Christmas in Mathis

Uncle Cantrell and Nathan

 At Thanksgiving the sisters decided that we could all get together for family Christmas the weekend of the 15th in Mathis. Evidently that worked for everyone else's schedule too because the whole Houston bunch came too! Nathan and I had recovered from the stomach bug from the weekend before (my birthday weekend) and were looking forward to a nice weekend with family. The timing also saved me from the two Christmas parties the night of the 15th that were conflicting (young families at church and EY WM team in Kingwood). I managed to get all the presents bought in advance but did not actually get them wrapped until the night before we left. That meant I had to pack us up Saturday morning which always puts us running behind.

Joule helping the wrapping process.

We wake up Saturday morning at the crack of dawn as usual and quickly notice that Nathan feels warm. So we take his temperature and sure enough it's above 101. Wooooonderful. I start packing anyway telling myself that 101 isn't that bad and it is probably just an ear infection. He was acting perfectly fine and playing in a good mood. But I called Kimberley and Kelley anyway since they both have little ones that would be sensitive to what Nathan might have had. Oh, I forgot to mention that his daycare had sent home a note earlier that week saying hand-foot-mouth was going around his class. I only got ahold of Kimberley and she helped persuade me it was still okay to come and she would not hold us responsible if Chance or Breydon caught HFM (highly contagious). Of course she had ulterior motives for wanting me to come, but we'll get to that in a little while. I was still in denial and telling myself it was an ear infection so I finished packing us up. I took his temperature again before we left (his mood was deteriorating by then) and sure enough it had climbed to above 102. At this point I felt like the worst mommy in the world but we still dosed Nathan with Tylenol and loaded up the car with presents, luggage and us. Then, because this was a horrible morning already, my car decided not to start.  We had to wake up the neighbor (who does shift work) to borrow jumper cables. Luckily that worked on the first try and we got on the road about an hour and a half late.

The ride down was uneventful. Nathan slept or sat quietly awake for the majority of the trip. We finally got to Mathis around 1:00 or so and ate lunch from the leftovers that hadn't yet been put up from the big meal. We also noticed that Nathan was starting to get faint spots on his cheeks that we figured were just bumps from sleeping up against his carseat strap covers for so long (remember the denial?).

Nathan livened up a little bit around his cousins but was still being super clingy and acted tired. His fever didn't want to stay down so we had to keep dosing him with Tylenol and Advil all day long. We waited for Cynthia and Bill to arrive before opening presents, which was torture on the kids who knew what was going on (mostly Allen and Breydon). I think we finally got around to opening around 4:00 or so. I didn't take very many pictures since I was trying to open Nathan's presents and keep an eye on Mom who had a special present to open from us.

Mom finally got around to picking up the special little box we had for her then proceeded to torture Jimmy, Kim (who also knew what was inside) and I with the slowest gift opening spectacle I've ever seen! Of course she didn't know it was special and didn't know we were all watching her from across the room, so she can be somewhat forgiven. She was also distracted by watching Cantrell and Allen opening their presents since they were the closest to her. After Kim berated me for taping the box closed, and thus prolonging the suspense even longer, Mom fiiiinally got the thing open. She lifted up the size 2T "Big Brother" shirt and held it in front of her for at least 30 seconds, no doubt wondering if I had mislabeled the box. Then the lightbulb turned on and she lowered the shirt slightly to peer over the top at me looking for confirmation. I just said, "Oh, did I put the wrong name on the box?" She just started laughing that half-laugh half-cry thing people do and came over to give us a hug. We then showed off the shirt to the rest of the family who almost universally said, "Really?!"  It made the whole trip worth it, even though I won worst mommy of the year by taking my obviously sick child around all his cousins three and a half hours south of his own home.

So now the trick was keeping the happy news within my family since we planned on surprising Lori on Christmas Eve in a similar fashion. Everyone (mostly Mom and Kelley who live and work in Sinton also) complained that Christmas Eve was soooo far away but nevertheless agreed to keep quiet.

Nathan got more toys this year than last year when it was mostly clothes.  He got a Melissa & Doug puzzle train (Skipper & Dayle); sweaters (Bill & Cynthia); Leapfrog Alphabet tablet and Big Brother book (Aunt Kimberley & Uncle Kevin); a Cowboys tote bag and magnet scribble pad (Aunt Kelley & Uncle Chris); a Hallmark read-along friend Nugget the puppy and accompanying book and glow tent with writing wand (Grammy), superhero cars (Uncle Cantrell) and foam dinosaurs for the bathtub (Gigi).  Again, no pictures...sorry.

Allen building his present fort.

Breydon copying Allen and building his fort.

Grammy, Nathan and Gigi

Aunt Kimberley and Cousin Chance

The rest of the day was spent playing with cousins, puppy dogs and getting asked questions like, "Are you going to have a baby sex party?" (courtesy cousin Tommy) I responded that we already had that party but we would think about doing a gender reveal. We left Grandma's house at around 6:00 and headed back to Lori's house in Sinton. Nathan took a catnap on the way there and was refreshed enough to play with Popo a little while before bedtime.

Pumpkin could hardly hold still long enough for Nathan to "throw" the ball.

This is Nathan looking at the ball with an "ewwww" expression.

He slept horribly that night and ended up coming into bed with us  around midnight because he was otherwise inconsolable. By the next morning there was no more denying it. My baby had more spots on his mouth and was starting to get them on his hands and feet. My precious angel had HFM. Bad mommy! Of course he didn't want to eat because of the sore throat so we had a difficult morning before packing up to head home.

One trick we managed before leaving was to fit Nathan's present from Lolo (a Radio Flyer two-seater wagon) in the trunk with all of our luggage, presents and pack-n-play since she was certain they wouldn't have enough room when they came the next weekend (turns out she was right). We had to put our suitcase in the backseat, but everything else fit perfectly in the trunk, despite the naysayers around me who said it couldn't be done. Doubters. The ride home wasn't as good as the one going down. Nathan slept only a little and was hard to keep entertained the rest of the time. But we finally made it home and thus ended a short but long weekend that was full of the happiness of sharing our news and the concern of taking care of a sick munchkin.

Next up, an update on the pregnancy and Christmas at home (although perhaps not in that order).