Oh what a night!

About every three months or so I go through the house and purge clothes and toys to donate to Goodwill. Yesterday evening I decided to go in Audrey and Sophie's room and get rid of some toys. Not only do we have Christmas coming up, but Sophie has a birthday this month as well so I kind of figured I better make some room. I filled 5  trash bags full of toys. The kids didn't even blink. Sad isn't it? As I was finishing up I noticed Sophie's frog Hattie sitting on the top bunk naked. A few weeks ago I washed poor Hattie's dress and put it on a hanger assuming that Sophie would either put it on her or ask me to. Apparently she did neither. 
Sophie told me that she did not know where Hattie's dress was. Not good. See the company that made Hattie discontinued making this line of stuffed animals a few years ago. She now has a new line out, but they don't quite look the same so buying another replacement to sneak in was pretty much out of the question. So the search began. I looked through all the bags again to make sure we didn't accidentally put it in with the donations. I went though all the toy baskets, dresser drawers, shoe boxes, etc. No dress anywhere. Sophie ended up crying herself to sleep on the couch last night and I was pretty close to doing the same thing myself. Luckily this morning super dad found it. It was stuffed in a box with some dress up clothes that I looked through twice last night. I think I'm going to have one very happy little girl when she wakes up this morning.

Those &*@!* Christmas lists

I have to admit I am extremely lucky when it comes to my kids in that they rarely ask for things. When they do ask for things it's not for much and I try to get them what they ask for within reason. Usually when I ask them what they want for their birthday or Christmas they'll tell me one or two things. Three at the absolute max. For example Kylie has been wanting an American Girl Coconut dog for nearly a year. Everytime I ask her what she wants for Christmas this is the only thing she asks for. I've been asking her if there's anything else she wants and she consistently tells me there isn't. Audrey asked for the American Girl Ginger Cat and a leapster. Consistently these are the only two things she has wanted.
Well apparently at their school the classes are all making wish lists to put up outside their classroom doors. By the way don't even get me started on how their school never, ever does anything for the other holidays celebrated at this time of year because I'll rant for at least an hour. Kylie brought home her list to work on with her homework the other day. She was actually kind of upset about this list because as she told me there was only one thing she wanted, yet there were something like six or eight lines for them to write on. I told her she could leave the other lines blank if she wanted to, but that was inconceivable to her. Yes, sometimes I wonder if this child is really mine. She finally puts down that she would like some clothes for her dolls, the dog and then she pretty much fills up the rest of the form with books. Then Audrey proceeds to tell me that her class did the same assignment at school already. I ask her what she put on her list. And I am floored. She tells me that she first put a new coat on the list. Huh? That's funny since I just bought her a new coat a few weeks ago and it's hanging in the closet with the tags on it still. I tell her this and she says "Oh yeah, I forgot about that." I ask her what else was on her list fully expecting to hear her say Ginger the cat and a Leapster. She tells me that she can't remember everything that was on the list, but she knows that she wrote down that she wants a Baby Alive that bounces and a DS. Nice. First of all those dolls freak me out. We saw some in Target about two weeks ago and they were all going off like jackhammers. Creepy and weird and no way that thing is coming into my house. And a DS? Really? I had no idea she even knew what one was. The bad thing is that I've already bought one for Kylie and I bought Audrey a leapster. You can kind of see how Christmas morning is going to go here can't you? She'll open the leapster and be happy with it and then Kylie will open her ds and she'll got into typical middle child you don't love me mode. I totally expect to have a huge dent in my forehead by the time Christmas arrives from banging it against the wall.

And the craziness begins...........

This weekend seemed to be the kick off of the holiday madness for us. It was a lot of fun, but I'm kind of happy that today is just plain old Monday with nothing scheduled. At the beginning of the December my husband and I have always given the girls matching pajamas for Christmas. We wrap them and put them under the tree so they can open them and then wear them all that month. The funny thing is even though they know pretty much without a doubt that their present will be pj's they still get extremely excited. Since at least one of my girls is asleep in the evenings before her father gets home from work we decided to wait until Friday to have the opening of the pj's. 

 

 Since I was kind of worried that they would open their gifts and start to moan, "great. pajamas again." (which they didn't by the way) I had another little something for them to open. I picked up some of the little webkinz for them thus earning my spot as mom of the year. I know most kids are kind of over the whole webkinz thing, but mine are still crazy over it.

 Then on Saturday I decided to take the girls to a parade in a nearby town. My husband was working so yeah, not a very smart decision on my part. Luckily my mom and dad met us when we got there so it wasn't too bad. Kylie and Sophie had fun, but Audrey did not. As I've said before she tends to be super sensitive to noise, textures, etc. and the noise level was really bothering her. 

 Naturally my family being my family the parade was not without incident. First we parked in a church parking lot. The girls were playing in this little garden area while we were waiting for the parade to start and I was standing a few feet away with my mom and dad talking. Some woman that apparently had no clue as to how to drive an SUV pulled into the parking lot. She swung out to try to park and came within inches of hitting my mom, dad and me. Then she almost mowed down my kids. Needless to say mama bear was pissed. Then when the parade ended I put the kids in the car and Kylie immediately began to cry that she needed to go to the bathroom. I told her I would drive her to a nearby McDonalds. Umm, yeah that didn't happen. I pulled the car out only to find that someone from the sheriffs office had pulled their car in front of the exit and I couldn't get out. So I started to back up, but a line of cars had formed behind me so I was stuck. So I'm sitting on a street stuck in traffic with a crying eight year old. Then the parade doubled back so I had to wait for that to clear. Finally the bands and floats went by and the officer moved his car and pulled out into traffic. A few other officers were bringing up the rear of the parade and one let me out into traffic. No sooner had I pulled out into the street than lights and sirens came on. Naturally since I had done nothing wrong I ignored them. Then the car next to me turned on his siren, flashed his lights and CAME ON THE BULLHORN and told me to get off the road until the parade cleared. Two words. NEVER AGAIN. 
Sunday luckily was much better. We took the girls to the Shriners Christmas party. They had a great time and I almost got a picture of all of them with Santa. 

 

Two out of three's not so bad. Oh, and apparently Santa wears an earring. Weird huh? Then the girls went out in the 40 degree weather with no coats (because their mom totally sucks) and road a train. 

 They felt like popsicles when they got back, but they had fun. Then we left the party and took the girls to see Tangled. If you haven't seen this movie you really need to. It was really cute. Kylie has despised pretty much anything princess-y since she was about six (weird kid, I know) and even she loved it. All in all it was a pretty good weekend I think.

Open Letter Friday

Dear Amazon,
I am begging you please stop it. The sales that is. You are killing me and my husband is about ready to. I mean it. Really. I finished all of my Christmas shopping ages ago. We do not need anything. As a matter of fact I'm pretty sure that I've got all three girls birthdays covered as well. So for the sake of my marriage go back up to your usual prices. Thank you very much.
Mommy

 

Disclaimer: The gray bag is actually from Gap. They're having a sale today too. God help me. 

 

He's back..............

A few years ago I heard some moms talking about something called The Elf on the Shelf. I didn't really know what they were talking about, but I knew it had something to do with looking for an elf at Christmastime. I finally decided to get in on the action last year and I am so glad I did. I ordered an elf on the shelf kit through Borders not really even knowing what I was getting. What arrived was a box that contained a small toy elf and a book explaining the story of the elf. Apparently you're supposed to put the elf away and read the story to your children. Basically the story tells how Santa Claus sends one of his scout elves to the homes of children to watch over them during the day. At night when the children are sleeping the elf reports back to the North Pole to give Santa the low down. Each morning when the children wake up they have to look for the elf because he likes to hide in different spots around the house. The one catch is that they cannot touch him or his magic will disappear. 

 

I have to admit I was very skeptical when I first read the story to my kids, but they seemed to really be into it so I thought I would give it a shot. I mean, hey if it is incentive for them not to kill each other and possibly clean their rooms it can't hurt to try right? So last year the tradition began. The kids loved their little elf and every morning during the month of December they would wake up and the first thing out of their mouth would be "Where's the elf?" Audrey liked our little elf so much that she cried herself to sleep on Christmas eve because she knew she wouldn't see it again until this year. Luckily Santa left a note telling her that if since she was so good that he would let the elf come back a little early next time. So this year the day after Thanksgiving our little friend arrived and the kids have been having a blast. Saturday Audrey and Sophie decided to destroy their bedroom and not clean it up so guess who was hanging out in their room Sunday morning? I'm actually thinking that it might not be such a bad idea to have a Valentines elf, an Easter elf, an independence day elf, a Halloween elf, a Thanksgiving elf............

Happy Monday!

I hope all of you had a fantastic holiday weekend. I have to admit that I was a bit worried that my sanity would not survive having my children and husband underfoot.  Not only did it survive, but we had a great time. We put up our Christmas tree and a few decorations (sorry, no pictures as our little tree looks kind of pitiful) and even wrapped a few presents. The present thing for me was kind of a big deal because I hate wrapping presents. I love to buy them and give them to others, but the wrapping? Not so much. 
In other accomplishments I ordered the kids new carseats (ouch!), took loads of stuff to goodwill, organized some things in the kitchen and uploaded tons of pictures to a photo storage site. My computer crashes about once a year so the photo thing is a must for me. Speaking of photos I took a few of the girls on Thanksgiving and thought I would share. Unfortunately poor Kylie can't take a picture without blinking so hers didn't come out so great. I'm going to try to schedule a real photo session with someone that half way knows what they're doing after Christmas.

Yes, Sophie has boots too she just didn't want to wear them.

I also took some time out to do some things for myself. I had my hair colored finally (darker) and ordered myself (yes me, not the children) some clothes. I'm crossing my fingers that they fit my big butt. Speaking of my big butt I added another street to my walking  route and I'm hoping that will help shrink it some. This street has two big hills and they are kicking my butt big time. I'm hoping all this walking is helping, I know that I feel better since I've started.
Have a great week everyone!

Some observations

• I just realized this morning that my husband will be home Wednesday,Thursday, Saturday and Sunday. This is the guy that usually only gets one day off work a week. I hope our marriage can handle it.
• Christmas is 32 days away which means that my baby's birthday is 30 days away. I am really starting to freak out over this. I want her to stay four at least another ten or twenty years. Thirty would be good too.
• Duke won last night. If you live within five miles of me you probably know this already from listening to me yell at the television. I'm glad my neighbors like me.
• I saw Harry Potter this weekend. Good movie, but I think I was expecting a little more from it. Still can't wait until July to see the conclusion.
• I just finished reading the first short story in Stephen King's book Full Dark, No Stars. I don't know why I read Stephen King books because they depress me to no end. 
•  I need to do something with my hair in a bad way. It has gotten way too long and the color looks like crap. Suggestions? 
•  This is so wrong. 

• I am kind of cautiously optimistic today. For the past two weeks I have been having horrible neck and shoulder pain along with some pretty bad headaches. I'm thinking maybe a pinched nerve? Yesterday and today I've been feeling much better so I'm crossing my fingers that whatever it is has worked itself out.
• Did I mention that it's basketball season?