That’s possibly the cheesiest title I’ve ever come up with, and that’s saying a lot, considering I spent a couple of years titling articles in the ZOOgram magazine at The Baltimore Zoo. Got Cranes on the Brain? Paying Raptor Attention?

The holiday report is this:

THANKSGIVING: Anne and Auggie visited. The Hills came over, as did David, and Jeremy stopped by, as did Jeremy Jr. and Julie and Cousin-Shana. Patricia was here too. Am I forgetting anyone? We played some games, went to the playground (a bit chilly but nice to get fresh air.) We had a lovely dinner, as prepared by Jerry’s Famous Deli and picked up to-go. This is called slaving over a hot credit-card. Violet was not interested in eating one bite of this feastly feast, oh no, she had found superior nutrition in the form of a small tray of assorted trail mixes set out as appetizers. All day, all she ate: Trail mix.

CHRISTMAS: This time I got Whole Foods do the cooking, and what a tasty meal it was! We were joined by Jeremy, Melissa, David, Junior, Julie, Noelle, and Phil. We were also joined by the Wightmans, but as we did not hear the phone ring to let them in, we were denied the pleasure of their company. [Yes, in other words, we invited them and then did not answer the door when they came. We are enormous jerks. ] But in happier news, we played Pictionary and Buzz, played outside in warm sunshine, and partook of decorated cookies, mudslides, a fantastic meal, and other treats. Oh, except for Violet, who spent the day eating nothing but—you guessed it—TRAIL MIX. Again.

I got a few photos on my phone, and Melissa and Jeremy had a camera along, so one way or another, I’ll share photos with you soon. Now I need to go eat some leftovers and dump the trail mix out of my shoes.

Merry merry to you all!

Here at No. 6, we are preparing for for the holidays with festive verve. We have decorated the Christmas “tree” and wrapped the gifts, sent out the cards, and invited the friends to play on Friday. You will note our “tree” is actually a lamp. Reason: Vibble cannot be trusted with an actual tree. I learned that at Sizzler.

Stevel is working from home this week and off next week. Awesome!

This year Violet is getting … not a lot. She doesn’t really know what’s going on, so I’m not about to drop a wad on her. There IS a new tricycle in the house (well, new to us—recycled), and I’ve ordered some accessories for it. And when Nana and Papa-Auggie visited for Thanksgiving, she got an early holiday gift in the form of a cute little dollhouse. So the newness is well underway.

Vibble went to speech therapy last week. Overall, she is behind—the speech pathologist says she is about 25% behind—but not for any medical or mental reason. The doc attributed it to “desire,” meaning, Violet doesn’t want to talk more, or doesn’t have incentive to talk more. She didn’t advise speech therapy, just a continuation on our part of things we’ve already been doing and perhaps an increase in the activities we do with other children. She did say Violet is advanced in terms of coordination and physical agility. She thinks she will likely catch up to her peers with encouragement from us to practice talking more.

On an unrelated side note, a holiday shout out to our friends at Table Toppers, one of my favorite products and something I’m thankful for this holiday season. These things have saved us. Everywhere we go (and we eat out a lot, for various reasons), everyone seems so impressed when we whip these things out and attach one to the table. Like we are such great parents for insuring our daughter eats off of a sanitary surface. Little do they know the actual reason: Violet cannot be trusted with dishware. (We learned that at Sizzler, too. Also at Akbar. And Thai Dishes. And …) Oh, and on another unrelated side note: Toddler leg warmers are some of the cutest things ever invented, holy crap.

More recent photos

Enjoying a visit from Debi and Sam right now. Photos of that, plus Christmas morning, are here (click). Merry merry!

UPDATE! I have more to add:

So, on this visit, we did the aquarium, which Sam seemed to enjoy a lot. He is a fan of turtles and got up his nerve to pet some rays and sharks in the touch-pools. He aspires to be an oceanographer one day, so it was really up his alley. Violet, meanwhile, was enthralled watching all of the kids. She also seemed to enjoy the tanks this time—not a ton of enthusiasm, but she was interested. The only incident was when an adorable sea lion came over to the other side of the glass right in front of us to play, and Vibble freaked out—screamed, clutched at me, and began sobbing. Too dog-like, maybe. No matter how much I try to expose her to dogs in a gentle way, she fears them for the most part.

We also enjoyed a great day down at the beach by the pier with Sam and Violet. Vibble is very entertained by her big cousin.

For new year’s, Debi and Sam hung out with Violet here at No. 6 so Stevel and I could go out to dinner ALONE. This hasn’t really happened much in the last ten months, although it WILL be happening MORE. Anyway, we went to Akbar, of course, and enjoyed ourselves. We even got dessert (the Mango Surprise is BACK). When we got home, we all watched the ball drop on the East coast. As we debated whether to stay up until West-coast Midnight, we watched an episode of Hannah Montana, thanks to Sam. If you’ve never seen this show, it’s really something. Steve’s reaction? “Is this the end of civilization?”

Christmas was delightful. We spent Christmas Eve with the Kodjas and their other guests here in Santa Monica, trying some authentic Thai seafood. It was delicious, and I had never seen a big squid-head on a grill before. BUT NOW I HAVE. We played “Scene-It,” which I have to admit I always assumed was a dumb game, but it is actually great fun. Violet interacted with 8-month-old Joseph. He is a big, healthy kid with sweet pink cheeks. Mostly, they grabbed at each other’s faces. It was Mrs. Kodja’s birthday, which meant there was both a cookie-cake AND an ice cream cake. And champagne! Let’s just say I had to detox the next day, and not from the champagne. The Kodjas also brought us two pears the size of monkey heads for New Years.

Christmas morning we had visits from David, Jeremy, and Melissa. (Thus, additional photos shall be forthcoming.) We all enjoyed watching Violet experience her first Christmas. She did not seem to notice anything special going on and mostly, as we predicted, enjoyed playing in the discarded wrapping. David and I took a walk to get cake (well, I got cake, and David showed amazing restraint in ordering only a bottled water) and visit Sarah-Architect. Later, the Kadoshes (Eitan, Jacquelyn, and Charlie) came over for a nice, long, leisurely afternoon and evening of Rock Band, “Apples to Apples,” and junk food. Oh, man, GREAT DAY!

Happy new year to all.