Happy New Year!

I almost forgot today was New Years Eve. I'm not a big party person so it's never really been a big deal to me. I went to rent some movies today and the guy at the counter was all like "but dude, it's like the last day of 2008, man." And I'm all "yeah? so?". Not to down play it or anything, but I just never have seen the necessity to go out and pay money to hang out with people you don't know and then drive home with a bunch of drunks. So my plan is to have a nice dinner, dessert, movies. And hopefully make it to midnight.
Side note: so there's another funny thing about the guy at the video store .... He gets my phone number and then you know they have to verify my name...so he goes "so yourrrrr........." And I could just see the wheels in his head turning. He's got two choices: Pete or Corey. Certainly this red headed girl in front of him couldn't possibly be either one of those listed under this number. (those are guy names) "Corey", I said. "Well, can I see your I.D.?" And then he sat there and inspected it for what seemed like forever and you could see his little mental Note To Self: yes, girls can be named Corey. And then I thought (are you really this worried about video store fraud??)
I didn't say anything, but I sure wanted to. The thing is, I'm used it. But it never ceases to make me laugh. All my life people have thought I was a guy just by looking at my name in print. I would always get the "oh, I was expecting a dude" when I would answer my phone at work. I actually really like my name, but it's always funny when people think I'm a dude!
Anyway, back to the new year...
I dunno...I'm kind of not feeling it. Like, I'm not excited for what's to come. I don't know what is to come, maybe that's it. I remember last year excited to start a few projects, excited for what the year would bring. But this year I don't really have anything planned. I'm not really a resolution maker. Because it just seems like too much pressure or something. Last year I tried to do the 365 project (photo a day for a year) and I made it 6 months. That's pretty good for me! I was thinking of NOT doing it this year. But then....I went into my pictures and tried to make a collage of 2008. There were SO many that I just loved. I ended up making 2 collages. It was great to go back remember there was a lot of good stuff this year. And a lot of it I would have never captured if I didn't do things like the 365, or the Day in the Life project, or my December Daily project. Looking at all those pictures just reminds me how good life really is, and how much I really do have to be thankful for. So, I'm not going to hold myself to it, or make any promises...but I'm thinking of attempting the 365 again. I guess I've got about 24 hours to make a decision! (collages to come later...photoshop crapped out on me and I lost everything I was working on! grrrr!)
Here are my NOT resolutions:
Moderation (food related mostly)
Being a better friend (to those near and far)
Spending more time as a family (I need this to be on Pete's list too)
Continue to grow and learn and be a better wife and mother.

Cheers to 2009! May yours be happy and healthy. :)

The year of the horse.

*Photo heavy and a little wordy*
At least it was at our house. Besides the two outfits I bought her, and the new kitchen set Santa brought her, all Megan got for Christmas was horses. Thank goodness she likes them! LOL! I'm not joking, It think the grand total was something like 20. I'll have to line them all up and take a picture. I did end up getting Jake a bow, though not the one we originally wanted. We decided to go ahead with the bigger, more expensive one because 1) it's all they had and 2) we figured he could grow into it and 3) it would be better to have something rather than nothing under the tree. Oh yeah! And remember in the video (below) how Jake was asking for diamonds?? Well that went on for days after I recorded that video. Then he kept saying that Santa was bringing him a treasure chest with diamonds. Santa was really starting to stress out. :P Tuesday night I went out to Michael's to pick up a gift card for Pete's mom and I found a little wooden box with a lid on it and they just happened to have a package of "diamonds". So I filled the box with the diamonds and wrapped up and put it under the tree. Seriously.....that's his favorite gift. Go figure.
Pete and I decided not to exchange gifts this year. It was kind of a bummer, but good on funds. He always gets what he wants when he wants it anyway, so he makes it hard to surprise him. What I found so interesting was that after all the gifts were opened Thursday morning, Jake said to me...."mommy, you and daddy didn't get very much. You guys really didn't have any presents". He was very sincere and kind of sad about it. I was surprised that he even noticed. But glad that he did. I'm glad he doesn't think Christmas is all about him.

Here's a little run down of all our Christmas celebrations in pictures:
Horsie #1 from my mom:


Blurry:

Gift exchange at my Dad's:

Megan totally excited about horse #2:

Christmas Eve at our house:

This is my nephew, Blake. His mom got this red robe as a gift and he immediately took it over. And for some reason he took his shirt off. I don't know why. But he looked so funny with this huge robe and then his gold chain. LOL!! We kept calling him Red Robe Man.

Christmas morning:



Christmas day was pretty uneventful after the present opening. It was nice to be home, but also felt kind of weird that we had no where to go and nothing to do....I didn't even have any big dinner planned. I guess I thought we'd have left overs from Wednesday night...but um...they didn't leave me any!
Thursday afternoon I also got the wild idea to start potty training Megan. Instead of waiting till after the holidays. We've had some success and a lot of failure. It's like she IS getting it, but for some reason there's still something not getting through. I'm not sure if I should just let it go for now or persevere through it. I could go on and on about it, but you all don't want to know about potty training, right?
Today: I'm hoping to get some of those residual piles of Christmas stuff finally put away. You know what I'm talking about right? The little piles of new games and toys and socks that have yet to find a home? That's always kind of my least favorite thing about Christmas. That and putting away the Christmas tree. It's such a chore, but I'm eager to get on with the regularly scheduled programing.
I'm looking forward to the new year. 2008 has been tough. Good, but tough. And I expect that '09 will still hang on to some of the residue from '08. But I'm looking forward to resolving a few things and getting on with life.
Have you thought of your Word for '09 yet? Any New Year Resolutions?

Christmas Eve, Eve

Well, there are all kinds of things going on here lately. Saturday night we went up to my moms to gather gifts and give hugs. Sunday morning we headed up to my Dad's for more of the same. Then home, raining all the way Sunday night. Yesterday was another trip to the DMV (much less eventful this time) and then out to Bass Pro Shop to pick up Jake's bow. They still were out of stock on the one we wanted to get him, so we opted for the upgraded version. I think it's going to be too big for him. The draw weight (which is how hard it is to pull back the string...like in the equivalent of pounds) is I think 17-22 pounds. Yeah, the kid is 5 and maybe weighs 40 pounds! I don't think he's going to be able to pull it back. But at least he will have it under the tree and maybe Bass Pro will get more in stock after Christmas and we can exchange it for the one we wanted. That's the best I can do I guess.
After Bass Pro, I stopped off at Target for a few groceries/necessities. I was really surprised that no where I've been this week has been terribly crowded. I mean, there is definitely more people out, but it doesn't seem to be like the mad rush I remember from years past. Either more people are getting their shopping done early, or they still haven't done it, OR the economy is really getting to everyone. I'm going with #3. Anyway, the crowds were fine IN the store, but man, people are crazy OUT of the store. I'll never understand the mad rush people feel for a parking spot. And the dirty looks they give. Jeez what is up with that? I go in expecting it to be bad, park as far away as I can and no one bothers me. I like it that way!
Today was a trip to the grocery store. We're hosting Christmas Eve with Pete's family tomorrow night. I don't really have to cook, as they are bringing most of the food. But a good host always has good appetizers, right? Well I like eating appetizers more than I do real food so ya know... that's really why I did it! Anything that can be dipped or held together with a toothpick is way better than real food in my book! I made onion dip, deviled eggs (is that bad, since it's Christmas and all??), salami thingies, more cookies, and tomorrow I'll make up some bacon wrapped jalapeno thingies.
I still have ONE more gift to buy and I'm hoping that Pete gets home early enough tonight so I can run out and get it.
In closing, here are two little videos of my crazy kids. You'll see evidence of Megan's ability to cry at the drop of a hat FOR NO REASON AT ALL. Luckily, I was able to nip it quickly, but usually she'll go on and on. You'll also get to see Jake rambling on incoherently about something...sorry about that...but the rest of it is cute. Oh, and Jakes Christmas list...what the heck. The kid is stressing Santa out, for real. He keeps changing it. A Wall-E machine?? Where did that come from? I've looked all over and haven't seen one. And um...diamonds? Kid, mom doesn't even get diamonds. I don't think you will either. You'll also notice he doesn't even mention the bow?? The bow, he couldn't stop talking about for weeks? Luckily, he is still asking for a fast bike...so we've got that taken care of (thanks Mom!!)
Merry Christmas Eve, Eve!!

I feel like I have so much to blog about, and yet so little. There's been a lot of little things running through my head, but not really anything of huge significance.
First I'm starting to panic a little bit about Christmas. We are doing a very simple Christmas this year, but I still want the !!! and awe for the kids on Christmas morning. We had a few things in mind for each kid that we knew we were going to get. So Pete and I went out last night without the kids. We had told Jake about a month ago that we would get him a new bow for Christmas. We even saw one at Bass Pro Shop and so of course he has been excited about it ever since. It's #2 on his letter to Santa. Anyway, so Pete and I go out last night specifically to get this bow. Well, they're out of them. And they don't know when they'll get them in. (Frrr!!!) So, ok option 2....the internet! *sigh* Well, I can find it online.....BUT....I can't get it shipped before Christmas. I guess because technically it's a firearm (this is not a toy, but an actual real youth hunting bow) they can't do overnight or 2nd day shipping. I'm just at a loss. There is a slight chance that Bass Pro will get some in on their Sunday night shipment so I'm going to call on Monday. But man, he's just going to be so disappointed if it's not under the tree. And so will I. I mean the kid only asked for 3 things. You would think Santa and I could deliver, right?
I think I've got Megan covered. Pete found the most awesomest horse last night at Target. I go there like every day and I hadn't seen it. Thank goodness I took him with me because I would have missed out on the coolest toy. The girl is just obsessed with horses. She loves them. The one we got her is pretty big, has a long white mane and tail, a pink saddle, a princess crown and other coolness. She's just going to love it. I can't wait!!
In other news.... I got into another car accident yesterday. (@#$%^!) If you're keeping score, you're right...it hasn't even been a year since my last accident. I swear I've been in more accidents than anyone I know. Except maybe my stepsister. Don't get in a car with that one! LOL! J/K! This accident yesterday was again, not my fault. A non English speaking, no license, no insurance, IDIOT pulled out in front of me. I did everything I could but still slid into him. Luckily there is really no damage. But still. It just really, really ticked me off.



Potty training. It's just time. I've got to get on the ball with that one. Megan brings me a diaper, lies down on the floor and says "Change me Momma!" Ummm. Yeah. The thing is, every time I've ever put her on the potty, she WILL NOT GO. Not even a dribble. The other day she had stayed dry for at least 4 hours. We were getting ready to take a shower, the water was running, she'd just drunk a whole cup of milk..... You would think she'd really have to go, right?? I even pored warm water down the front of her...you know, to kinda get it going?? Nothing. She gives me nothing to work with. I dunno. I'm going to hold out through Christmas and then we're headed straight to potty boot camp.
The DMV---Why is it, you can never go in there and just not have a major fiasco? Pete bought a trailer for the ranch and I had to take the pink slip in to get it switched over in his and the company's name. Well, they ran my credit card and it wouldn't go through. So the girl goes to another machine and it worked. Meanwhile, the other machine decides to put the transaction through. So they charged me twice. No big deal, right? Ummmm...apparently they can't do refunds. Huh?? Is this not 2008? What do you mean? They said it would take like 3 weeks. Are you kidding me? They ended up giving me cash. But here's the even more stupid part. They can't refund more than $100 at a time. So they had to give me two receipts. It's just strange. It ended up being fine, but such a hassle. And I still have to go back because apparently they have no idea how to spell.
Ok, so is this like the biggest complaint post ever!?? ha ha! really I'm not usually this negative. I think I just must be having one of those weeks!
Sorry, I'll stop now!

Overheard

at breakfast...

Megan: Where Dada?
Jake: He's at work.
Megan: Wal-mert?
Jake: No. Work. Work!..............Mommy used to have a work. But they kicked her out.

I just had to laugh at that!

This post has no point

Better than saying it's random, right?
But look at this picture! Isn't it pretty??! I took this yesterday for my December Daily album. I can't stop looking at it. This is straight out of the camera. No photo/color enhancement. I'm just in awe of the colors. It was also pretty awesome because yesterday was the first day since BEFORE Thanksgiving that we actually saw blue skies here. We've been socked in with fog for over a week. (wait...almost 2 weeks??) It can make you a little insane. Not seeing the sun for that long. And it's not even raining. That would be one thing. It was just miserable and cold for no reason.
Both Jake and Megan are much, much better. No more sickies. It was in and out very quickly with both of them. Thank goodness. Puke with a 2 year old is much, much different than with a 5 year old who knows what to do. Kind of a funny moment when I was cleaning up the other night...I'd taken all the sheets of Megan's bed and decided it just would be pointless to put new ones on. So I pulled out a few beach towels to lay on the mattress instead. So she's standing there watching me pull them out from the linen closet and says "momma? pool?" Poor little thing thought I was gonna take her swimming in the midst of puke and butt coldness.
I'm still paranoid about getting the sickness. I hate, hate, hate the stomach flu. I will avoid it at all cost. With all the power I have. I will try to defy it. So far, so good. I've been washing my hands like crazy and avoiding eating anything I um......don't want to see later. : I was really feeling bad this morning. I thought for sure this was it. Turns out I just needed to eat something. I was fine after that. Duh. Sometimes I amaze myself at my own ridiculousness.


I made these cookies today. Found the recipe on Food Network as one of the 12 days of cookies. I'm usually not a fan of the store bought sugar cookie dough, but these are so good. It's 2 sugar cookies with chocolate mint gnash (isn't that a fun word?) smushed in the middle and then melted chocolate on top with chopped up candy canes. They are so rich and....chocolaty. I could only eat half of one. Plus I don't really like candy canes. They add kind of a weird texture that I could do with out...but they do make the cookies look pretty and festive. These are really good, easy cookies. Grab some milk though.
My neighbor always, always has dirty dishes in her sink. How do I know this, you ask? Cuz I can see directly into her kitchen window from the window in my stairwell. And I'm not talking about a couple of coffee cups either. I'm not even talking about breakfast dishes. I'm talking about so many dirty dishes from last night, this morning and who knows when that their piled high and spilling out onto the counter. Please note that I am not judging her. Also note that I am not comparing her to myself. I am simply comparing her to the lady that used to live there. Because it's such a drastic difference. Sally never, ever had dirty dishes in her sink. None. I always thought that was strange. I mean never. Not even a coffee cup or a butter knife. I don't know, I just thought it was weird. And now I think it's weird that this other lady is so different. I got used to looking at that empty sink. I promise I'll stop obsessing over my neighbors kitchen habbits.
Please note that presently there are no dirty dishes in my sink. Just for the record.
So, I guess that's all the random I have for today.
14 days till Christmas. I am no where near being ready.

"Momma, dat dis-cussing"

Well, I don't have much to blog about. Other than the fact that I thought Megan had escaped the sickies from Jake. Wrong.

The title of the post is what she said right after the...you know. *ugh*

Like I said, nothing to blog about other than that, the 6 million loads of laundry I've done since last night, and my pruney hands from the over obsessive hand washing I've been doing.

What is it about that smell that gets forever burned into your nose hairs? It's like what ever I do I can't escape it.

Anyway, that's that.

Hoping all is well by tomorrow.

sick. :(

Poor little guy. I haven't seen him take a nap in months. I picked him up from school today and he said his tummy hurt. I thought he just must be hungry. But then he didn't really want to eat. And well...I won't go into the details.
We've been lucky so far. This is the first anyone has been sick all Fall. But why'd it have to be the pukey sick? Colds, flu..I can deal with. I don't deal well with puke. But luckily, I have the best 5 year old kid ever. No really. He goes to the toilet. And he doesn't miss. He's really brave. Obviously more brave than his mother.
The saddest part is that he is just miserable. Not just from the sick. But because he is sick. He could hear all his friends playing outside and he knew he couldn't go. And he cried and said "I'm just waisting the day away!"
So he's sleeping on the couch tonight and asked me to stay down here with him. So I will. And tomorrow if he's up to it, maybe we'll go rent some movies and veg out together.
Not exactly what I planned for the weekend, but we'll make it through.

Little pink houses for you and me

I'm not feeling very festive today. Not feeling Christmasy at all. It's just one of those days where reality has reared it's ugly head. I've said it before...I'm an avoider. If there is something I'd rather not deal with, I push it to the very back of my head and spend time pretending that it doesn't exist. In the hopes that maybe, just maybe if I leave it back there long enough, it will go away. It's never actually worked though. Dang it. Today, one of those little things I've had hiding back there did a 180* and is now smack dab in front of me again. *sigh* Don't worry, it's nothing bad or anything. Not really. It's just kind of pissed me off and all I want to do is put it back where it came from and go on trying to pretend it doesn't exist. It kind of went like this: oh, right, right...my house is for sale. And oh yeah, we can't afford to live here anymore. Right. There really isn't anything I can do about it anyway. So why not just let me go back to my fantasy world? Where I don't have to think about any of that nasty stuff? It'll take me a day or two, but I'll get it put back it's place wayyyyyy back there where it belongs :)
Anyway
Sorry for that weirdness.
But that's me.
In other news: Megan is still continuing to cry. Over everything. Still. Someone please make her stop. For a second I thought it might be because her 2 year molars are coming in. But no. All I have to do is say "Just a minute, honey" and she's on the floor in a ball of tears. I don't know how much more I can take.
I did end up making some more tiny houses today. I had dreams last night of a little village made entirely of tiny little paper houses. I couldn't help it...they're not that hard to make and just so dang cute. The ones I made today turned out a little better than yesterday. It just took a little practice to get the method down right. If you decide to make some and you want snow on the roofs...use a glue like Diamond Glaze and run it over the ridge line and it will naturally drip down the sides and make for good snow. I put clear glitter on top of the glue and it looks so cute!
So that's all I got for today. I've got to go clean up all the glitter, paper scraps and fake snow that is littered all over my kitchen counter! Oh yeah and avoid that other thing.

Dec. 2: project

Instructions can be found here. Mine isn't as cute as hers though. It wasn't quite as easy as I thought it was. Well, the only problem I really had was getting the roof to stick on. You really have to have patience and I don't. I think my houses are a little bigger than Sarah's too. There weren't precise instructions on how to do it so I just kind of went with it. This one is going to go to a new home as a gift and I think I just might make another one in a bigger jar. Fun little project and it looks super cute sitting on my counter :)

Dec.1

Every year about this time I get this wild hair to make Christmas cut-out cookies. And every year about half way through the rolling I find my self wondering: Why am I doing this? They never turn out they way the do in the magazines. I do not have the patience for decorating. And I think most importantly.....no one eats them! So, why? Why every year do I put myself through this torture? I still have no idea. On the bright side though...These actually turned out really good. I used a new recipe and they actually keep their shape when you bake them. So the snowflakes look like snowflakes, and Santa doesn't look like a big blob. Oh, and they taste good too. If you're interested in the recipe let me know and I'll email it to you. I love making cookies, so these are just the first of many this month.
My house kind of looks like a tornado hit it. For some reason I'm trying to cram all the holiday goodness into one afternoon. I've taken all the stuff out of the closet, strung lights outside, put up the stockings over the fireplace, made cookies, shopped for kids presents, and have a half-way put together Christmas Tree. There are boxes, and paper, and glitter, and fake pine needles everywhere. Giant messes overwhelm me so I'm not quite sure what possessed me to think I could do it all in one day.
Anyway.
Thanksgiving was fun. I love just hanging out all day and stuffing my face. It's my favorite holiday. Besides 4th of July. I actually did pretty good though. Not tooo much stuffing. :) Mom's oven broke so we had to cook everything in her cottage out back and in the camping trailer. That was fun. Hauling hot food back and forth. Luckily the turkey was cooked on the BBQ so we didn't have that to deal with too.
Yawn.
Am I boring you yet? Sorry.
The rest of the weekend was pretty boring too. Jake went with Pete to the ranch for 'Boys Weekend'. They had a ton of fun, but I seriously missed my kid. I mean, I missed Pete too....but it's just so much different when your kid is gone for 3 whole days. I'm almost embarrassed at how much I missed that boy.
Megan and I had fun too. I took her to the movies for the very first time Saturday night. We went and saw Bolt. It's sooooo cute! I really liked it and I think I'll take Jake for a special date so he can see it too.
Ok I'll stop here with the randomness. Must go finish decking the halls.
Happy December!