all i wanted was some interwebs. . .

and they wouldn't give it to me! and they wouldn't give it to me! all i wanted was some interwebs! just some interwebs!

it's been a while, friends in cyber-blog-land. i said in my last post that we were going to be switching internet providers and little did i think it would take nearly three weeks. to make a really long story a [very] little less long: i signed us up with at&t on the 4th. the modem came on the 7th. a technician was over-scheduled on the 8th. just missed me on the 9th. i called the 10th and was told (contrary to my confirmation email) i needed to be home. they rescheduled for the 12th. a technician/pastor came on the 12th, enthusiastically commented on grant's books, tested our phone jacks, and said he couldn't finish the work outside but would send someone that night or the next morning to do it. nothing. i called the 14th: "someone will take care of it tomorrow and get back to you." 15th: nothing. 16th: message, "there's a defective cable outside. our tech company will be put on it." several more useless phone calls and on the 23rd, "a tech will come by tonight before 8 pm." nothing. christmas eve on our way home from running last minute errands we passed a cricket store. our conversation was as follows:

r, with a healthy amount of sarcasm: hey! we should get cricket broadband for a month. that should maybe give at&t enough time to hook us up.

g: maybe we should get cricket and tell at&t to take a hike.

r: yes, please.

once back home, we put the girls down for their nap and grant calls: "can you hook us up or not?" "the technicians can't get into the box." "really? well, we want to cancel before we run out of time to get a refund." passes the phone to me: "would you like to reconsider? i could schedule a tech to come out to you on the 3rd?" "uh...no thanks." grant went to the cricket store and an hour or so later we're connected with the outside world. the end....

...kind of. while cricket broadband is "unlimited" it slows down once you've used up your "paid for" downloads. we skyped with my family on that first night and must have used a whole heap of superbytes. it's taken me two days to upload pictures to this post. seriously. 

on to our decembering . . .

last year, if you'll remember, we had a lot of paper chains and snowflakes. this year we decorated our tree with paper chains and penguins:

and put last year's snowflakes on the window:

on a fine, 85 degree saturday, we had amanda take our family picture at the japanese garden in hermann park (i'll post those pictures another day). once we finished, grant and i took hazel and lucy over to the new exhibit at the zoo. lucy was very excited to see one of her favorite, non-extinct animals:

after the rhinos, we walked through tunnels:

until we found:

hazel and lucy called one over:

and bonded:

they've done a really nice job with the new addition. the girls loved the drums:

and the hidden koolookamba:

it was a nice, short trip to the zoo. we finished walking through the new african forest and after a quick peek at the sweet, little meerkats:

we headed home for our naps.

the following weeks were spent doing holiday-like activities, such as drinking hot chocolate (usually with the a/c on):

eating traditional treats, like grant's graham cracker and orange frosting sandwiches:

we really missed not being able to go to temple square for the christmas lights but we braved the traffic and crazy crowds for lights in the heights:

it was . . . different. fun, but not really what i was expecting. there were some pretty decent bands playing and lots of beautiful houses covered in lights.

we did our 2nd annual gingerbread house decorating with amanda and matt:

from upper left, clockwise: mine (and the clear winner, despite [or maybe because of] the broken roof), hazel's, matt's, amanda's, and lucy's grubby hand "sneaking" more candy off the table: 

grant helped lucy with her house:

on christmas eve, we saw most of my family via computer, made cookies for santa, went on a scavenger hunt for christmas pj's, read luke 2, watched mr. krueger's christmas, and then put the girls to bed. fast forward to 6 am:

hazel, knocking on the bedroom door: "daddy! mommy! there are presents under the tree!"

me (aka the grinch): "it's too early to get up. go back to bed!"

oliver starts scratching the door and meowing for his food.

i get up, let hazel help feed the cat, tell her to lay back down, get back in bed and sleep for another hour before lucy starts crying to get out of her crib:

opening presents took ages. both girls wanted to play with everything as they unwrapped them:

they were very happy with all of their presents. thank you for the gifts, everyone!

and that was our december in a nutshell. hope yours was a fantabulous as ours.

zoo-i-ness

alright, devoted readers, you may let out that breath you've been holding all weekend in anticipation for this post:

it was a gloriously chilly evening. so cold in fact most of the animals were hunkering down inside their respective buildings. we were ok with that, wanting to stick to the indoor exhibits anyway. we started at the aquarium, where hazel was fascinated with the new jellyfish tank:

they are rather fun creatures (when there's an inch of glass between us anyway):

then on to the old favorite -- the fish tunnel, where the girls played dead:

next, my personal fav (read: sarcasm), the reptile house:

hazel was very impressed with this snake's camouflage, "his head looks like a leaf!":

and these also delighted my strange, reptile-loving girl, "that one's dancing!":

this little turtle/tortoise was cute:

this crocodile did not move from his position the whole time we were there:

seriously, mouth open and everything. about 5 minutes in, i was sure he was dead or a fake. but just as we were turning to leave, he opened his eye. phew! when we walked out of the reptile house, the zoo was closing so we headed home to our favorite wild animal:

ps. grant did it. poor patient little oliver...

pss. christmas decorations are finally going up. hooray! i'll put up pictures as soon as i can but it may take a while as we're finally getting new interwebs. double hooray!! blast you, verizon, and your capped downloads too! so. . .who's better? at&t or *gulp* comcast? we'd like to watch movies and skype so speed would be nice but we don't want to get stuck in some lame contract again.... help, please!