Christmas in Pepperell

We spent Christmas with my family in MA this year. Since I had to work all week before Christmas, it was a bit of a whirlwind trying to get everything ready to go and get out the door. We decided to head up on Thursday morning at about 1:30 am, with the hopes that Jarrett would sleep in the car most of the way and that we would miss traffic. We had success. Jarrett was a trooper in the car (as was the dog) and we made it without too much trouble. When Jarrett wasn't sleeping, he was happy reading a book, having a snack, or looking out the window.

Grams and Grandpa were happy to see him and he warmed right up and got to playing with everyone and running around the family room checking everything out. There were lots of cabinets to open and close and a nice kitchen island to run around. I had been fearing he'd be interested in the wood stove, but he just sort of looked at the fire and moved on. Due to the new gate, he couldn't get very close anyways. He did enjoy sitting in front of it reading his book one chilly morning.

We were lucky that the weather was pretty warm while we were there and Jarrett had fun running around in the yard and taking a little nature walk. He also enjoyed climbing on and off the bench with Grandpa. He tried out his new tonka truck in the yard as well.

On Christmas, Jarrett wasn't overally excited about new toys or opening gifts but he played along. His favorite toy probably  being a strange little toy dog that responds to shaking a plastic bone.

Uncle Greg and Marlene came over for Christmas dinner and won the best present title with this new motorcycle that he proudly road all over the house.

Unfortunately, all day, I had been suffering from an itchy eye that I just thought was allergies, but by the end of dinner, my eye was oozing everywhere and my whole right side of my face had swelled up. We decided to cut out of dinner early and head to the nearest "Immediate Care." After going to the wrong one first, we made it to an open one with about 3 minutes before they closed. They were nice enough to rush me in (and out) before they headed home. Turns out I had a pretty bad case of pink eye. It ended up spreading to both eyes before calming down with the help of some eye drops. It was not fun. I had no idea pink eye could be so miserable.

We ran some errands the next day and made a few returns. Jarrett had fun playing in the various stores and trying out some toys in Buy Buy Baby and the Paper Store.

After checking the weather, Pepperell was bracing for some wintery mix the following day so we decided to cut our visit short and head home a day early. We again left in the wee hours of the morning. Jarrett again was a trooper, but we had to make a few more stops for our dog this time!