Whew

Well, the lights are hung, the tree is up, and now we just need to wrap and relax. YAY!!Of course I cant wwrap until the gifts are delivered, and that isnt until Wednesday or so, so I can realx til then.

The angels and hearts are coming along nicely. I starched what I had made and put the ribbon through. they look very nice, very antique looking. I may have to keep making these and decorate the tree with them next year. They are so pretty. I may try them in a gold thread though, it would be a nice contrast to the green of the tree. I always have these wonderful ideas, but end up procrastinating until it is too late, so we will have to see how this one goes. I did use a free online pattern to make some teddy bear blankets for my kids last year that turned out real good, and the kids LOVE them.

Now, my husband and I are also trying to pay off bills and be out of debt by the end of next year. No small feat I can assure you. So, why the urgency, you ask? So we can save up to buy a movie camera and go into the movie making business. WHAT!?!?! No, seriously, we are. We want to start with a "get your feet wet" ultra low budget horror flick. He will write the screenplay, I will help with the ideas and make-up. The money savings will be used for a digital video recorder and editing software. He is also looking at taking some film classes at the local college. So, here goes the next phase of the roller coaster of life.

The Most Wonderful Time Of The Year--Really?

Well, here it is, that time between Thanksgiving and Christmas. Time for shopping, cooking, shopping, hanging lights and decorations, shopping, cooking, shopping, seeing family, and shopping. I have found, in the last couple of years, that I hate going to malls and stores during this time of year. Parking half a mile away from the stores, fighting the angry mobs looking for that perfect Transformer gift, standing in endless lines. I began doing most if not all of my Christmas shopping online. Most of the time I can get a good deal on shipping, rarely have to pay taxes, and best of all, no stores, no crowds, no parking. It is all delivered right to my door. Now, I do have to go home before picking up the kiddos from day care, just to be sure that none of the gifts are delivered in boxes with pictures of the contents. That did happen one year, busted.

We decided that both sides of the family will be getting family photos we had taken this year. I am framing them and crocheting some nice angels and hearts in thread to put in them. I will be framing the 5x7 pictures in an 8x11 frame, matted and with the angels and hearts in opposite corners. I hope it will look nice. I used some free patterns I found online, since I have not found myself to be particularly gifted in the area of writing my own patterns. I will just be lucky to get all these angels and hearts crocheted...I started a bikini for my niece a couple of years ago, finally ditching the pattern and trying to get it together myself. I did get the suit all crocheted, but then couldn'd figure out how to sew in a lining, so that one got scrapped as well. I have a ton of partially completed projects laying around in the project graveyard that is my dining room.

So, as part of the holiday season, and having small children in the house, we hang up the decorations inside and out. Now, I am not one to coordinate everything in the house from the kitchen to the bathrooms. We have a few decorations we put out and we put up the tree. The fun part, the exterior of the home. Last year we did not put up the lights on the house, or in the bushes. My nephews had a friend who was putting up his lights and fell off the roof of his two story house. This 19 year old young man was paralyzed from the waist down. So, after all that we really did not have the want to put up the lights. This year, however, my kids are having none of the darkness outside, they want bright and shiny and twinkling lights everywhere. So we start to pull the lights that have been hibernating since Christmas before last and try to untangle them all. Of course, most of the bulbs won't come on. So, between shocks and small cuts from broken bulbs we try to figure out which bulbs need replacing and which ones are just not coming on because of the break in current. We have not really figured out an easy way to do this. Now, my husband is not really known for his patience in these matters, so he opted to just buy more lights. Fine by me. Of course, we get home and half the lights we bought are the multi-colored and half were clear. We are now about halfway through hanging everything outside, hope to be done tonight. My Christmas shopping is just about done, gift cards to be delivered to my mailbox. Then all that is left is wrapping and cooking and all will be well.

Merry Christmas Everyone!!!

Thanksgiving Eve

Well, today is the day before Thanksgiving. I am sitting at my desk at work crocheting angels to frame with family photos, trying to figure out how in the world we will fit all the prepared food into my fridge tonight. Both mine and my husbands family live fairly close, and since we have young children, we are expected to cart from home to home while still cooking much of the food. My parents live close, so that isn't a big deal. His mother, on the other hand, lives about an hour away. His family also likes to wait until the last minute to announce all holiday plans. So, I had him call his mother two weeks ago to do two things, first, tell her I will be cooking much of the food for my parents Thanksgiving dinner, and second, ask when we are having dinner there. I told him to do this in that order, which he did. When he asked what time she wanted to have dinner she promptly announced she would be serving at 1pm. How nice....naturally. I am so thankful my parents are flexible. Now I will have to deal with the pouty faced in-laws when we have to eat and run. If we only had a bigger place, and a live in maid, we coudl just invite everyone to our place to save on the headaches.

I was smart though, I got food that the whole family can help cook. We will be cooking as soon as I get home from work. I got a ginger bread house for the kids to decorate (a little early I know). This may be messy, but will keep them away from the stove while all of my concoctions are splashing about. I am planning to make a cherry pie, which I have never made before. While at the store last night, though, I of course forgot, of all things, cherries. Now, I am assuming, being a novice, that these are a necessity for a cherry pie, so I will be fighting the crowds at the store this evening. I made this mistake last year, trying to buy ALL of the food the day before Thanksgiving. May I say that most of the time women are the gentler creature, until it comes to this time of year. I was literally rammed with shopping carts. I could certainly understand this if I had stopped in the middle of an isle, as I would love a rocket launcher on my cart to clear the way sometimes. However, if I am at a shelf taking items off the shelf to purchase, there really is no need to ram me.

Another thing is this, I will go to Wally World most of the time because it is the closest grocery store that isn't stocked like a convenience store. They built this store with about 35 cashiering lanes, however, they only stock it with about 8 cashiers. Why would this be? I have to assume the management of the store is performing some sort of sociology experiment. Surely with 8 cashiering lanes open and 200 people waiting to check out there will be some sort of reaction, right?

So, at the end of the day, when the cooking and cleaning and shopping has been done, when the kids are in bed and I am able to relax (seriously, what is that) I think of all I am thankful for. I have a wonderful family, and anyone who knew me before the age of 24 would be so surprised that I even survived to have a family of my own. I have been blessed with parents and a sister that I love not only as family but as friends. My husband and I both have jobs that pay us well, and this allows us to provide for our family and help out my sister when we can. We have healthy members of family, all around. Overall we are very thankful for everything right now, we have no major worries, and when we get them our support system kicks in and helps us move through that catastrophe and wait for the next.

Have a Happy Thanksgiving everyone, and I hope your blessings are as bountiful as mine!!

The First

Well, this will be my first post in my first blog. This blog will just be random thoughts from time to time about how my life is going. First, an intro....married mother of two, work full time outside the home, need to lose weight, need to clean my house more. Sometimes happy with where life is, sometimes not so much. My hubby is a huge sports nut, so are my two sons (moreso my oldest). My hubby is also about the LEAST romantic person you could meet, and if I want romance I have to set reminders in his e-mail calendar with specific instructions. Takes the spontanaeity out of the romance, but what can you do. I do crochet quite a bit, and try my hand at various other crafts. I have been working on a scrapbook for my grandmother for about 6 months, and just hope to finish it before she passes on. I will try to post here quite a bit, and it will probably be mostly rants and raves about my daily life, and my daily life is probably not much different than most to be honest.