Happy Early Christmas to me!

I guess it was meant to be a joke, but Mother Nature gave me an early Christmas gift today. My first grey hair. I am 28, shouldn't I have have a couple of years before I get these? I pulled that bad boy out and am crossing my fingers that it was just a fluke and I am not yet really going grey. I. Am. Old.

Merry Eve of Christmas Eve!

Yes I really just said that! I got out today, courtesy of Chandra, without the girls and got all the gifts that family sent money for. They still each have some money left over to get what they want with and they will also still have a gift card from their Grandma to spend after Christmas. Mykenzie is seriously getting about everything I could imagine this year. I have no idea what I will ever buy her again until she starts asking for clothes, I can't wait for those days for her. Kaylee will have an even longer line of My Little Pony's lined up through my house (she lines them all up like they are in a parade or something) and I think they are going to be quite happy this Christmas. Just wait till you see what they get! I am so excited I can't stand it!

I was going to go ahead and post the pics of the crafts I made for family members. I am so mad at myself and I didn't take a photo of the cutest thing I made! GRRR! I was thinking about making one for myself so I guess I will be for sure now so I can post it. So now I am waiting even longer to post them. Maybe I will whip one up tomorrow. Not sure how much free time I will have.

I totally suck and didn't take my kids to see Santa this year. How pathetic is that? Mykenzie saw Santa at my Mom's group Christmas party but Kaylee didn't go because she had a birthday party at the same time. She would be the one I would really want to go :( We may have to make the trek out to the mall and see the jolly ol' elf tomorrow.... on Christmas Eve. That does NOT sound fun. Travis thought he was going to have the day off and it turns out he has to work a half day so we could go do it in the morning while he is at work. We shall see how the morning goes.

Merry Eve of Christmas Eve!! 2 days left everyone!

My Rockstar

I finally caught it on video! Well, kinda. If you count the fact that you can't really see it and it is horizontal but shot vertical then I guess I got it! lol You can hear Kaylee singing though all you are missing is her spinning in a circle while she is singing. My girls love Pink too! :)

My Rockstar

4 days!

Wow time is flying! We are down to 4 days till Christmas now! All of the gifts are bought, the ones I needed to mail I mailed on Monday and Tuesday. We bought the fixin's for our Christmas dinner this morning. Everything right down the list is checked off. All that is left is the wrapping! Yikes! That will be fun. That will happen Christmas Eve after the girls are asleep though. I still need to get in the attic and locate their Christmas PJ's so I can get them wrapped before Christmas Eve. I have gotten gift cards from my sister and money from my BIL that I will go pick the girls some stuff with to open on Christmas Eve. Who knows when that will happen though since they are both out of school now.

Both the girls school parties went well. Kaylee had a typical party that was fun. Mykenzie had a Christmas brunch that we brought a ton of muffins for (and had a bunch left over). She got to have something fun everyday the whole week so she was loving going to school. Both girls made us gifts that are waiting under the tree for Christmas morning. I love getting school gifts! They are always my favorite things. I really love when they make ornaments especially cause they are fun to look at every year when we put them on the tree. I have no idea what they made this year but I am sure we will love them.

Tomorrow is our girl scouts party/ceremony. My first time being a part of a ceremony. I generally get an award at the end of each year, but this time I have a part in it, its different. We (all of the leaders) got together Friday night and it continued Saturday morning to make shirts for all the girls. They turned out really cute I must say. Took us over 6 hours to get them all done but I think that they will really like them. That is their Christmas gift from us leaders. We are excited that they will all have matching shirts for field trips now!

We tried to go to the live nativity at the church by our house last night but it started lightening so they had to pull everyone inside and we only got to see the animals. They had camels though so that was cool. Hopefully we will make it to Opryland hotel to see the lights. I wanted to go tonight but that doesn't seem like it is going to happen. Oh well. I am slowly changing my mind as I type and I think I may start wrapping gifts tonight. I guess I need to get off this blog and get busy making dinner so we can bake cookies and get the girls in bed early enough to start wrapping tonight.

What?

It is Friday already? I don't know where this week went. I stayed home all day Monday till the evening when we had a girl scout meeting. Tuesday I ran some errands and finished up Christmas shopping (that is a lie I still have 1 thing for Travis to buy and something for my BIL), Wednesday we were at home all day again, Thursday more errands and now it is Friday. It really flew by. I did manage to finish all of my Christmas crafts (lie again I still have 2 to do but it will only take me like 10 minutes so it doesn't count). I wrote out my Christmas cards, I bought new ones since the ones I had were blank inside, and got them mailed but I still need a couple addresses from some people who moved. Meredith gave me some boxes so the gifts are loaded up and I will be shipping them out on Tuesday morning before I have to go to Kaylee's school party. I read over 1000 pages in 2 books in 2 days. I am hooked on a series that has been around for awhile now since there are 4 books out and a movie, but I hadn't heard of them and then when I did thought I would have no interest. I finally gave in and wanted to see what all the hype was about, yeah, it is well deserved. I am restraining from picking up book 3 till I get some things done that I need to around this house. We will see how long it lasts. I want to read it BAD!

It snowed here today so Mykenzie is out of school. It is mostly melted now that it is 10:30am. Turns out she isn't feeling well anyhow so she would have been home regardless. She seems like she may be starting to feel better some now though.

I have an ornament exchange to go to tonight that I am excited about! I always love getting together with the ladies from my moms group. Tomorrow we have some things to do during the day and then Travis and I are going to his work Christmas party. Not sure what exactly is happening yet on Sunday I have a couple of tentative plans. I just can't believe it is already the weekend. It is officially 12 days till Christmas now! Well 12 days, 13 hours and 25 minutes!

That is it for our week around here. I picked up crafts for the girls to make their grandparents like they do every year so if Mykenzie is feeling better we will get that done today, if not this weekend at some point. Seriously I just can't figure out where this week went.

17days, 5hours, 24minutes, 55seconds,54,53,52 ...

Less than 20 days now! When I started counting down on here there were still 20 weeks! I have a counter in the footer of this blog now and I love it. I did some gift wrapping the other night for those who live far away. Now to find boxes to ship the stuff in. Chandra gave me one today so that is 1 down, 4 more to go :) I ordered some thing online for the 2 dads and I haven't gotten them yet and am getting very impatient about it. I want to get the gifts mailed soon and I need those in order to do it. Plus I am waiting on a picture so I can finish up a craft project for my MIL so I can get her stuff in the mail.

It has been an unusually busy weekend, tis the season for that though. On Friday night we went to our church's Christmas program. It was good, very different then I expected for sure. Preached without being preachy. It confused poor Kaylee to no end though. It was 2 angels trying to get to the birth of Jesus and in doing so they went through different time periods. One was the Elvis era where they were all talking about the king coming (the angels thought is was THE King) but it was of course Elvis. So Kaylee leans over and says, "Mommy is that REALLY a King?" Then another part they were at some blue grass thing and they were singing about Santa coming on a train and going choo choo train is coming. So she was very confused at this point and and says "So mommy, does Santa really come on a train or does he come on a sleigh?" Poor kiddo so confused but very happy when they finally found baby Jesus.

Saturday morning started with us out the door around 9am to head to a local nursing home to do a craft with the residents with our Girl Scout troop. Started out really irritating because 2 of the other leaders weren't there, 1 we knew way in advance that she wouldn't be there, the other called at 9:25 when we were meeting at 9:30! Freaking ridiculous. We only had 6 girls total come which is kind of sad because 2 of them were my kids and 2 of them were the other leaders kids, we have 19 girls in our troop. We made stockings with them to hang on their doors and it was nice. It is a little hard to be around old people like that when you aren't used to it. There was one lady wheeling herself around and saying "help me help me! I am all alone, I don't know what to do. Where do I go? Someone help me." I have always want to live to an old age to see my children grow and their children ect. And all of the old people I have ever known in my life still had their minds when they passed away in their 80's. If I have my mind I am happy to be alive but really if I am wheeling around a nursing home saying help me help me I'm all alone, I really just prefer to go home and be with the Lord. Some couldn't lift their hands, most couldn't write it is just really sad. We will take the girls back in Feb. to do another craft with them. It is good for the girls to be involved and they all enjoyed it.

After the nursing home was done we came home and had lunch and I whipped up a batch of deviled eggs real quick. Then Barbara came and picked up Mykenzie to take her to the moms group annual Christmas party to see Santa. I took Kaylee to her friend Avery's birthday party. They both started at 2:45 which I found strange. I asked Kaylee if she would rather go see Santa or to Avery's party and it was no contest at all. She loves Avery! She had a great time at Bounce U with all of her friends from school and Mykenzie had fun at the Christmas Party. I enjoyed chatting with the moms at the party but I wanted to be at the Christmas Party. This is the first one I have missed since I have been here and I am a bit bummed. They both wrapped up at the same time and Chandra brought Kenzie home for me, where I made a quick dinner for the fam and was out the door to get groceries for the shower today. I sat on my butt for the rest of the night, well I boiled eggs and cut veggies but that was it. I cleaned for a bit today but then just enjoyed the shower. I will eventually put all my furniture back where it belongs but for now I am just playing online waiting for Desperate Housewives and Brother's and Sister's to come on. I am especially looking forward to B&S tonight! Sooooo good. Now that my busiest weekend of the month is over with and most of my shopping is completed I don't know what I am going to do with myself now. Ha! I lie I have plenty to do but things will definitely seem slower now that some major things are over with. Travis' work Christmas party is Saturday. I have never been to it with him before so it will be interesting and I am not all that excited about it but I am sure in the end it will be fine. I just need to stop stressing! lol
I actually have no set plans for this week,till the weekend. Wow! I need to call a few friends I keep telling I am going to call and don't. Duh! Oh and I just found out that my friend Amy is coming to visit after Christmas for a few days. It has been 2 years since I have seen her so I can't wait to catch up! The next day Amber will be coming with her kiddos so that will be really fun too. Don't you just love Christmas time!!!
17 days, 4 hours,49 minutes, 15 seconds...14, 13,12,11,10.....................

Procrastination

Main Entry:
pro·cras·ti·nate
Pronunciation:
\prə-ˈkras-tə-ˌnāt, prō-\
Function:
verb
Inflected Form(s):
pro·cras·ti·nat·ed; pro·cras·ti·nat·ing

transitive verb : to put off intentionally and habitually intransitive verb : to put off intentionally the doing of something that should be done
synonyms see delay
— pro·cras·ti·na·tion \-ˌkras-tə-ˈnā-shən\ noun
— pro·cras·ti·na·tor \-ˈkras-tə-ˌnā-tər\ noun


This is the definition of me right now. I have had a long day. It has gone from 9am to 7:30 pm just running from thing to thing. Now I am home and I need to clean. I say alot I need to clean but this time I REALLY NEED to clean. I am hosting Chandra's baby shower tomorrow for her sweet miracle baby and I really can't find the motivation to clean my house! They are all tired moms too they won't mind my mess, right? LOL I will clean some I promise ;)

Biggest Loser

I am a fan of Biggest Loser. Though this is only the 3rd season I have watched of it I fell for it fast and now am addicted. This season I really just want to smack all of the contestants on the blue team. Seriously I don't like any of the ones that are left. None of them. Vicky is a royal beeach. I think she has some serious mental problems and I feel badly for her children. Heba and her slow talking idiot husband drive me nuts. She was a total PITA while he was gone but she has softened some since he came back but still. So now all that is left of the black team is Michelle. I so so so hope she wins. I will be so sad if they get her out of there too. Stupid stupid Amy, she should have voted to kick Vicky out when she had the chance, what a dumb ass. Especially since Vicky sent her packing the very next week. I hope Michelle wins it all and that Colleen picks up the prize from those who went home. What do you think about this season?

The Holiday Season has officially begun!

Today is known all over the country as Black Friday. The day after Thanksgiving and stores every where slash prices for Christmas. People get up and stand in long lines starting as early as 3am just hoping to get their hands on a deal. Good times. I, however, was not one of those people. I stayed all nice and snug in my bed sleeping soundly. I find deals all the time so no reason to go out with all the crazy people. I am just about done with my shopping anyhow! Yay! Now I just have to wait for everyone to send the girls their gift cards and money so I can go out and shop all over again. We open gifts from family on Christmas Eve so I go and spend most (not all) of their gift cards so they have gifts to open on Christmas Eve. So basically I go Christmas shopping for the girls twice.

We had a nice Thanksgiving yesterday. Very low key hanging out. We had ham and all the fixin's. After we ate I seriously tried to figure out why in the world I even bother because the girls eat nothing I make. But it was yummy so whatever, their loss :) Today we enjoyed visiting with our friends and then listening to Christmas music (92.9 all Christmas all the time) and singing and dancing. Now we are watching the movie Elf. We put up our Christmas tree last weekend and it is beautiful. I love, love, love my tree! I wish a picture could capture how it looks all lit up at night but it just can't. It is a pain in the butt tree that you have to put together branch by branch, it is not pre-lit but I wouldn't trade it in for anything, it is perfect. Travis put up our outside lights yesterday. I love Christmas!! Less than 4 weeks now!

What have we been up to, you ask?

Well Travis ended up canceling his trip to Ohio and stayed home from work on Friday. This meant he got to go with Kaylee and I to Mykenzie's school for her Thanksgiving lunch. The food was, uh school food, but it was fun. It is always fun to see how your kids are at school with their friends.

We have a date for Mykenzie's braces and palate expander. She will be getting them both on January 7th. I hope this is all she will end up needing done so she doesn't have braces from the time she is 8 till she is done with middle school. That would be a long time for that. If all goes well she will be done with everything in 10-12 months and the palate expander will be done in 3. Fingers crossed.

On Thursday Chandra came over and we spent the day crafting Christmas gifts :) It was so much fun. I think I may be addicted. I have been doing it ever since (and some before then) I still have a couple things I want to do but it seems like every time I turn around I am picking up a new idea and making something else.

Today I spent parts of the day doing laundry and parts making vinyl lettering for my house! Another addiction that could be hard to break. I will post pics another time. My camera battery is charging so... Plus one of the things is for Christmas and well, it looks cute all by it's lonesome it will look cuter once the rest of the decorations are in place, which will either be this coming weekend or the Wed. before Thanksgiving. We shall see. Personally I want to go get them NOW and put them up! So some of it could be done before the weekend. I bought a ton (seriously like 20 boxes) of new ornaments with at least 4-8 ornaments per box, after Christmas last year so I CAN'T wait to see what my tree looks like this year with all my new pretty things :) If I remember correctly though I need to purchase some more lights for the tree this year.

I have way too many hobbies these days I don't know what to do with myself. It is funny because the thing that has suffered the most is my online time and I still manage to get online and do what I need to do. Guess I was just wasting time before. I haven't really scrapbooked in about a month either, well 1 LO but I don't know if you can only count 1. But I have managed to read a book (4 Blondes by Candace Bushnell, not that great) get a ton of crafts done, keep my house decent, spend time with friends and kids, have my DVR up to date, make and hang my vinyl lettering, ect... Are there suddenly more hours in the day because I certainly have not gotten better at time management. Oh we watched Kit Kittredge (American girl movie) and Get Smart this weekend too. We enjoyed both of them :)

The rest of the week will involve, getting ALOT of my Christmas shopping done, finishing up my outstanding craft projects, Get my Christmas cards written out (all but adding the pics that will be coming soon since I ordered them this weekend), lunch with friends, Thanksgiving program/lunch at Kaylee's school, oh and a few errands for good measure. And maybe pulling some Christmas decorations out of the attic.

Can you even believe how close the holidays are!! We only have 8 days till Thanksgiving! I guess I better go get my turkey!!! Christmas is now only 5 weeks away!! I am trying so hard to hold off on the Christmas music.... but I am singing "It's the Holiday Season"

Crazy Kids

Super Saturday!

I have had a wonderful day! If you know about my mental state for the past week you will know that it is past due. My eyes popped open at 7:30 and I suddenly remembered there was a church yard sale I wanted to go to this morning that started at 7. I threw on some clothes and a hat and ran out the door. The sale wasn't at all what I was expecting, I was thinking of the old church rummage sales I used to go with my mom to as a kid. This was pretty small but I found a treasure :) I went so I could look for things I could re-purpose for myself as well as Christmas gifts. And I found this beautiful thing....

Yep that would be a square cork board.... just what I have been wanting. Guess how much.... 25 cents!!!
I went to another one but had no luck and finished up my yard sale spree in my neighborhood where I picked up these for $2...


and while I was waiting for the lady to get me a bag, the man said do you need a lamp and I turned around and saw this lamp that I had completely overlooked!



So I spent a total of $11.50 (I got a little glass vase too) and am very happy with my purchases as is Travis.

Then we made breakfast and ate our French Toast and I showed Travis the purchases I made at Hobby Lobby on Thursday and he got busy hanging them up for me.
Since the girls have been in school we have always hung backpacks on the door knob to the kitchen door that goes to the garage. Travis has decided he no longer wanted them their so I found a cute solution, it was not at all what he wanted but I am happy with it :)



I had an idea in my head for what I wanted in the girls bathroom to hang towels ever since we redid it all those months ago. Well I never found it. So walking through Hobby Lobby I passed this cute solution and voila, now they have hooks for their towels instead of door knobs!!!



After that was all done my awesome husband took it upon himself to sand and prime my 8ft 2x6 that I bought to make some Christmas gifts and I threw in a couple of 2x4s and this little diddy too :)
That would be a ceramic trivet surrounded by cork :) The cork is covered with paper as to no get primer on it and the trivet has been primed for the next step! I know you are just dying with anticipation to know what it is that I will possibly be making with all these treasures. I can't wait to see how everything turns out. I never thought I got the crafty gene and I may not have but I am perfectly capable of stealing other people's ideas and making them into something of my own ;)

In about an hour I will be going out to dinner with my girls to celebrate (late) one of their bdays. Then tonight I am going to Bunco with my moms group! Seriously, it was the perfect day!

Hello there Fall

So our temps have been all over the place lately from mid 40's to high 70's, it is nuts. The one thing I have found to be most strange though was the leaves hadn't changed and started to fall. Last year by the beginning of October most of the trees have lost their leaves. But right now they are all beautiful! The trees are perfect and even my tree's leaves are turning RED! They have never changed since we have lived here so it has been quite nice to see them turning red :) This is what makes fall so great for me, it really is beautiful!


To update all the happenings in our lives lately that don't involve politics...

I have lost my calendar which also means I feel as though I lost a limb. Notebooks and calendars keep me sane and now I lost 2008. I have all of my old calendars since HS and now 2008.... GONE. I am so upset.

Mykenzie had her first Orthodontist appt on Wednesday. He basically told me what I already suspected. She will need a palate expander. This will only have to stay in for 3-4 months, which I didn't realize, I thought it would be longer so that is nice to know. She will also have mini braces (yeah, I never heard of them either) on her top teeth for 10-12 months. He thinks that should fix her issues but he is giving it a 50/50 chance that she won't need anything else done. Here's hoping. Waiting for the call to tell me how much cash we will need for all this. I don't really care cause no matter what we are getting it done, but it still sucks.

I have dove into Christmas preparations and have purchased several things for the girls as well as some materials to make some things for people as well. I am addicted to craft blogs these days (if you have a really good one pass it on please) so I am hoping to make some gifts this year. I made the cutest things for my nieces that they will love, if you are around me alot you already know but I can't post it on here cause they read this and they can't know (well my nieces don't read,as they are 2 and 3 but their moms do) I will post pics after Christmas though cause I love them :)

I guess since I am moving on to Christmas prep, I should probably go ahead and put the Halloween decorations away, especially the outside ones! lol I would much rather recover a notebook ;)

The day after.... euphoria

I am a 28 year old white woman. I have never been discriminated against because of my race. I was not alive during the civil rights movement. I still feel the enormity of this election. I have wept for joy and screamed out loud. I woke up this morning feeling like we were in a new world. A world where all people are equal. I woke up with a renewed feeling of hope and joy that our country and our world will change for the better. I don't fully know how to describe how I am feeling but I am truly joyful to have been a part of this historical election. Proud. Proud of our country for the long way its people have come. To watch everything unfold on television last night and see people like Jesse Jackson, who were a part of the civil rights movement with tears streaming down their face knowing all they have been through to finally see a dream realized. A dream that seemed so far out of reach but one they had the hope of for all these years. It was amazing for me, I can not begin to imagine the significance that the moment held for them. This is big.

I spoke with Mykenzie, who has been interested in the election this year, this morning, my eyes filled with tears. I was telling her to remember this day, remember this moment. Savor the fact that she was here during such a historical day. To think about Martin Luther King Jr. and about all she has learned about our world just 45 years ago to where this election put it today. Remember this moment. It is big.

Those people who voted for John McCain and may not be happy that Obama won please take a moment to step back from your views and just fully appreciate the magnitude of what has transpired. To loosely quote Elizabeth Hasselbeck (which I NEVER thought I would do)"No one lost today....today is a victory for this country. To have Barack Obama be our next President, the first black President... I haven't felt this good through out this campaign.... I will get in this long line of supporters. I wasn't the first but I will jump in that line and support our President, because that is what,as an American, I believe we should do."

This is BIG. A man had The Audacity of Hope and I believe our country and our world will be a better place because of him. We dared to hope that change was possible and hope won yesterday. Now the work begins....

History has been made!!!!!

Barack Obama will be our 44th President of the United States of AMERICA!!!! Woo Hoo!!!!!
American's have risen above and proved that we no longer see the color of a person's skin but the person themself. Congratulations President Obama and congratulations America for finally getting it right for the first time in 8 years!!!

In case you have been living under a rock....

TODAY IS ELECTION DAY!!!!!!!!!!!! GO VOTE!!!!

I am seriously giddy with excitement! Only an hour and a half till the polls close in Ohio!!!

You don't have to worry about me... what about you?

This was emailed to me from my friend Riki. Thanks for the giggle girl it is pretty funny! You won't have to worry about me giving the election to McCain, how about all of you out there? Make sure you Barack the VOTE tomorrow

November

Can you believe it is November already? Doesn't it seem like it was just last week that I started my Christmas countdown and we had 20 weeks? Guess what it is now... SEVEN! Whew! I am so ready to get my shopping done. I have 2 people checked off my list but that's it.

Halloween was over and apparently Fall left with it. We have temps in the mid 70's! Seriously, last week our high was 45. What the heck? Next up is Thanksgiving and I imagine we will be staying home and I'll be cooking for the 4 of us. Fine by me, I enjoy our quiet family holidays. There are some aspects of having all your family around during the holidays that I wish we had but in those cases you have to take the good along with the bad soooo, yeah.

Our busy times are slowing down for a couple of weeks, well at least during the week. Travis will be traveling a ton this month, joy. He has several trips to Chicago and one to Ohio planned. He and 2 of his brothers bought some property up there so he will be going up to do some work, I wish we could go with him but I am not going to pull the girls out of school. Oh well.

The girls are both doing great. They both seem to have gotten a worse attitude lately though. Not sure what the deal is there. Mykenzie has been fine with us but super mean to Kaylee. Kaylee has just been behaving horribly for a couple weeks now. She is generally ok when it is just her and I but add anyone else in the mix and watch out. We are working on it. On the plus side with the girls though they are both doing great at school! Kaylee has learned alot and has not gotten anything but a green light all year.
I had Mykenzie's parent teacher conference last week and her teacher had alot of wonderful things to say about her. She said she has the potential to be a great leader if she can gain in a little more confidence in her abilities. She also got her test scores back from the TCAP testing at the end of last year. She scored really well on everything. She is barely below average in Vocabulary and Language everything else she scored in the 70's and in Spelling she scored 81 and in Social Studies she scored a 94! If she can vamp up her vocab and language I see a politician in our future. Let's just hope she is a democrat! In her defense her wonderful (she says sarcastically) teacher last year did not work on vocab and writing with them hardly at all last year. I actually thought it was strange that she never had to do any writing but thought maybe the little bit they did do was normal. I don't think so now, I so dislike that woman. I think this year we will see a big change in those scores because she has a much much better teacher.

November 4th is tomorrow!!! It is FINALLY election day! I am so over the election, I know you would never know it from talking to me or reading this blog! lol I really want my guy to win,for once but I am tired of listening to the back and forth and at this point they are both just saying the same things over and over. So if you haven't voted already (I love early voting and cast my vote for Obama last week) make sure you get out and vote tomorrow!! ESPECIALLY if you live in a battleground state and you are voting for Obama!! Hopefully we will know without a doubt who our new president is by tomorrow at 9!