Well, Santa's Elf worked fast and furious last night and got the LikeABike assembled and placed under the tree along with various and sundry other small gifts, including a wooden Thomas the Tank Engine train set with three cars and a cute little figure 8 track.

Julian woke up at 6:15am. I went in and coaxed him back to sleep for a few more hours, then we went in together to wake up Daddy and Puppy. Dan distracted Julian while I snuck out to set up the video camera on a tripod and turned on the Chrismukkah tree lights.

Julian was duly awed by the new LikeABike, but the train was the big hit of the day. I shouldn't be surprised, given his recent obsession with vehicle taxonomy. Trains have been an especially big hit of late. We saw several Cal-trains go rushing by in a single afternoon, got a teapot that whistles like a train whistle, rode the monorail at the Dallas airport AND saw the Light Rail system go through downtown Cambell right in front of our car last night. It's been nonstop trains for the last few weeks. Oh, and I never realized how many toy trains people have lit up out on their lawns for Chistmas. Until this year, that is, when I was notified of each train spotting with a loud cry of "DA TWAIN!" followed by vigorous signing of the word "train" over and over.

I really can't complain, because I have a thing for trains myself. When Julian calls out "Mommy! Twain!", I'm always like, "Really? Where??"

So we played with the train set, and with the new LikeABike, which will be a huge hit once Julian grows another inch. We also got a mini badminton set, since Julian was dragging around the badminton racquets all summer. Instead of a birdie, there is a ball made out of that same netty material, but with it coiled into springs to make a ball shape. So it's like badminton, but easier to hit and retrieve. And the racquets are much shorter. Julian loves it.

Then it got cold and started raining, so we came back inside. Amazing, beause yesterday was like springtime. I went for a two hour walk in a T-shirt and flip-flops, and I was afraid that I was going to get sunburned. Today is back to dreary and chilly and wet. Which is fine, I mean it IS December. There's still a bit of novelty to the chilliness. It's in January and February that the cold and wet gets so tedious. And no, I have no right to complain about cold living in California, I fully realize that. Hey, Florida felt cold in the wintertime when I lived there too, and now I could easily be one of those crazy snowbirds charging headlong into the frigid 72-degree surf. It's all relative.

Anyway, I made Cioppino this afternoon and it was fantastic. A cornucopia of spicy saucy crab, clams and shrimp...Dan and I devoured it like shipwreck survivors, with plenty of crusty bread. I made a Pear Pie too, from some random recipe off the internet and it came out delicious, with a sort of sugar cookie crust on top of it, if you can imagine that. So we're stuffed like little pigs right now, but feasting is good at this time of year.

I'm just sad that I didn't get any more of that Organic Eggnog from Trader Joe's, because that stuff is the best ever. Blows regular eggnog right out of the water. A little cognac at the bottom of a glass, pour in the TJ's Organic Eggnog...heaven. Forget that crappy supermarket eggnog, it's all high fructose corn syrup and crappy fillers. The TJ's Organic is IT.

So we ate, played and played and played, and then watched back-to-back episodes of Arrested Development on DVD from Netflix. Family dysfunction was a good theme for the day, since Dan and I are both wishing that our familes could be a bit more...well, functional, I guess. Well, what can you do? You can choose your friends, but not your family.

We lit the first candles of Hanukkah tonight. Julian INSISTED on wearing the yarmulke, which is hysterical because he is so otherwise resolutely anti-hat. Yet he kept putting the yarmulke back on all night long. He would bend over and it would fall off, then he complained until I helped him put it back on.

The funniest moment came while reading the three verses of traditional Hanukkah prayers. Dan read the first one, I read the second one, then Dan said as a joke, "Julian, you read the third verse."

Julian leaned forward, looked at the page, and started solemnly intoning nonsense syllables. Our kid definitely has a wicked sense of humor. Totally cracked us up. We caught it on video, which makes for an amazing day just full of video catches, which we never, ever get. Thus far my video of Julian consists of endless shots of him grabbing for the lens and whining. Oh, except for the many video moments I captured where he is falling off steps or toddling off his truck onto his head or something equally charming. Ugh. Today was full of amazing video captures. I'm sure it will never ever happen again.

I am extra thankful, since my digital camera is on the fritz. It ran out of juice and then never charged back up. Right before Chrismukkah too. I dug out my lovely Canon Rebel film camera today. I really sort of missed it. It's just maddening to have to both pay AND drive to get your film developed, wait forever, and in the meantime you have no idea whether the photos you took are total crap or actually good. But it's almost worth it just for the sheer pleasure of hearing the shutter click the very MOMENT that I press the button, instead of 5 seconds later. And when the film photos are good, they're really good, not blurry or fuzzy or leaving you wishing that you had bumped up the resolution a little.

Off to bed. Our day of sloth and gluttony has left me happy but pooped.