My sister's vacation........not what we planned.

This is a little long....

My sister, Heather finally got to come down from Missouri to meet Colin. She came in on Thursday, and we just spent the rest of the day hanging out around the house and talking, like always. We took a trip to Walmart to develope some pictures, and to fix my glasses, that I have so been missing after Jackson broke them. She got to play with Colin for a while before it was time for him to go to bed, and we stayed up for a little while longer talking before we retired for the evening. We had planned out the next couple of days that she would be here, so we needed some rest.
The next morning we got up early so we could take Colin to his two month check-up. He also had to get his first round of shots, not fun at all! He had to get three shots and some type of preventative that they give him by mouth. They did the oral stuff first, and he had trouble not choking on it, so by the time we got to the shot portion of the visit, he was already ticked. The shots were so sad, Heather was crying by the time we left. Now it was time to have some fun because the hard part of the day was over, or so we thought.
We had planned to go "Thrift Towning", which to me me means going to a bunch of different thrift shops to see what treasures we can find. And then I wanted to take her to the Stock Yards so she could see the cowboys herd the longhorns down the street. She loves that kind of stuff!
Although inconvenient, I made a last minute decision to go get my registration renewed on my car because it had already expired. This meant driving from Lake Worth back through Azle almost to Springtown, and then all the way back to Fort Worth when we were done. By the end of this, you'll know why this was a blessing. We realized we had both forgotten our cameras at home, so we stopped to get them when we came back through. By the time we made it to Fort Worth we only had enought time to hit one of the shops before we needed to be in the Stock Yards. We found some good stuff there and then headed on our way.
It was really nice downtown. There were lots of people walking around and the weather was perfect. I, however, had forgotten my camera in the car, so we decided that I would just copy Heather's pictures when we got home. We didn't have to wait very long to see the longhorns, and they were very cute as usual. There was one poor cow, dragging up the back of the group who looked pretty miserable. She was very pregnant and looked like she was having trouble walking. I felt bad for her! We walked through a couple of little shops before we decided to head out.
By this time Colin was really coming out of after shots sleep, and was needing to be fed. One of the thrift shops that I had thought about going to earlier was right on the way and had a pretty discreet parking area that was good for feeding the baby. We probably spent about twenty minutes in the car before going in. While I was feeding and changing the baby, Heather was trying on some of her new finds from the previous store, and she also had to change Jackson because he had poured water all over himself in the back seat. We were being completely nieve about the part of town we were in, we were too busy having fun.
Right as we were leaving the car, I noticed that her window wasn't rolled up all the way. I unlocked the car and rolled it up and we went in. The lady at the front desk told us that the store was closing in 15 minutes. So we hurried. Heather found a couple of thing, checked out and we left. As we were walking up to the car, Heather laughed and said "Jamie you left the window down." It took a minute for it to sink in, but my window was actually in my front seat. We had been robbed! They took Heather's purse with her credit cards, drivers license, the key to her rental car, iPod, and several other things that were in there, she had another bag that was full of her business info, her make-up bag, her cell phone charger, her contact case, hair brush, her camera, and I don't even know what else. I, fortunatly, wasn't missing anything other than my window.
I immediatly called 911 and Heather was freaking out trying to find someone that could get in her house to cancel her credit cards. She open the door to the car which sat off the alarm(I guess busting out a window isn't enough to set it off), and I couldn't find my keys to turn it off. By this time Colin was very unhappy and Jackson thought it was all a game. So, there was a moment where I was about to got completely nuts. Heather's husband wasn't home but her mom was able to get in and got the cards cancelled rather quickly. I called Jared to tell him what had happened and asked him if he could come up there. The cops finally showed up about ten minutes later not that they were much help. They were both nice, but in that kind of situation there's really nothing to do. They walked around the building and found some guys behind the building spray painting but they didn't have any property on them. They took all of our information and then they left.
By that time Jared had shown up for moral support and to take the kids home in his car. The rest of the night was spent trying to wrap our minds around the whole ordeal and trying to get organized. Making lists of what was missing and their worth, calling a lot of people that were really not helpful, and one more trip to Walmart for Heather to get some replacements of a few have to haves that were stolen.
All day Saturday was spent trying to figure out the rental car key situation. We woke up early that morning and my parents came and got me and Heather to go back to the scene of the crime and search around in hopes of maybe finding that they had thrown something down that wasn't useful to them. The rental car key was one of those things we were hoping to find. Well, we had no luck but we saw some pretty disgusting things as we searched around back allies in the slums of North Side. It took all day, but we finally found a guy at about 8:30 p.m who could cut a key for the car for less than half of what everyone else was quoting us, not to mention that he was super nice. We ended the night on a good note. However, Heather had to get up early the next morning and leave for Dallas.
I felt awful about not knowing that Heather had left her purse in the car, I swear that I'm not so dumb to know not to do that in North Side. I just really didn't know. So again, Heather, I'm so sorry! She felt bad about my window, but that was really a non issue for me. And if anyone ever needs a locksmith and you live around this area, Carlisle Locksmith is the best! And Heather, I promise your next trip down here will be a whole lot better.

And you have to thank the "thugs" for no pictures in this post, they stole the camera that the pictures where on.

Colin Smiles

You'll have to excuse my baby talk, but he's always in such a good mood in the morning.

Colin talks!

This isn't the best of video quality, but he's just too cute! The cooing at the end is Jackson from the bathroom, he loves to copy Colin.

Christmas is officially over

That may not sound so good to some, but I am actually a little relieved. It makes me feel like a Scrooge though. We went into Christmas thinking that it would be very low key and sort of relaxing this year. All of the Abrahams (minus us) were in Utah, so we felt like we had a lot less going on this year. However, it didn't end up feeling that way. We spent Christmas Eve at my parents house with my siblings and their kiddos. First off, there were way too many people in that house. We had some really good food, of course, and got to watch all the kids open their gifts. Jackie gave all of the kids union suits with their names on the behinds, very cute! Can you find Jackson? He was the only one that would stick out his tush. Jackson also got a remote control four wheeler from his Aunt and Uncle, of which he still hasn't played with because there are no batteries and I can't seem to leave the house to get any. Jared got a meat smoker, grill thing! It was really nice, and I think he's pretty excited to use it. I got a mini crock pot and a pair of pinkensheers, and I'm excited to use those. Colin got a really cute onezie with his name on it, and a super cute stuffed Camel. I know Mom was stressed out the whole time, but we did have a good time, and are very thankful for all the great gifts. The next day was our day to be at home together as a family. It was kind of nice for it to just be us. Jackson had a real good time as usual opening his presents. He is very enthusiastic! He got a box of instruments from Aunt Heidi, a light bright thing from dad, a new Vtech game (he calls it the Vbox, like dad's Xbox, and now Grandma and Grandpa have a Wiibox), and he got his favorite, the HotWheels racetrack. Jared got a really nice dutch oven and a pocket knive and a new set of Scriptures (of which I don't think he's going to use now after Heidi went to all the trouble to have them sent to us, because he downloaded the scriptures to his new IPhone that his boss got him). Jared got me a new phone, an mp3 player, and a vaccuum cleaner that ended up not working and UPS has yet to come pick it back up. It was still a nice gift though. After all the gift opening, we invited my parents and brother Chase over to introduce them to Christmas Breakfast. Jared cooked for all of us, and it turned out so good! They really enjoyed it too. That was probably my favorite part of all of the Christmas gatherings, just relaxing around the house after Christmas Breakfast. A couple days later, on Saturday, we were having our usual big family gathering at my cousin D'Anna's house. That just so happened to be the morning I woke up with Mastitis. I felt pretty awful all day, and didn't really get to enjoy that as much as I normally would, but it was nice to see some family that I don't get to see very often. I also got see my cousin and her baby, who is just eight days older than Colin. Jackson had fun playing with all of the kids and opening more gifts. I took a few days, but I finally started felling better. Just in time for our annual AbraLutz White Elephant Christmas party on New Year's Eve. We and the Lutz's have done this for the past two years now, and always have such a good time. I have to give the Lutz's all the credit this year though. They were so great, she even came over and helped me clean to get ready for it. It just so happened that this year it was scheduled for the same night as the stake dance, so we didn't have a very big turn out, but he still had a great time. We played Catch Phrase, Guesstures, and Boulderdash. We had our gift exchange and everyone stayed till after the ball dropped. We had a a nice Christmas, but I am a little glad it's over. I am looking forward to this next year, watching Colin grow, watching the two boys learn to play together, and maybe getting back in shape a little bit. We'll see...



This pictures a little blurry, but it's almost a smile. I have been trying really hard to get a picture of a smile. As for Colin, he still continues to grow, and he is so strong! He can roll himself off a pillow and I often joke that he's going to start walking because he can support himself so well with his legs. He's gonna be a big boy!