I know this is a little delayed...but I feel as if we just recovered from our travels.
Despite three planes, three timezones, three states and three separate Christmas celebrations in seven days...our holiday travels were relatively relaxing. There were some big moments, like when Ellie met her new cousin Tristan for the first time and gave him hugs and kisses. But mostly, we were able to see lots of relatives and friends in a short period of time. Isn't that what the holidays are about?
In Santa Barbara we went climbing on dolphins...
Hunting for turtles...
Ellie became a princess when she found a tiara in Aunt Susie's room...
Ellie with Great-Grandma Dolly
Ellie shared her new toys with her great-grandparents...
Ellie with Great-Grandma Van
We had a traditional SB holiday feast of Santa Maria BBQ (tri-tip, baked beans, and garlic bread)...
We went jumping for oranges in Great-Grandma Dolly's backyard...
And searched the trees for thousands of Monarch butterflies...
Ellie became the best hugger ever...
Ellie hugging Great-Grandpa Van
And the best cuddler...
Ellie learned to pose for family portraits and look at the camera...
With great-grandparentals Van
Even without mommy and daddy in the photos...
With Grandma Pam and Grandpa Pam or Papa or Grandpa Mike
I appologize for the lack of photos from Chicago. It seems that we forgot to take our camera everywhere. Or have it at the ready. However, this photo pretty much sums up that we had a great time, relaxing nd hanging out with family and friends.
Coloring with Grandma and Grandpa Harrer
Ellie is an expert traveller now and although she didn't sleep on any of the flights (including the one where we landed in CA at 10pm pacific time which was 1am her time) she was terrific on all the flights. And she has a sense of geography now. She understands we can walk to school, have to drive to Aunt Susie's and have to take a plane to see the grandparents because they live, "very very far away". Although our trip seemed short and our visit brief...every moment was quality time.
Last night I accompanied a couple reporters (along with my fellow producer and good friend Leo) up to Manchester, NH for the New Hampshire Primary. The results were a foregone conclusion, so excitement and anticipation levels were low, but it was still sort of fun being in the thick of things.
Leo and I were assigned to field produce (round up interview subjects, communicate with producers and executive producers back at the station) for a couple reporters covering the Romney campaign. It wasn't too tough to do either because a lot of big names were just milling about in Romney HQ. Here are a few shots from the night.
Room full of Mitt-backers.. pre-victory speech.
NBC News' Peter Alexander (who can be seen on "Today" and "NBC Nightly News)
Former Massachusetts Governor Bill Weld (who once famously dove into the Charles River wearing a full suit to "proove" it's "safe" to swim in)
Former Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty (yippee.. Tim Pawlenty, the guy who dropped out of the Presidential race on the GOP side well before anything actually got started)
CNN's Candy Crowley (who was a big jokester.. always laughing with her crew and the other reporters in the room)
Fox News' Carl Cameron (who texts more than a 13-year-old girl)
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Polls closed at 8 pm.. with networks already calling the race for Romney at 7:50 pm.. based purely on exit polls. Turns out this time they were right. Mitt came out to do his thing, flanked by his wife and five sons, around 8:25.
After that.. the room cleared out pretty quickly. No after party. No bar (open or otherwise as you usually see in most other campaign HQ's). Mormons aren't the drinking type, as you know, and apparently not the interesting type, either.
Most of the reporters just chilled in that empty room, putting together their reports on the press risers, through the 11 pm news (newses?) they were reporting for.
That's one of our guys, Dan Hausle, in the gray suit.
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This morning, Ellie woke up and immediately started singing Jingle Bells. Then she started to say, "Its time to get up Daddy...Mommy...time to wake up". Even on Christmas morning she obeyed the rule of staying in her bed until Mommy or Daddy comes to get you.
Ellie was certain Santa had come. And she was right! Under the tree were lots of presents for her, mommy, daddy and even Mallie. Santa brought a shopping cart with some fruit in it, the baby suitcase that she has been asking for, a camera just her size, and lots of other special toys and presents.
She also had a stocking full of fun stuff like chapstick, a magic wand, goldfish, watercolors, a coloring book full of Disney princesses, and a Cinderella Pez dispenser.
Santa remembered mommy and daddy's favorite and traditional stocking stuffers, like Sour Patch Kids for mommy and Spaghetti Os for daddy! Ellie was very helpful as we opened our stockings.
Ellie even helped Mallie with her stocking. Santa brought Mallie some special treats and put them in her stocking.
Ellie was very surprised to see a baby rhinoceros toy. She was so happy that Santa had remembered their little inside joke when she had visited last time and told him what she wanted for Christmas.
She was very happy to see that Santa had eaten most of the cookies she left out. Although he was a little messy and left some crumbs which she wanted to clean up. Santa also left her a note, which thanked her for being a very good girl this year.
After playing with presents for a little bit, we all enjoyed a traditional VanBlaricum Christmas morning breakfast of fried mush.
Ellie's attention has now turned to her vacation to California and Illinois. She has asked if she can bring her shopping cart on the airplane...we told her there wasn't room. She also keeps reminding us that we have to bring her pretty dress that Aunt Susu got her for the "party". She's pretty excited and playing with all her special presents. Just as I'm about to post this...we just noticed that we are having some snow flurries right now. Its just barely a white Christmas in Boston!
Below is the video we took of Ellie finding her presents this morning. Enjoy!
