There is only 2 more shopping days left..............

fa la la la la!!!!

This has been a busy busy week! Life has been stressful maybe not more stressful than any other day but compounded by other life events stressful never the less.

There was school on Tuesday and Brendan was happy to get back. Winter break started on Wednesday. The school's Winter program was cancelled. I'm not really happy about that because Brendan had 2 parts. I still want to see the program. I am working with the school to see if it still can happen.

It seems for every step forward I find I am a block behind:) Ahhhh such is life. Terri (that's Mrs. L. to you:)) and I have decided we are the new Oprah and Gail -- Jeff is starring as Stedman and we haven't decided who D (her husband) is yet. Since D works nights and they have 5 (yes 5) children her free time is limited (I am not going to give anymore information about her since I don't have her permission to talk about her.........yet:)) -- so we have been hanging out at the scino -- Not dropping a ton of money (no Steve I don't need an intervention) but its a nice place where we can sit and just talk - you know mom talk - she can see the humor and not the humor of Whitlee's latest art project -- grilled cheese dipped in ketchup torn apart and plastered on the side of the toy box. Or the delicate engineering of balancing the Elmo couch on top of the coffee table while eating grapes and cookies:0 You have to just LOVE 2 year olds:) Anyhow we have decided the Jade Monkeys SUCK - freaking monkeys...........We have a love/hate relationship with the fairies...........Disco Freddy no longer SUCKS he is the disco king.........The penguins can be really nice..........the dolphins are fickle...............The witches have mood swings.........The big Kahuna is TOTALLY rad.......Milking the cow is a fun place to start...........and any machine over $.05 makes me break out in a cold sweat:) I did however get my totally bitchin white trash Muckleshoot Casino blanket...............hmmmmm now to decide if I want the crystal that is available in January. And for the record I am currently $35 up and I used it to buy part of a ham from the Honeybaked ham store for Christmas. Brendan loves to hang out with her boys as they LOVE Yu-gi-oh:). It's nice she gets me and I don't have to feel defensive about anything --- they are good people!!!!

Christmas.................it's just around the corner and not a present wrapped ok 1 present is wrapped..........really just one!!! I am trying to convince Jeff that since I shopped and purchased the presents he should wrap all of them. He isn't going for that. I haven't given up yet..............they will get done Jeff and I are no strangers to staying up all night wrapping. We have a Christmas tree but it's not in the house -- We had a tree-sicle the bucket of water we put the tree in was a solid block of ice. Even though it has thawed out if we bring that baby in it will lose every single needle on the tree and I don't want to clean that up. So, we are so getto we have a Christmas Ficus - yes that is right a Christmas Ficus. We brought the fake ficus out of Whitlee's room and I trimmed all the branches that she had peeled the leaves off of and tomorrow we will be putting on lights and ornaments - I'll be posting photos when we are done. The kids don't care as far as they are concerned our tree is the jewelery tree that Grammy made us. It has always had meaning but this year it means more to us since it is our first Christmas without her. It doesn't really matter that the tree-sicle is outside a tree doesn't make the holiday - spending it with family and people we care about is what makes it special.

We aren't going to Jeff's dads until January - I think the plan right now is to try and go down Friday night before our Snow/Ski weekend with the football freaks. We'd go down Friday spend the night and then leave Saturday to drive to Mt. Hood. I wonder how long it takes to get from Portland to Mt. Hood -- we should check that out. Can you believe we are going to the snow on purpose!!! I know I know pretty crazy huh!! The kids are so excited. I think Brendan is waiting for us to say we aren't going. We need a getaway weekend. We didn't go on vacation this year - not even the beach so snow in the winter it is and probably the beach this summer (but I can't think of that right now). We are gearing up to be snow bunnies ok I'll resemble a polar bear but we will have fun fun fun. Of course I am bringing my computer I never leave home without it -- I am actually only bringing it so I can download the photos I take. My goal is to take a MINIMUM of 3000 yes that is THOUSAND pictures - I think I can do it. Ahhhhhh, visions of scrapbook pages are dancing in my head.

Whitlee started gymnastics today --- she loved it -- I am trying to upload some video of her -- it was precious!!!!! Cheerleading starts the 28th of February - we are EXCITED.


And here is Brendan............


Whitlee got her first "real" haircut -- it was actually a trim but then Ms. Angie french braided her hair -- I literally took 500 pictures:) I love my new camera:)

Jeff doesn't have to work on Tuesday so I am going to see if I can take Brendan into downtown to see the Bodies Connections exhibit. He has really wanted to see it but it's not really something that I want to take Whitlee. The only thing is to see if they are open the day after Christmas. I'll have to check into that. Maybe I'll have him take Whitlee to see Charlotte's Web so she can scream "RATS RULE!!" at him. Hum........something to think about.