12.29.07
Posted in Family at 8:11 pm by kellgaston
Christmas here started on Monday evening.
But Monday started with a trip to the pediatrician. She changed baby’s medicine.
Then, we went to grandma’s. Dh ran around with his dad, while I hung out at grandma’s.
At 5:30, we headed to great grandma’s. We had chili and stew. And lots of presents for baby. He got a little ride on/push toy, some pjs, and lots of other stuff. (My contribution was huge —
cheese and chopped onion– dh picked a very strong onion — I cried and cried). I had to make dressing for Tuesday’s lunch once we got home.
Tuesday morning, we opened presents at home before heading to grandma and grandpas. We only exchanged small gifts, since our big gift was the new hd video camera. I received a pair of earrings and a necklace. I bought dh some more Wii accessories. Baby got an OSU outfit and some small toys.
We had a traditional Christmas lunch at grandma’s. Baby got lots of goodies, but the best gift for him was his bouncing tigger. Now they bounce together. I promise a video soon!
It was a wonderful day. Happy Holidays!
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Posted in Family at 8:06 pm by kellgaston
On the 20th, we drove to Durant to celebrate Christmas with my family. To make things even crazier, I agreed to do a wedding cake for someone I didn’t know. Mom told me not to. I should have listened to her. The girl was scatter brained. She made the check out to “the cake lady.” Anyway . . .
I worked on the stupid cake most of Saturday. Nathaniel didn’t feel well (dh had taken him to the doctor on the previous Wednesday — he has a secondary infection and was given some antibiotics). Anyway, I worked and worked on it. First, the neoclassic buttercream for the strawberry filling didn’t go right. I overcooked the syrup. But finally it worked. The other buttercream went fine. I started icing. Sometimes, icing goes easily. Other days, it’s a struggle. That day it was a struggle. I haven’t used that type of icing very often. It’s great to work with, but you can’t put it on very thick. It’s basically butter and egg yolks — if it gets too warm it becomes hard to work with. And it was warm in that kitchen! I was so upset with the middle layer that I ended up scraping it, trimming it, and reicing it. I still wasn’t pleased, but I worked on it until it was time to go set it up. I did all I could. It was fine, but definitely not my greatest work. It’s not like I could go pick up a substitute at the last minute! Grr . . .
We went to set it up. The caterer had the cake table set up right in the front. Not good, because the bride picked a tiny cake. It was way too puny to put in that position. And, the flowers were way too big. The bride had not given the florist a picture of the cake.
Whatever! I got it set up and we went back to Durant. Yesterday, almost a week after the wedding, I get a call that they were “troubled” about the cake. I just wanted to say forget it, I’ll just take the deposit and forget the balance so I don’t have to talk to them, but I only did this cake for the money. I don’t know the people. So, I called the mom. She “didn’t want to be unkind” but she thought the cake was “unprofessional.” In the 10 years I’ve been doing cakes, I’ve never had anyone say the cake looked “unprofessional” — I’ve never had anyone be displeased. I’ve had cakes I didn’t like and some that I loved. She said it was too small (I didn’t pick the size), too yellow (coloring is always iffy — I wanted to add more brown but didn’t have anything that I trusted), the icing was too thing (I should have just used the icky fondant instead of delicious Italian buttercream), and it was unstable (I’ve never had a cake topple — I’ve had some lean because they were unlevel, but never topple). Usually, I stay with my cakes, but this one I left. I blame any problems on unruly kids or the extemely heavy floral cake topper (it was huge!). I’m just glad it’s over. I ended up reducing the price, but I’m still mad. It looked fine.
Back to Christmas . . . I had wanted to go watch a movie that Saturday night, but baby was not cooperative. At one point, we thought he was having an allergic reaction and called the doctor. Who knows what it really was. We did end up getting to watch the N*tivity Story. And, we had takeout from Ch*lis.
On Sunday, we skipped church (they go way too early in the morning) and worked on lunch. We had roasted beef tenderloin with mashed potatoes and green beans. Oh, and lots of dessert. It was yummy, but by the time I got to eat, my meat was cold (but still very tasty). Then, it was present time. Baby was not in a good mood, but we have some great pics of him with his cousin Joshua.
We stayed until around 4p.m. and then headed home. It was a long, but fun weekend.
When we got home, dh went out to do some last minute shopping!
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Posted in Uncategorized at 7:53 pm by kellgaston
I’m so far behind! It’s been a busy couple of weeks.
Last week, I had to make up for my missed dental appointment. I had to have 14 fillings. 7 on Monday and 7 on Wednesday. It was very unpleasant — worse than any other filling experience I’ve ever had and I don’t exactly know why. The right side of my mouth still hurts. So much so that I have to take Tylenol every 4 to 6 hours. I have even resorted to using baby’s orajel when I had nothing else. It wakes me up in the night. Unfortunately, the doctor is out on vacation, because believe me, I’ve called to complain. I hope it starts hurting soon.
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12.17.07
Posted in Uncategorized at 3:07 pm by kellgaston
Thanks to the weather, our scheduled portrait session for December 10th had to be cancelled and it has yet to be rescheduled. So, what to do about Christmas cards? (I’d been planning to insert wallets into the cards)
I decided we should take photos at home in front of the tree to use for photo cards. Well, after multiple attempts, we have some good pictures, although the timered shots just don’t look great.
But, dh managed to get some great shots of baby.
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12.15.07
Posted in Uncategorized at 9:20 pm by kellgaston
Last weekend, I decorated my first cakes since IVF (I decorated Mill’s wedding cake the day I started stims).
It was fun, though stressful. Baby missed me, but got to play with maama, his aunts, and Cousin Joshua. Thought I’d share some pics.
– Nate and Josh with Aunt Bloss
– Cousin Kaylee’s birthday cake
– Vegas themed party cakes
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Posted in Uncategorized at 9:04 pm by kellgaston
–Our backyard Monday morning
The saying goes that if you don’t like the weather in Oklahoma, just wait a few minutes and it will change! Last week, it was beautiful and in the seventies. But Sunday morning, all that changed.
I have so many thoughts on this week that it may take a while to share them. Quinn said I needed to record our “adventures” in ‘Thaniel’s baby book, but I think this is a better venue.
Baby and I drove to Durant early Saturday morning to help with a Christmas party. We made good time and I went to work on my cakes. Baby got to play with maama and see Aunt Bloss and Cousin Joshua. It was fun, although he was a little cranky. I didn’t get to spend much time with him because I was busy.
Baby, Maama, and I didn’t stay for the whole party. We picked up Cousin Eddison (who’d been duck hunting all day) and went home.
Baby woke up early Sunday morning and I caught the weather. The ice storm anticipated for Sunday night hit early. It was already icing in OKC! So, I got on the road fast, hoping to beat the worst of the storm. I made the fastest trip home . . . ever. I hit freezing rain about 2/3 of the way home. The roads were still clear, but my windshield and wipers froze up. I was so glad to get home. Baby slept the whole way.
We hunkered down at home, watching the ice begin to coat everything. People started to lose power, but I thought we might be okay because our power lines are underground. We made it through Sunday night just fine. My work was closed Monday. I’m non-essential! Dh’s building had no power. Everything was going great, and then . . . silence and darkness. We lost power!
We didn’t know what to do because we had no idea how long we’d be without power. At first, we thought we’d hang out here for a while. But, it was lunch time. So we headed out to look for lunch, hoping we’d call home and get our machine shortly. No such luck. It took a while to find a place to eat because so many places were closed. We ended up at Taco Bu*no. It took like half an hour to get food there!
Then, it was off to Grandma’s. We spent the afternoon there. As we were eating dinner, their power went off too! It had flickered all afternoon, but we hoped it was not going to go off completely. We were wrong! It was a long, cold night. Nathaniel slept with us (for the first time). I was so scared I was going to roll over on him.
–Our frontyard Monday morning
Tuesday dawned cold and dark. Dh was determined to go to work, despite the conditions and his being sick! MIL, baby, and I went to SIL’s house for the day. Spent the day there, had dinner, and then dh and I ran to our house to get more stuff. On our way, we realized we had no flashlights! We had to use our cell phones to get around! Driving back to MIL’s, we stopped to get me some dinner and I almost started crying in the drive-thru. I was tired and wanted to be at home!
When we got back, things had improved significantly. An uncle had loaned us his generator, so we were able to bathe by candlelight in a relatively warm bathroom. And, baby got to sleep in his pack and play! So we slept better.
Wednesday, I got up and started to organize everything. Dh was still sick, but finally went to the doctor. Just as I finished organizing, dh called to let me know that we had power! Yeah! Two days was lon enough!
It was early afternoon before we got home, but it was great. I had to throw a lot of groceries away and scrub ice cream off the floor, but being home is sweet!
Tuesday night, 634,000 Okies were powerless. Fortunately, our power was restored comparatively quickly. Thank goodness!
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12.04.07
Posted in Uncategorized at 7:04 pm by kellgaston
Just a quick update. Baby rolled over for the first time today. Of course, we missed it. Maama got to be the first to witness this momentous feat. She has pictures of the progression, but I haven’t had a chance to upload them yet.
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12.03.07
Posted in Uncategorized at 7:56 pm by kellgaston
Baby has been wearing us out lately with all of his jumping. We were at a loss for what to get him for Christmas. So, I started doing some research and came across a stationary jumper in the same rainforest theme as many of his other toys. So, last night, mom and I went to babies ‘r us and bought it (practically the only time we were out of the house all weekend because we’ve been sick).
Dh and I put it together last night. And, this morning baby got to try it out. He loves it! He was hesitant at first, just checking out all the toys, but soon he found his feet and had the thing bouncing, bouncing, bouncing. Mom managed to take some pictures, so I’m including those.
In other news, I’m soon to have a new blog home (blogspot has been fine, but I’ll be happy to be able to view it from work). Dh finally came up with an appropriate domain name. So, we’ll be moving to http://thegastoncrew.com. We thought the name was appropriate!
Oh, and I’d been procrastinating about baby’s Christmas stocking. I just didn’t think I would have time to make him one to match our’s. However, I got a chance Saturday evening and finished it in about 5 1/2 hours.
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