Happy New Year Everyone!

Just 5 more hours! Yeah us!

Confusion

Ok, I may have confused a few people. Three days from Sunday meant- 3 days left without Robert. He comes home on the 4th day (Thursday), but you can't count that day, because he will be home that day.
He made it to Kuwait. Now just a day to wait until he can board a plane to fly home. I am getting stir crazy and can't seem to occupy myself enough. I cleaned the cupboards in the kitchen- they needed it badly. That took most of the day, but I am still bored and restless. One more day to go with nothing to do, I guess.
Happy New Year's Eve everyone!

3 days and counting!!

We can't wait! We are very excited!
Now how are we going to get through those 3 days?

Merry Christmas and winners!

Merry Christmas to everyone.
I hope yours was fantastic.

My parents and youngest brother came. We went to the White house and shopped and bought hot chocolate from Starbucks (had to try it out, once), celebrated a 40th wedding anniversary with yummy Cheesecake, opened lots of gifts (but saved some for when Rob got home), and went to see the temple lights. It was a wonderful time. We did the traditional nativity play. This year Crash Bandicoot played the roll of the baby Jesus. He lay in a blanket on a bed of pom-poms. Emma was Mary and actually fit into a skirt that I had bought for myself, but haven't been able to get into since I had Max- scary. Joseph was obviously Joseph, Max was our sweet little angel, Dad/Grandpa was King Herod, Sam was all three wisemen, and Uncle Timmy was the Shepherd- note all the animals he seems to be taking care of.Traditional Christmas Eve PJ's

Our Secret Santa finished with some fun gifts for us. What a lot of work to do the 12 days of Christmas for a family, but how much fun we had trying to catch them- we never did.
It was a great Christmas, except that we didn't have a Dad. The count down has begun, though. 5 more days and counting!
Some of you didn't get our Christmas letter, but it had a code in it. My aunt Cheryl was the first with what the code said, but didn't give the answer. The code said, "if you haven't got a half penny then what?" My husband informed me that there was a mistake and the g was turned into an N, so that may have confused a few people. Anyway, the Burnham's from Nevada came up with the answer- then God Bless You! I guess I have to give 2 prizes! Congrats!

Christmas Tag

I was tagged by the grand Gretchen to come up with 5 Christmas things. Here they are:

5 Favorite Christmas Movies:
1. While you were Sleeping (I maintain it is a Christmas movie just like Die Hard!)
2. White Christmas
3. The Grinch
4. The Christmas Story
5. National Lampoon's Christmas

5 Things that happened yesterday
1. got antibiotics for an infected finger (Darn you Wal-mart beauty salon!!)
2. took the kids to do their holiday shopping
3. Ate Cheesecake for my parents 40th anniversary
4. Talked to my brother, briefly
5. Made cookies for Santa claus

5 things to look forward to
1. Robert coming home
2. Christmas eve
3. Robert coming home
4. Christmas day
5. Robert coming home

5 things on your wish list
1. scrapbook stuff (I collect it)
2. Robert to come home
3. smaller hips
4. bigger boobs
5. Peace on earth
(OK, I just couldn't remember any of the gifts I bought for myself- so I had to come up with other wish list items.)

5 things I love most about Christmas/Winter
1. snow on Christmas (not going to happen this year)
2. Hot chocolate
3. Christmas music
4. Trying to find the perfect gift
5. Saying Thank you to everyone and telling them how much they mean to you
And of course the treats!!

5 people I tag
Jamie, Rebecca, Jen L, Brittany, and Jodi

SPT- Comfort and Joy

Christmas Comfort:

St. Nicholas gave us girls these slippers. I think he found them here. They are fabulous! I am not a slipper gal for the most part, but these are so comfortable and very stylish. In fact, this is what the teachers are getting this year!

Christmas Joy:Love seeing my little ones enjoying Christmas. Here is Max helping play Jingle Bells on the Chimes at our Church Christmas Party.

Volleyballs done! Yeah Me!

Some of you may know that I volunteered at my daughters school to help out the volleyball program if they would extend it to the 6th graders- so Emma could play. Well, they took that and ran. I became the 6th grade volleyball coach. Some of you might also know that I don't know a thing about volleyball. I looked long and hard on the internet and got tutorials and videos and the new book of rules. I did a lot of reading. Unfortunately, reading doesn't do much for skill! And skillz is something I don't have! Very, very luckily for me, I found someone in my neighborhood that not only knew what she was doing, she had actually coached high school volleyball before. Hallelujah! She couldn't come all the time, at first, because of her son's soccer- those days were extra hard, but in the end it all turned out. We had a fun time, the girls had fun, they all learned something, and so did I! Thanks Donna!! We ended the season winning against the 7th and 8th grade team. The girls, of course, were ecstatic!

Secret Santa

We've got a Secret Santa. This is what they brought us yesterday. It was such a cute idea- 12 brownies (I think a few may be missing in this picture. LOL) with 12 reasons they like us stuck on toothpicks in the brownies. It made us feel so good!

Holiday Daze

W e are in full Holiday mode here at our home. We had our second Christmas party on Friday. This one was with Emma's soccer team. We have only been a part of this team for 2 seasons, but most of these girls have been playing together for years. The one requirement was that the girls come in a dress. After the picture they were allowed to change into anything they wanted. The soccer coach just really wanted to see his girls in something other than kick butt gear!
We have shopped, cooked, and decorated. The kids did the Christmas tree this year. I kept it that way for a week and then just had to change it. All the gold ornaments were together in one spot, all the big balls were at the top of the tree, etc.
Poor Max has had a hard season so far. This is his second cold so far and this one came with a fever.
I am also in the middle of Christmas cards. I don't know what I was thinking, making the cards this year. Why can't I just be like normal people and buy them? And to top that all off is the stress of writing The Letter. A Christmas letter should be interesting, informative and a little fun, not too long and not too laden with praise for ones own off-spring. Tricky! But I love letters. Some of these people I never hear from except once a year. Don't just send me a signed copy of your holiday photo! Ok, well if you must, but I much prefer a note saying what you are up to!
I must admit, with all this going on, it is mostly me that is doing it all. I sometimes worry that I don't do enough with my children to help them enjoy this time of the year and think about Christ. This year I am giving myself a pass, but I will be very glad when we have the advent calendar next year. I want to really celebrate with my family and enjoy the whole season!

How do you make this time of year with all the things that you want to get done a family affair and how do you help them all enjoy the real reason for the season? Do you like Christmas letters and cards too?

Diverting Santa Questions

Things heard lately:
Child: Aren't Santa and St. Nicholas the same thing?
Me: Of course not. (Of course they are, but we aren't saying so!)
Child: But I thought they were
Me: Nope. (note: no other explanation! More would just get you into trouble)
Child: Why doesn't he come to everyone.
Me: He only comes to people that believe in him. Our next door neighbors don't believe in Santa, because they are Jewish. St. Nicholas is the same. He is mostly a German guy, but we brought him back from Germany, so he has to come to us too.

Joseph: Mom is Santa Claus real?
Me: What? (Fiend deafness!)
Joseph: I said, "Do you know if Santa Claus is real?
Me: Yes. (again, do not expand on the Yes. Child #2 and 3 have no idea that you are answering the question of whether you know if he is real or not, but think you are answering the ultimate question!)

Sam: Mom is Santa Claus real?
Me: What do you mean? (Darn, no way to get out of that one!)
From here, I can't remember how the conversation went, but it ended up with something I could answer truthfully without giving any real valuable information out! Lucky me!!

And by the way, I am going to have to check out that nursery. #4 has started saying "Dern- it!" a lot lately. And today he came out with "What the Heck?" I don't know who is teaching my child these kinds of things, but 3 is a little young to be cursing already, don't you think? LOL

SPT- Season of Love

I am cheating. Take a look at the previous post. This is my Season of Love. It fit perfectly and it even has a self portrait in it- all be it one I have already used!

Revealed

Ok, finally it is the 1st of December and I can reveal what I have been doing. I made quite a few people curious when I posted this picture.Well, here is the finished result. One person guessed it right. It is an advent calendar. I sent one to my husband in Iraq and the other went to a family member for Christmas. Inside the mittens there are rolls of paper that have activities on them. There are gifts in the package that I sent that had corresponding numbers with certain of the activities. Like one day was "Enjoy the sounds of the season." That day there is a CD made by my daughter Emma and I with our favorite Christmas songs on it. One day it says to "Enjoy the taste of the season" and there is some yummy hot chocolate to go with that.
Some of our other ideas:
Go see the lights at the temple
Do a good deed
Family game night
Do Christmas cards
Make snowflakes
Bake Christmas cookies
Watch a holiday movie
Read a new Christmas book
Decorate Gingerbread houses
Go around the neighborhood looking at the decorations and give a prize to the one your family votes as the best decorated.
#1 in my husband's was "Decorate for Christmas". I sent him a little Christmas tree and all his activity papers are tied with a little ornament to go on the tree. He says he has the most festive cubicle in the area! I love how excited he is to open up number 2 already and see what it says! He said he really wanted to peak at all of them, but restrained himself. Now he has something exciting to look forward to every morning- exactly what I was hoping for!
The kids were really bummed that I didn't make one for us, but getting two completed and off was enough of a challenge for one year. Besides, I expect Rob to bring his home and we will use that next year.