Our Very Festive Weekend

Joe works from home on Fridays, and I just happened to get an email from Bath and Bodyworks saying their candles were on sale for one day only, so we spent his lunch break at the mall. There happened to be absolutely no wait to see Santa. The poor guy was just twiddling his thumbs, and actually had the photographer take a few photos, just to make sure they got it right. I had a bad case of hat head, and was not really "picture ready" but I think part of the point of Santa pictures is to have a somewhat awkward yearly family memento. Ez definitely took care of that with his stony glare. He did wave to Santa before and after the picture though, so he doesn't completely hate Santa, he's just not a fan of the picture process. In Santa's words, "I can tell when a kid is gonna freak the hell out, and I knew he would be ok." Well said, Santa. Well said.

Friday evening we wanted to go visit our favorite Christmas light spots in Pasadena. We started with the tree at the City Hall:

Ez loved the giant tree, of course. He went straight for the lights, and then we walked around the tree a few times. Unfortunately, that is where our Christmas light journey ended. Two of the other spots didn't have their lights on, which we didn't understand. It's pretty close to Christmas, and one of them was decorated, the lights just weren't on. 

Saturday afternoon Ez got to play at Grandma Kat's while Joe and I went to the Nutcracker. I love ballet, and haven't been in forever. And Joe hasn't been at all, so it was really fun. We saw the IFP Ballet company, and they did not disappoint. The only downside was we had to move seats because there were a bunch of little ballerina girls in front of us standing in their seats and dancing in the aisles. It was really cute. For a few minutes. And then it was distracting. Thankfully there were empty seats a few rows back. After the show, we googled "en pointe" and looked at the images, and came across one ballerina's bare foot. Scary. They definitely sacrifice a lot to be able to dance around on their toes like that.

And just for fun, I found a little pregnancy comparison of me around 4 months pregnant with Ez on the left, and about 3 months pregnant with baby #2 on the right:

Apparently I can't pass up an opportunity to pose with a giant nutcracker. 

Some of the cute little candy dancers from the show.

On Saturday evening we went back to Pasadena for a friend's birthday party at the Melting Pot. It was a lot of fun catching up with friends, and it was cool because they had a private room, so the kids could run around without causing too much of a ruckus. I don't know if you've ever been to the Melting Pot before, but it was our first time, and most likely our last. We had heard it was expensive, but that still didn't prepare me for paying over $50 for literally: one bite-sized chunk of salmon, half a baby potato, 2 mushrooms, a side salad, and a rice krispie treat and some marshmallows. The main problem was that aside from the salad and veggies, it wasn't at all vegetarian friendly. Also, if you're strictly vegetarian, you probably wouldn't want your veggies cooked with other people's meat. Thankfully I eat salmon, but there were only 5 bites to be split among 4 people. It would've made more sense for us to just eat beforehand, skip the food, and show up for the company. Lesson learned. 

Afterward we went to another of our favorite Pasadena Christmas light spots: Hastings Ranch. This is our 4th year going as a couple (see here and here), and our 2nd year going with Ez. Now that Ez is in a forward-facing carseat he was so enthralled by the lights. When we got out to walk he was so excited his little feet were running in the air before they even hit the pavement. Ez has a thing with deer right now, and one of the streets was completely lined with lit-up reindeer, so he would go up to each one, touch it, and yell "DEER!" then get really excited when we praised him for getting the word right. A lot of the houses also have Christmas carols playing, so there was a whole lot of impromptu dancing going on. Basically, it was better than I could have imagined. Seeing Christmas through Ez's eyes is the best gift. He makes everything a thousand times more fun and magical.

I've got one more side by side pregnancy comparison for ya. Me kissing a reindeer in 2012 on the left, vs. me, the reindeer, and Ez this past weekend:

The night pretty much ended when Joe dropped his brand new iphone 6 and smashed the screen. Thankfully it's going to cost less to fix than we thought. An alternative way we could have spent our Saturday evening would have been to have a nice cozy bonfire using twenty dollar bills as kindle. But such is life, and lessons learned: no more Melting Pot and heavy-duty rubber cases for Joe's phone from now on.

Sunday turned out to be pretty productive. I did most of the gift wrapping, finished up a few gift projects, and we spent the evening hunting for the cheapest price on a new iphone screen. 

How was your weekend? Have you made good progress on your holiday bucket list? Here's how ours is looking at the moment: 

Our Modesto Christmas trip is planned. The Snow Festival isn't going to happen, because we went car shopping that day instead - a welcome tradeoff! So far I've watched half of two Christmas movies (Elf and The Holiday), so that kinda counts as watching one whole Christmas movie, right??

Linking up with Our Pretty Little Girls, Happily Ever Mock, and Sundaes & Spaghetti for: