Merry Christmas!

MERRY CHRISTMAS! 

I hope you are all having a fabulous Christmas day! Ours has been entertaining as ever. (Is anything ever not entertaining in my house? Well, yes, when the kids take to coloring on things other than paper - closet doors, walls, floors, coloring themselves with a sharpie...that's not really entertaining.) I hope Santa was good to you. (He was very good to me - $$ and Coach...what more could I ask for?? .....a maid...that's what I should have asked for. Crap!!))

Our festivities started last night really. We usually spend Christmas Eve having a family night. (I love it!) Last night we watched Elf (not my first choice in holiday movies but we were seriously lacking in choices so it would have to do) and had hot chocolate with Christmas colored marshmallows and some festive-type brownies (well, they were brownies with sprinkles on them lol). It was awesome. When all was said and done, the kids made a special plate for Santa with our festive-type brownies and some celery for the reindeers, said goodbye to Pinky (our Elf on the Shelf) and headed to bed, to not go to sleep.

Once we (finally) got the kids to bed, Brian and I set out getting the last of the presents wrapped and setting up the living room.

When that was all done it was almost midnight and I was utterly exhausted. However, not exhausted enough to go to bed. Of course not. Because I will never learn that I will require more than 3-4 hours of sleep the night before a holiday. Instead. Brian and I went to work setting up a maze of crepe paper in the upstairs hallway. My dear sweet Kierstin informed me that no matter what we did, they would find a way to sneak downstairs before we were awake. And my response? "Is that a challenge? Well alright then. Let's do this."

Challenge accepted. Challenge won.

We spent a good 45 minutes setting this up all over the upstairs (with a clear path for us, of course). And to up the ante a little, I left a note telling them they weren't allowed to come downstairs until they get through it with knocking down or tearing any of the paper, or else.....(lol). To their credit, it took them an hour but they made it with all 35 pieces of crepe paper intact and still attached to the wall, and were still downstairs before 6:30 (Brian and I were awake by then though. They're crazy antics woke us up quite early.

The rest of the day passed so quickly it was ridiculous. But it was wonderful. Well, except that Santa was foolish enough to get Makenzie a Furby Boom. Google that - you might be as disturbed by it as I am. It responds to you, laughs, sings, snores and...has gas. (yeah.) After watching it for several hours I'm pretty sure that thing is evil incarnate and is going to come alive in the middle of the night and terrorize me in my sleep.

But that's not festive at all. Sorry about that. (I really am kind of scared of it though.)

Anyway, we hope you are all having a wonderfully Merry Christmas!! We miss everyone so much!

All our love!

 

Where Did the Week Go?

I'm really starting to think that time passes differently here in England. Like maybe I'm gaining 2 hours for every 1 of yours, although sometimes it feels like maybe 4 to 1. Either way, this week flew by me. It just sprouted wings and said "peace out crazy lady, I'm outta here. I don't wanna deal with your loony antics anymore". Well, maybe that's a tad dramatic, but it really did go by pretty fast. Probably because we were (not so) patiently waiting on jolly little elves to drop the kids' presents in our APO box, which seemed to take for-ev-er(!). (Note to self: don't ever procrastinate on the Christmas shopping again. The wait is maddening and I'm pretty sure I sprouted at least a few new gray hairs because of it.)

Anywho.

We did have a really awesome week, despite time moving a lot faster than I would have liked. The girls had their final Girl Scout meetings of 2013 and found out that each of their troops was able to raise over $300 from the bake sale extravaganza (**I just love that word...don't you?). That is just amazing! They're well on their way to having enough money for their first Girl Scout overnight trip (and I'm trying really hard not to freak out about that and remember that it will be amazing for them). They got to celebrate and have parties and all kinds of fun stuff. Brian found out that he made NCO of the Quarter thanks to all the awesome stuff he's been doing at work. (I'm super proud and excited!!) And Mr. Hayden read to me.

Did you see what I just wrote there? He read to me.

I cried, just so you know. I mean, it would be awesome to sit here and tell you that I was that super cool mom that handled it like a pro and was all "you're doing so great...keep going". No. That is not what happened. I cried....and cried and cried. I'll sing from the rooftops about how awesome and smart and fabulous he is, and how I know he can do anything he wants, but there's always this tiny part inside of me that wonders what the future holds. Will he ever live on his own or have a job or...learn to read? Well, let me tell you, singing-me jumped for joy at the sound of him reading and pretty much laughed in doubting-wondering-about-the-future-me's face. And then I cried. (There were a lot of tears. It was an off-and-on-again thing for a bit.)

As for me being awesome this week? I'd love (like really love) to tell you that I achieved some long awaited goal like climbing Mt Everest (except that's not one of my goals, like ever) or learned some super cool new thing, but no. I did not. I did find out that I received an A in my Intro to Spanish class by the skin of my teeth. No seriously, by one one-hundredth of a point. It was close. And I did get all of the laundry clean - does that count at all? No, not really? Aww, that's sad. I felt like it was a major accomplishment. How bout the fact that 3/4 of the Christmas presents are wrapped? They'd all be wrapped except I ran out of places to hide things. British houses are not known for their ample storage/hiding spaces, so for now the rest reside in the boxes they were shipped in and the boxes are strategically sitting in the floor of my room. (I'm a rebel like that.)

I will most definitely try to work my awesomeness next week. Although, I think if I can find a way to keep the kids from ripping into the Christmas presents before they wake us up, I will have achieved greatness. Right now I'm thinking of using crepe paper to make papery-type obstacle course of sorts that they'll wake up to Christmas morning. I'm thinking that when they try to get through it, they'll make so much noise that it'll wake us up and we can all enjoy present unwrapping together. The other possibility is that Hayden will just demolish my crepe paper masterpiece and I'll sleep right through it, thereby missing the unwrapping of presents. (Hopefully I figure something out soon.)

Well, anyway, if I don't talk to you before Wednesday - I hope you have a wonderful Christmas! We miss you bunches & love you all so much!

 

Break Time

Do you hear that? It's the sound of relief. The beautiful silence that means I am not studying because winter break has officially started for me. Finals are over! Yay! That is such a sweet sound. Lol

So I feel like it's been an eternity since I've been here. I have spent the better part of the last week studying and figuring out Christmas presents for the kids (well, and mourning what I thought was the end of a book series that I really love) that I didn't even realize it was Friday until around 10 this morning. (It's probably a good thing I did realize it so I didn't try to send the kids to school tomorrow.) I also forgot to move our Elf on the Shelf for an entire week. Word of advice - don't do that. Don't forget to move them...your kids might think he's dead. (Mine did.) 

But yay because it is Friday - no school for me for 3 whole weeks. And on top of that, we actually finished our Christmas shopping today...and (!) I got the Christmas cards mailed this week too. Now I don't know if they'll make it to anyone before Christmas, but it's the thought that counts, right? And how did I celebrate this wonderfulness? (Because everything wonderful must be celebrated.) I baked...a lot. Not for us though. The girls have their very first Girl Scout fundraisers this weekend - a bake sale. And this mama is nothing if not a proactive baker and supportive Girl Scout mom. (Which really means that, yes, I will contribute and volunteer for just about anything they have going on if you give me puppy dog eyes and tell me that they need me.) So they did (give me the sad eyes and the "we really need you" speech) so I stood in my kitchen for an unmentionable amount of time baking. (They really do need me right? Please tell me they did and my feet aren't hurting like this for nothing.)

Thankfully, once they were all baked Brian stepped in and set up an assembly line. 100+ cookies (with more to come tomorrow) were wrapped up by the 2 of us while the girls taped and labeled. Being a proactive baker and supportive GS mama is tiring, y'all. (Did I tell you that Brian and I spent almost the whole day walking around Cambridge? Maybe that's really why my feet hurt so bad.)

Fortunately it's just about bed time here. (Ahh, another sweet sound - silence.) So I'm going to hole up on my couch with a book and some wine. But not until I move the elf. The apocalypse may happen if I forget again.

Good night y'all.

Christmas Spirit

Can you believe it's almost Christmas? As in less-than-3-weeks almost? I cannot. Not even a little. Part of me is still stuck back in October wondering what happened to Halloween. And trying to figure out why in the world I only slept like 3 hours the night before Thanksgiving, knowing full well that I was going to be cooking all day, after cooking all day the day before. Or something like that. I was exhausted - that's the point - and I have no one to blame but me. So it's really already time for Christmas?? That's just blasphemy. I'm just now getting around to buying presents because apparently I've gone into slacker-mode. (What's that? I still haven't emailed you back? I'm sorry. Seriously, I promise I am. I'll get there. One day. Probably around the same time I mail out Christmas cards so that they get to you in January. It happens.)

Jokes aside, I really am having trouble processing this whole "time for Christmas" phenomenon. I did decorate though because that's 50% of why I love this time of year. My house gets all sparkly. (It's that girly part of me...the one who questions my love of super-descriptive crime novels...who loves for my living room to sparkle.)

That's our living room stuff - the Christmas tree that attacked me while I tried to make it pretty (and now it looks like I lost a fight to the world's largest cat)...our mantel...the french doors into the room are even sparkly....and last but not least, my new friend that I picked up in that German Christmas market we went to a few weeks ago. (Oh and my favorite candle in the whole world is sitting next to him - who cares that it's really a "Thanksgiving scent", right? You won't judge me will you?) 

So yes, I'm really trying to get into the Christmas spirit. I'm hoping the decorations will help. It's been tough though. There's been so much going on the last week. Today alone was just sheer insanity. We're having some kind of wind situation. I have no idea what this is or why it happens every year but our first year to go through has not gone well. 

Let me show you....  

That's what I came home to today and was faced with the question of "how exactly does one politely call their letting agent and explain that mother nature threw a tantrum and somehow the fence fell apart?" The answer? You call your husband and let him call the letting agent. Problem solved.

So yes, that's what's going on the world o' me right now. Exciting, isn't it? So for now I'm going to go ignore my broken fence (while crossing my fingers that the rest stays upright) and go read. I hope that all is well in the world o' you...and that your fence isn't falling apart.

Much love to you all!