girlymama

...and a happy new year

Well, surprise! We're actually in Ohio right now. Husband's grandmother died on Christmas Day, so we were out in Western PA for the funeral yesterday. We're recovering at my mom's house today, taking lots of naps and relaxing after a emotionally draining day.  We did still have a nice Christmas with our families and our kids, of course, had a blast.

I'll post when we get home!

merry christmas!!

Full house - lots of family - busy crazy busy!  I'm sure I'll have some good stories next week ;-)

Merry Christmas!!!

men!

I went Christmas shopping last night at 9pm (long day!) and I kept giggling at the lost looking men wandering through the stores with puzzled, bewildered looks on their faces. ("Need gift for wife... need gift for wife...) Apparently most were waiting for the perfect gift to fall out of the sky and bonk them on the head, since most didn't actually seem to be looking for anything in particular. Hilarious. If you're not busy tonight or tomorrow, go to the mall, get a Gingerbread Latte  or Peppermint Mocha * and laugh at them as they wander around. (Unless your husband is one of them. Then you should go shopping with them, take them right up to the jewelry counter and say, "Something over one carat, please!" That'll teach them to wait until the last minute!!)

*non-fat, to balance out the huge cookie you will buy to go with it.

my little showstoppers

Here's my kids' concert at Community Bible Study. Little Sister was technically in the concert, but spent the whole time doing some sort of interpretive dance behind her class while they were singing and then almost knocked down a microphone in a failed attempt to wow the audience with a solo performance.

Wordpress is being difficult, so go here to watch Big Sister performing at her best. Standing when the rest of her class is sitting, facing backwards, not doing the motions, lip-syncing and almost falling off the stage. We may need to rethink the paying-for-college-with-a-music-scholarship plan....

i've decided

that I am not homeschooling-mom material. After my kid has been out of school for... 3 days. Is that bad?

Big Sis is driving me nut-o!  I have realized that she is much more high-energy than I remember (and she must be getting the majority of that energy out at school) because she has been bouncing around the house all week. When she is not asking me if she can do a craft, she is literally running around in circles in the living room. (literally.)

I feel bad, since I am probably not giving her as much attention as I should with Christmas being on Monday and all, but jeez! I am deseperate to go somewhere today. I don't care where. I may even brave the mall 5 days before Christmas, just to get out and get some of this energy burned! Does anyone have a moon bounce I can borrow?

On the bright side, it looks like we're all in the clear with the mysterious stomach bug that made my sister throw up 14 times in 7 hours. (FUN!) Thank you, God!!

anticipation................

The stomach bug made an appearance in our house yesterday. After scrubbing the house down and dunking my kids in undiluted Lysol, we are waiting expectantly.

One down. Who's next?

its the most wonderful time of the year.....

Ah, Christmas. I just love Christmas. Usually. For some reason, I am just not into it right now. Perhaps its the fact that I'm hosting Christmas for the first time and the associated craziness of having my whole famly staying with us and Husband's whole family staying a mile away. Perhaps its just general life stress and money woes being complicated by the holiday. Perhaps its being sick. Perhaps its just run-of-the-mill PMS, but whatever it is - I'm just not as excited as I should be this year.

My sister is here, so I was able to go shopping yesterday. For five hours.  It wasn't as much fun as that would sound and somehow - despite spending gobs of money - I only bought 2 actual christmas gifts. This was the week that everything ran out - does this happen to you? Within 3 days, you run out of shampoo, soap, toothpaste, diapers, toilet cleaner, tissues, lunch bags, alumunium foil, etc. So, its off to Target to spend a gajillion dollars on nothing fun. (Well,  I find cleaning supplies fun, but I fully realize that it is not normal.)

Oh - Actually I did find something fun. I'm on a hunt to find something to wear to Husband's work party. Ugh. I didn't go last year, this is our first official 'work' function and I have NO IDEA what to wear. Help me. I bought this  to wear with either a black 3/4 sleeve turtleneck or a shirt that is similiar to this, only its a satin covered with lace v-neck with velvet trim (can't find a pic on Target, sorry!). Or maybe something like this? Or this? (nevermind - only in XL) And why to Gap clothes suck this season? I tried on the skirt/lace top combo and my sister gave it a great review and my husband said, "I think that might be too fancy." So I asked, should I wear pants? "No, I don't think so." A different top? "Ummm...."GRRRRR!  So I'm on a mission to find out what I am supposed to wear to this stupid thing.  I'll may have to corner some other wives at the party we're going to at his coworker's house on Saturday.  Feel free to browse the net and pick out something for me to wear. Just make sure you get fast shipping because it needs to arrive by Tuesday, okay?

This is not what I started writing about, but I guess its related anyway under the whole "holiday hoopla" category. But I must run. The bathrooms won't clean themselves, unfortunately! Looking forward to DCRmom's brunch tomorrow and some mimosas!!!

it's official!!!

We're going to Disney!  I booked plane tickets and our hotel/park ticket package today. Ouch. We're staying here, after days of research and reading some rather scary customer reviews about roaches and scary locations....

Despite the fun of spending so much money before we even get there, I'm excited. My girls are going to be thrilled. Yay!!

On a completely unrelated note, I just got Big Sister's school pictures back today. Good grief. Looks like she's about a photogenic as me. Poor kid.

i'm not posting today

...because all of my internet time is being spent researching our trip to Disneyland, which we're hoping to book this week.

I'd write something clever, but I'm too busy thinking "It will be worth it It will  be worth it" while dollar signs flash before my eyes as I scour the travel sites for that magical deal. ("A 4-star hotel, plus a flight, plus a car, plus park tickets for only $1,000!? Finally!!!") Dream on, self!

home run

Yesterday we went to visit my father and my step-mom for Christmas. They live about an hour away and I'm keeping up my life-long tradition of seeing him about 2 or 3 times a year.  We're not crazy about their house - Stepmom smokes (cough cough) and they have a scary dog (dobermann) and it is completely not child-proof (stress).  
Now, one thing about my dad, he loves  to give presents. And he's given us some great ones over the past few years - our TV, our laptop. He's given us some duds, but we don't mind - he'll come through eventually :-) (They do buy our kids the most obnoxious toys ever - everything must be electronic and make lots of noise and have absolutely no off-switch.) But this year they blew us away.
They gave us a beautiful piano that was handmade by my grandfather. He tracked one down (Grandpa made less than 40 in his lifetime), hauled it down from Connecticut in a rented trailer, had it tuned three or four times and he's bringing driving it down to our house before Christmas. Actually, to say I was blown away is an understatement. What a gift. Not just cool - since I really wanted a piano  - but really special. We have a true family heirloom now, something really special to hand down to our children and grandchildren.
I'll post a picture as soon I its delivered!