Our Festive (and hopefully last) Weekend as a Family of 3

As we continued to wait for Jax's arrival, we decided to stick to our annual Grover Christmas tradition of visiting Santa at Roger's Gardens here in Corona Del Mar. Brad taught Taj how to say Santa Claus and all day he was chanting "see Santa Claus" and was so excited to visit him. When we arrived (and luck has it, especially at the Gardens just like last year) there was no wait to see Santa! But of course, no matter his enthusiasm to see Santa, the second we attempted to put Taji on Santa's lap he started shaking and saying "no, no" and got very scared! Poor Santa, what a trooper, he stood with us (as you can see on the picture above, and very furthest from Taji (because even his presence next to him made him nervous) for our "family" Santa portrait. If I had known Brad and I were going to be in the picture with Taji, I would have at least put on make up!
These next pics are what we do every year in the garden, because every year since we started coming here I either have a belly or a baby! This year I am fortunate to have both!

I can't get over how large and in charge I look lately with my huge belly. Especially in my solo pic I look like I'm truly hiding a beach ball under my shirt! It also seems like I can't get out of the spotlight, lately everybody comments "whoa look at that belly" or "you look like you are ready to pop!"..... you think? Try telling that to Jax who is comfortably and squishably relaxing inside!

As we always do, at the Gardens, Taj enjoyed watching the choo choo train and we picked out 2 new handmade ornaments (all from Poland) to put on our tree. The blue "baby" heart is for Jax (his first ornament), and the Santa in the Car is one that Taj picked out for this year 2011.
After Santa's visit, Brad took us out for a nice family dinner at Gulfstream, where Taj feasted on his favorite Clam Chowder. We told ourselves how special this dinner might be, since it could be the last time we dine as a party of 3!

The next day, still no baby Jax, so...... we headed out on our duffy boat to watch the last night of the Newport Boat Parade. We bundled up, and along with Aunt Sherry and Taji's cousins Cayden and Sierra, we hit the bay, caught a beautiful sunset, cruised around looking at the decorated houses and boats, and had prime seats for the boat parade (out on the water of course).

After goofing around with his cousins, and being super hyper, Taj finally mellowed out and took in the sights of the boat parade. He was fascinated with it and loved watching them go by, exclaiming "big boat!" We pointed out the santas, the snowmen, the angels, and other characters... it was his first time seeing anything like this, so cool!
Here were our favorites of the night: