First Christmas

Christmas has been a week-long affair for Austin. It started with a drive to Montreal on Dec. 24 -- which was a rather uneventful almost-six hour ride, despite that fact that he slept very little. Santa's sleigh (aka, our SUV) was pretty full however -- it's amazing the amount of stuff you need to bring when travelling with a baby and Christmas presents.

Austin's Christmas present to everyone was to sleep in until 8:15 on Christmas morning, followed by present opening at the hotel with grandma and granddad, Ali, Billy and Suzie. He tired of the game quickly, so mommy and daddy finished opening his gifts for him. He did, and still does, very much enjoy the gift Santa brought him.

Then it was off to great-grandma's house for brunch with the rest of the family. Below is a picture of grandma with most of her grandchildren, and now great-grandchild.
And, of course,there was another flurry of present opening.

Christmas dinner was at a friend of the family's where Austin sampled most of the meal. He wasn't too sure whether he liked turkey or stuffing, but he certainly did love the homemade spicy guacamole appetizer...who knew!?

We made the reverse trek along the 401 on Dec. 26. Again, he chose to sleep very little, prompting us to decide, when possible, future drives will be done at night.

On Dec. 28 (at Austin's bedtime) we loaded up the car once more and headed for London. Christmas at grandpa's (Ryan's dad's) was the next morning, where once again Austin opened a present or two before tiring of the game.

Last, but not least, Christmas moved to Nana and Gramps' house (Ryan's mom's) on Dec. 30, where Austin received, and mommy and daddy opened, more presents.

Austin clearly doesn't understand the whole Christmas and present thing, but will definitely enjoy all the toys, books, dolls and DVDs he received. And mommy will too -- because there are now new books to memorize and more than one Baby Einstein DVD to watch!