Christmas 2008

So for the third time in less then 2 months we made the 5+ hour road trip up to Maryland for Christmas. But this time we got to meet our new niece/cousin- Kelsey! Oh yea and see the rest of the family- lol!

The drive is made a lot easier in the past couple years by listening to the Janet Evanovich's bounty hunter, Stephanie Plum series. Dave and I are hooked and we only listen to them in the car on road trips. It makes the drive go by so much quicker.

Arden was a huge fan of her new cousin Kelsey. She kept saying "bay-bee" and pointing to Kelsey and giving her kisses all weekend. It was cute.

We got up to Annapolis on Christmas Eve with just enough time to relax a bit and have some dinner. My parents were very generous and put us up in their Courtyard Marriott with a suite with an adjoining room to their room which was quite nice to have our room separate from our baby that goes to bed at 8 pm. Thanks Mom & Dad! Christmas morning we woke up and made the drive back over to Brian & Amy's. We quickly realized that the majority of the gifts under the tree were either for Kelsey or Arden- the two that couldn't really open their own gifts. And Arden wanted to play with everything after she opened it so we knew gifts with small children was going to take awhile! Arden got lots of new fun things but I think got a bit overloaded towards the end, so I stashed some gifts to be "new" again in a couple weeks. Stretch it out a bit. She did get a new tricycle from her Noani & Poppi which she thought was lots of fun! And she got a very Elmo filled Christmas with slippers, two Elmos, multiple Elmo books, and even a DVD. She got her first baby doll which she now likes to tote around. And the bag of rocks and the computer keyboard that Dave & I got her were a hit too! It's so much fun to watch Christmas through the eyes of a child and I have a feeling this is just the beginning. The day after Christmas we drove 2 hours down to Ocean City to see my Dad's side of the family, including my grandmother. It was really special for me for her to meet Arden, since I never got to meet my Great- Grandparents. And I haven't seen my cousin, Seth or Uncle Don in awhile so it was nice to visit with everyone in the larger extended family. Arden did great sleeping on the way down, but not sleeping on the way back. She was a real trooper to the crazy holiday schedule that she was on.

Then on Saturday Dave, Mom, Dad, Arden and I took the Metro down to DC and went to the National Museum of Natural History. Arden's first time on public transportation! She got a kick out of the Metro. The museum was a bit crowded but that was expected and constant. She walked around and saw big dinosaur bones, insects, and sea creatures. Then she crashed out in her stroller while we had lunch at the old post office.

Sunday was spent driving home which thank goodness was rather uneventful. It was a busy but fun filled family filled holiday!