January Roundup

 We had a pretty quiet month following the very busy holidays. I think this was much needed by all of us. 

Max has been begging to go to Olive Garden because he is a marketer's dream and gets sold that their food is delicious based on all of their commercials. Since there is nothing I can eat there Andy took him one day for lunch. He agreed that it's only ok and he has had much better Italian food at other local restaurants. Andy was happy that the Olive Garden obsession is finally over.

One Saturday I took Max and his friend over to Mix Cooking school where they learned how to make pasta from scratch. The boys made fresh pasta and pesto to go with it.

We watched a very important Packer game with Grandpa T and Grandma S.

I took Max lunch to school on one of the Friday's this month. He requested Chipotle and was one happy boy.

Max had golf once or twice each week this month. He still loves golf and him and Andy talked about going to play golf after school and maybe on the weekends too so Max can practice.

The long month of January is over and we are heading into February. Not a whole lot going on this coming month but I will do my best to keep everyone updated. 

Christmas Part IV

 For the last part of our trip we headed over to Grandpa T and Grandma S's house. Max wanted to start with presents. 

Max got to spend a lot of time with cousin Beau. This is still adorable to watch him play with Beau. He would have been such an awesome big brother. 

Max also enjoyed playing with aunt Emily. He absolutely adores her. She is the fun aunt that will toss him around. 

For NYE, there was a Mexican Fiesta where we all participated in getting the food ready. Tayler and Batu came over to join in on the fun and even Batu helped with the pomegranate. He was the only one with experience cutting one open. 

Of course Grandpa and Max popped a bottle open and watched the cork fly out onto the golf course. 

We played a fun game of charades. I was shocked that Andy and Tim participated, but I think they participated for Max's sake. It was a lot of fun and Shelley and I killed it. Who would have thought we were so good at charades. 

Time to have desert and celebrate ringing in 2024 with candles and a pinata.

One last game of left, right, center. This was a new game for me and it was an easy game and a lot of fun. Grandma S won the first game and Max took home the winnings for round two. 

It was time to go to bed to catch our early flight back to Arizona. What a great trip back to WI. We got to see so many people and Max got to participate in the annual traditions that he loves so much. We even created new traditions with fun family games on NYE. 

Christmas: Part III

 We arrived at Grandma L's house and it was still snowing pretty good. Max wanted to go out and play so Grandma pulled out a pair of old snow boots and gloves that fit Max. The three of them went out to play in the snow while I stayed nice and warm inside.

They even built a snowman. 

Max was anxious to open presents, and again, he received a lot of nice gifts. 

Grandma L made us her Christmas tradition dinner and we spent the rest of the time lounging and relaxing. Max and Grandma went to Dave & Buster's together and they went to see a movie that Max had been wanting to see all while Andy and I relaxed. We did get to meet up with Ryan and Emily quite a bit this year while we were on the west side of Madison so that was great. 

Christmas: Part II

 Just like years past, we spent the first part of the WI trip at Grandpa J's and Grandma V's house. 

We started the visit off with presents in the morning. Max got a lot of great gifts.

We played this card game Max got last year and we had a lot of fun. I can't remember who won the game, but I do know that I did not win any of the hands we played. 

We did the annual bowling and game room tradition at the local bowling alley. For the first year ever, Andy won both games. Max had his standard cheese curds for lunch. 

This was a little different trip this year. My grandma has been diagnosed with acute leukemia so when we visited her we all had to wear masks to ensure she didn't get sick. Visiting was full of non-stop talking and a lot of laughter over stories. BTW...Max is officially taller than grandma Marge by a few inches. 

That night, Andy and I went out for drinks with Aunt Margie, Steve, Tayler and Batu. It was a cold night, but a lot of fun catching up and a lot of laughter. We also reminisced on stories of Grandma Marge. It was a nice night out.

It was not supposed to snow the whole time we were in WI so I didn't pack any snow gear for Max to play in, but he still managed. We woke up and it was snowing pretty hard. It was beautiful to watch.

It was time to say our goodbyes and head to the west side of Madison to Grandma L's house for some more Christmas fun.

Christmas: Part I

 We had a very nice Christmas weekend here in Phoenix before we hopped on a plane and headed to WI. Max made all of his grandparents homemade cocoa bombs. This was harder to do than we thought, but Max did a fantastic job and five of them turned out great that he could gift to his grandparents.

We went to Top Golf with one of Max's buddy's and his parents. We enjoyed the night of golfing and laughter. Max had to golf wearing a Santa hat to be festive. It was raining this night so at times we were hitting balls when it was pouring out. 

We decorated two gingerbread houses. Max decided to make it a competition, him and Andy against me. We had a lot of fun that night. 

Christmas Eve, we went to see Wonka at the movies. I thought the movie was good but not as good as I was expecting it to be. 

We had our annual Christmas dinner at home with steak and king crab legs and chocolate fondue for dessert. 

We tracked Santa on the Norad app before we headed to bed for the early arrival of Santa. Max was a good boy this year because he got an electric scooter and an iPhone from Santa. He was beyond excited because he didn't think he would get a phone. He's been asking for it for at least the last year. He's the only one of his friends that doesn't have one. Ugh! Now we have a cell phone holding 10 year old in the house. 

After presents, we headed off to the airport to see family in WI. We surprised Max with first class seats. He was so excited. He has been asking to fly first class for a while. He wanted to see what it would be like to fly first class. Now that he knows he doesn't think he can fly any other way. He was thrilled that his glass of apple juice kept being refilled by the flight attendant because in economy you only get one glass of juice. I completely understand kid. First class is the place to be!