6 things I learned on Christmas Eve 2007

• 6 people sharing 2 double beds makes for a very poor night's sleep
• parking overnight in the parking lot of the hotel you're staying at is not always included in the room rate
• one person walking alone can travel from points A through B to C in the same time it takes two people with 3 kids to travel from point A straight to point C
• visiting a huge childrens' museum on free admission day that also happens to be a holiday is like going to Disneyland in the summer- crazyness
• traffic cops in Chicago have no soul (or Christmas spirit) and will not hesitate to give a ticket if you don't have your licence plate on the front of your car because there is no mount for one and you haven't bought one yet
• Christmas Eve is best spent at home, hanging out with family- where no outside influences can work together to ruin the day

cankle

Just to gross you all out, here's two pics of my ankle yesterday morning and evening, respectively. As I previously posted, it feels a lot better and really doesn't look all that bad. So I guess I'm on the mend.

Christmas music and holiday business

I absolutely love Christmas music! I get so excited to pull out my CDs and start singing along on Thanksgiving day. I also look forward to singing Christmas hymns in church for the month of December. If you asked me what my favorite Christmas songs are, I would probably say O Holy Night and Ave Maria. But my real favorite Christmas songs are All I Want for Christmas is You and I Want a Hippopotamus for Christmas- these two make me laugh and want to sing along at the top of my lungs.

I don't want to use the word hate here- but there are a few Christmas songs that I do not like, not one bit. If these songs come on while I'm listening to the Christmas station on the radio or even on a CD that I love, I will skip them immediately. The offending songs are Little Drummer Boy and Do You Hear What I Hear. These songs drive me crazy! I'm pretty sure I hate them. Even when Josh Groban sang Little Drummer Boy on Oprah, I had to fast forward through it. I tried to like it, for Josh, but it couldn't be done.

My favorite Christmas CDs this year are Bing Crosby (this and every year) and James Taylor (just purchased). Close runner up is Squirrel Nut Zippers' Christmas album (you just can't beat Carolina Christmas- we're chillin' in our underwear). And then there's always Harry (Connick, Jr.) my Christmas music staple. Ahh- I guess I can't narrow it down to just one.

Some questions posed to readers- What is your favorite Christmas album? What is your favorite Christmas song? What is your real favorite Christmas song? Any Christmas songs you hate?

I was thinking today about how fast the Christmas season seems to go by every year. I always feel like I'm unable to do everything I want to during this season and therefore can't enjoy it to the fullest extent that I want to. I feel like I got a good start this year but now here a week before Christmas, I've sort of hit a slump. Maybe it's because I've been a bit incapacitated these past three days but I think it's mostly just that fact that I only really have one more week before Christmas is over. It just goes by too fast.

That's what I've been thinking about about today. Luckily, my ankle is feeling a lot better and I can even walk pretty well when it's wrapped up. So I'm going to try and get back to business tomorrow, the business of getting down with the Christmas season.

p.s. We Arizonans figured out how to make a real snowman...well Jon did, I took pictures.

a quick update

• One of the afore mentioned hats was recieved today, so check out the pics here or here.
• I injured myself yesterday. Missed the last step walking down off of the stand after saying the closing prayer. (Last time I volunteer to do that!) Rolled my ankle something fierce. I was holding Jonas at the time, but didn't drop him. I now have one ankle and one cankle.
• We got about 8 inches of snow last Saturday. Funny that my injury was not snow related, although Jon took a dive in the parking lot after church yesterday. Those dang slippery church shoes.
• Also of note, Jon had to dig us out with a snow shovel so we could actually get to church yesterday. First time for us Arizonans. He wasn't a fan- his feet and hands got cold- probably because he was wearing flip-flops and no gloves.
  
• Posted some pics of the snow and the kids here.

holiday projects- part 1 and potty training update

This is a sample of the ornaments I made for the ornament exchange party I went to 2 weeks ago.

These are a few of the ornaments I received at that party. My favorites are the wooden bead snowman and the wire angel.
These are hair bows I made for Maryn in the past few days. We made the brown clips at enrichment and I got so excited that I made the candy cane ones at home!

I have also made hats for my two little nieces, but I'm not going to post the pictures of those finished products until the gifts are actually received.

One last note- Maryn has left the world of daytime diaper wear forever.  We couldn't be happier or more proud of her!

playing in the snow and treat count

We got the kids all bundled up and Jon took them outside to play in the snow today. Check out the pics here.

number of treats I've made this week:
lemon meringue pie: 1
pecan pie: 2
cheese ball: 1
chocolate chip cookies: 9 dozen

Planning on fudge tomorrow. Anyone? Anyone?

attention blog world

Jon is writing a final paper for one of his classes about blogging. He's conducting a semi-survery about how and why people blog. So, if you read my blog, but don't read his, please go to his site and participate! Thanks!

this morning

"It's like Christmas outside! Do you think Santa changed Christmas to be today?" -Seth

tree decorating and today's surprise

Not really the best pics since you can't really see any of their faces or the ornaments they were putting on the tree. Plus my camera is unable to capture the pretty glow of the tree lights. But it's an important part of the Christmas season, right?

This is what we woke up to this morning. And it was snowing when we came home from playgroup this afternoon. Pretty exciting for the kids, and me too.

good news Monday

• The freezing rain has not returned (for now).
  
• A good friend did me a huge favor and actually made my Christmas card this year!
  
• Maryn is a potty-trainee super-star!  She actually got out of bed this evening and yelled downstairs to me that she needed to go.
  

Thanks for all your comments about my previous post.  To be honest, I wasn't sure if anyone besides my family would actually read the whole thing. To answer some of your inquiries:

The ornament party was really fun and I can't figure out why I never organized one or went to one before now.  It was so fun to be crafty and create something and then to see what other people's craft styles are like.  Yes, some of the ornaments I got were lame, but most were way cute and something I would have never thought to make myself.  So I urge all you fellow crafters- throw an ornament party!  You may wonder how I managed to secure a seemingly exclusive invitation seeing as I'm so new to the area.  Here's how it went- I was walking down the hall at church when a woman (the wife of one of our home teachers, I really barely know her) walked past me, said hi, then turned back around and said something along the lines of "are you crafty?".  I said something like "kind of, I can be".  She said "I have one more invitation to an ornament party, would you like to come?"  I accepted and that was that.  It seems like I was in the right place at the right time.  I plan to make some more ornaments, so I will post some pictures of those ones to give you an idea of what I made last week (just need to find the time).  

All in all, not bad for a Monday.

I got punk'd and freezing rain

Potty training is still going, but not that well. Maryn isn't at the point where she can actually tell me that she needs to go. She either tells me while she's going or immediately afterwards. So I'm not sure that she is developmentally ready. Plus, we have not gone "cold turkey", I still put a diaper on her when we left the house yesterday and while I was gone this morning and the kids were home with dad. I'm not sure where to go from here. So don't worry Michelle, it doesn't look like she's quite ready, Zane may still beat her. I recently acquired this book from a local used book sale for only $.50, so maybe I should crack it open.

The following is the story of one 30 minute increment of my day yesterday. I was at the kitchen counter attempting to mix together dough for a pie crust, I was using my hands, so they were covered in flour and butter. Seth was in our adjacent living room making a Christmas card for his friend, Elijah. I was spelling words for him letter by letter (as patiently as possible). He kept getting lost especially on the long words like "Christmas" and "Elijah". Maryn pushed one of our chairs up to the counter so she could watch me and "help" by sticking her fingers in my dough and handing me everything I didn't need. Where was Jonas you ask? Who knows? Hopefully not climbing up the stairs, his new favorite pastime. Maryn said "Mommy I wanna poop in the potty" (this is what she always says whether it's #2 or not) just as she "goes". Her undies and socks are soaked and it's dripping down onto the kitchen floor, Seth is still trying to spell "Christmas", Jonas has reappeared and is heading straight for the new puddle, and my hands are still caked with flour/butter paste. Seriously, It was a moment out of a sitcom, although I don't think any team of writers could have recreated this chaos. I was expecting Ashton Kutcher to appear at any moment. I know you are all on the edge of your computer chairs wondering "what did she do?". Well I'll tell you- I did the following things in a matter of seconds: wrapped up the pie dough in plastic and put it in the fridge, washed the goop off of my hands, stripped Maryn down and wiped up the huge puddle. I then ran upstairs with Maryn and threw her in the bath and asked Seth to watch Jonas and make sure he didn't climb up the stairs after me. Just as I was finishing up with Maryn, my sister called. Seth brought the phone up to me but I made him tell her I would call her back. He stayed on the phone with her for a few minutes and it took me that long to realize that the three of us were upstairs together. Where was Jonas, you ask? Who knows? I left Maryn partially dressed and raced to the staircase to find Jonas almost at the top. So I brought him upstairs with me and finished with Maryn. We now had about 20 minutes before we were leaving to meet Jon for dinner. I'll spare you the rest of the specifics, just know that we all made it to dinner- dry, dressed, unharmed and on time.

And now onto the freezing rain. Last week at playgroup, the other moms were talking about how horrible it is, you can't open you car doors, you can't get your keys into your locks. This morning I left my house at 8 am to go and buy some pecans for a pie I was making to take to a party at 11 am. It was cold and cloudy outside, but there wasn't even any ice on my windshield. Later when I left the house at 11 (I was running late already), I noticed it was raining as I opened my front door. After I took two steps, I almost slipped (in my new boots). I realized that my entire concrete walkway (of seven stairs) was coated in ice. I made it to my van a saw that it too was covered in ice. I got out the ice scraper and started trying to clear off my windshield, remember it's still raining and I'm wearing slippery boots. I finally was able to scrape off a little window, get inside and back out only to feel an unfamiliar sliding motion. I got really scared and almost stayed home, but decided to go ahead. The house I was going to was just down the street and around the corner, how bad could it be? I made it to the party house without causing an accident but almost slipped as I tried to walk on the sidewalk. Inside all the ladies were talking about how bad the roads were and someone mentioned that stake conference had been cancelled for the evening. I have never been so afraid to drive home in my life. After actually slipping and falling on my rear while leaving the house, I made it home without incident.

If any of you readers out there in blog land have made it this far, congratulations. I have one more little story to share. The party I went to was an ornament exchange, the first I've ever participated in. It was really fun and a good way to get craft ideas. I was working on my ornaments (I made cinnamon ornaments and then decorated them with ribbon and beads and stuff) last night while watching Oprah and Howie. Jon came upstairs from the basement and said "Wow, those actually look really good!"

What's that supposed to mean, Jon?