Christmas.

I know it's a little late for a Christmas post, but who cares... it's my blog, my post...

On Christmas Eve we went to my folk's house. My dad had ordered fresh lobster to be delivered from Maine (does life get any better?) but they didn't arrive. In fact, as the story goes, they were shipped to the west coast (dad tracked their progress online) and made it out to the desert. Then for some unknown reason, the package started heading west... where it sat in Los Angeles, and then eventually started traveling back to the desert! The UPS guy arrived at my parent's house with rotten lobsters that you could smell from ten feet away WITHOUT opening the box. Dad refused the delivery thus forcing UPS to RETURN the box back to the east coast... stench and all. We had prime rib instead. Yum!

That evening, Lacy put out cookies, milk and carrots for Santa and his reindeer! As Lacy fell asleep, Randy dashed for the cookies, I got stuck with the carrots. Next year I will move much faster!

Just like her mother, Lacy scrambled to open her Christmas candy found in her stocking! (Thanks mom, you are the best! I totally forgot Christmas candy!)





I had been warned about buying certain gifts for Lacy by much more experienced parents. We were told that she would, most likely, gravitate towards the cheap gift and completely ignore the expensive ones. I was sure that this would not be the case. As it turns out, we have a ridiculously overpriced Baby Alive that has gone completely ignored since she opened it... well, except when she told me that, "the baby is crying mom, feed it"! Stupid doll. The first gift Lacy opened was the bear-skin-rug (see my previous post) from my parents. As Lacy tore the wrapping paper off of the giant brown box, she exclaimed, "Thank you for my box! I love it!" What a cool kid, she was so jazzed to get a big brown box.
By far, the most popular gift at the Cramer house was the alphabet puzzle my sister found for Lacy. She is so smart! In fact, at dinner the other day, Lacy turned to us and said, "I think I want to be a doctor, like my aunt Becky". Hmmm... maybe we better get that college fund going, huh?Lacy is not just an academic, she is also artsy you know... this is her photograph of her Grampy Mike. With her Grammy Judy watching over Grampy's shoulder! It's just ingenious the angle she chose!After our breakfast we loaded up the car (no small feat) and headed off to the San Diego area. We had lunch/dinner at Randy's Aunt Lana's house. As always, everything was amazing and beautiful. Aunt Lana made Lacy the cutest hat I had ever seen (and like a total idiot I left it there!)... Aunt Lana is totally a hipper version of Martha Stewart. I envy her taste. Here is cousin Ashley, who Lacy named her Baby Alive doll after... and according to Lacy, also has cute buns! (Inside Joke)

We spent some time with the family...This is the newest member of the family, Katie... she is sooo cute.

After that, we headed back to Grams' house for more gifts.

Lacy received not one, but three Barbie dolls from her aunt Larci as well as some of the cutest clothes...

Grams gave Lacy a million gifts including three Leap Frog games and a few toys I couldn't manage to find myself! Lacy was in heaven!

By far, the coup of the entire holiday was Uncle Kyle and Aunt Natalie's gift Mr Bucket. Lacy couldn't wait to play with Mr Bucket! Lacy is a very lucky little girl.By the time we arrived home around midnight, we didn't' have a single inch of room left in our living room. We (Randy) made nearly a dozen trips from the car to the house to get everything inside! Next Christmas I hope to be in a MUCH bigger place!