And now back to our Christmas adventures! We loaded up the car and headed for Chris and Anne Marie’s on the 26th of December, 2008…

Yup, Grandma Sue, Mommy, Daddy and Ian motored south. Ian slept for part of the way, completely off his schedule, and needed to run around a nearby playground to burn off some of that saved up energy.

Give that kid a couple of cars, and he’s good for quite awhile. We opened presents that night, but didn’t actually take any pictures of that for some reason. I did get video, which I will be doing some fun stuff with hopefully in a little while. Chef Chris treated us to an excellent dinner this evening as well, before dealing a humbling game of Texas Hold ‘Em to his victims. That night, Ian slept horribly… off schedule, ears hurting, at a new house whenever he opens his eyes… I hope Uncle Chris and Auntie Anne understand Ian can be a much better boy. (Not that he did poorly, he actually was an amazing trooper, if you think about it.) See this image larger.

So the next morning we woke up and Uncle Chris drove his exhausted cargo to Naples.

Upon arrival, Ian immediately took inventory… “One fish, two fish… shhh Daddy I’m counting, here.” You may have noticed the blossoming violet splotch on Ian’s forehead… he slipped on a cement lanai a few days earlier, and it became like a living mood ring on his head… purple means he’s feeling sassy and tired. See this image larger.

Great Grandma Betty knew precisely what to do with her great grandson under the circumstances. We decided to try and either bring food or order it and that was going to take awhile, so these animal crackers came in quite handy… and tasty! See this image larger.

“Hello Applebees? Yes I have an order for 6 people. I need a cheeseburger without the cheese. What? Yes, FINE a HAMBURGER then… SO BE IT!” See this image larger.

And then the opening of the gifts! See this image larger.

Great Grandma Betty gets a kick out of Ian’s insistence that this be opened immediately. See this image larger.

“Well I heard about the fella you been dancin’ with, all ovah the neighborhood… so whydin’t you ask me baby, uh didn’t you think I could?” If you’re confused by that caption, click it and all will become clear. See this image larger.

Ian played “Santa,” distributing the gifts accordingly. It was awesome to see him get names right on the first try for most of us. See this image larger.

A hug of thanks, and maybe an apology or two for turning the stereo on and off 42 times. See this image larger.

And a hug for Grandma Sue! Thanks for coming! See this image larger.

I don’t think I got a good shot with Melissa in it with Grandma, but we did manage to pull off this one and the next. Ian wasn’t even supposed to be in this shot per se, but I think it turned out pretty good! See this image larger.

Granny and the boys! Well, two of the boys. As you could tell from the pacifier being included in more and more shots toward the end there, Ian was running out of energy fast! See this image larger.

It did end up being a relatively quick trip, but it was great to see Great Grandma Betty again! Ian called her “Betty” at one point, which was really awesome, and he’s done so again at least once since seeing these pictures. We all had a good time visiting, and look forward to doing so again! (Or hopefully we’ll see you up in Michigan over the summer sometime, Grandma?) See this image larger.

On the 26th we went to Grandma Sue’s. It’s a trade-off for Ian. He gets to spend time with a different grandparent, and seeing everybody is good, of course. On the other hand, it might not seem like it would be as fun with less kids running around over at Grandma Sue’s… but on the OTHER other hand… he’s the ONLY kid over at Grandma Sue’s, so the spotlight is on him. So no matter which place, he wins, right?

Ian got to open some presents that Santa left at Grandma Sue’s for him to open… This easel was very cool, and to this day Ian guides anybody who will help to follow Grandma Sue’s instructions for drawing a happy face, whenever we’ve got something to draw with: “Curcle… eyeee… eyeee….” See this image larger.

Cute little bugger, isn’t he? What if I told you he chased Grandma Sue’s cat K.C. to the far corner chair, where it sat cowering and saying a little kitty prayer that it be left alone? Does that make Ian less cute? Probably only to a cat. See this image larger.

Melissa skillfully pulled off this shot… if I were to hazard a guess, however, as to how this happened, I’d say Ian chased the cat right through this cube. I’ll take this time to again apologize to the cats of Florida, in this case K.C. in particular. See this image larger.

Ian tried out Grandma Sue’s cool vibrating chair cover. I’m guessing it made him completely fill his diaper. See this image larger.

Ian… IAN… um, HELLO? See this image larger.

Horsey-back ride, and a glance of sheer joy. See this image larger.

Tried a few shots here without the flash… not too too bad. See this image larger.

Grandma Sue offers up a bed-time story, so that Ian might sleep well, and he did… as you’ll find out in part VI, it turned out that he’d need it — the plane ride irritated those ears of his, and sleep would be hard to come by for the next several nights. See this image larger.

The trip to Chris and Anne-Marie’s, and off to Great Grandma Betty’s in Part VI!

Christmas at last! Days of swimming, playing games on Grampa Ray’s laptop, playing games on Uncle D’s iPhone, running around the house while being timed and taking “short cuts” through The Villages have culminated in a spectacular morning of joy!

“OH. MAH. GAHD. I CAN’T SEE THE FLOOR.” See this image larger.

Here Ian glares at the camera, wondering if this photoshoot is in any way delaying the opening of the gifts. See this image larger.

Ian gets a nice book, and the call of the “blankie” is almost too strong… “Don’t fall asleep! GAKEUP! Must… open… presents…” See this image larger.

Here Ian shows off his practiced unwrapping technique. He just needs you to start a corner and he’ll take care of the rest! See this image larger.

Kids say a lot of things when they receive the present of their deepest desires, but “I was good enough!!!” has got to be the clincher for best line ever! Congrats Connor on receiving a Wii! See this image larger.

Ian swipes one of Connor’s presents and wears it as a hat. Can’t help it when he sees a circle! See this image larger.

Connor be sure and tell your parents that it was Uncle D who told you how to do the Heisman pose. I’m only a part-time nerd. 😉 See this image larger.

Ian stole that present too for a bit, sorry Connor! See this image larger.

This crazy fold-out city had a lot of fun interactive activities on it, and Ian was mesmerized for quite a while. See this image larger.

Trying to carry four cars at once ain’t easy, but he pulled it off with a little help loading up. See this image larger.

If it looks at all like somebody told these two they’ve got to ship all this stuff home shortly in boxes, that wouldn’t be much of a stretch, lol 😉 See this image larger.

Just a few pics in Part IV, I want to make sure I don’t overload anybody’s computer with too many pics! O_o;;

I had my web host move the blog so that we didn’t run into so much downtime… sadly this messed up permissions and I’ve been unable to edit the blog. That’s not why, tho. I’ve basically been on fire since I got back from Florida with work and whatever else. But now we’re back in business apparently, so let’s get bloggin’.

First we start at home:

This is a picture from Christmas at home, which took place on the 20th of December. Ian received a guitar as one of his presents, and it is pretty fantastic as far as kid’s toys go, I must say. I on the other hand, am sporting a very mature (cough) um… controller for a uh… video game where you pretend to be able to play guitar. See this image larger.

Believe it or not, the night of the 20th, we headed for Lansing, to stay at a hotel, as mentioned in entries below. Ian slept between us in bed when we got there, and he was a real trooper. There were some intense moments of driving through the blizzard, and to see him cuddle up on his “blankie” out of exhaustion was heartening to say the least.

The next morning, we made it to the airport via shuttle, and the runways did not look very clear… there was also a crazy wind rustling up walls of zero-visibility for the pilots to contend with. They moved our gate twice…

The flight to Florida was arduous — Ian did his best not to cry, although the flight aggravated his ears which were still hurting from his cold a handful of days earlier. We tried his pacifier, but it didn’t seem to make him feel much better, and he was not a happy camper by the time the plane was beginning its final descent. Girl that sat in front of Ian… wherever you are… I apologize to you again for the number of times your seat got kicked and the tray behind you was moved into the up/down position. Mostly people told us that he had behaved himself nicely, apparently in contrast to some other kid they were thinking of. One thing that came back to haunt us was a game that we played back at home. Melissa or I would pretend we were asleep and snore loudly, Ian would scream “GAAKUP!” meaning, of course “WAKE UP!” Well, you can imagine what he thought when he looked around and saw mostly a plane-ful of sleepers that needed some waking. (It didn’t turn out as bad as I made it sound, but some hasty explanation was in order.)

Anyway so the plane landed, Grandma Sue was waiting with excited hugs, and Melissa began figuring out the car seat. We had a brief hilarious moment in the airport parking lot in the meanwhile… a car full of people was waiting in line behind us as we packed up the car, and they were looking at Ian with a sort of anticipation, constantly glancing behind them and then over at the boy in my arms. I swiveled Ian a bit so that both of us could see what was behind them, and lo’ there was Santa driving a mini-van, complete with cap and a dead-ringer for Mrs. Claus. I pointed and Ian lit up like a Christmas Tree “SANTA!” The entire car erupted with happy laughter and applause and Santa kindly waved back.

Grandma Sue drove us straight to Grandma Barb and Grampa Ray’s where fun and mayhem awaited us… More about our time there next entry!