my all time favorite movies. 
Hey, I could TOTALLY be the next bond girl!
I think I do a pretty mean Marilyn Monroe impersonation. Minus the curls and super red lipstick of course.
Yep, I am both a Trekkie and an X-Men fan. Now you know my dirty little secret.
The one show I wish I could have seen. Apparently there is still a tiger exhibit in one of the casinos, but we managed to miss it on this trip. Next time.
Tom punching a defenseless Mohammed Ali.
Hanging out with Cameron Diaz.
It's like a buddy punch. I think. Tom's really short...
See, really short. It's ok. I'll still keep him.
Julia Roberts. And I just noticed that her 'dress' is see-through lace. Interesting.
Uh, honey...I don't think Paris Hilton is a leftovers kinda girl...
Givin' tips to the PROS.
This post is a bit delayed, but you all know the reasons why. =)
Tom and I had a great time in Vegas. Despite me being a little nervous about leaving the kids for FOUR whole days for my first time, it turned out that I wasn't worried about it at all while we were gone. They were in great hands, so aside from the occasional thought of "oh, Tristan would like this" (etc), I didn't really think of them too much.
We definitely packed a TON of things into our little four day trip. We saw Jerry Seinfeld, Cirque du Soleil's "O" show, the Defending the Caveman show, ate at Wolfgang Puck's restaurant The Cut, visited the Mandalay Bay Shark Reef, Madame Tussaud's wax museum, and did a LOT of walking. We saw most of the casinos, not quite all but almost. There is such an amazing variety of things to do there, I LOVED it. I also loved the shopping! ; ) We definitely want to go back.
The only real downside for me was that there is smoking allowed in the casinos. Totally forgot about that, since you can't smoke indoors anywhere in Washington now. The upscale ones weren't nearly so bad, but in some of the less swanky ones I had to walk out after about 15 minutes due to a raging headache. Luckily my headaches went away pretty fast in the (hot!) fresh air, so it was do-able. I'd have to say my favorite casinos of the ones we saw so far was the Venetian, and the Palazzo. Wonderful shopping, and they were so beautiful. Since I don't think we're going to Italy anytime soon (surprising, right?), we'll have to head back to Vegas and get our gondola ride there.
Photos will be posted in batches, so I don't make one post too long and also to avoid linking to a slideshow. I didn't bring my Canon, as I wanted to travel light and be as carefree as possible. So, all these photos are from my little Sony p&s. Not phenomenal photos, but you can see for yourself that they definitely captured how much fun we had!
These photos are from before/after the Cirque du Soleil show. As usual, no particular order to them.A cool water globe fountain.
Cirque du Soleil
A statue in front of Cirque du Soleil
In front of the Vegas "Eiffel Tower". I have no idea what casino it belongs to, haha.
Before Cirque du Soleil. I would like to point out that this is the same dress I was wearing when Tom and I got engaged some seven years ago...and it now fits as well or BETTER than it did then! 
I was going to start blogging about our Vegas trip, but when I logged on I noticed that FatCyclist (to the right on my blog list) had just updated his blog. Upon stopping over there to check it out, I found out that after her extended and ferocious battle with cancer, his wife Susan passed away this evening.
If you haven't checked out his blog, I would encourage you to do so. Not only is he a wonderful writer, he is also about as close to a true hero as I can imagine. I could only hope to handle such a terrible turn in life with so much grace, dignity, courage, and yes, humor.
Fight like Susan.
And I think I'm not the only one. When you're spending minimal time indoors, things like blogging tend to fall by the wayside. I've noticed on the blogs that I read regularly, postings have been less frequent also. Summer is a busy time for everyone, not just me!
I don't have any new photos or any new stories really. Just wanted to explain my extended absence. =) Tom and I are heading to Las Vegas to celebrate his 32nd birthday (kidless!) this weekend, so I should have some things to write after we return.
