We had ourselves a merry little Christmas

Photo shoot in his Christmas church outfit...and last documentation of his curls

The house all lit up. E helped to fill the luminarias up with sand

E dancing in his Christmas PJs. Showing us the snowman was "tall, tall, tall"

He was definitely like a kid on Christmas morning

Showing off the complete new look

Merry Christmas From the Meltons

We wish you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

(Thanks Ian for such fantastic pics of us)

This is what I learned in 7 years of college

So I sat down tonight with one of the most fantastic cups of hot cocoa I've had in a long time and was immediately reminded of my undergraduate schooling in Biological Engineering. Among many other things we had fun little discussions on properties of different foods. For example, pizza cheese burns your tongue because a great deal of energy is given off when it changes states of matter when the hot melted cheese hits your not as hot tongue and solidifies. Both starch and ketchup are non-Newtonian fluids. While starch mixed with water with get thicker as you apply force to it, ketchup will thin which is why it is actually easier to get it out of the bottle when you shake it (or why someone finally got smart and invented the squeeze bottle). But the best food fact (if you can call it that) I ever learned is how to make a really good cup of cocoa from the little powder packets. The secret is "making a paste". I don't know about you but when I just dump the powder into a cup of hot water it takes forever to get it all mixed up and then when you think it is completely mixed you still find powder chunks as you are trying to sip. My wise professor Tim Taylor (yes that is the guys name on Home Improvement) taught me the correct steps for using the powder. They are as follows:

1. Place the desired amount of cocoa in the bottom of your selected hot liquids container (aka a mug or Styrofoam cup) -- I personally like to use at least a packet and a half of cocoa, usually two. Sometimes if I'm feeling crazy I add some ovaltine.


2. Pour just a little bit of hot water in the container, not too much, just enough to wet the powder.


3. Stir the contents into a paste. This achieves the desired goal of dissolving all the powder without the hassle of the clumps.


4. Add more liquid to desired level. At this point since all of the powder is dissolved it doesn't have to be hot. I like to add hot water to about halfway up the cup then add cold milk so that the end result is a really creamy cup of cocoa that is already the perfect drinking temperature without the scalding of the tongue or the blowing and waiting.


5. Optional- Add marshmallows, flavored syrup, whipped cream, cinnamon, sprinkles or any other cocoa accoutrement you'd like to sample.


6. Drink up!

I avoided working again

E and I braved the mall yesterday and all three of us went to Walmart today and surprisingly neither was that bad. You know what one of my favorite things about the age E is right now is he's been great at actually going with me to pick things out that he'd like for Christmas. He watches me buy them but then by the time we are home he's completely forgotten about them so he'll hopefully be surprised and excited when he opens them Christmas morning.

What I really should have posted about

So I really should be working right now, but I am just not in the mood to be editing and Installation guide for septic systems. shhhh... don't tell on me.

Thank you for humoring me through my last post. I really felt bad about it and Br was stuck out of town due to the icy roads so I have nobody to talk it out with. Sorry.

In any event, things have been super busy around here. Both Br and I have been left with little spare time (for being social or blogging) due to work responsibilities and travels. Fortunately one of our recent trips had nothing to do with work. We went to my sister's in Baltimore for Thanksgiving. My dad was out there visiting at the same time too. We had a nice visit with them all. It was a quick trip with little time to do anything but just spend time with family. We did manage to sneak away to the National Aquarium for a few hours. While we waited outside for our turn to go in, E kept himself busy pushing his cousin around in a stroller, chasing seagulls and trying to jump in the harbor (and I mean that very literally). Once inside he got a little mad when I kept him from climbing into the ray tank. I'm guessing if he could tell me what he wanted to be when he grew up it would be a scuba diver or marine biologist or member of a polar bear club. Here are a few pics from the trip. Check out the new Winter slide show if you haven't gotten you fill of Melton and Goodson pics.

Our Hosts

Our new nephew

My niece demonstrating that she loves her brother
This is pretty much how E felt about the whole Thanksgiving meal

E and his cousin played, fought and play fought
E before the aquarium
E inside the aquarium

E about 3/4 way through the aquarium. He's asleep on Pappy because he wouldn't let me or Br anywhere near him for most of the weekend.

My lack of time has also resulted in a lack of jumping into the holiday cheer. I have yet to really do any Christmas shopping. Not good. We've barely just put up or tree this week and E took no delay in undecorating it. I'm also bummed because I haven't made a single holiday treat, and I just don't know that it's going to happen this year. I guess I still have a week to try and pull something off but I guess if it doesn't happen, I have 372 more days to try again before next year. For all of you who haven't spent a Christmas with me, I really am usually more festive than this. Please give me one more year to prove it.

Does this make me a bad person?

Mind you that when I sat down to the computer to make this post I had no idea that it's been almost a month since I last posted something. Sorry this is going to be a weird one (not for the faint of heart or weak in stomach), especially after such a long hiatus. We'll see if E agrees to let me on the computer long enough to write another post.

Anyway right now I'm feeling kind of really bad. Most of you probably don't know, but I really like lizards. When I was a kid they were by far my favorite animal up until my adolescence when my favorite became frogs, but lizards were still a close second. I loved when we moved to our current house because there are tons of really cool and really big lizards in our yard. Today one of my friends met his demise due to my carelessness. I pulled out of the garage to go pick up E. My habit is to back up then stop and wait for the garage door to go all the way down before I go again so that I don't get paranoid as I'm driving away that I left my garage open. Right as the garage was almost completely closed I noticed a big lizard walking very slowly (probably because it is way too cold outside for cold blooded creatures), kind of like a dinosaur, towards the door. He was so slow and the door was coming down so fast. Turns out when a garage door and a lizard get in a fight the door wins. I thought that maybe if I opened the door fast then he could escape. Unfortunately he was a little too slow moving because I had already pushed the button to make it go back down after I decided it was a futile effort. The shock of him moving again made me open the door one more time. I waited a little bit, but by this point it was definitely too little too late. So now I'm feeling like a bad person because I've smashed one of my friends, not once, not twice, but now four times (since I did it again after returning from getting E). I'm a horrible person.