Christmas 2007

Christmas was loads of fun, most of our family was here and lots of fun was had by all. Here is a picture story of Christmas…


Opeing presents...

We got a Wii!

Sewing with Memaw.

Riding her new bike.

And I got a new camera! Yeah!

It was a lot of work, and I am exhausted from it, but it was a good time. I need a vacation from my vacation now. I am thrilled with my camera and I have already taken many blurry pictures and I have a lot to learn, but I am excited about it. I have wanted this camera for over a year and now, I finally got it. I can not wait to really learn how to operate it!

It is nearly Christmas. We of course have some little last minute purchases to make, but overall all our shopping is complete. I am excited that I have 5 days with my family and can hardly wait to spend every minute with them. It has been way to crazy in our house the last month and I am looking forward to laying low, baking some stuff with my new mixer that I love and making memories together. I want to try and not get too caught up in the commercialism of the season and remember why we celebrate. To spend time with the family and enjoy it. Watch some movies together with cookies and hot cocoa. And most of all to simply relax and not stress out about much of anything.

A little Christmas Cheer

Emilys Christmas Performance

For the last 6-7 weeks we have started to go to church on Wednesday nights again. the kids are enjoying it as Josh and I are as well. Emily really enjoys it because they have been preparing for the Christmas performance. The class she has been attending is the 3rd-6th grade girls. I think she likes it because she gets to hang out with the older girls and feels really cool about it all. She is finally at an age where church is become a social time for her as well as for the whole, I don’t know, learning about God stuff.

Anyhow, last night was the big performance. We had a great time. She did great, and was quite nervous. But I love her for it. Here are some videos of it, if you care to see. She has her hair all curly, because the night before she wanted me to curl it in rollers for her. So it is SUPER curly. She wasn’t sure if she liked it or not, but I think it is too cute. Of course, she was ready to wash it and get the curls out last night.

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And I am sorry for the shakiness of the video, I had Jacob pulling on my arm.

Whirlwind

We have had quite a crazy 10 days. Life has come at us fast and we are gearing up for the Holidays. I don’t think it plans on slowing down anytime soon! Last weekend we had Emily’s birthday party and everybody had a great time. Nothing like a pool party in December to create a memorable birthday.- I will post pictures later, I forgot my cord, and they are still on the camera.

Friday night was my company’s Christmas party. Josh and I got all dressed up and left the kids with a sitter. And a real sitter. She was 16 and Emily thought she hung the moon. They had a great time and so did Josh and I. At the party this year they had a casino night and Josh loved getting to play poker and I enjoyed a roll of the roulette and a few hands of black jack.

On Saturday morning we had Girl Scout caroling in a nursing home and it was great fun. We had 6 of my 9 girls show up and both the girls and the audience seemed to enjoy the performance. After that I dropped the kids off with Grandma and headed up to meet an old office friend in Salado. This is a fabulous little town with even more fabulous shopping. We shopped till we dropped and then headed home, but it was such a good time. I got nearly all my lagging Christmas shopping completed during that time. Once I got back home Josh and I took the kids over to the mall. We are in search of a very specific item, and I know that I am going to end up having to order it and that frustrates me. I hate to pay shipping. But we were unsuccessful in our quest for that item, but I did find some wonderful shoes! So, all was not loss.

Sunday was left for church and more shopping. We picked a name off a tree at church and had to find the little tyke some gifts. We joined up with Josh for lupper and went home and attacked the pile of laundry that has been looming over us and growing on a daily basis for the past 2 weeks. We made it through a few loads, and when I say we, I mean Josh. I had nothing to do with any of it.

It was a great weekend. It flew by entirely to quickly, but it was super fun. There isn’t a day left in the month that we don’t have some sort of plans already. Some highlights from this week to come are: Boy Scout Pack meeting, Emily’s performance at church, Bunko!, and I have to make 3 dozen cookies tonight.

I love the holidays.

Gingerbread houses everywhere

Here is what I have been working on this week. Our department is having a cubical decorating contest. Several folks have created beautiful areas that look like you would see at someone’s home. I went another way with it. Here is my “life-sized” gingerbread house. I made it from PVC pipes, brown paper, and lots and lots of scrap booking paper. I am glad it is done and am super happy with the results. I just hope I win.




On another note:
What is the sweetest sound you can ever hear?Your nine year old daughter humming and singing the new church songs she learned at church last night.

Pictures

This is mostly for my parents, because I know that SO many of you look at my pictures through my flickr site, but I am changing my settings so that only “friends and family” can see the photos. There has been some crazy things going on over on flickr and Josh expressed his distrust of having the kids pictures out there for all to see, so I am changing the setting. Now all the old pictures will be able to be seen for a while, as I have over 2,000 pictures and it will take me a while to change them from open to closed. Also, if you are interested in seeing my photos, I do not have a problem in the world with it. If you want to look at my crazy, not so great, wish I was better photography just open a flickr account and add me as a contact. If I know who you are, then, it is no big deal. If I don’t know you, but you find my life so interesting and want to continue to enjoy my children’s pictures simply email me and let me know you are not an internet stalker and I will add you as well.

I plan to leave regular pictures, which show no children in them open, so if you click on the flickr page there will still be pictures, but eventually you will be unable to see any pictures of my children or any of their friends.

Questions

Why is it that my child who can remember outrunning the cops 6 years ago can not remember where she put her shoes the night before?

And why is it when I send her into her room to look for her belt, she comes out in no less time than 15 seconds later unable to find it. But when I walk into her room not a minute later I see her belt lying on her bed?

Why is it that if I can’t find the remote control to the TV, the first place I have come to look is either in the children’s bathroom or in my son’s room?

Why is it that I can eat my cereal with out spilling milk all over my table, chair, floor and myself, but neither of my children can?

Why is it that my children cannot remember when they are out of lunch money at school until I find the note from the cafeteria in their backpack, pants pocket or daily folder?

Why is it when I tell the children to go get in the car because we are leaving and I walk out side and they are everywhere but in the car?

Weekly update

I have been “on the road” this last week and while I had more time at home, I felt busier than ever.

On Monday we had the Boy Scout Pack Meeting. Jacob received his Bobcat award. It really was something special. I will post pictures once I download them off the camera which I intended to bring with me today, but sits on the low wall of our house.

Tuesday night I honestly do not remember what we did. Nothing officially planned that I remember doing.

Wednesday we headed out to church. We have recently begun attending Wednesday night services again now that the children are old enough to keep out past 7pm. And they love it! Especially Emily. She participates in a program they have for 3-5 grade and she thinks she is hot stuff. I am excited that she is excited to go to church.

Thursday night we had a family night and went to Subway and ordered sandwiches for 3 of us and a pizza for 1. Can you guess who ordered the pizza? Then we went home and watched Kid Nation from the night before and really enjoyed eating our sandwiches in front of the TV as a family. Laughing together and being silly.

Friday night we had a family night again. We rented Shrek the Third and giggled together as a family and went to bed as a family at 8:30pm. All 4 of us, to bed at 8:30. It was really rather pathetic.

Saturday was a fun filled day with Girl Scouts, the last soccer game of the season, a trip to the mall, a fabulous spaghetti dinner at the table and an early bedtime.

Sunday was filled with a little bit of Christmas shopping, and a party for one of Emily’s friends at Main Event. We had a great time.It was a crazy busy week and this doesn’t even begin to tap at the surface of it all. But I have too much work to do since this is a short week and I have so much to do. Crazy busy times around these parts. We have to pack tonight for our trip, we leave tomorrow after I get off of work. So I have lots of packing to do and loads of work to catch up on. It is going to be fun, but a lot of work in the mean time. Plus, can you believe that Emily will be 9 in less than 2 weeks. Shoot me now.

Ramblings

Yeah! It is Friday! That makes me more excited than almost anything! And it is a 3 day weekend! Yeah! And the kids are in school on Monday! Yeah!

So an update on me… because it is all about me. My throat is feeling better. A little better each day. I am really hopeful that by this time next week I will be able to say, “Pain? What pain?” It feels more like an incredibly sore throat now, which is a vast improvement over the shards of glass I had been swallowing for the last 11 days.

We are very excited to travel to New Mexico and see all my family and friends. We haven’t made the trip in over a year and are excited for some green chili and beautiful sunsets. By golly, my throat had better be healed before we get there. The kids are excited to “treasure hunt” with Pepaw and I am excited to Black Friday shop with my mom. This is one of the things I miss most. Almost as much as I miss Burger Time. And that is saying something!

Mom has always been a shopper and she is an even better bargain shopper. “Look at all the money I saved!” is a line that I have heard from her more times that I can even remember. Once I was in high school I would drag myself out of bed the day after Thanksgiving and we would hit the Burger King for breakfast (since it was one of the only places open at 5am) and wait for the stores to open. It was great. After I was married and had moved back to New Mexico we would meet up early in the morning and shopped until noon when we would stop for lunch and maybe catch a movie. It was so much fun.

After we moved 10 hours away we both continued to shop on Black Friday. I would go alone. I thought that I would have a better chance of finding the great deals because now I lived in a big city and there were 5 Target stores just with in 20 miles rather than the 1 store in Las Cruces. But with those 5 stores came about a billion extra people and I was unable to find some of the deals as easily as I was back in New Mexico. It was very sad. Because I love to shop. I love to shop the day after Thanksgiving. I love to take care of 95% of my shopping that day. I rarely do any prior to that, I always forget I bought anything. So I do most of it that day, and I love it. But I have missed the shopping with my mom.

Until this year! I am SO excited to be going to New Mexico because we are going to get to sop together again! I have been scouring the internet sites where the ads are already posted and creating a list of things I want to try to buy. And I will probably be able to.

My only problem is going to be getting them back home without the family seeing them.

So we are excited to travel so far and enjoy a meal together. I am thankful for the opportunity to do so and ready for the fun to arrive!

The red hat

This is what I found when I saw Jacob heading to his room for bed with a glass of water:




All tucked in:


And fast asleep:


Only my baby bone head would sleep with a hat on but not a shirt.

Because all I can think about right now is me.

Well because I have been asked to update from all the people who read (dad) and because it has been a while I thought it might be time.

Since we last spoke quite a bit has happened. Most importantly (to me) and painful (to everyone who is within earshot of my screams) I had my tonsils out a week ago today. It has been an interesting adventure to say the very least.

We woke up at the crack of dawn and got the kids across the street to the wonderful Mrs. Ann’s house so that we could be on our merry little way. Once we got into the van it would not start. The lights would dimly come on and then nothing. The car would not crank. So we figured it just needed a good jump. So we opened up the Tracker’s hood and attempted to jump it. For like 10 minutes. At this point I am scared we are going to be late and the Tracker while it does get us from point A to point B it NEVER leaves Round Rock. NEVER. And we had to go to Austin. I was worried, but we had to be on our way. So we hopped into the Tracker and headed off into the darkness of night.

We got into Austin and got lost. I knew where we were supposed to go, but it had been at least 3 years since I had been to that hospital and almost that long since I had been in that part of town. When we finally rolled into the parking lot we were 5 minutes late, but I figured they would be forgiving. By this point I had to go to the bathroom like nobody’s business but I had been told to hold it because they had to perform a pregnancy test on it before I was put under. But I had to wait for like 15 minutes before they called me back and I was allowed to use the potty. I was not pregnant, big surprise. Then I got to get all dressed up in this beautiful gown, cap and footies. I was stylin’ like you just don’t know it. Then they tried to start my iv. Tried is the operative word. I was poked 4 times before they finally got it to “stick” in my hand and I should have remembered that from all the other times I have had to have an iv, but, I forgot and was punished for it.

They gave me the good stuff awhile later and the next thing I know I am waking up in the “recovery” room. There was no recovery taking place, just lots of pain.

Then we go home and I sleep and take all the meds like I am told to. And the pain is killing me and I am SO itchy and my tongue is numb and I am having quite a bit of trouble breathing out. And that is not normal. So the next day we call the doctor because the itching was horrible, all over horrible. In between my toes, on my nose, the back of my knees. I am sure I looked like a meth addict I was so itchy. The nurse at the doctors office told us to go the ER, so we go. I am SO out of it because I can hardly speak and I am high on the drugs and they determine that I am allergic, big surprise. So they give me some benadryl and tell me to call the original doctor again. So we do and he is mad that we were told to go to the ER, but in hindsight, I am glad we went. Not for the $50 co-pay we had to pay, but because we went to the new hospital right by our house and we were in and out in an hour. That is good info to have in case of a real emergency (and we all know my kids, it is only a matter on time) and because they gave me benadryl which is what I continued to dope myself with even after getting a new Rx from the doc because the new one did NOTHING for the pain, so I went back to the old one and just threw some children’s benadryl over it to help the itching. And it worked.

So I am now a week after the surgery and I am hungry and in pain still. But I am alive and hopeful that I will feel better to eat turkey by Thanksgiving. And pie. I miss pie.

And if you are curious about the van the battery was indeed dead, so dead it would never start again, but still new enough to be under warranty so we were not out anything but time and a little frustration. And when I say we I mean Josh because he took care of it while I was in a narcotic induced coma after the surgery.

I am tired

I have got all sorts of drama unfolding around me at rapid speeds. I almost don’t know how to deal with it- so I have almost just stopped trying. I am feeling so overwhelmed it is a bit ridiculous.

Let’s just start with this weekend. It was good, good and busy. Jacob had a soccer game that he played in and did well. He seems to be catching on a little more and more each time he is on the field. He is getting the sport, to a point. The games are enjoyable to watch and he seems to enjoy himself during them. On Saturday afternoon Chelsa had a Halloween party and the kiddos got all dresses up and headed over there for 4 hours of crazy sugar filled fun.




On Sunday we had the Girl Scout Chili-Cook off, which was great fun and I had 8 of my 11 girls come and enjoy. It was a good time and I am glad it went as well as it did. I am tired and ready for bed now.

There is lots of drama at work and I am not even sure what is going on. Unfortunately I am in the middle of it. I am not “in trouble” so don’t worry mom and dad, just lots of changes and it is stressing me out. Hopefully I will just get promoted this week and all will be well. But I am not holding my breath.

My 365

So I ran across this idea that this guy came up with that I think is fabulous. You write about 365 people that you have met in your life. You write one a day. You only use a certain amount of letters. It is fabulous. I am very excited about it. I started my page, it is linked to the right.

I think this is pretty awesome.

It has been a week since I updated and well, so much and so little to tell you all about.

The family and I will be traveling to New Mexico for Thanksgiving! I am SO, super excited about this. Josh was given both Thanksgiving and Christmas off, so we decided to head down to visit the family and friends in New Mexico.

Do you hear that Serina? We will be coming to see you in a few short weeks!!!!!

Also, I found out this morning that I will be having my tonsils out in a few weeks. I am excited and a little nervous about it. Well, not about the actual surgery part, but the recovery. I am scheduled to travel the week after, unless I get promoted and then who knows, and that makes me a little nervous. I will have 6 days of recovery under my belt before I have to travel, but I am still a little nervous. I am sure it will be fine, as long as I have lots of meds to take with me. In fact it might work out real nicely, because I will be able to rest in the afternoons rather than being stuck coming in to work, because I do not have but a weeks worth of sick leave.

Jacob had his first soccer game of the season, and we have moved up out of the “kiddy” league. He is in his third “season” with YMCA soccer, but he has only been playing for 1 year. But now there are referees and the game has transformed from a bunch of kids in a pact all trying to kick the ball into a sort of real game of soccer. There is SOME actual playing taking place.


An action shot of Jacob running after the ball

Jacob played the first and last quarter. He wanted nothing to do with soccer during the middle two quarters. He was crying and acting extremely un-Jacob like during that time. And then, he wanted to play. And he played the best he had ever played. The kid is just weird. But he enjoyed it and I think they won. I seriously have no idea, Jacob says they did and I am going to just take his word for it.

We also did a little shopping for Emily as she does not have many cold weather clothes and Lord willing, fall is coming. We ended up in Aeropostale and picked up two very cute shirts that she just loves to bits. The only personal problem I had with them was in order to get her a t-shirt that wasn’t inappropriate for her as far as fit and tightness, we had to get an extra large! Ugh. But she loves them and they are very cute on her. Now we are on a quest to find a decent pair of pants that fit her well. Wish me luck!

Weekend Update

I had a perfectly wonderful weekend where I did next to nothing. Like I said, it was wonderful. On Saturday the children let me sleep until 8am. They were up, but they did not bother me, but once to ask if they could watch TV, to which I said “sure, leave me alone.” And they did. It was fabulous. When I finally rolled out of bed around 9 I got myself cleaned up and went to the grocery and came home. And stayed home. I hardly even talked to anybody. It was the best day I have had in months…. no offense to anybody.

On Sunday we hit the Target, Michaels and the hair salon after church and went home. I did a little decorating for Halloween and then did nothing until Small Groups. I seriously think it may have been the best weekend ever. Don’t get me wrong, I love doing stuff. I love to be busy, but after the last month of nearly killing myself trying to do too much, it was SO nice to do nothing. We gear back up this weekend with Girl Scouts and Jacob’s first soccer game of the season, so we will be busy again, but I loved this weekend.

Life...

So I am SO very overwhelmed with everything going on in my life. I am not even sure what I should be doing. I am going to quit my job at The Disney Store today. There are a million reasons why, I really do not even know where to start. I hate to just walk in and quit, but when I tried to talk to them last night they still somehow roped me into going in last night. I didn’t stay late and was clear that I needed to leave when the store closed, for my own sanity, but I have a feeling that if I don’t just walk in and hand them my shirt and say, “I won’t be back.” That I will end up having to work there forever. And I hate that. Because I don’t ever want to work there again.

I also decided it would not be financially responsible to student teach this spring. I simply cannot justify student teaching if I am not going to have a second job. And well, I am not going to have a second job ever again if I can help it. Which leaves me back where I started and confused as ever. I think I will put the teaching on the back burner and try it again next year, but hopefully I will be able to gain employment and won’t have to go through all of this again. I was thinking about doing an alternative certification, but after thinking about it, I think I am going to stick with the Family and Consumer Science and try again next year.

So there is my drama…. blah.

We need a chew toy

We have a chewer. And it is not the dog. Well maybe we have a chewer in addition to the dog. Jacob is our chewer. He never was much of a chewer when he was a baby, it really wasn’t until he was much older that the chewing became an issue. And he does not discriminate. Anything that he can get his little hands on is fair game for chewing.

Take for example my very first fabulous Coach bag. It was wonderful. Josh and I had searched literally all over Austin to find last years bag. When we found it I was thrilled and I carried for almost a full year, until Jacob got a hold of it. He chewed the leather strap almost right in half. And when I asked him about it he didn’t know why he had done it. He actually hardly even remembered that he had done it.

He has effectively chewed on DVD cases, his fingernails, buttons off his shirt, pillows, blankets, and pencils. The pencils are the reason for this post today. You see last week Jacob had to pull a card (get in trouble at school) for chewing his pencil. Now the child is not a few teeth marks on the pencil kind of kid. He is a chew the eraser down, through the metal kind of kid. The teacher did everything right, but, he still got in trouble. I just hope he can break this habit, because he was quite crushed about the situation. So I took him to the doctor yesterday and nothing is really “wrong” with him. He is not deficient in anything, they did a finger prick. So I do not know what his problem is. On the other side he got 2 shots and a flu mist up the nose. Emily got 1 shot and the flu mist. Yea!!! Shots!! Jacob cried for like an hour.

Turdy, RIP

I may or may not have mentioned the latest addition to our house in the pet department. Last summer while the children where in Kentucky with my parents, Emily caught a turtle. And because Josh and I had yet to join them in Kentucky my mother thought it would be ok for the kids to keep the turtle.

Now keep in mind that we already have to very obnoxious dogs and one king of the household cat.

So she purchased a cage, some food and a name for him (Turdy) and he came all the way back home with us from Kentucky. He lived on our kitchen counter for all this time. Now Oreo, the cat, has taken an interest in the turtle. But he would only lean down and look into the cage and push the cage out from the wall. I could tell he was interested, but he never seemed menacing, or appear to be a true threat to Turdy. He was after all, in a cage.

Well, the circle of life has shown its ugly head her in our house. Oreo figured out how to open the cage. My mother in law found the cage open a few times on Thursday, but always closed it back up and went about her business. On Friday morning, the cage was open and the turtle was missing.

Josh and I received a frantic phone call at 6am from Emily telling us that Turdy was missing. She was quite beside herself and was weeping into the phone. About 10 minutes later we received another call informing us that he had been found in the hallway, and that his shell was cracked, but he was still alive.

People, that is not good news, at least according to the internet.

So they placed him back into the cage and off to work and school everybody went. However, once they returned home, he was no longer with us.

Josh and I returned home from Little Rock that evening and we held our second family funeral. It was very sad and mournful. Emily was so distraught she was unable to participate, or attend the entire service. It has been a rough week and hopefully we will all heal in time.

Bullets, again

I have hit a bit of a writing block. Not that all of my loyal 3 fans are missing anything fabulous in my writing, but just fir prosperity I am going to write a little bit… in bullets.

• Last week I was in Little Rock, AR for my job. I was told I “get” to drive a company car, rather than fly and because of this Josh came with me. We had a nice time, but it was no vacation, like I think Josh expected it to be.
• Emily got in trouble in school while we were in Arkansas, for calling a kid a butt face. Yeah, Emily- at least she didn’t hit him this time. So we are making progress with her. Now we just have to work on expressing our anger in a positive way.
• This weekend Emily spent the night over at her friend Claire’s house. Claire does not live in the neighborhood and Claire is usually very nice to Emily. Emily had a fabulous time and enjoyed herself so much. When she got home I asked her how it went and if she had fun to which she exclaimed, “YES!” I responded with, “Isn’t it nice to play with girls who aren’t mean to you?” I was thrilled she got some good girl time.
• Jacob is growing like a weed. He is eating constantly, too bad it is pop-tarts and cheetos. Last night Josh made something new for dinner and of course Jacob wasn’t interested in eating it, so he ate an apple, carrots and grapes. I have such a weird child.
• I finally bought new glasses last night. The ones I currently have were purchased at least 2 and a half years ago, if not even longer than that. And when I got the contacts that I currently have my prescription had changed quite a bit with my astigmatism and now I can see so clearly with my contacts. I have just been dealing with my glasses, only wearing them when absolutely necessary because the prescription is so bad, but I decided I just needed to do it and I went out last night and bought a pair. And, if I had wanted to, they would have been ready last night! I am going to pick them up today, but they were ready in the same day!!!! That has NEVER happened to me before. Usually when I walk into an eyeglasses store that has glasses ready in around an hour they tell me, “Well ma’am, for most prescriptions, but not for yours.” I am thrilled and can’t wait to be able to watch TV in the evenings with a clear view.
• In very exciting news… Josh changed the breaks in the tracker and, wait for it, fixed the car door!! We now have 2 cars with at least 2 doors each that work!! It is very exciting news in our house. Jacob was thrilled to help with the breaks and even more thrilled about the door. He had been quite worried about it for some time now.
  

That is about it. We are in the thick of it here, with school, scouts for both kids, dance and soccer starts soon… oh and both of us have 2 jobs. We are living life to it’s fullest. I just hope it doesn’t catch up with us anytime soon.