A morning at the Louisville Zoo

Before leaving Louisville we met up with my parents to spend some time at the zoo. Too bad it was a bit chilly! We only got to see half of the zoo before we needed to take off, but it was plenty of exercises for me (perhaps not enough for Ethan)! Here is a slideshow of pictures from our brief visit. Highlights included seeing a family of elephants, the gorilla exhibit and the giraffes. You could get really close to the animals!

We also had a very delicious lunch at the hotel my parents were staying at. It was a lovely morning, and a smooth drive back to Bloomington...

Congratulations, Hannah and Victor!

This past weekend, the Snyder family drove to Louisville, KY to attend the wedding of my cousin, Victor (That's Vicky's cousin). It was a lovely ceremony at a beautiful cathedral in downtown Louisville, and the reception was at an arts center just outside downtown. Very chic! And the food was yummy! My cousin Vic is a chef, so he knows food...

I didn't get as many photos of family as I wanted to. It's hard to do that when you're looking after a toddler! But we had Cuestas from all over the globe: Japan, Russia, Australia, Canada, Europe. We're all over this crazy planet! Ethan had a great time dancing, as you can see from the slideshow. More photos to come of our stay in Louisville...

Karaoke Kids

One of the joys of mommyhood is swapping babysitting with other mommies. A few days ago, my friend Deb watched Ethan while I ran a myriad of errands (hard to do when you're in and out of the car with a toddler). Then yesterday morning, I watched her little 3 year old named Sam. Ethan took particularly well to him. When the kids are about the same age, they really just play together, and so you're free to get some stuff done around the house (but not TOO far away from the kids :) Makes me wish I had twins!

They did several things over the course of the morning. Other than playing with cars, they had a good snack, and played with the toys in the family room. There, we keep a mini portable karaoke machine that Ethan likes to fiddle with, mostly by just pushing the buttons. But yesterday I turned it on for him, and he started speaking into the microphone. Well, this was just plain fun for the both of them, and when Deb came to pick up Sam, we had a little recital for her. Here is a sampling...

Bandage-free!

This past Tuesday we had what would be our last visit to Springfield. When we arrived at the Burn Unit, they unwrapped Ethan's arm and were pleased to find how well it was healing. It was healing so quickly that we were all ready to leave bandages off completely, and we no longer had to come back! We don't even have to meet with the doctor for a follow-up! Of course, if any problems arise we are to contact them. You can imagine how happy I was!

It's hard to see in these pictures, but most of Ethan's skin will look normal after about 6 months. However, there will be some scarring of those trouble spots we keep mentioning. You can see one of the spots just below the crook of his elbow.

All of this pink skin is new, healthy skin. We will need to be vigilant about sun protection the next year, after which we will see what the final scarring will look like. I had a similar injury as a small child, and already I recognize the scar tissue on Ethan, because I had the same kind of skin on my right thigh. But by the time I reached my twenties, it was hardly noticeable!

How can I forget?

Maybe we can chalk it up to "mommy mush brain"! I want to give a special shout out to Grandma and Grandpa Cuesta ("Pipaw") for the colorful Zoobooks subscription they started for Ethan earlier in the year as an early birthday gift. It's one that will keep on giving, for sure! Every month we get a magazine focusing on one animal. It's filled with pictures, educational info, even an activity page. Thanks, Mom and Dad!

Happy 2nd Birthday, Ethan!

March 31st marked Ethan's two year birthday! To celebrate, we had a birthday playdate with all his friends. We had about 9 kids over with their mommies. Wow! What chaos! I think Ethan was a little bit overwhelmed! When we sang happy birthday, one of his friends started crying, and then he started crying. It was very funny. Afterwards we all ate some Elmo cupcakes I made. Aren't they cute?! Yellow cake mix topped with homemade buttercream icing tinted red. The eyes are made of vanilla wafer candies, and the nose is an orange jellybean. The pupils and smile are icing tinted black. Funny thing is, Ethan ate everything on his plate BUT the cupcake :) That's ok. I don't object to his aversion to sweet, baked goods!

The night before we decided to let him open his gifts. David and I got him a little race track with cars.

Grandma and Grandpa Snyder got him this cute Thomas the Train starter set.

His Aunt Gayle and their family sent him this huge aquadoodle mat. It draws with a marker that is filled with water. Yay! No colors on the walls!

Ethan had so much fun playing with his new toys! We even got surprise gifts from afar! My bestfriend from highschool, Maria, remembered Ethan's special day and had them delivered just in time. What a sweetheart...

Here is a short video of the birthday chaos...

A New Tactic

To try to help Ethan with his baths, I got him a set of water crayons. I figure distracting him from me scrubbing his wounds might make the whole experience less distressing! Anytime he realizes that I'm messing with his arm, I say "Ethan, where's the purple crayon? Can you draw over here?" And he immediately looks to his crayon and begins to scribble. Yay! Less crying for Ethan, and less crying for me :)

Hail...

Can you believe this? I'm sure some of you have seen even bigger hail, but this was my first time to see anything bigger than rock salt. It looked like tons and tons of dippin' dots in the street, on the deck, in the yard. Glad the cars were in the garage!

Making Progress

We had our first home visit with an occupational therapist yesterday afternoon, and in that short hour Ethan made fantastic progress! For the past two days, the best David and I have done is gotten Ethan to open his left hand, which until then was permanently clenched even though it was not injured. We thought of all sorts of distractions to allow us to manipulate his hand and his arm, practicing some range of motion exercises. However, Ethan would never do it voluntarily. Until yesterday! Our occupational therapist, Tanya, spent about 20 minutes observing him with me before engaging in some real time play. By the end of the hour long session, Ethan was opening and closing his hand, reaching up to grab things, and VOLUNTARILY using his left arm and hand. Wow... We can't wait to continue the playtime activities that Tanya suggested to get him to use his arm even more. One of them is getting him to push. Here he is pushing his stroller, which makes him extend that left arm.

Meanwhile, every morning I continue my on the job training for my second career as nurse! To be honest, I've really enjoyed washing his wounds and changing his dressings, even though he cries the whole time. Perhaps it's my subconscious way of healing the whole experience for me...

Before the Burn...

The day before Ethan's accident we took a trip to Peoria's Wildlife Prairie State Park to try our luck at seeing some animals "native to the area". David was on Spring Break, and the day was forecast to be mild. Though we didn't see too many animals, we had a lovely day strolling in the not-so-mild weather. It was quite brisk :) But I was pleased to find that since last summer Ethan has improved his climbing skills! He was able to climb all the way up this wooden jungle gym and slide.

We rented a little wagon for the trails, thinking that Ethan would get tired and want a ride. Boy, were we wrong! Mommy was the one who got tired! And it was only until I got in the wagon that Ethan wanted to ride, too. So, Dad pulled us along a stretch of trail...

After our trip, we stopped by the local Pizza Hut for lunch. It's probably Ethan's favorite food--pizza! Mom and Dad like it, too...

I love happy, family times, don't you?

Transitioning back

It's been a good day and a half back at home. Yesterday was a bit rough with Ethan being overtired from bad sleep and late naptime. But today, was a ton better. He slept for a good 12 hours, with a few wake ups during the night, but nothing out of the ordinary. This morning we gave him his bath and treated his burns and all went well. Of course, it was uncomfortable for him, but we already knew that. We've also got visits from a home health care nurse to look at his wounds and help with the dressing changes if needed, and an occupational therapist to help Ethan with using his burnt arm.

We will be going back to Springfield once a week over the next 3 weeks to have outpatient services, and eventually have a final look from the doctor at the burn unit. We're not looking forward to these trips, but we are glad that Ethan will get the care he needs.

Below is our last morning at the hospital. We also have pics from his bath from two days ago. The intern that morning took these photos and printed us some copies. As you can see, it still looks pretty bad, but these pictures actually show that he's doing well. You can also see some of the whiter areas near his elbow and upper arm/shoulder that were more severely burned. Anything that is "pink" (like on his trunk) is healthy skin.

We're going home!

This morning at 8am the doctor took a look at Ethan's wounds and she determined that he will heal well on his own. While those problem areas are still more damaged (2nd degree deep partial burns, I think she called them) they will heal on their own, and will indeed have some scars. She explained in depth what kind of scarring might POSSIBLY happen--a raised, rough kind of scar. However, there are ways to help with this, and if in the future we wanted to skin graft we could. Skin grafting right now was still an option, but the healing time for either option would be the same. And a skin graft would still result in scars, just a different kind.

So, tomorrow we will observe the nurses wash and dress his wounds and receive "training". Then we'll all head home in the afternoon. We're not sure what it will be like taking care of him at home, especially with 3 weeks of dressing changes, which is the projected healing time. But we are convinced that God will provide what we need as He has proven to be faithful once again throughout this ordeal.

Thank you for all your prayers. We have felt them in a big way...

A turn for the better

After completing the night shift, David said both of them had a ROUGH night. Ethan slept from midnight to 3, was up until 4, then slept again until 8:30. Not enough sleep for either of them. And when I arrived this morning at 9am, Ethan was still in bed, rather cranky. We quickly got him breakfast and pain meds, since we knew the bath and dressing change was coming up soon.
After the bath, Ethan was quite put out, plus the tylenol/codeine kicked in. He took a long nap while our friend, Rita, came to visit.

We have a new nurse working with us today, and she said that the problem spots still look white. Unfortunately, the doctor didn't make it in to look at him, so we'll have to wait till tomorrow to see what she says.

After Ethan woke up from his nap, we had a good lunch. He even begun to play. Here we are finishing up our meal. He actually counted "1, 2, 3, cheese" for the pic! But we've been very blessed today with another gift: a playmate!

This afternoon as Ethan was beginning to play on his own, a mom and her 23 month old son named Marco were walking by. They had been admitted last night for a similar injury, but the hot water was in a bath tub. The boys were immediately interested in each other, and got to walking around the hallways with moms beside them. This little guy has burn wounds on his feet and bottom, but he was walking all the same!

Not only did the two of them walk/run the halls, they enjoyed a wagon ride. Marco rode, and Ethan pulled! The nurses were so amused and thought it was the cutest thing. I was so happy to see Ethan acting like his old self again.

So while we still don't have a definitive answer, we are filled with hope. Thank you for all your encouraging emails and prayers. We've even had a handful of visitors, some whom I didn't even know. These were women who attended the Hearts at Home conference and had heard our situation during the Mom's Night Out event on Friday night. These people took the time out of their schedule to visit with us and pray with us. Wow...I am continually touched and overwhelmed by my brothers and sisters in Christ.

How quickly things change

On a lovely, sunny and mild day just a week before the start of Spring, we had an unfortunate accident. As I was cooking dinner, Ethan came up beside and me, reached and pulled down a pitcher of hot tea I was brewing on the counter. We quickly went to the ER, but were then transferred via ambulance to the Burn Center at Springfield's Memorial Medical Center.

Upon arrival, the staff determined that he had 2nd degree burns on 13% of his total body surface area. It's a good amount for a little guy, and he was in a lot of pain. They continued the morphine that the ER had begun to administer, which calmed him down quite a bit.

He was delirious, and slept fitfully. David and I, though technically not BOTH allowed to be in his room overnight, were there the entire night to make sure he was ok. This was probably one of the worst nights we'd ever had.

The above pictures were taken on Thursday night when it happened. You can see much of his arm, and part of his chest were burned, but I couldn't get a shot of his under arm/side of torso area. That evening they washed the wounds, treated and bandaged him. They don't allow parents into the tub room, and for good reason. I could hear him screaming throughout the whole burn unit.

The next morning, they repeated the same procedure, and they continue to do this everyday, evaulating his wounds with each dressing change. As many of you have read from my emails, most of his wounds will heal on their own, but there are a couple of areas that suffered more extensively, and it is a "wait and see" approach at this point.

Today, Ethan is doing a LOT better. They stopped the morphine on the second day, and he is eating and drinking well, so they've pulled out the IV as well. We have an occupational therapist working with us to make sure Ethan uses his bad arm. In doing so, it'll prevent that skin from stiffening up from not being used. She brought some toys and balls for him, which was fun for a while, but admittedly Ethan does get bored easily!

We are thankful that God has spared Ethan from any more serious injury. We praise Him for his mercy and provision. We have friends with whom we can stay in Springfield, which means David and I can get good sleep while the other is with Ethan. We have friends who are taking care of our home and kitty while we are gone. But most importantly, we have an extended family of brothers and sisters in Christ who are praying for us. And their prayers are being answered everyday. God is good, and He is able!

For you Star Wars Fans

Two months ago, the Peoria Symphony did a concert of popular movie soundtracks. The most popular medley they did was from the original Star Wars, and then Star Wars: Phantom Menace. As a surprise to the concert-goers, we had Star Troopers and even Darth Vadar himself greet the guests coming in. It was really scary to find out that there is a "battalion" here in Central Illinois that actually meets to talk about all things Star Wars, and probably re-enacts popular scenes from the movies, and do such "gigs" as this one. But you know what was even MORE sad? Was that I got totally pumped when they played the original soundtrack theme and had star troopers, Obi-Wan and some villains process down the side aisles onto the stage. I literally had to stifle my urge to yell and cheer. Man, I'm such a geek... The sabers were COOL! At the very end of the concert they did that "Duel" theme with the choral part. Funny thing was, when the choir came in, I was stunned, because I thought, "Wow! That's a really good track!". I turned to a new friend sitting beside me (that's another story) and looked stunned. Then I looked back to the stage, and there was the choir, along with various characters from the movie rising on the stage. They were standing on one of those rising platforms at the front of the stage that is built for such things. So at the very end, the whole group of performers were on stage for a powerful ending. It was SO CORNY, but as a Star Wars fan, it was fun. Rather indulgent of the conductor, I thought, because it was SO not a typical symphony performance. But it's nice to loosen up sometimes, huh?

You know there's something wrong with this world...

...when you attend a benefit and find that beer and wine are free, but juice costs $1. That just ain't right!

A special guest

Earlier in February we had a very special guest stay with us for one night. One of David's students in Beijing, Arnold, was passing through during his whirlwind tour of the United States on his quest for the perfect graduate school. He was traveling to NY, DC, Boston, Chicago, San Francisco, LA, San Diego (and I'm sure I might have missed a city) to visit his prospective schools. In Chicago he took the time to take the 2.5 hour train ride to our small town of Normal, IL to visit his old teacher.

You may or may not remember that David and I taught English in Beijing for 6 weeks in 2005. (http://vicky_snyder.home.insightbb.com/vickyblog-Summer-05.htm) This was one of his students. David had gotten to share his faith with him, and they had many discussions about Christianity that summer that continued over email. So you can imagine how happy we were to hear about some awesome God stories he shared with us. His English was fantastic! He has made so much progress over the past few years, and during his time traveling the States he really picked up a lot. Arnold shared that over the past couple of weeks he had been traveling he had met so many people who helped him along the way. He had made many connections with several Christian student groups on the campuses he visited and felt God's love and provision EVERY step of the way of his travels. This is the closest I've come to seeing the seed we've planted bear fruit. It was awesome!

During his stay, David showed him our town and the university. Here is Arnold's take on his experience. Check out his facebook pics and captions at http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=400&id=348100150&l=b493f&ref=share

Good luck at school, Arnold! And we hope to see you again!

When Parenthood Gets Hard

No one likes to be tested. But there are times when we are inevitably faced with the challenges of reality. And that's when we find out what we're really made of, what's really inside of us, what really resides in our heart. And often we are weak. Often we are not the people God wants us to be.

We just came off of a few days of sickness. All of us were sick. Most of it was cold related--stuffy nose or runny nose, sore throat, cough. I was dealing with fatigue, Ethan's nose was runny, David's nose was stuffy. But then in the middle of aisle 8 at our local grocery store it all changed. Ethan threw up. Was it the stomach flu? Food poisoning? The boy threw up four more times in the next two hours, and for the first part of the night he woke up every hour to gut wrenching heaves. I never thought I could feel so sorry, until the next day.

Taking care of a toddler is hard when you are running on very little sleep. Luckily, Ethan was much better. It must have been a 24 hour thing, because he was back to his normal, hyper self. Except that he woke up at 4:30am! How could he have such energy after not sleeping so well (mom and dad certainly didn't sleep that well, either)? Dad stayed up with him till he had to get to work, then I got up to start my day. What was usually routine for me became insurmountable. Disobedience, temper tantrums, getting into things, feeding Ethan a meal, all became impossible to tolerate. I was heading for a mommy meltdown! And yes, Ethan was better, but he was just as impatient as mommy was. How many times did I cry out in anger? How long did I allow Elmo to be his babysitter?! And here is where I know I will fail time and time again as a mom. That thought is both comforting and frustrating. While I know that many other parents struggle as I do, in all the same areas as I do, I also believe that I need to rise above that and not accept what statistics tell me. I need to be better than that! These past few days, I was not.

We got through it, but not without one more visit to the doctor a couple of days later. And sure enough, our little boy had yet another ear infection. Definitely a contributor to his crankiness. And with the antibiotics kicking in, Ethan is not only back to his normal self, he is more patient and cheerful, too. Mommy and daddy are back to their normal, well-rested selves, too. Until next month when his next ear infection sets in. Please, winter, give us a break!

The funny thing is, we haven't even gotten to the REAL tough stuff of parenthood. Oh, I know I'll have to buckle my seatbelt for that when that comes. When I think of those times to come, I often ask God, "Oh, what have You in store for me? What other lessons will You teach me?"

Air Tran Fiasco

Here is where I write about what happened to me two weeks coming back from my trip to NY. Ethan and I hopped on a 7:30 am flight out of LaGuardia to Atlanta. Our connecting flight from Atlanta to Bloomington was scheduled for 11:17am. Unfortunately, it got delayed due to foggy weather in Bloomington. 3 hours later, they cancelled the flight.

Waiting in line with a toddler all by yourself is really hard work. I kept his DVD player out while we waited to rebook a flight to any nearby city in Central Illinois. The weather wasn't getting any better, so I took my chances and got a flight to Chicago Midway for 4:20pm. David was already en route to pick us up.

Here is where the trouble began. We boarded the plane and took our business class seat (my mom bought us an upgrade!). It was a full flight, so I knew Ethan wouldn't be able to have his own seat, but he played next to me while we waited. Finally, the passenger arrived to take his seat, but Ethan didn't want to give it up! The entire 10 minutes we'd been on this plane he screamed and wailed everytime I tried to put him on my lap. The flight attendant told me that if I could not quiet him down they would have to ask me to leave. Well, Ethan didn't quiet down until it was too late. Luckily, a friendly lady behind me gave me a pen and paper to let Ethan scribble. This quieted him down, and he was calmly sitting on my lap. But the flight attendant made her way to me and said, "Ma'am , please go to the back of the plane. Some gate agents will speak to you there." I gathered my things in shame, trying to hold back tears, and went to the back.

When I got there, there were plenty of empty seats, so Ethan was happy. The gate agents arrived and tried to figure out what the problem was. "He doesn't want to sit on my lap," I said. "He wants to sit in his own seat." They asked me if he could sit on his own, and I replied that he needed his car seat. I then requested that they bring it to me, since I had only gate checked it before boarding the plane. "I'm sorry, ma'am, we can't do that. The flight is already closed," they replied. Apparently, this meant that no one could go below to get my car seat. They then reiterated that as a lap child, he needed to be on my lap for taxi and take off. But when I tried to get him on my lap, Ethan screamed again. "Ma'am, we're going to have to ask you to leave," the duty manager said to me. That was the end of that. With such finality in his tone, and me being at wit's end with humiliation and frustration, I got off the plane.

I called David while exiting the plane, sobbing. Probably from mortification, but definitely out of desperation. How was I going to get back home? WHEN? He said, "They can't do that!" But the plane was already backing away from the gate. He then asked me about the carseat. Well, that carseat was on that plane, still! At David's prompting, I hung up the phone and bared my teeth. I told those gate agents that my carseat was still on that plane, and if they didn't get it for me, they would have a lawsuit on their hands, because I couldn't go ANYWHERE without that carseat. You should have seen how fast those people moved! They radioed every crew member down there, spewing code words and such, and pulled the carseat out in all of five minutes.

I'll try to end my misery here, because I really want to just forget about the whole incident. They rebooked my flight for a Bloomington-bound one an hour later. That flight was capped off. They booked me for a flight to Chicago Midway a couple of hours later, that one got cancelled. They finally booked me on the last flight out to Bloomington at 9:20 pm. I was stranded in Atlanta for another 5 hours, with a tired toddler and nothing but a meal voucher to ease my woes.

The weird thing was, I wasn't even angry. I was just desperate and sad. I felt really victimized and unjustly treated. How could they treat me in such a way? It wasn't even my fault! They cancelled our earlier flight due to weather delays, which is why my kid was cranky!! I mean, who ever heard of throwing a mother and child off a plane because her kid is crying? Well, you may have heard that story in the Chicago Tribune in January, because Air Tran did just that. They kicked an entire family off of a flight bound for Boston because their 3 year old refused to get in her seat. OK, maybe that's a different situation, but those poor guys ended up being stuck overnight. In the end, AirTran refunded their flight and gave them three vouchers for round trip airfare.

So what did they give me? A full refund and a flower arrangement with teddy bear as their formal apology. And misdirected luggage which ended up arriving a day late with my wheels missing. Yeah.

I'm over it now, but some family members have urged to pursue some legal action. According to the AirTran customer service rep who took care of our situation, there is no policy regarding crying babies. There IS a policy regarding disruptive passengers, and the pilot does have the prerogative to give the boot to anyone on the flight. I guess he thought Ethan counted as a disruptive passenger. But AirTran customer service urges that this policy does not apply to children. She nearly darn well recommended we take legal action and contact their legal department. I'm leaning away from doing so. But there is a good argument for trying to get some policy in place. I'd hate for someone else to go through what I did.

What do you think?

Hey, cuz!

A visit to NY would not be complete without a quick drive to New Jersey to see my brother and his family. My sister-in-law's birthday was that week, so we all went to one of our favorite restaurants. Ethan and I spent the night at my brother's house, too, which gave the cousins time to play and see each other again.

A new mom

While in New York, we also met up with Mindy, my other best friend since I was 2 or 3! She was having a baby shower that weekend, but lo and behold the baby came early!!! About 5 days before the baby shower, Myles Duncan Tait came into the world, a healthy baby boy. It was awesome that we got to meet him, because we weren't planning to--Mindy wasn't due for another 4 weeks. Mom and baby are doing well, and Daddy is getting used to his new role, too.

It has been probably over 3 years since us three friends have been together, so this was a very special time for me. I'm so glad we all got to be together. I know, call me a SAP. But it's ok to be sappy when it's important!

New York Trip

About two weeks ago I was in New York to visit one of my old best friends from childhood who now lives in Japan. She was visiting NY for about a month, so Ethan and I packed up to go for almost a week (poor Daddy was left behind, and that was no fun at all).

I got to meet her two kids, Keiji and Arisa. Keiji is 3 and a half, and Arisa is 1 and a half. They are the cutest kids! We spent the night at their place, and Ethan and Keiji really had a good time running around and playing while the moms caught up on all that has been going on in life.

Back to work!

Oh, the holidays are gone! And my hubby is back to work! But not without one last hurrah. Last week we took a day trip up to Chicago to bring Ethan to Shedd Aquarium. First thing in the morning we ate breakfast, jumped in the van and sped up to the Windy City. Thankfully, we just missed rush hour so we had a smooth drive once we hit Chicagoland. Here we are standing in front of the "Caribbean Reef" exhibit.



Our favorite part was the Oceanarium, where we got to watch a dolphin show and see the new baby beluga! Ethan loved the dolphin show! Everytime they jumped in the air, he clapped his hands and exclaimed, "Yay!". This was a surprise to us, since we thought that maybe he wouldn't quite get it. But clearly, he was entertained! We then went below ground to view the Beluga Wales. They are tough to catch on camera, but here you can see a rather blurry shot of most of them. Another highlight of the aquarium is the new Wild Reef exhibit. Well, I guess it's been there for about a year, but it was new to us! We got to see sharks! And a saw fish! I had never seen one in real life.

After our 2.5 hour visit we made our way to the Mouse House. Liz was kind enough to let us lunch and nap there! Her hubby was at work, so while Ethan and David napped, we had girl talk, which is always fun. I always love catching up with friends and hearing about what's new in life.

Unfortunately, nap time didn't last for as long as we wanted, though! Ethan was up after only an hour, and Lauren (her daughter) was up before too long, too. Here's David keeping them entertained. We had such a nice visit!

Super Baby Sequel

Ethan's latest film...and Daddy's latest directorial pursuits :) Guest appearance by Mommy!

Christmas in New Jersey!

After our visit to NY we spent a few days in New Jersey to visit with my brother Fred and his family. Ethan got to spend a lot of time with his cousins Andrew and Elena, and boy did he get hyped up! I'm so glad that he had fun, and that he has got to see them twice this year. Grandpa Cuesta took us out to a fantastic buffet lunch when we arrived (all you can eat seafood, sushi, and other Japanese fare), and prepared lobster for us on Christmas Eve. I helped out by preparing sage-stuffed shrimp and steak. The feasting and festivities continued Christmas day with a turkey dinner prepared by Teresa, my sister-in-law. But did I mention the desserts? We had a smorgasbord of sweets that day: fruit tart, pumpkin pie, cheesecake, sfogliattelle, cannolis, and shortbread.

Merry Christmas!