Christmas Lights Galore

If you want to see the ultimate Christmas light display, you have to check out this guy's light display!

Wizards of Winter Light Show

Holy cow! He has way too much time on his hands and I'm sure his neighbors just love seeing this every night for a month. :-)

Santa Arrived Early!

We had another nice weekend. I spent Saturday getting ready for us to have our Christmas that night. We had finger food type appetizers for dinner, some Asti, and we all opened presents. Ella had the most work to do since she was in charge of helping Lily open most of her gifts too. Ella is a getting really good at opening gifts now. And she plays with each thing before moving on to the next one. The gifts were under the tree for a whole week and she left them alone. I was pretty impressed by that! She really seemed to like everything she received. We have a bunch of pictures that hopefully I'll get posted before we leave for the blistery cold of Wisconsin.

Sunday morning we woke up and Santa had taken time out of his busy schedule at the toy workshop to deliver a few gifts early. There were gifts waiting for Ella & Lily by the fireplace. Ella was excited that he was nice enough to make an early delivery for us! Then we spent Sunday relaxing most of the day and had a very enjoyable evening visiting with our friends Matt & Allison. They live in Madison and were out here visiting Allison's family. We made our annual trip to Don Cuco's. We first took them there three years ago and now Matt requests that we go there each time they visit. ;-) We don't mind since we only seem to get there when people visit. Matt is going to be Lily's godfather so it was fun to see him meet her for the first time. And we look forward to meeting up with them again during the holiday week in Wisconsin.

So now, we are just gearing up for our big Christmas trip. I've got to find the winter coats, scarves, mittens & hats. Our poor blood has thinned after so many years in warm weather winters. And from what I hear there is tons of snow already and its really cold so far this winter. Oh joy.

Actually, it will be nice to have snow for once. The last two Christmases in the Midwest have been virtually green Christmases. This will be Ella's first real experience with snow! It will be so fun to see her reaction. Don't worry I'm sure we'll be posting photos and probably even video of it. So everyone will get to see her have snow fun!

I'm sure I'll send a post or two from the snowy Midwest. But, we hope you all have a very Merry Christmas, Happy Hanakkuh, or just a Happy Holiday! And a great New Year!

Busy Times

Well I have all our Christmas shopping done except for two things I still need to buy. I mailed several packages at the Post Office yesterday. So the gifts should arrive in plenty of time for Christmas. We went to the Harvey's baby shower on the 4th, then the Hornet Christmas party was in Santa Monica on Thursday, the 8th. Andrew got home early and we dropped the girls off at Jenn's house. It was the first time we left Lily with someone other than grandparents. Jenn is awesome though and we knew both girls would have a ton of fun. It was also the first time Andrew and I really have gone out together since we've had Lily. It was a fun evening with really good food, drinks and gambling. They had casino tables set up for black jack and roulette. The room was pretty swanky too, like one of those VIP rooms you hear about with celebrities. There were couches and lounge chairs as well as big comfy booths. (There are pictures in the December Hornet album on our pictures site)

We spent the weekend trying to get caught up on stuff around the house. We never seem to get ahead with the house these days. Last night we drove around Glendale and Burbank looking at Christmas lights. Both girls were great in the car and Ella really seemed to enjoy herself. She would point at the houses that were really lit up. She is starting to recognize who Santa is and she would point out all the inflatable Santas she could find. The left picture above is the best house in Glendale and the right is the best house (or two houses) in Burbank. :-)

Have you ever noticed how every year there seems to be a new trend in Christmas decorations? Several years ago when we were living in Lubbock it was the icicle lights, then a year or two ago, the inflatable decorations popped up. It seems this year's newest fangled must-have item is the inflatable snowglobe with fake snow floating around on the inside. At least, out here in California that's the trend. Maybe because the fake snow is the closest thing we get to snow/winter around here. I wonder if this is the trend all over.

Today is Andrew's birthday, so he got breakfast in bed with the girls (just Pilsbury cinnamon rolls from the can, but still yummy). And then he opened his gifts from us. He's spent the morning watching football and keeping an eye on his fantasy league. He doesn't have to worry about his team this week because he's seeded #2 in the Playoffs and has a bye into the second round this week. Anyone else out there excited that the fantasy football season is almost over?!

This afternoon we are going to a birthday party. Not for Andrew, but he will get cake on his birthday! The party is for Ella's little friend, Xander who is turning three.

This next week should be a little quieter and more relaxing for us and we're looking forward to celebrating our Christmas with the girls next Saturday! Santa's even going to make an early delivery for us since we'll be in the Midwest for the actual day.

Nana & Papi visit

My mom and Dave came for a visit last weekend. They got in on Thursday, Andrew picked them up from the airport and brought them back here to meet Lily. Lily just loved being cuddled by my mom. In fact, whenever my mom held her, she fell right asleep and wouldn't let my mom put her down or she would wake up. And Dave did a great job of being in charge of bouncing Lily in the bouncy chair. ;-) We went to our favorite Mexican restaurant in Glendale, Don Cuco's for dinner. It was very tasty as usual and I got to have my first real margarita since getting pregnant with Lily. YUM!

On Friday, my mom, Ella and I made the dough for our gingerbread men and cut-out cookies from the store bought Pilsbury sugar cookie dough. The Pilsbury dough was really good and a lot less work and cleanup than making them from scratch. We cut-out the gingerbread men on Saturday and frosted the other cookies. Ella did really well. I measured out the ingredients and she helped me put them in the bowl. She helped stir and she cut-out the cookies as well. But her favorite part was eating the mini m&m's I bought for the eyes and buttons on the cookies.

Saturday afternoon, we walked up to Kenneth Village. They were having a sidewalk art fair in the afternoon. We looked at the art (paintings, ceramics, knitted things) and then sat at the coffee shop and had a snack. It's so great that Ella is getting a little older now. She gets out of the stroller and sits by us at the table to eat her snack. She wanders a little bit, but she knows to stay right by us. This is much improved over 6 months ago when she would want to get out of the stroller and just run everywhere.

Sunday, we spent much of the day lounging around the house. Andrew and I went to Greg and Kelly Harvey's baby shower in the evening. Nana and Papi babysat Ella. Nana had a great time playing with Ella in her room and Ella even gave her several hugs! Ella was a little nervous we weren't going to come home though and stayed awake until we walked in the door. ;-) The shower was very nice. It was at the restaurant in Barney's department store in Beverly Hills. We had a great meal and it was fun to bring Lily to meet the Harvey's baby girl, Grayson as well as our friends Robin & Terry's little boy, Julian. Julian is just 11 days older than Lily and Grayson was born on November 2nd. It's fun that Lily already has a built-in playgroup!

It was sad to see my mom and Dave go, but we'll see them again in Racine over the holidays along with the rest of the Comande/Isaacson clans!

Birthday Wishes!

The cookie making was quite a success with me, my mom and Ella. I will post more about our weekend with my mom and Dave and update pictures shortly.

I did want to quick post that Andrew's birthday is on Sunday (Dec. 11th). He'll be the big 2-9, only one more year left of the twenties! If any one would like to wish him a happy birthday, you can leave him a birthday message in our guestbook!

Now I'm off to try and finish my Christmas shopping this morning. Only 16 more shopping days until Christmas!

2-Month Check-up

Lily had her 2 month check up on Friday morning. She did great! She now weighs 12 lbs. 4 oz. and measures 24 3/4 inches!! She is off the charts for length! Just for comparison, Ella was 11 lbs, 10 oz. and 23 1/2 inches at her two-month check up. Lily did really great getting all FOUR of her shots too. Poor little girl!

We brought Ella with us to get her flu shot. Now, she has a HIGH tolerance for pain. She totally watched the nurse the whole time, watched the needle go right in her arm and everything. And didn't even flinch or anything! Nothing. No crying. What a trooper she is!

'Tis the Season

Well, we have polished off the Thanksgiving leftovers (yes, including the two pies--that I believe I probably ate most of by myself--here come those holiday pounds!). We had a wonderful Thanksgiving with Erin and DJ. The dinner turned out perfectly, even though my mom wasn't here to help with the cooking this year. And as always we played board games in the afternoon and evening. I can't really recall past years' records, but the Women squashed the Men this year in a rousing 4-0 victory (one game of Trivial Pursuit and 3 games of Scene It!). And for those of you that know my reputation for winning at Scene It!, I would just like to say this was an even match. All three games the guys were close, and actually had the chance to win at one point. But Erin and I persevered! Stay tuned next year for the rematch of Battle of the Sexes!

We are not a little tipsy in the photo above. ;-) Just the camera is. We were trying to get a picture of all of us and the camera kept tipping after Andrew hit the timer button and was running back to his chair.

Andrew, the girls, and I had a really nice rest of the weekend as well. We got the Christmas decorations out and made the house look festive while listening to holiday tunes on the iPod. I saved all the unbreakable ornaments for Ella. When she woke up from her nap, she helped me put the finishing touches on the tree. She is a really good helper when she wants to be!

So now we are all decked out for the holidays and my mom and Dave are coming in today for a few days. My mom and I plan on trying to make Christmas cookies with Ella. I'll let you know how it goes!

There are Thanksgiving pictures up as well as a few of us decorating the tree (in the December 2005 album) and trying to get a cute picture of the girls in the outfits my mom bought them for Christmas. Happy December! Only 25 more shopping days until Christmas!

Our Little Artistic Genius

So, Ella is a budding artist, can't you tell? I mean clearly the picture she drew above is the ocean (with all the different blues and greens she used) and with little "fishies" (the fish stickers) swimming in it. Andrew and I were just amazed by her talent!

Gearing up for Turkey Day!

Well, we have all the groceries bought, the turkey is resting peacefully in the refrigerator, the roasting pan is on the counter. I'm picking up two Marie Callendar pies (pumpkin and cherry) tomorrow. I bought them from Ella's babysitter's son. They had a fundraiser at school, so not only did I get the pies for the same price as if I went to the restaurant and bought them, part of the cost went to the school. Now that's Thanks giving!

I have to say Thanksgiving is probably my favorite holiday of the year. I love everything about the meal and stuffing myself without feeling an ounce of guilt. Plus the Macy's parade, football, and that nice sleepy feeling you get for the rest of the day from all the tryptophan in the turkey. Although according to the "how stuff works" website, it's not really the tryptophan that makes you sleepy. If you're the curious type, check out: "Is there something in turkey that makes you sleepy?"

Anyway, we are really looking forward to our visit with our friends Erin and DJ. Andrew and DJ are planning on playing golf on Wednesday afternoon, while Erin and I get organized for our cooking extravaganza. Then on Thursday morning, Andrew will get the bird ready and start baking it while we sit and relax until all the side dishes need to be made. Then the rest of the day will be spent with good spirits (yay, a good excuse for some wine!) and good friends.

I'm also excited because I plan on decorating the house for Christmas this weekend. I want to maximize decoration time since we'll be traveling for Christmas. Also my mom and Dave are coming to visit Dec. 1-5 so I'd like to have the house ready for their visit.

As we think about everything we are thankful for this year, and with the holidays approaching, let's remember there are those less fortunate than us. Please think of giving a little. Toys for Tots is a great charity. Barnes and Noble also has a nice charitable opportunity. Our local store has a holiday book donation drive. You can buy a book for a child of a specific age (ie: Girl, age 2) and that book will be given to a child fitting that description for Christmas. I bought one last weekend with Ella in mind. I hope they are doing this particular drive in the future because I'd like for her to help me pick out the book and for it to come from her. This way maybe she'll realize she's fortunate to receive all the things she does and that some kids have a lot less than her. Plus, I love the educational value of giving a child a book.

Okay, I'll get down from my soapbox now.

Also, please keep my cousin, Michael in your thoughts and prayers has he gets ready to leave for Iraq. He is in the army and is leaving next month to go there for a year. We hope for a quick year and his safe return!

We hope all of our friends and family have a wonderful Thanksgiving! We are so thankful to have all of you in our lives!

Mega Millions and Smiles

We don't typically play the lottery, at least not on a regular basis.
But sometimes, you just gotta buy a ticket. Last Friday, the Mega
Millions jackpot was $263 million dollars. So, feeling lucky, Andrew
stopped on his way home from work and bought some tickets. He always
plays one ticket with our important dates (birthdays, anniversary,
etc) and then one ticket with computer chosen numbers. We had $5 worth
of tickets. And won absolutely nothing.

Since no one won the jackpot on Friday, we decided to go for it this
Tuesday and the $315 million jackpot. He used the same approach with
his choice of numbers. So last night, we watched and wrote the numbers
down. Then grabbed our tickets and started comparing. Whoo hoo, one
number. Nothing. Nothing. Nothing. Whoo hoo, one number, AND the MEGA
NUMBER! We won $3! We were one of only 110,019 people to win $3.

We didn't win the millions but we were close. The winning ticket was
sold at a store in Anaheim! At least we were in the same state.

In other news, I woke up this morning and said to Lily, "Good Morning
sweetie pie!" And she looked right at me and gave me an enormous
smile!! I was so excited. Her first real, non-gassy smile! Of course,
she wouldn't really do it again for the camera. But we'll get it one
of these days. ;-)

New photos!

I just got done uploading new pictures to our Shutterfly site. Check out the November 2005 photo album when you have a chance. I'll be updating the album throughout the month as well!

Tom and Pat visited us this past weekend. It was a little bit calmer than the previous weekend. Thursday evening we attempted to eat at the Elephant Bar restaurant (a favorite of ours to take visitors to). The evening was capped off by Ella having a small meltdown in the restaurant. So it wasn't the most pleasant experience. On the other hand, Lily slept the whole meal so that was a plus. ;-)

Friday morning, Tom and Pat watched the girls so I could have a little time to myself (spent browsing at Barnes and Noble). Then we spent the rest of the day around the house. Grand Tom and Grand Pat took Ella for a walk and got Baskin Robbins for everyone. Yum! And we finally got around to carving our pumpkins that had been sitting on our balcony for about a week. Check out Carving Pumpkins to see the results.

Saturday we took a trip to the Brand Library park. The library building has a lot of great architecture and foliage around it. A perfect setting for a California Christmas card picture. Although Ella wasn't real cooperative all weekend with having her picture taken (notice her absence above and in the pumpkin picture with Tom and Pat in the carving movie), we did manage to get a halfway decent picture of the four of us and the six of us. Ella is only slightly scowling. Not too bad.

Andrew and I were also able to get out just the two of us to do a little shopping. We decided to run errands together instead of doing something like going to a movie. Funny, how your priorities change. A few years ago, we would have loved to go to a movie (in fact we went almost every weekend before kids). But now, it seems kind of a waste of time to sit next to each other and not talk, staring blankly ahead. Don't get me wrong, I still love to go see a good movie. It just seems like more fun to actually spend time talking with Andrew than just sitting there with him. ;-)

Saturday evening, we invited Andrew's cousin Ed, Yolie and Patrick over for pizza and to meet Lily. We had a really nice visit with them. It was nice to get caught up with Ed and Yolie. We don't see them as often as we should for them only living 45 minutes away from us!

Sunday, we all piled into the Pilot (it kind of feels like you're riding in a school bus with all those people in it, especially when you're sitting in the waaay back and you go over bumps. You fly up in your seat just like on a school bus!) and went to the Glendale Galleria. Ella ran around the play area a bit and then we all headed over to the Disney store where Pat stocked up on stuff for both Ella and Lily. We just spent the rest of the day relaxing and watching football. We got to see some of Hornet's graphics for the Jets on television. I guess the Hornet crew who were at the game also got on television. But we deleted the game from the DVR before we had a chance to see them. ;-(

Tom and Pat had a safe trip back on Monday. And now we are looking forward to our next visitors, Erin and DJ for Thanksgiving!

Warren called...

As many of you know, yesterday was Election Day. If you've been paying attention to the national news, you may have heard there were four major ballot initiatives by the Govenator. All of which were totally shot down by the voting public. The last several weeks have been a barrage of political commercials and phone calls around here. We tend to not answer the phone when an unknown number comes up. These ever tenacious callers leave us nice long-winded messages in response to our machine picking up. Well, Andrew finally listened to two of them when he was cleaning off the machine this morning. And whose voice did we hear? Warren Beatty! I got all excited. I said to Andrew, "You mean Warren called our house, and if I'd picked up the phone I could have talked to him?"

Well, turns out after we played it again, it was just a recording. I guess they didn't expect anyone to pick up the phone in all of Southern California. ;-)

Cute movie

Since Benjamin was kind enough to plug our website on his blog, I thought I would return the favor. ;-) He posted a cute little movie of Ella from last Easter. Here's a link to it: Ella Easter Movie. That's Andrew's Aunt Gail playing with Ella in the video.

Christmas is coming!

Now, I don't want people to think we like Christmas because of the gifts. But since it's inevitable that someone, somewhere is going to buy a gift for one of us, I thought I would make life easier this year. I have created Amazon wish lists for all four of us. And all you have to do is click on the link in the sidebar. Once there, just click on our name and the list will pop up.

Many of the items on our lists can be bought in stores other than amazon.com. If you purchase something from the list from somewhere else, just shoot me an email and I'll mark it off the list. If you happen to get something for me, just email Andrew and he'll mark it off my list. I also have the preferences set so we can't see what someone has bought for the whole month of December.

Please let me know if you have any questions. We'll keep the lists on here even after Christmas and update them about one month before each of our birthdays.

Lots of Visitors

Last weekend my dad, Clare and Sam came to visit us and meet Lily. Even though we originally thought the trip would just be laid back and relaxing, we ended up packing a lot into the weekend!

On Friday, they babysat the girls for me so I could get a much needed haircut. What a nice break for me! And when I came home everyone was happy and cheery! Then we took a trip to Target. Okay, so maybe Friday was more relaxing then exciting, but you gotta love Target! I should probably buy stock as often as I spend money there.

Saturday, my dad, Andrew, Ella, Lily and I went up to Kenneth Village, a little shopping area in our neighborhood. They were having a fall festival with food, drinks, bounce houses, and a children's costume parade. You can check it out through the Fall Festival video clips on our new movie website. If you watch the clips, see if you can spot Jaws and also the macaroni and cheese. We think they were the best costumes.

In the afternoon on Saturday we ventured over to Pasadena and walked around the Huntington Library and Gardens. It's a pretty cool place. They have vegetation from all over the world and orgranized the gardens so that you're walking through different areas. For example, there's the desert area, subtropical, etc. They also have an awesome Japanese garden with a koi pond and bonsai trees. BONSAI!

Sunday, Andrew took everyone (I stayed home with the kids) on a driving sightseeing tour of LA. Our usual trip: the studios, Hollywood, and then Rodeo Drive. Sam was in search of the most expensive pair of jeans he could find (not to buy, just to look). They found $650 at Dolce and Gabbana. I'm sure there are even more expensive jeans out there too! Sunday afternoon, my dad, Ella, Lily, Andrew and I went to a Halloween birthday party for one of Ella's playmates. There are some video clips from there also on the movie website.

Sam's birthday is on Halloween but we celebrated a day early and went out to dinner at Maurizio's Italian restaurant here in Glendale. It was Lily's first trip out to a restaurant. Aside from wanting to be held the whole time and not sitting in her carseat, she did great. Ella did pretty well too. ;-)

Monday we all just relaxed and hung out at home. And they made it back to MN safe and sound on Tuesday afternoon. Next up, we have Tom and Pat visiting this weekend!

Happy November everyone!

Anemones and Swifers

Just a quick Ella update.

Can you believe that Ella can say the word ANEMONE? She has this Nemo book with buttons you press and one of them says a little saying and ends with "I live in an anemone." After it finishes, Ella always says, "anemone". Andrew and I both just looked at each other flabbergasted when we first heard it. This is from the girl who won't even call me "Mommy".

She also likes to clean things up, a surprising quality in a two year old. She likes to get the Swifer or the broom out of the closet and "clean". Granted, she won't clean up her room, but she likes to keep the rest of the house clean.

New website feature!

If you look in the sidebar on the right you'll notice a new feature: Isaacson Movies

If you click on it, you'll be directed to a new website that hosts our latest movies. I'll also post raw video clips from time to time since we don't have a lot of extra time these days for editing fun movies. There are two movies uploaded right now "Lily's First Days" and "The Many Faces of Ella". They are Quicktime movies and you'll have to be a little patient with them. They load the whole movie and then just start playing on their own (there's no control bar for the movie).

I hope to post a little Halloween footage in the near future as well as Halloween photos on our Shutterfly site so check back by the end of next week!

HAPPY HALLOWEEN

Hope everyone has a fun weekend for Halloween! We are having my dad, Clare and Sam (Clare's son) come visit us this weekend. But our Halloween fun started last weekend. We took the girls to this play area at the mall for a Halloween party! Several of Ella's playgroup friends were there. We all had a blast. I'll upload some more pictures after this weekend, but here are two so you can see the girls in their costumes (just ignore the fact that Ella is pulling her dress up. ;-).

I think Ella has a busier social calendar than we do, I suppose that will be the norm now until she leaves the house all grown up. She has a Halloween birthday party to go to on Sunday so we'll get more pictures then and we may try to go trick or treating on Monday, we'll see.

There are also a few Halloween displays around here we may check out this weekend. One of them is at the house of one of the producers of The Simpsons. If you're curious check it out here: Boney Island.

Our Darling Ella

I said I would post about Ella's latest shenanigans. Well, she had a doozy this week. So I put the gate up in her bedroom doorway when I'm going to take a shower. Well, I happen to talk to my mom on the phone for about ten minutes on Wednesday before I was going to jump in the shower. Ella seemed to be playing nicely in her room while I did this. Maybe too nicely....it was awful quiet. So before I went to jump in the shower, I peeked in through the doorway. And what do I see? My darling daughter with a tube of Desitin (that would be gooey white diaper rash cream) in her hand! And the evidence of her "quiet play" ALL over her face, arms, legs, and not to mention smeared all over her room (for those of you familiar--the little table, her blue chair, the dresser, crib, her kitchen, and several spots on the carpet!) So guess who got to take a bath before i could take my shower?

So as if that little episode wasn't bad enough. The next morning she was upstairs with us. And she stealthily reached into the pack n play where we had Lily's Desitin, grabbed it, then quietly, nonchalantly made her way downstairs. About five minutes later Andrew came downstairs and peeked in her room and all of sudden I hear, "Ella, where did you get that?!" Luckily this time she just had it on her hands and face and hadn't done much damage to the room yet.

Ironically, I think this sort of behavior may be genetic. I believe I may have heard a story a time or two from my own mother about how she came into my room when I was little and I had Desitin all over my face and the crib. ;-)