All Caught Up

The tree is decorated.  Let the parties begin!

=0)

Mollie is adorable.

And M came to visit me while I was sleeping...in Animal Crossing.  Kind of weird, but we love that silly, silly game.

Christmas cards have been ordered...better late than never.  I actually did some really, really cute ones and worked on them for over an hour and when I went to check out, realized I was on a designer site and they were close to $100 for only 40 picture cards.

Ugh.

They were adorable but I am cheap, so I had to start all over on another site...and no, shutterfly did not have what I needed.  And I love shutterfly.

=0)

Then, a total God thing happened...as soon as I ordered them...100 cards for $42.81, though I do have to pick them up...my computer mouse stopped working, which was exactly what I needed to have happen.  

The house got cleaned.  The laundry is done.  Presents got wrapped.  A shopping list was made for this weekend.  Made a deposit at the bank.  Dry cleaning was picked up and more was dropped off...gotta love tux shirts during concert season.  Gas was put into my car...and I only paid $1.67/gallon.  Unbelievable.

I also went to Costco and bought all the goodies for the basketball snack bar, which along with another woman, I am in charge of running for this year.

Cuz I am a freshman parent.  Or a sucker.  Or both.

=0)

Brian's friend just left, Alex has an evening practice tonight and M has been sitting in music juries all day and won't be home for awhile.  Supper will be baked eggs...with bread and champagne.  I have 11 necklace orders to fill, so I'll be pounding away at the kitchen table until it is time to eat.  Friday is my last day accepting orders for Christmas delivery, so the rush is ending.

OH...M subscribed to the sports tier on our cable a few months ago (gotta see every Buffs game, you know) and along with it came the Hallmark channel.  We're talking nightly hour after hour Christmas movies...the totally sappy, happy kind of Christmas movies.

Love those.

=0)

So Clean!

Working on Christmas cards.

Oh my.  Time flies.

In good ways, too.  My biggest boy will be moving home for winter break at the end of next week.  He's probably not as excited as I am, but it's OK...he can fake it for a month.

=0)

(my boys a decade ago!)

Hanging Out

I have video, too...but here is Alex the basketball player's debut in freshman choir.

He rocked.

=0)

The next night...back to where he feels much more comfortable.  His team made it to the championship of this tournament...so fun!

Friday night after the basketball game, Alex loaded the bus and Brian and I loaded the car...us with pizza from Nick's and a fabulous smelling Christmas tree.

Saturday morning, M did the lights and now it sits, undecorated but beautiful, in our family room.

I'm thinking we'll get to the ornaments sometime this week...though I am not sure exactly when we will all be together.

No rush...Christmas will still happen with or without ornaments.

=0)

Also yesterday...brothers bonding in the backyard.

Happiness is...winter lemons.  Tons of them on the tree.  Love, love, love winter lemons!

Last night was the 1st night of M's (and now Matthew's!) Christmas concerts.

Fabulous.  Check out all the great pictures I took...or the pictures I wanted to take if I had not left my camera on the kitchen table.  Lovely.

=0(

No worries, I'm going back next weekend.  I was hoping to go today, but there's not an empty seat to be had.  Bummer.

Also last night...the tournament championship for Alex.  I missed it but had friends there texting me scores and in the end they lost by 9.  Double bummer.

It is now 1:45pm and I am sitting here still in my PJ's.  M cleaned the backyard and is now off to his concert and the younger boys are playing some sort of shoot em up video game which I am choosing to ignore.

Great parenting tip there.

=0)

I am going to run over to Costco and pick up a hunk o beef, which I'll throw into the oven with a bottle of wine and porcini mushrooms and rosemary.  Mash some potatoes, roast some green beans and call it dinner.  

Gotta spoil that guy that I like so much.  Especially since he's working so hard and I am sitting here in my jammies.

=0)

Sing a Little Song

This morning, I hung even more lights onto our already well lit house.

Which is no biggie, unless you want to use the convection oven while they are all lit.  Or a hair dryer.  Or a television.

You get the point.

And also...is it really so bad to plug like 28 strands of lights into one outlet?

=0)

As I was outside in the chilly 71 degree weather, Christmas music blaring thru the open door...my kitties were frolicking around the ladder I was on.  They were so cute and silly, hopping and playing in the bushes.

I was so happy and my cats were so happy and it was sunny and I was singing and I thought to myself...wow, I am Snow White.

Yep.

Snow White.

That's me.

=0)

The outside of our house is now very, very Christmas-y while the inside is still rather Thanksgiving-ish-ly.  I even whistled a sweet little tune to the animals with hopes that they would take care of the inside, but alas, they didn't listen.

Oh well.

Tonight was a concert...a choir concert starring none other than Alex.  In a tux.  Singing.

Happily singing.

I think he gets it from me.

=0)

It was so funny...at half time, I mean intermission, a mom we know came up and told us she knew right away which boy was ours...the small dark haired kid that looks exactly like Matthew.

Ummm...no.  Ours would be the really tall blonde in the back.

NO, she said.  

YES, I replied.

NO, she said.

Ummmm....YES, I replied.

And back and forth we went until she was convinced that I knew which child I had given birth to.

Crazy.

=0)

(pictures tomorrow...I am too tired to plug in my camera, so just close your eyes and imagine...)

Crazy Busy

One day at a time.

Breathe in.

Breathe out.

Tonight I need to be in three places at once, where as last night I only needed to be in two places at once...that is, until my husband called me and needed me to bring something to his rehearsal (which never happens, btw) and upped my needing to be in two places at once to three places at once.

Whew.

The good thing is that Brian only needs to be one place and it's Alex who needs to be in two places, so if Brian can go with my girlfriend and her son tonight then I am back to only needing to be in two places.

Easy, peasy, pumpkin pie.

=0)

My goals for this morning are to shower.  I guess that should say my goal for this morning IS to shower, but I always like to have more than one goal.  And taking a shower is at the top of the list.

I do need to start lugging all this junk upstairs to the attic because it is all in the way of my washing machine and that is not a very good thing.

We also have one area of one strand of Christmas lights on the house that needs to be replaced with a new strand of all working lights...don'tcha just hate when that happens? 

OK...scratch all that.  Showering is still happening but I am escaping to the movies this morning with a girlfriend. Can't refuse a movie invite via text message.

=0)

OH...and here is my ginormous 15 year old, just hanging around.  See?  You truly can do pull-up's anywhere!

Wrap Up

There is nothing more beautiful than big fluffy snowflakes.

Nothing.

=0)

Attempting to get a perfect picture with all the cousins.  Impossible, but rather amusing.

All my sister-in-law wants for Christmas is a jacket JUST like this lady's...and if anyone out there wears a moose jacket with stars, sorry if I offended you.

But please burn it now.

=0)

Big Bear Village has everything...but 1st?  We went to the town square for the annual tree lighting ceremony.  People from all over town gathered and sang Christmas carols and listened as the announcer guy told us to remember the real reason for Christmas...Jesus' birth, followed by 3 verses of Silent Night.

We're not in politically correct Orange County anymore!  Very, very refreshing.

=0)

2nd?  The gift for those who have everything.

Forget the moose jacket...buy a hat!

It was a lovely week...can't wait to go back.

Silky Smooth

Just plain scary, but I do love my sisters.

=0)

I have lots of pictures to share, but not much time this morning, so I will just leave you with the above photo.

Back to real life!