Merry Christmas (2014)

I know this is more than a few days overdue, but we’ve been insanely behind on everything holiday-related this season. So, sorry! Believe it or not, this was actually the first year in our married life (and my adult life, period!) that Mrs. Yeti and I didn’t send out Christmas cards either! Yikes…such slackers…

Anyway, I guess the good news is that since we already have the Christmas cards purchased, we’ll be able to start working on them that much faster this coming Christmas! Ha! Either way, here’s hoping the holidays were good to you and that the year ahead is even better! Merry belated Christmas, amigos.

As you can see from the pic, Greta wore her Elsa Halloween costume to her visit with Santa. Yep, it was that kind of year. Enjoy!

 

 

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Disney Princess LEGOS

Just when you thought LEGO had reached the pinnacle of coolness with the recent release of their fanboy-tastic “Lord of the Rings” and “The Hobbit” LEGO playsets, they take things even further by adding the Disney Princesses to the mix as well.

That’s right, brick lovers, the Disney Princess LEGO sets are here. And though several of the bigger name Disney Princesses like Snow White, Cinderella and Ariel have appeared in hugely-popular DUPLO playsets over the years, this is the first time Disney royalty has appeared in a “big kid” LEGO set and the results are freaking awesome.

Seriously, even if I didn’t have a Disney Princess-loving daughter, I would want some of these sets. Beautifully detailed with rich, subtle colors you don’t often find in the LEGO universe, the sets are far cooler than you’d expect, especially considering how totally lame and borderline sexist the company’s previous girl-themed efforts have been.

I mean, no offense to the toothy lasses in the LEGO Friends collection, but, girls can do much more than run an ice cream shoppe, beauty parlor and/or brush their horse’s plastic hair all day long. Say what you will about Barbie, but at least she has career ambitions, while even the best of the LEGO Friends sets feel a marketing scheme that never really took off.

Whereas the new Disney Princess LEGOS are so cool and character-specific that they actually breathe new life into a franchise that most parents I know feel has lost a little steam in recent years. And, by focusing on the strengths and unique skills/talents of each of the Princesses featured in the LEGO sets, the powers that be present girl characters that, you know, actually do things.

The Merida set highlights her archery skills, Rapunzel’s set focuses on her skills as an artist and even Ariel — who many consider to be the most offensive and weak-willed of the bunch — gets a chance to focus on her skills as a “collector of human artifacts” in one of her two LEGO sets. OK, maybe that’s a stretch, but, it’s better than nothing.

But the biggest surprise of all comes in the largest, showiest set in the series, Cinderella’s Romantic Castle. If you ask me, Cinderella was always the first truly modern-skewing of the Disney Princesses, but, rather than showcasing her skills at sewing and cleaning (both of which she obviously excelled at) Cinderella’s LEGO set goes out of its way to highlight her cheeky sense of humor by sneaking all sorts of hidden treasures into the castle. Her bed features a “secret drawer” containing a mysterious envelope (a souvenir invite from the Royal ball that started it all perhaps?) and another “secret room” upstairs hides a treasure chest behind a door that is only opened by a key hidden behind a trick bookcase downstairs. Forget romance, this castle is downright magical!

And in case you were wondering how long it takes to construct a 646 piece LEGO castle, I can tell you from experience — Greta got the castle from her Grandma Linda for Christmas — it takes forever. Just kidding. I didn’t actually log the hours, but, it took us a good two or three days to do it right. But, Greta and I had a blast building it and luckily, all of the big new LEGO sets come with very detailed instructions, so, we had lots of help.

And with my new “Lord of the Rings” Battle at the Black Gate LEGO set (yep, Santa heard my pleas as well!) due to start construction sometime this weekend, I forsee much cross-movie franchise bloodshed and turmoil in the land of LEGOS. Poor Cinderella will never know what hit her!

Questioning our “Elf on the Shelf”

I don’t know if it’s her age (four and a half must be the magic number!) or what, but, Greta is totally Christmas-crazed this year. Everything about the holiday is new and exciting and wonderful and as you can imagine, it’s been a total blast. All she wants to do is bake and decorate and shop and wrap presents…it’s hilarious.

And another one of Greta’s favorite things to do lately is talk the ear off of our beloved Elf on the Shelf Christmas elf, Paul. For those of you who don’t know the story, Elf on the Shelf elves arrive at your home in early December to watch over the kids. Then, every night after everyone is in bed, the elf flies home to the North Pole to give Santa an update on the child’s behavior and every day when the little one’s wake up, the elf has moved to a new perch in the household.

Aside from being a really cute and very fun tradition, the elf is also very useful as a disciplinary tool…especially when your wee one is throwing an epic, candy-fueled tantrum. I simply have to ask: “What would Paul think of that?” and Greta usually shapes up straight away. So, thanks, Paul!

Anyway, like I said, Greta loves looking for him every morning and actually spends a lot of time “chatting” with Paul about her day, what she wants for Christmas, I even caught her showing him some of her superfly new ballet moves one time. It’s very cute.

And then, this past weekend, everything changed when a very concerned Greta asked Mrs. Yeti and myself why Paul (who she had been carefully scrutinizing all afternoon) has a tag on him. “I thought he was real, but he has a tag, like a toy.” Greta said. “Is Paul a toy?”

Stunned by the question, Mrs. Yeti and I shared a blank look and then I quickly replied that the tag was like the luggage tags that we put on our suitcases when we fly on an airplane and that Paul has one in case he gets lost on his way to the North Pole every night. Greta stared at us for a long skeptical beat and then muttered: “Hmmm…OK.”

I think she bought my story, but, Greta is a pretty observant kid, so, I’m afraid the magic of Paul might not last as long as we’d hoped. And I still can’t help wondering why the fudge Paul has a tag in the first place?! I mean, I know there are laws about all that stuff, but, surely the Elf on a Shelf could have a freaking removable tag! Urgh…

And on top of all that, we went to see our usual Santa this weekend and Greta said she needed to come up with something else to ask him for since she already told the low-rent Santa we saw a couple of weeks back at a street fair what she wanted. Thinking fast, we told her that the previous Santa was just one of the man in red’s helpers, and that seemed to work. But, wow, this magic of Christmas business is hard work, man…

“Christmas Wishes” on KOST (2013)

Not sure if you guys remember this or not, but, every year around Christmas time we get loads of comments on our sister blog about a post I wrote five years ago (!) about KOST 103.5’s “Christmas Wishes” program. Most of the people commenting seem to think that our blog is somehow connected to KOST and ask for all sorts of crazy things for Christmas.

It’s actually kind of sad sometimes, especially the people who write about losing spouses and stuff…yikes…if it’s true, my heart goes out to them. But on the other hand, part of me wonders what the hell they are thinking coming to our blog for “Christmas Wishes.” I mean, if they took the time to actually read the original blog post they’d see I was writing about how much we love listening to the “Christmas Wishes” on the radio, not granting them! Urgh…

Thankfully, we haven’t gotten nearly as many comments this year as we did in year’s past — I only say thankfully because they do kind of make me feel guilty sometimes, like it’s the universe’s way of asking me to play Santa or something — but, the one’s we did get are pretty good, so, I’m going to repost them below. And if I had my wish this Christmas, I would bring both of these poor saps a couple of commas and maybe a period or two for Christmas, because, as you can see, they could really use them. Merry Christmas, everyone!

Merry Christmas 2011!

Santa just finished up his work in our living room…guess he and Mrs. Claus will pay more attention to the words “Some Assembly Required” next time they go shopping. Ha! Totally kidding. Actually, they got off pretty easy this year, lots of tiny Barbie kitchen gear to set out on the tiny Barbie kitchen table and counter and shit, but, overall, relatively easy stuff to assemble…even in the dead of night on little or no sleep. So, yay for that!

Anyway, as I head back to bed with Mrs. Yeti — did I mention that we were up too? Well, we were. The same time that Santa was here too…weird how that happens, huh? — I wanted to stop for a minute to wish you all a very Merry Christmas. I don’t know what you have planned, but, if it’s anything like ours — we usually eat, watch movies, play with presents, nap and repeat — then it’s bound to be fun. Merry Christmas, amigos!