I loved the movie “Uncle Buck” when it first came out several years ago.  I think every kid ought to have an Uncle Buck – the kind of no-nonsense guy who sort of watches out for the kid, no matter what.  I liked it so much that my kids call my brother Uncle Buck – no, they really do –  I doubt they know his real name.

So Emily’s brother and sister-in-law are expecting which means Emily and I will be an aunt and uncle sometime in August.  I am typically a pretty no-nonsense guy so I am pretty much declaring myself to be L2D2’s “Uncle Buck” (though I hope he/she doesn’t call me that). I actually just got a hat very much like Uncle Buck’s a few weeks ago…

So, L2D2 you ask…what does that mean?  We don’t know the name or the gender of this child but we have to have to call the little bugger something.  We though about superhero names (Emily’s brother has a Superman tattoo) but that seemed sort of gender specific. I’d feel bad if I had called little Becky Spiderman for 9 months.  I considered going with Neonate 1 or Zygote Alpha in the style of the Presidential code name system but that didn’t seem to work either.  Emily and I both love Star Wars so we decided to go with L2D2, using the initials of the parents and the 2 for…well…version 2 of said parents.

So, without further adieu, I’d like to introduce you to L2D2, my niece/nephew!  

Congratulations L1D1! We are certainly very excited!

When we bought our house, the main bathroom had an enormous garden tub with jets and big fancy knobs and drains and room for 2.  We were sure that it would get a lot of use and be a great thing to have in our new old house.  We quickly found, however, that our 50 gallon hot water tank would not fill our 80 gallon tub and, more importantly, our 80 year old floor joists would probably not support 50 gallons of luke warm water plus two hind-ends.  So, here we are, stuck with an enormous garden tub in our bathroom that never sees any use.  Yesterday, we found a perfect use for it – a place to let snow melt off of boots!

Now let me back up and tell you the events leading to this.  We got some snow so the kids were off of school.  I went in to work in the morning but was owed a half-day of time for working over the holidays.  I came home for lunch and knew I had to stay as Emily and the kids were driving each other crazy.  We decided to bake some cookies and invite the neighbor kids over to play.  We started with a lively game of Dance-Dance Revolution.  It’s a ton of fun and I can get a mean dance on when I need to out-do my kids!

After an hour or so, we decided to make use of the snow that had fallen so we headed to a cool hill nearby where we wore every last bit of snow off.  By the end, we were sledding on pure mud and I ruined a pair of jeans!  Anyhow, we had a great time playing but were so dirty when were were done, we didn’t know what to do.  Normally we strip and make a mad dash through the house, but it was too cold for much of that.  We made it to the bathroom and got into the bathtub and got rid of the snow and mud.  It was a perfect use for the garden tub.

As I think of it, we may just leave it in the bathroom now after all.  I had planned to make it a real garden tub and haul it out back and stock it with fish.  I don’t know what we would do with snowy boots if I did that, though!

We got a bunch of new games for Christmas this year. We have been in an all out game playing marathon this week. I’ll give you a quick rundown on a few of them. Family game night has lots of options now! Anyhow, here is my impression of a few games…

Apples to Apples – holy moley, this is an awesome game! Basically, each person gets 5 cards, each with a word. Each person puts down their card that most closely describes the “target word”. It’s a lot of fun…especially with small kids. For example, once the target word was cuddly. The submissions were basketball and lobster. As the judge, I had to decide which was most cuddly. Interesting game for sure!

Guess Who? – sort of like Clue with out the murder. You get 25 people and have to eliminate faces based on characteristics like eye color, beards, etc. We’ve had a bunch of fun with this one.  Abigail is a master!

Life, Pirates of the Caribbean edition – If you know the regular game of Life, you pretty well get this edition…just add a parrot on your shoulder and say “arrrrr” a lot more.  You pay in dubloons rather than dollars!

Dominoes – this has been our big time winner. We’ve played just under one million rounds of Mexican dominoes in several different variations over the past week. The kids have a fun time playing this although I think the adults (we’ve played with everyone) have had the most fun. I had no idea dominoes was actually a cool game!

We are working hard to institute a regular family game night.  We play games a lot but I suppose as the kids get older that it will be more difficult.  I figure we’ll start a tradition now if we can and hope it sticks.  Do most people have a family-something night?

We had a great Christmas this year.  We spent lots of time with family and enjoyed tons of great food and gifts.  The kids were pretty calm on Christmas eve and went to bed before too late so Santa could come at a decent hour.  On Christmas morning, the kids even slept in until 7 or so (I was never that kind on Christmas to my parents)!  I think kids really are the most awesome at whatever age they are at.  I remember being so excited for my 2 and 6 year olds to open presents, but it was even better for my 5 and 9 year olds.  My Mom always said she liked us best at whatever age we were and I think I agree.  I am not sure that the same rule applies into adulthood though.  Of course, she can send us home now instead of just to our rooms.  Anyhow, I think I like my kids best at whatever age they are too!

Abigail had strep for Christmas but she is now mending (after 4 days on an ineffective antibiotic, she got a new type which worked).  I only mention it because we had to wake her up on Christmas morning.  Isaac was eager to open presents and we knew Abigail would be mad if he didn’t wait.  So, we woke her and the kids started opening stuff.  By the way, motrin is magic – it makes the most awful strep/sore throat/fever bearable for everyone!  Anyhow, I loved how our Christmas morning this year.  Rather than just fly through all the presents, the kids stopped and played with each gift before moving on to the next.  We didn’t prompt them to do so, but it let us know that Santa had done good research.  It took us 3 hours to open all the gifts (and there weren’t that many)!  We were exhausted by lunch time!

I’ll post some more pics tomorrow of one of the gifts that Isaac and I each got…but I need time for the bruise to properly finish developing before I show it off!