MichaelandChrissy.com

Chrissy and I attended the UChicagoTech Christmas Party on Friday night (this is our fourth year running!).  This is a special event for my office every year, as it’s not just for the UChicagoTech employees, but also for many of the law firms, licensing companies and University faculty that we work closely with.  Our department has just over twenty people, but 170 people attended the Christmas Party.

The venue, actually a florist called “A New Leaf“, was very nice with interesting architecture.  It smelled really nice in the lobby.  We took advantage of the free valet parking, since it’s hard to find spots in  the Lincoln Park area.  The food was an excellent buffet of finger food, and everything was thankfully clearly labeled (I hate it when I have no idea what I’m eating).  Dessert was a selection of delicious chocolate truffles.

One tradition for our office party is the psychic.  Chrissy and I get our fortunes told at this event every year, just for fun.  Sometimes the psychic is pretty good (like the one that told Chrissy that she was pregnant with Aiden, even before she knew), and sometimes they’re not so good.  This year, the psychic was pretty good.  Apparently, we both have bright futures ahead of us!

We spent a little time mingling with my coworkers and their significant others.  We even got a shock as my boss’s boss’s boss sat next to us at our small table during dinner.  They were very nice people, it was just a little socially jarring.  I made sure not to drop my fork!  Overall, it was a very nice outing, and we enjoyed ourselves immensely.

In honor of Aiden’s second birthday today and in retrospect of the hornet activity on the morning of last weekend’s birthday party, I wrote a fictional short story about a little boy who inadvertently causes an international honey shortage (among other things). It’s much longer than my usual blog post, so click “Read More” below to read the whole story.

We threw Aiden a birthday party this weekend, even though he doesn’t turn “2″ until next weekend (we had it early because next weekend is Labor Day and people might be out of town).  Aiden had a sports-themed party, complete with a White Sox baseball birthday cake, a basketball hoop in the yard, and decorative pennants for all sorts of sports.  Aiden’s favorite word (next to “Uh oh!”) is “Ball”, so sports seemed the way to go this year.

The weather channel said that it was going to rain on Saturday, so we had made alternate plans to pile everyone into the house.  Luckily, there was no rain.  The sky did darken a little bit, but that was kind of nice because it cooled things down (it had been muggy and powerfully hot all day).  Timely, that was when we let Aiden open his presents in the back yard.  He got plenty of birthday gifts, but he really wanted to run off and play towards the end.  Just a few more presents to open, buddy!

Everyone had a good time, especially Aiden.  The only ones who didn’t appreciate the party were the group of hornets that took up residence on our deck.  Chrissy noticed them in the morning and her dad “relocated” them (to hell).   Thankfully, they were gone before guests started to arrive.  There were a lot of little kids over that day, and bees would have complicated things.

Aiden’s first birthday party was on Saturday. The weather turned out to be agreeable, 75 degrees with slight clouds, so we put tents up in the backyard for the event. Predictably, we went with a Transformers theme, and Chrissy went all out on the party favors. Everything had Transformers on it: plates, tablecloths, napkins, streamers, and other decorations. After much searching, Chrissy even found a Transformers cake with a transformable Optimus Prime on it.

The best part about the cake was that it came with a smaller “smash” cake. This one had a single purpose: to be demolished by Aiden. We got lots of pictures of the sugary carnage, and Chip took some video for us (we’re going to try to get on YouTube soon). Aiden had blue and red icing all over his face and arms. I had to hose down the high chair afterwards.

A little over thirty of our closest friends and family came for the party, so Aiden had plenty of gifts to open. He was pretty spoiled. We tried to send him back in a huge “monster” gift bag, but he wasn’t too happy with that idea. Special thanks to everyone who brought something for Aiden! It was a great day and we’re happy that we could share it with you all.