Promised Pictures From The Holidays

At last...here are some of the pictures from Christmas 2010 that I have been meaning to post. If only I were not soooo tired all of the time. Anyway... As you can see from the numerous pictures below, we had a wonderful time with my family down in San Diego.

But before I get to those I wanted to share a few more pictures and talk about Joey's visit with Santa. As I mentioned before, Joey was not the slightest bit intimidated by Santa...in fact he was not bothered a it at all.

Behind us (in the 40 minute line we waited in) there was a family with a 7 year-old boy who I am pretty sure had Ds too...but I was not 100% certain so I did not raise the subject in the short conversation I had with his mother. He was a beautiful boy and I tried to engage him in conversation when I was trying to decide whether he had Ds or not. He was fairly quiet and was (sadly) very hard to understand when he spoke...but he was so sweet and loving with his mother and 11 year-old sister...and when he smiled he had the beautiful almond shaped eyes that I see when Joey smiles (and which I love so much about Joey when he smiles). I wanted to say something but was afraid of being wrong and offending her. Now that I think about it there were so many ways I could have brought it up but I totally chickened out. Oh well...next time I will know what to say and do because I have played the situation out in my head a thousand times since.

When we got down to San Diego Joey was fascinated with the Christmas tree. We did not get one this year because we are still in the two bedroom condo and there simply was not a place we could put it while maintaining some separation from Joey's play areas (and I did not want to be yelling "no" at him all the time).


We spent Christmas Eve at my parents house with my two sisters, my sister's family and my aunt and cousin. Joey looks like such a big boy here!

Here we are about to have Christmas Eve dinner, just hanging out with my Dad (pa pa).

Opening gifts on Christmas Eve. As you can see Joey got into the gift opening...although I think he enjoyed the paper, bows and sitting on the boxes more than the gifts themselves.



And here Joey is getting to see his kitchen set from Grandma and Pa Pa on Christmas morning.



Of course he got a few accessories (such as stainless steel pots and pans and fruits and veggies...lots of pieces to spread all over the house). Funny how he knows exactly what to do with the food and the bowls, spoons and cups.



Our little family on Christmas morning.

Christmas day we went over to my sisters, Auntie Cara's house. Joey was being silly while playing with his cousin Ellie.

And he loved sitting in this little chair...we got some animated faces from him in the chair.

Silly Joey...

On the drive home (all 500 miles of it) Joey was playing nicely (sort of) with his baby doll. The doll was a Christmas present from my Aunt Jonni. We are hoping to teach him how to be gentle with a baby...as you can see it is going to take some work.

He also enjoys poking its eyes....we have a lot of work to do before Joey becomes a big brother someday.
Once we got home, Joey still enjoyed playing with his kitchen....