Christmas week

Now that the fever scare has died down a bit (*knock on wood*), let me update you on our lovely Christmas week. Aunt Tracey flew down on the 20th and we had a nice brunch over at my parent's. Molly decided that her morning nap should be three hours long that day so we were all starving by the time she arrived with N. We had a nice relaxing weekend and headed up to Lucille's on Monday to see cousin Ali (pics were posted).

On Tuesday we headed downtown to see Christmas in the Park. It was a bit chilly so Molly was bundled up in the Bob stroller and was more than happy to have a blanket on her for once. Every now and then you'd see her push the blanket down and point to something that caught her eye. For me it was really just an excuse to have dinner at Pizz'a Chicago. SOOO good! Although after dinner I went outside to wait for N (who was retrieving the Yukon from a parking garage up the street) as Molly was in her jacket and boots and getting a little warm inside. I'm just making sure her blanket is nice and secure when I hear some guy behind me yelling about someone touching his fuckin' car. I turn around and see this very angry man coming around the front of a Dodge Charger to confront a guy on the sidewalk just a few feet from me. This guy is super pissed so I move Molly behind the cement pillar we're standing in front of. The pedestrian tells the guy his hit his car because this guy almost hit him (the Dodge was over the front line of the cross walk with the back tires well inside the cross walk). The driver did not care. He keeps going on about his fuckin' car and how it should fuckin' not be fuckin' touched and then pushes the pedestrian so hard his feet come up off the ground before he lands practically on his back. At this point the pedestrian says, "Do you want me to call the police?" and the angry man responds with, "Do you want to fuckin' fight?" Yeah, I was confused too. Since Molly is safe behind the pillar and behind me I then say, "How about *I* call the police?" as I get my phone out. Angry man then realizes I'm there and I start dialing. At this point my dad has come out and I have him stand behind Molly as I walk towards the pedestrian. Angry man takes off as there are now multiple witnesses, but before he gets in his car I say to the pedestrian, "Make sure you get his license plate!" so angry man speeds off. The pedestrian was more than a little shaken up so I hand the phone to him (911 had been dialed) while I run out to catch the license plate number. It was something along the lines of 5NPR001. I think the letters might be jumbled, but I kept repeating them to myself as I tell my dad to go get a pen. The pedestrian was completely shaken up and more than a little freaked out. No kidding, he had just been assaulted. I give him my contact number along with the make, model, color, and license plate of the car and tell him to have the police call me if he decides to fill out a report as I was a witness. So yeah, that night was a little intense.

On Christmas Eve my dad, my sister, N, and I headed down to The Tech for the Leonardo da Vinci exhibit while my mom stayed at our place with Molly. It was really cool. They had a lot of artist renderings of da Vinci's work along with small scale models of all the tools he created to get certain works built. I think my favorite was a clay sculpture based on a man turning into a bird. That's the one I kept going back to. I highly recommend for those in the area as it's the only exhibit of its kind in the states. It runs through January and I think that's it.

Christmas Day we hosted... again. I'm pretty sure we've hosted every Thanksgiving and Christmas since we moved into this house in 2003. With Molly in the picture it is easiest to just be home. I was also more than happy to not have to go anywhere Christmas morning as I watched the rain go almost horizontal thanks to some serious wind. I put a roast in the slow cooker and that was pretty much it. Had everyone else bring the sides, appetizers, and dessert. I'm also more than happy to let others clear the table and clean up. So it was a pretty low key Christmas for me. We stopped doing gifts a few years back, but Molly scored some serious loot. Need to put away her toys from her birthday so she can concentrate on the new stuff and then I can rotate those back in and they will seem new again.