Day 362

Paul and I made a run to the grocery store for one last thing for dinner tonight. When we got home, he exclaimed that he forgot to give me his Christmas present from his Pre-K class. Apparently, it was left in daddy's car and no one remembered to put it under the tree. Of course, it was a cute picture of my little cowboy. ;)

Day 360

Every year Grandma Barb gets us an ornament for the year. These are the ones we received this year. It's kind of funny, but when I took the first pictures, I didn't realize they were our ornaments. I just thought they were cute.

Day 359

This boy was so happy to receive a banana in his stocking that it just had to make the picture of the day.

Merry Christmas to all!! I hope you are having a very happy and blessed day.

Day 358

Just a picture of our tree tonight before I head off to bed. All the presents are wrapped and waiting for some excited little boys in the morning.

Day 357

We decided to have an early Christmas celebration with some dear friends of ours tonight. I made a few dishes and they brought a dish and a yummy dessert. The kids had a fantastic time, and I'd bet that they were all asleep before they made it out of town. It is really nice to be able to share this time of year with friends as well as family.

Day 355

For years I've told myself that I'd make some stockings for my family, but I have yet to be inspired by anything. I'd been searching some of the after Christmas sales too for anything that seemed to suit our family. This year, we finally decided to commit and buy some that we liked. I'm still holding out hope that one day I'll make some, but in the mean time, we have some lovely stockings to hang.

Day 354

I had some Christmas shopping to do downtown, and decided that a visit to some of antique stores was long overdue. I had so much fun looking through the treasures. I came across a collection of furniture, and wish I had a home for this piece.

Day 352

It's become an annual tradition to get the boys' handprints on plates for the grandparents for Christmas. When I was looking around the store for the right pieces tonight, this snowman was just begging to be made for my parents. My mom collects snowmen, so it's perfect. Fortunately, I brought dad along for the activity because the snowman required a bit of actual painting. I'm hoping he fires up well.

Day 351

It's taken several weeks, but I finally managed to get some lights up on the house this afternoon. It took a lot longer than expected. I didn't get to the store soon enough to really add to our collection this year except for a few strands. I'm hoping to continue the white lights along the roof line, but I've discovered that the bushes are in the way of the ladder, and I'm honestly not sure when I'll get another chance to work on it. Maybe next year.

Day 347

Paul and I took a Christmas cookie making class this afternoon. He had a ton of fun rolling dough, pressing out cookies, rolling balls, frosting, and sprinkling sugar. He also did a fair bit of taste testing along the way. One of my favorite things about this class is that it was at one of the local wholesome food stores, so a lot of the ingredients were natural and added healthy elements to the delicious treats.

Day 344

Tonight we had a fantastic opportunity to see Cirque de la Symphonie, which is Christmas music played beautifully by the symphony with cirque performances during select songs. It was an amazing and fantastic treat! We had a great view from our first row, cheap seats in the third tier. It was so fun and a very nice evening out.

Day 342

I have been hard at work on getting the Christmas cards addressed and out in the mail at a decent time this year. I'm just about done, and if they get out this week, then it will probably be the earliest ever.

This is my "workspace" while I sit on the couch, watch television, and address envelopes.

Day 338

Tonight was the night of the annual Women's Christmas Dinner at my parent's church. We had great entertainment from The Three Wisemen. It was so fun to see them in concert again. It was also an awesome night of fellowship, laughter, and fun. I enjoy being able to catch up with everyone.

The photo today is of the little gift from our hostess, my mom. It was this cute little silver angel and you can see her packaging in the background.

Day 334

When I got home from work this afternoon, my husband came out to greet my youngest and me. He gave me this look like, "I totally cannot believe you!"

I asked him, "what?"

He says, "You got six packages today!"

Um, well, I knew I had been ordering a few things lately, but six packages in one day? That seems like a lot.

It's true.

Anyone who knows me, knows that I do a lot of ordering online. There have been bunches of sales going on, and I've taken advantage of one or two, or maybe six.

And here's the worst part, all but two of them were for me. Yup, I've been shopping for myself just weeks before Christmas. Two of the packages were CDs. One was for a card creating kit that is absolutely adorable. The other three are clothes - two packages for the boys and a bag for momma. Most of the clothes for me are going back to the store.

Don't tell him, but there are more coming...

Day 331

There was a deal at Costco that I wanted to take advantage of, so we decided to run by and risk the crowds. We were pretty surprised to see that it didn't seem to be any more crowded than any other weekend. The lines were actually very short. It might have been our strategic plan to go right at lunch, or maybe everyone was at the mall. Either way, we weren't complaining.

Day 324

As I was leaving the movies after 2am, I paused for a moment to get a picture of the lovely Christmas decorations. The mall is kind of an eerie place to be in the middle of the night, but the lights were pretty.

Day 245

I have been stalking craigslist for a train table for probably about a month now. It's for the boys for Christmas this year. I wanted to look early so I would avoid the rush and hopefully not be paying inflated rates or fighting for one.

I managed to find a gal less than a mile from my work, with a table that exactly met what I was looking for, for a reasonable price. The table is in excellent condition, and I couldn't be more pleased.

It will be hanging out in the warehouse at work for the next few months - right next to the stove my sister picked up for free from one of my parent's neighbors last week.

Day 233

For Christmas, my brother gave Paul one of those toys with the hundreds of pins where you can put your hand under it and it'll show a three dimensional mold of your hand. Paul had it for a day or two before the head broke off of two of the screws holding all the pieces together. Fortunately for him, his mother works for a fastener distributor and fixing something like this should be child's play.

The fix really wasn't too difficult. I took the very, very cheap plastic screws out and replaced them with stainless steel to stand up to four-year-old play. The hard part was actually putting back in the hundred or so pins that got misaligned as I was moving the toy around.

I'm happy to report that it's all fixed and Paul is ecstatic. This picture is of the toy and some of the broken pieces.

Day 75

I have a new favorite bag. My mom made this bag for me. I wanted to do it myself. I bought all the fabric back in June last year, and I was all ready to go, but then I went back to work. Somehow I thought I'd get a chance to do it, but it just wasn't going to happen. My mom was going to put it together as a Christmas present, but I had all the fabric packed away from the move. I recently located it and she made it just a few weeks ago.

I really like Amy Butler's Midwest Modern fabric. It's just the right mix of mod and modern for me, and the colors are fantastic! I've been using it to carry my paperwork to and from the office, and I've been toting my camera around in it too.

Day 70

Today I did something I rarely do. I bought myself some music. My sweet sister gave me a fantastic gift certificate to Barnes and Noble, which was just awesome because no one ever thinks I'd like something like books or music.

I tend to be kind of picky about making sure I use my gift certificates on just the perfect thing, so it's taken me nearly three months to figure out what to buy. Now I'm anxiously waiting for my new tunes.