Christmas Lights Revenge

I've figured it out...no matter HOW you put away those Christmas lights last year, when you pull them out, they WILL be tangled. I thought if I wound them up just right, I could avoid the Christmas Light Tangle Tango. No go.

I even bought brand new lights....as soon as I pulled them out of the box, they tangled themselves in 2 seconds flat. Right out of the box! I swear! I guess it's their revenge, for us leaving their little icicle light friends on the roof all year.......

How to do you occupy a 5 & 2 yo for an hour?....just drag out a box of Christmas decorations & let THEM have @ it. I have ornaments hanging on every capable hook in the house. Including but not limited too....the bathroom, the bedroom soccer ball hook, the key holder, doorknobs ect. And many cozily lined up along the piano & the top of the entertainment center.

I don't mind one bit. I've never been one to have a themed tree or color coordinated ornaments. I LOVE letting the ktbunch help me decorate. I love reliving every Christmas memory past of each & every hand-made crinkled doily paper angel ornament, faded polaroids glued onto tin juice lids, & other sentimental items that I strung a ribbon on & dubbed it an 'ornament', like oldest's pacifier or the cork of H & I's first anniversary bottle of sparkling cider.

.....I have a 'pair' of wooden reindeer shelf sitters, decked out in thier Christmas best. L asks me...."Why are those cows wearing clothes?" lol

We put up a few strings of lights. I thought it would help H feel 'festive' when he gets home tonight after his very long day @ work. It would probably work too...if all the laundry was off the couch! :o)

RENT

SAW it! LOVED it!

I do not 'recommend' movies so don't mistake this for a 'recomendation'....

I already knew the plot & everything because I saw it on stage. I love what they did w/ the movie. Except Mimi's scene @ work, too gratuitist. Cheap. Otherwise, the rest was pretty right on. Maureen---hilarious. The character you just love to hate. She played it quite well.

I can't wait to see it AGAIN!

Go ahead---call it my 'guilty pleasure'.

AND it was FUN to sing along.

I had the music video in this post...but w/ the trailer on the same page...(previous post)...well then you have 2 different songs going on @ once. lol Not that slick! SO I had to nix it.

Too Early for Christmas?

Alright, let me just say that, although Christmas is NOT my favorite holiday (Valentine's is) I still LOVE it! For many years though I resented the fact that it seemed to come earlier & earlier. I resented the commercials, the decorations & the hurriedness of the season & then the giant emotional let-down I'd feel a few hours after awaking on Christmas morning, when it was ALL over.

The last few years though...mid-November, along w/ that crisp fall feeling & chilly but cozy nights, I'd turn on the oven, start baking & turn on the Christmas music. I also started to think less & less about the 'presents', meeting gift giving expectations, attempting to get all the holiday cards out on time w/ perfect family pix enclosed, rushing to deep clean the home so I could put up the decorations that were never quite right & all the other commercial trappings of the holiday.

I meditated & focused more & more on the HOLY-ness of the season & I began to enjoy it much more fully & there was NO let down.

I recently read on a forum I frequent, how many Christians do NOT even celebrate Christmas OR Easter. They view it as a secular holiday & UNbiblical. That is fine. I don't care but it did get me to thinking. One of their points was that the birth & death & finally resurrection of Christ was something to celebrate EVERY day.

The last part was the clincher for me. I think it IS something to celebrate everyday as well & I happen to enjoy taking the month of December to celebrate it MORE. With that in mind, what is the harm in listening to Christmas music in November, BEFORE Thanksgiving? Or June? OR even in February?

I keep hearing people verbalize how AWFUL they think it is to have Christmas music playing BEFORE Thanksgiving. How they just 'aren't ready' for Christmas to start yet.

Think about it though...WHAT are you REALLY not 'ready' FOR? IS it Christmas or the COMMERCIALISM? WHAT are you REALLY focused on? If you are focused on the HOLY-ness of the season (& essentially every day)...then wouldn't Christmas music be an EXCELLENT way to 'remind' us of the REAL reason we have to be 'thankful'?

Are you trapped in the holiday rush? Feel like it comes too fast & before you know, it's GONE?
Maybe you need to focus on the REASON & forget the rest. kwim? Avoid the mall, you won't get that 'feelling' there, along w/ crowds of unfulfilled patrons looking for the 'perfect' gift. If you have Jesus Christ as your personal Lord & Savior....you ALREADY HAVE the perfect gift. What more could you ask for? Anything else is just icing on the cake, & how sweet it is! :o)

The same goes for 'Thanksgiving'. The thanks doesn't have to end when the turkey runs out. Take the holiday season to REALLY think on all the things you have to be thankful for.

I don't look @ it as the thanksgiving ends & then it's--Christmas & then it's over & you don't think of it again for a year. I think of it as a continual day to day of giving thanks & meditating on Christ's gift to me. For me.

So personally, I have NO problem tuning into a radio station that's playing Christmas music a week before Thanksgiving & will continue until New Year's!

I LOVE it! And some of the BEST 'worship' & 'praise' songs are "Christmas" songs anyway! ;o)

ONLY 2 MORE DAYS!

I CAN'T wait! ;o)

Suckers & Scissors

Just when you thought it was safe to stop reading!

The littles were having their daily dose of their sugar FIX.....when suddenly, S's sucker 'mysteriously' became entangled in L's long hair! I saw him running around all of a sudden w/ his personal scissors, armed & ready to go. I'm like: WHAT are you doing w/ those scissors? 'Well, L has my sucker!' Ok, don't worry, I will get it out!

In the meantime, I led L into the restroom to wash the sucker out of her hair & advised them that there will be NO more wrestling while in the process of sucking on suckers!

As I started rinsing her hair...I noticed a thin sliver fall out----a CUTTING of her hair, precisely from the exact center back of her head. Good thing it was only a thin slice. YOU CUT L'S HAIR? I asked S. Yah, he responded sheepishly. Oh well, I shrugged. Nothing I could do about it now right?

I go to brush her hair & as I brush.....CHUNKS of hair begin falling out! :O !!!!!!!

So now there is a chunk, in the exact center of the back of her head, CUT off! We reminded S that he is NOT to cut his sister's hair EVER! WHY did he do it? To remove his sucker of course!

So I did what any mom would do...or maybe it's just ME? I took the wad of hair & taped it to an index card, recording for all eternity, the date & explanation of L's "first haircut":(

Ironically, the other day some friends & family were just commenting on how long L's hair was getting & I responded that it had never been cut yet. lol

I'm breaking the rules

It's against my better judgement but I just couldn't resist. I regret it but I can't change it now.

I'm SICK! I know it's against everything that 'motherhood' stands for. Mother's are NOT allowed the luxury of a sick day. I knew it was coming. I'd felt it for awhile & fought it off as long as I could.

I'd been fighting a sore throat for a couple weeks now. Halloween night was the kicker that did me in. We spent the night @ church for 'Trunk-r-Treat'. I felt like I was losing my voice. THen that night I could barely sleep because it felt like something was stuck in my throat all night.

The next day...I started feeling congested & coughing. It cleared up a bit during the day but by evening...it was getting worse. I finally broke down & took a Benadryl right before bed. Those things knock me out so I don't dare take them unless I'm planning on going to sleep. I can't afford to take it during the day.

I took it again last night. I'm hoping it will clear everything up for me before it get's totally BAD! I know I should probably take some 'cough medicine'...but you know how S really HATES to take liquid cough syrup? Well WHO do you think he inherited THAT from? :o/

Riding a bike in a skirt

I read that there are ladies that wear dresses & skirts all the time, every day. Never pants or shorts.
I wondered HOW they ride bikes in a SKIRT? I read that it could be done but I sure don't know how. I know the Wicked Witch of the East did when she was dognapping Toto & I think Mary Poppins might have. But otherwise....it's not something I've ever seen nor thought of trying. Seems too impractical.

Anyhoo....when we took our weekly bike ride to the mall, I decided to try it. I found some work-out, fitted shorts of mine but they seemed too fitted to be worn out in public & I was going to take a skirt w/ me to change into once I got to the mall anyway. So I decided just to wear the skirt over my shorts on my ride.

Everything was ok @ first. But @ one point, I guess I was going a bit too fast & my skirt kinda started billowing up. :O I tried to tuck it under me better or into my shorts but it was not working. I thought: ok *I* know I have shorts on under this skirt but noone else knows that...they're only going to see a woman riding a bike w/ her skirt blowing up. And it's not going to be 'Marilyn Monroe cute' either!

Good thing the ride is not that long. I won't be trying THAT again any time soon. I think women who wear skirts & dresses, ALL the time...do not ride bikes!

It was the day after Halloween & we were all a bit tired & still strung out on the sugary high of it all when we took this bike ride. Plus I hadn't ridden in over a week since the garage door openner had been lost. So when I came to the 'big hill' I reminded the ktbunch to cheer me on, on the way UP.

They half heartedly gave out a few woohoo's & yay mom's but I felt them trying to help by rocking the trailer. I told them to stop a few times because it really wasn't helping & was more of a hindrance. Finally after the 3rd time lil E informs me that they are NOT rocking the trailer. ??? I was puzzled until he calmly followed it w/.....'the trailer has come unhooked'.

Good thing it has that emergency hook. It really works! Imagine? We were going UPhill...those little tykes would have had a wild ride back DOWN the hill!

When I relayed this story to a 'friend' she said: 'the police would have been asking them: what does your mom look like? & they would have said: I don't know but she she was riding a bike w/ her skirt flying up!'

It was funnier in person! ;o)