This year we are spending the Christmas holidays with family in both Chicago and Seattle. We flew up to Chicago on Wednesday taking advantage of the seasonal nonstop flight from Cayman on Cayman Airways. The flight was only about half full so Arianna got her own seat and she did well for a four hour flight only getting restless as we got near the end of the long flight. We have been enjoying the first part of our trip in Naperville with my sister Johanna, her husband Brent, and sons Nick and Zach. Grandma Cummings also flew in from Washington for the holiday. Arianna has been adjusting to the cold but really doesn't like wearing multiple layers of clothing and walks around like a mummy slowly maneuvering in the heavy garments. She has been happily playing with her cousins though she and Zach are definitely getting into territorial disputes over who's mama and dada are whose.
Last night we left her with Grandma and her cousins while Katie and I went downtown and saw the Joffrey Ballet do the Nutcracker. Our cousins Chuck and Twila treated us to dinner at a downtown restaurant and we got to walk around inside the loop for an hour or so seeing the lights and other Christmas attractions. Then it was over to the Auditorium Theatre for the show. It was six years ago now that I asked Katie to marry me at the Nutcracker in Fort Worth so this was a restart of an important Christmas tradition in our family. Watching the families at the ballet both of us were thinking of when we would be able to come back with our daughter to enjoy the wonderful show.
This morning Johanna had an appointment so we bundled up the boys and took everyone else out for pancakes at the restaurant that the Bernard family goes to every Friday.
Then this afternoon we drove over to Lyons and visited with our Spetter cousins and got to see Uncle Hank and Aunt Mary as well as many of the Wolfe, Kaminsky and Spetter cousins.
We are here for two more days then on Christmas spend the morning in Naperville, fly out in the afternoon and the evening with the Loski family in Seattle. Arianna will get to meet her great grand parents on the Loski side as well as a ton of cousins etc. She will also get to meet her Uncle Alex as late next week we head up to Whidby for a day to see him and Grandma Cummings who gets a double dose of Arianna her for Christmas and then late next week for her visit.
