Karl and Angela Rees

Happy New Year!  It was a half holiday week for us, with Karl working Tuesday while Angela and Thomas ran all sorts of errands.  Thomas sure appreciated being at home and sleeping in his own crib, but we can tell he also missed Angela’s family.  We also appreciated sleeping in our own bed and being in warmer weather (though at night it feels almost as cold here as in Utah), but we sure miss having other people around to cook and to play with us and Thomas.  Tuesday night Karl played Frisbee.  Man, did he have some holiday laziness to burn off.

Wednesday, Karl took the day off and we celebrated New Year’s Eve by washing our salt-caked car, exchanging some presents, and buying Angela a bike (part of her Christmas present).  Then we installed a bike seat for Thomas on Karl’s bike (another present), and the whole family went out on a brief ride.   Thomas was so cute in his little bike helmet.   And he was all grins the whole way.  We played plenty of games throughout the day, and snacked on all sorts of veggies, chips, crackers, and dips.  Angela had been craving a cheese ball for a week.  So don’t let her tell you she doesn’t have cravings during pregnancy (another one this week—pudding).  We watched “Dark Knight” as the New Year rolled in—very disturbing movie if you ask us.

Thursday, we waited until mid-morning for the fog to burn off, and then we headed out for an outdoor adventure.  After lunch in the small town of Pescadero, we went on a 3 mile hike in Butano State Park.  Thomas loved the first part of the hike.  He was walking over bridges, up and down trails, pointing to all sorts of things.  Then he got tired of walking, so we put him on Karl’s back in a hiking backpack.  We were hoping he’d fall asleep as he hadn’t had a nap yet, but he just sang and pointed to things most of the way—except a brief bit when we let him out again.  He started complaining towards the end—probably because he was so tired.  After the hike, we spent half an hour at a nearby beach (Pomponio State Beach), and then headed back over the mountains, watching the first sunset of the year.

Friday, we had Thomas tested for allergies.  Sure enough, he’s allergic to eggs.  Egg whites, mostly.  It’s sad.  The good news is he isn’t allergic to oranges, and he likely will get over his egg allergy by the age of 4ish.  Meanwhile, Karl tried to get some work done.  And he got “some” work done, but not a full day.  He just wasn’t in the mood to work.  Instead, he came home and installed our new motion detecting, night vision, web-based “Thomas Cam.”  (Another Christmas present.  Now we can watch Thomas sleep from anywhere with an internet connection.  Actually, it’s more for the new baby than for Thomas—there are so many times it would have been useful when Thomas was younger.  But it was interesting to see how Thomas ends up in his odd sleeping positions).

Saturday we ran more errands and played more games.  We also went another bike ride.  Karl was amazed at how much trouble Angela was having with her new bike.  Lo and behold, when we got home, he discovered that the tires were almost entirely deflated and that the bike wouldn’t shift to lower gears.  Apparently, one should never trust a department store to assemble a bike and inflate its tires.  But at least she got a lot of really good exercise out of it.  She was so sore and tired!

Today we start having church at 1:00 instead of 9:00.  We don’t like feeling like the day is almost over when church lets out, and we don’t like the idea of Thomas not having a nap.  But we’ll see how it goes.  Karl will be teaching the 10 year old class this year.  Angela hasn’t been assigned a class this year.  Maybe she won’t have one?  And Thomas will start going to nursery in a month.