Christmas Swap

My sweet friend Becca recently organized a Christmas Swap. I am the last one to post about what I got...Sorry everyone!

I got my package from Tracie.

First there was the cutest snowflake necklace:

And just as cute was a snowflake pin:

I love that they are snowflakes, that way I can wear them just a little bit longer.

Then in the box was the whole set of Avon's Almond & Milk. Lotion, body spray, body wash, hand lotion and chap stick.

And I love, love short stories. My grandma and I used to read Chicken Soup for the Soul all of the time. Tracie sent me "The Book of Christmas Virtues" from the Chicken Soup series. I can't wait to sit down and read it.

Thanks again Tracie for the great package. And thanks to Becca as well for organizing the swap. Can't wait until the next one!

Stacy

12 Days of Christmas

with a twist. I borrowed this from my sweet friend Shannon. I couldn't resist putting it on here for today. What a great group.



Merry Christmas from all of us to all of you. I hope that you each have a wonderful holiday filled with many blessings, full of family and friends and many sounds of laughter.

Love,
Stacy

All Little S Wants For Christmas....

So sorry I haven't been around. Christmas has really come fast this year.

Hubby and I put some stuff in layaway on Thanksgiving Day. It ended up being that was about all we could get them this year so I am thankful that we went shopping that day.

That being said, Little S was talking in the car the other day about how Santa was going to bring him a DS. Having an inside track on the big guy in a red suit, I knew this was not going to be the case.

I sometimes feel bad that he gets a little cheated with his birthday in December (although we try really hard for that not to be the case) and also knowing that he doesn't really care for chocolate, I said that maybe the Easter Bunny would bring him a DS.

His response (he is such a character) at first was that Santa can bring anything cause he is Santa.
We told him that all the toys were already made and lists done and that we were sure that the Easter Bunny could handle a DS.

He says: "Nuh-uh, cause a DS won't fit in an egg!"

The kids cracks us up.

Stacy

Sick

I was playing around online and came across this site Only in a Woman's World sponsored by Lay's. So I watched the first few episodes. This one cracks me up.



I instantly thought of Laurel and I. Every time one of us gets sick, we brag about the weight we lost. How silly? We both know that in a few days all of it will be right back maybe with a few extra.

Do you do this too?

Stacy

Happy Birthday Little S!

Today is Little S's actual birthday. He is now officially 6 years old after 2 fake birthdays.

He loves to make silly faces for the camera. What a goofball.

When he woke up this morning, he went running to the sliding glass doors. He was sadly disappointed that there wasn't any snow. For some reason he was sure there would be snow on his birthday.

He then turned to the tree and didn't see any presents. He was also sure that Santa came on his birthday. Again he was sadly disappointed.

Poor kids, this whole birthday in December a week before Christmas has him all confused this year. He is learning about days, months and calendars at school. He is always asking what number day it is and marks them off on his calendar.

I sure hope the rest of the day is better for him and there aren't any more disappointments.

Look at this smile....how could you not love that face? He took this picture himself. What a goof!

Happy Birthday "Monkey-Monster-Peanut Butter-Pumpkin Pie"!

We love you!

Stacy

Brothers

Sometimes my kids surprise me and do things for each other that I would never have thought they would do.

In the bottom of my Christmas box was this:

It's a countdown to Christmas calendar. We have never used it. I don't even remember where I got it. Tween dug it out this year and hung it on the door jamb. No idea why he chose that spot. Little S was so excited about it. It was hung up a few days after Thanksgiving when we were decorating and I didn't give it another thought.

Tween has been filling the little bags every day and giving the "present" to Little S. Little S thinks that the elves fill it each night. Tween took this all on himself and has been having a blast with it. He sometimes sticks a piece of candy in it, a coin or even a little trinket.

I am so proud of him for sticking to it and for making Christmas come a little more alive for Little S.

Have your kids done something for one another recently that surprised you?

Stacy

Party #2

We had Little S 's party here on Saturday for his friends and hubby's side of the family. This was his other "fake" birthday as he calls it. He is starting to understand dates and since it wasn't really on his actual birthday he started calling it his fake birthday party. Sure hope he isn't expecting something again on his real birthday. Jeez.

This was his cake. He loves, loves, loves SpongeBob SquarePants. And the characters have a button on the back of them that makes them pop up and apart and you can mix and match them. An added present.

I bought foam book marks and foam stickies for the kids to make custom bookmarks. And we also played Little S Bingo. Just like regular bingo but with Little S across the top of the card and with pictures instead of numbers.

The kids had fun designing their bookmarks. I even bought some glow-in-the-dark foamies. Even Teen and Tween made a book mark. Of course since Teen only reads if he absolutely has to, he gave his to his girlfriend.

That package there are Bakugan. He got three packages. Tween got a few sets for Christmas or his birthday last year and Little S has been dying to play with them. Tween wouldn't let him touch them at all so he has been asking and asking for his own. He now has more than Tween and I informed Tween he was not allowed to play with them. Is that wrong?

Little S also always wants to play with Teen's Lego's that he collects. Teen does occasionally sit down with him and let him play with them. Fisher Price came out with a new thing called Trio. It is kind of a cross between a Lego and K'Nex . So daddy and I bought him a set for his birthday.

That night Little S begged Teen to help him put his Trio set together. It was the fire station set.

This is the finished product with the fire truck in the garage.

Stacy

Thursday Thirteen

I can't believe that Christmas is only a little more than two weeks away. I have been running, running, running for the last few days.

Thirteen Things I have to do before Christmas:

1. Finish Making My Christmas Cards
2. Address My Christmas Cards
3. Send Out My Christmas Cards
4. Finish Buying Gifts
5. Pay Off My Lay-a-way
6. Make a Few More Gifts
7. Wrap All of the Gifts
8. Finish Decorating My House
9. Bake More Cookies
10. Watch a Few Christmas Movies
11. Clean My House
12. Pull Off the Christmas Program at Church
13. Relax

What do you have to do yet before Christmas?

Stacy

Still Here

Sorry that I fell off of the wagon. I really tried to post Friday and Saturday from my phone, but apparently I did something wrong. I had thought I posted as I didn't get anything back saying it didn't go through. That is until Sunday afternoon just before I left my Mum's. So since I missed two days, I decided to go ahead and take a break. So now I am back.

We went to my Mum's time share for the weekend. It is always nice to get away and head up there. Every year we go up the first weekend in December and celebrate Little S's birthday. His birthday is so close to Christmas, that we try to celebrate early so he doesn't get lost in the mix.

This year was a lot different than most years though. There wasn't any snow and there weren't any deer and one other thing in just a moment.

It did start snowing Friday night and most of Saturday, but it was such a light snow that there was only a dusting after snowing all day.

As for the deer, my Mum later informed me that they had a big hunt recently and took 250 deer out of there. You read that right, 250! They really were over run and they were beginning to not fear people.

We had some sad news this weekend as well. My Mum's kitty had been sick all week and when the neighbor went to care for them Friday evening, he had gotten worse. My dad left in the middle of the night and went home to check on him. He took him to the vet and they decided to have him put to sleep. I felt so bad that my Mum had to deal with this while on vacation and not able to be home. But she was a trooper and did her best to take care of us and not be sad while the kids were there. While I know her heart was breaking. I don't know how she stayed so strong until we left.

OK, enough sad stuff.

Saturday we had Little S's party. Right before the party we had gone to Ponderosa for dinner. We were so full from dinner that we sang Happy Birthday and then put the cake away until the next day. None of us could eat one more bite.

After singing and not eating we let him open his gifts. He just gets his gifts from my parents and grandma at this party. Great MumMum got him a Webkinz. He named it Dorothy. Guess all that Wizard of Oz had sunk in hard...lol

Then he opened his gift from my parents. He got a Tonka Crane. He loves Tonka trucks. This makes 4. He lines them up in the summer and has a car wash with them. He is so funny.

Look at that smile on his face. The best part about these gifts is that he will sit and play for a long time by him self and I can get something done with out hearing mum, mum, mum, mum a million times....hehe

Hope you all had a nice weekend too.

Stacy

Candy Canes

This is a short and lame post tonight, sorry.

We ran all day and I almost forgot about my "mitzvah" today. So I had Teen take some candy canes over to one of the other buildings and hang them on their door.

Better posts over the next few days.

Stacy

Bravery

First I want to post about what I gave away today.

I bought a cute little mug that came with cookies for a wonderful lady in our church. Most of you know our little church is going through some struggles right now and she has just stepped up and out of her comfort zone. She has organized dinners for both fall and thanksgiving and is now in the process of preparing a Christmas Eve service. I put it in a gift bag, got a nice thank you card and without signing it, set it on the back table in the foyer for her to find.

I want to try for the most part to be secretive about what I am doing. But all of you out there in Blog land are in on my little secret.

Now back to the title of today's post.

Have you ever done something completely out of character? So out of character that you feel like you are watching a movie and not actually doing this thing?

I need to first let you all know that even though I live in a tiny little hick town with only one red light at the one and only major cross roads, I drive about 20 miles to work in an area that I would never go into after dark. It is very near Youngstown, OH. Now if you have never heard of Youngstown, OH I will tell you this fact I just looked up: The US average crime rate is 320.9, Youngstown's was 651.9 for 2007.

So when I was working full-time, I would mostly take my lunch with me or run through the drive thru, never ever getting out of my car. Ever!

Today they asked me to work a full day since the other girl took a vacation day. So at lunch I decided to run through McDonalds. When I go there the drive-thru line was almost out to the road. I parked the car and went in. The line was still a little long in there, but not as bad. The computer system had gone down and they were just trying to catch everything back up.

There was a bunch of people to the side waiting for their orders and as food would get done, they would get theirs and leave. One guy was skipped over a few times as his food took a little longer than the other peoples.

All of the sudden he walks up to the counter and starts cussing out the girls behind the counter about how other people are getting their food and he isn't. And it wasn't nice cussing either, it was the Bad, Bad words.

There were also a lot of older people in line (Social Security lunch day I guess). So after he dropped the bomb for about the tenth time and started on the mega-bomb, I said out loud for all to hear: "Can you please watch your mouth?"

Believe me, I think he was just as shocked as I was when he turned around and saw this white chick telling him how to act. He told me it couldn't watch his mouth and mumble something. Another customer behind me replied to him that he was being ignorant. He mumbled a few more things, but toned it down, the counter girl handed him his food and he stormed out eyeing me and the other guy who spoke up.

I placed my order, the counter girl apologized to all of the people still in the restaurant. I never thought another thing of it, until I was walking out of the door. How was I going to get to my car across the lot? All of the sudden I was terrified as I remembered I was in Youngstown instead of Smalltown, USA.

Obviously I made it to my car, back to the office and home without a problem. But even now I am a little shaken at what I did. I swear it was like a movie I was watching, not something I did.

And before you ask, no I have not seen "The Blindside" yet. If you have, you'll know what I am referring to.

Ok, enough babbling for one day. Night!

Stacy

Mitzvah Month

Ok, by the end of last month I was totally tired of posting every day. That was 2 months straight that I posted.

I was absolutely not going to post today. I was going to take a break. I deserved it after posting for 60+ days straight

Then I got a little email from NaBloPoMo saying that this month is "Mitzvah" month. Basically you give something away every day for the whole month and post about it. Jeez, it being the Christmas season and all, I am just not sure I can pass this one up.

So, here we go again. This does not mean I have to buy something every day to give away. The rules state it can be something as simple as giving a "smile" to someone.

So to start us off, I just did this to the doors in my hallway of the building. I put one for each person that lived there. Hope they enjoy it!

Stacy