Christmas Ornaments

Every Christmas for my whole life my mom has bought me a new Christmas ornament for the year. When I left home, she gave me the box of ornaments I had accumulated. The she continued to buy me, my husband and kids ornaments every year. I love pulling out those ornaments every year and telling my kids about how I got these ornaments when I was just a little girl. They love to hear the stories. Many of my mom's ornaments have been from Hallmark because she loves their series ornaments. Some from when I was a little girl she made herself when money was tight. She even bought me some Christopher Radko ornaments the last couple of years. My Christmas tree may not have a designer look with coordinating ornaments, but I love my childhood, teenage and young adult ornaments that hang on our "homey" tree. This year, after 32 Christmases, my mom passed the torch to me. It's expensive to buy ornaments for all of your 5 children, their spouses and their offspring! Today I took the kids ornament shopping. I went straight to the Hallmark store and threatened them NOT TO TOUCH ANYTHING!!! Sarah was looking at the darling little princess, Minnie Mouse and Barbie ornaments so hard that her eyeballs were nearly touching the ornaments. But they were so good and didn't touch anything! Whew! What a relief to get out of there without having to buy extra broken ornaments. So I let the kids choose.

I chose this one for Jonah's 1st Christmas!

Sarah chose this darling ballerina!

And Jacob chose this very cheap (yeah!) snow globe ornament, but of course it says "Jacob" and not "Christine."

And we got a Santa ornament for free! I love Christmas traditions! I'm happy to be continuing on where my mom left off. I can't wait to send my kids off with their box of ornaments when they're grown. This year is our first Christmas at our own house. I'm so excited to spend it together, mix Brandon's and my traditions, and start some of our own!

Who's Been Christmas Shopping With My Money?

First thing this morning I got 2 phone calls from my credit card company to verify some online purchases I'd apparently been making! The problem is, I haven't been making any purchases lately! I guess because of the succession of so many purchases so quickly, my account was flagged. Luckily, I have a great credit card company who called right away. So after a quick phone call to Brandon to make sure he wasn't doing a little sneaky Christmas shopping for me (darn it, he wasn't), I immediately closed my account. I just have to say that I feel a little violated! I wonder how this person got my account number! Was it from some unsecured site online? Could a waiter from a restaurant have snatched it when he took my card to pay for dinner? I'm really curious to get my statement and see what this person has bought him/herself with MY money! $500 on overstock.com and $200 on zappos.com, and more sounds pretty fun to me. It makes me want to find out the address that all this stuff is being shipped to, march over to that house and confront this rotten person! However, the costumer service rep from the credit card company said there would be an investigation, so I guess I better not interfere. I just want to ask whoever did this HOW he/she did it! We try really hard to be careful with our info, so I want to know what I did wrong so I don't do it again! Maybe I'll find something out from the investigation. We'll see! But again, thank goodness for good companies that check suspicious activity before it gets out of hand. And thank goodness for fraud protection so that I don't have to pay for this stuff, or else our Christmas would be somebody else's Christmas!

Thankful Turkey

For Family Home Evening last week we made a family "Thankful Turkey!" Being a former elementary school teacher definitely has some perks. I have loads of STUFF leftover from my teaching years that I can easily whip out for holidays and other occasions. This turkey was one such item. The kids definitely got a kick out of writing what they were thankful for on their feathers and decorating them. But who was still coloring his feathers with fancy designs after the kids were all tucked in bed? It was Daddy! So even though he was coloring INSTEAD of helping me wash the dinner dishes, he was quickly forgiven when he taped up his "masterpiece feather" saying that he was thankful for his wife! Yeah, that's me!!!

Home Improvements

By the time we built the garage, repainted and fixed the upstairs, and gutted and refinished our basement we were burned out from home projects. We've taken a year long break! It's been nice! But I told Brandon that we needed to do a little cosmetic work on the outside of our home this year. We finally replaced our bashed in mailbox and painted the post. Brandon then stripped and repainted the lantern post. We got a nice new lantern to put on top of it. And we finally got shutters up and our front door painted after 4 1/2 years of living here! I love short, cheap projects! (And you DO know that in saying "we" I really mean "he!" My job is strictly limited to keeping the children out of the way! I love having such a handyman for a husband!) So here are some pictures of our little home's new look! Hopefully next year we'll do some landscaping so we can stop weeding dirt patches!

Here's an angled view so you can see the shutters on the side of the house.

Aren't red doors suppose to bring good luck? It's not that we're having bad luck, but good luck is ALWAYS welcome at our house!

Taxes

Well tomorrow's the big election day! Is anyone nervous about rising taxes if Obama gets elected? I know my kids are already dealing with rising taxes! The "Mommy and Daddy Tax" after Halloween is pretty unforgivable at our house. We're just trying to be good parents and protect their fragile and developing teeth and bodies from all of that unnecessary sugar! After all, we function as a dictatorship here. There's no democracy within these walls!

Halloween Fun

Here's our little Bat Boy!

Sarah & Jacob with their Jack 'O Lanterns!

Princess Sarah, Our Knight in Shining Armor Jacob
& Bat Boy Jonah!

All of the cousins dressed up with Nanny & Papa! (Except Sarah & Jonah who were at home under quarantine with their germs!)

Halloween Sugar Cookies

We invited the Daniel and Alyvia over to make and decorate sugar cookies for Halloween! The boys lasted about 5 minutes and then they were off to play! The girls on the other hand spent lots of time piling frosting, sprinkles and candy on their cookies! Hmm . . . I wonder where Sarah could have gotten her sweet tooth from? Could it be from her diabetic, sugar-aholic father or her overweight mother from generations of chocolate lovers?

Clarification of the Stomach Flu

So apparently my little letter about the stomach flu caused quite a reaction. I have to say that I'm a little embarrassed! Sorry! Maybe I should explain a few things.

First, I was not mad, although rereading my post I can see how I seemed that way. I guess I meant it to be funny. And in the heat of the moment as I mop up vomit, yes, I was a little bugged.

Second, I tend to be a little dramatic until things blow over a little. So if I post something full of drama, take what I say "with a grain of salt!" Now don't you see what a saint Brandon is for being married to me?!

Lastly, part of the reason I started a blog was to journal a litle bit. I have often thought that I wished I was better at journaling so that when I'm older I can remember what I feel like as mother of little children. I see lots of older people who forget. I want to remember so that hopefully I can be more sensitive and helpful to others once I outgrow this stage of life.

And thankfully, we did receive a tender little mercy in that Sarah was the only person who got the stomach flu! Jonah's working through a very small ear infection, but that's VERY doable, and not related to Sarah's illness.