Winter Guard Dates Are Up

I've updated our calendar with the Winterguard dates. Unfortunately for you, you can't see past Dec 2007, so you can't see much of my handiwork. Sorry about that, but you'll be able to view them soon (if you figure out how to view them, let me know because I can't!).

In other news, I think my dogs have colds...they're wheezing a bit. They need baths too, but I'm in no hurry to do that in this cold. **shiver**

In the near future, I'll be reviewing EmigrantDirect vs. INGDirect. I'm a recent convert...explanation coming soon.

Have a great weekend.

The Great Christmas Card Race

So, I was up until MIDNIGHT last night finishing up our Christmas cards! Ninety-five percent of them went out with today's mail. Wait, maybe more like 90% - seeing as there were just under 100 cards! Sheesh! I always rush to get them out by the first of the month because 1) I already have a lot to do and 2) we have to get the potluck invitations out. And don't you know that we had already RECEIVED one Christmas card by the time I got ours done?? **Waving hello to Kevin, Becca & Aidan** They were our first card, arriving the Saturday after Thanksgiving. Wow!

In other news, PJ and I made the executive decision to celebrate Christmas with the kids a few days early...12/22 to be exact. Typically, we pick up all the kids from their other parent's house at about 2pm on Christmas day. After that, we head to PJ's Mom's to open gifts and eat and then we head home between 6 and 7 pm. Well, that's an awfully long time to wait to share Christmas with our kids and let me just tell you how cranky they are by that time. OHMIGOSH...Christmas present time should be fun! And it's not fun. So, after looking at the calendar and brainstorming, we've decided to go ahead and do it early. We'll be at my Mom's on the 23rd and at my Dad's on the 26th. On the 24th we typically have no kids (except this year as Ethan's Dad will be out of town). Anyway, when I shared the news with Megan, she was very excited. "I get tired of opening all those gifts on Christmas anyway." LOL

How long until Christmas???

It's only 29 days until Christmas! Woohoo! So, I know that in my last post I said I'd be back before Thanksgiving...well, I lied. I didn't mean to, but life got in the way of blogging. HA!

Anyway, Wednesday, I worked from home. Ethan had friends over for a while hanging out. Overheard this conversation:

J: S, don't you need to go to the bathroom?
S: Um, no.
J: Yes, you do.
E: He's trying to tell you to leave for a minute.
J&E proceed to discuss S. S is a girl. :P

Ah, I love listening to preteens. The girls came over in the evening and we hung out. Watched Sleeping Beauty . I watched The Last Unicorn on Monday...I feel like I'm reliving my childhood. heheheehehehehe. Joe is back in town from school.

Then on Thursday (that would be Thanksgiving!), I made some YUMMY Corn Pudding and the kids went over to Grandma's while PJ and I got ready. We watched the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade too. Good times. We ate at 1pm so the girls could go back to their mom's. We celebrated Mary's birthday too, though it's really Tuesday. After the girls went home, PJ and I hung out at his mom's for a while catching up with everyone; Ethan walked home. Once we were all home, we putzed around and watched some TV and whatnot. I played Mastermind with Ethan. Heidi & Kurt celebrated their 5 year anniversary today!

Friday, PJ and I went up to visit Trisha and Dave and to see their new house. Ethan was supposed to go with us, but he hung out with a friend. After we got the tour of their new house, the four of us went to meet Tammy and Tim (that wedding we went to in FL) for lunch and the six of us had a good lunch with marginal service at Longhorn. That night, PJ went to work at the bar and I was going to get the girls. Joe brought them over instead, so I just got a few things done. Joe didn't end up staying and Ethan stayed at a friend's house, so the girls and I just had leftovers for dinner (or whatever they wanted) and after cleaning the bathrooms, I settled down in front of the TV to watch my latest celebrity crush (Alex...the guy in front).

Saturday, we got up and PJ went to help Natalie with some cabinetry stuff. I can't remember what I did, but I think it was laundry. The girls finally got up and then once everyone was home, showered and whatnot, we went to pick out our Christmas tree. This year we cut ours down at a tree farm. That was a first for us as a family (actually, I think it was a first for the kids, period). We're definitely doing it again because the tree is sooooo much better than any of the other cut ones. It's hardly lost any needles. Anyway, here are the pictures of our day (picking it, cutting it, and then decorating it). We also swung by to see Leslie who is in town and then went to pick up Megan, who was visiting with a friend for a few hours.

Sunday, Joe and PJ went to breakfast. My dad stopped by to drop off his compressor. He's upgraded his. PJ is excited (ooo...tools & toys!). Then we did yardwork...we had a million leaves to clean up. Thank goodness for yard vacs (thanks Dad!) and riding lawnmowers (thanks again, Dad!). The job was a bit quicker and the kids could help. Ethan was at his dad's, so he missed out on all the yardwork fun. :P The yard looks great though!

Megan and I hit the grocery store and Big Lots (for the SECOND time this weekend). We had a few miscellaneous things to do around the house and then we baked some Christmas goodies. Our holiday party is in two weeks (12/8, for those of you attending and you're all invited) and we need to get our act together! Must get working on those Christmas cards. Our tickets for The Nutcracker arrived! I can't wait!

Okay, later - Ethan needs to get ready for school tomorrow and he's way too distracted juggling clementines.

Various Tidbits

Sam found out she made the varsity winter guard team. She's very excited. Congrats Sam!
Ethan is busy making "Goo Cake" for his class tomorrow. Oh fun. LOL
No updates on Megan.
PJ's out somewhere watching the Skins lose to the Cowboys. I think he'll be bummed when he gets home.
I just got home from a baby shower. It was very nice and fun to sit and chat.

And that's about it. I was trying to post every day in November for National Blogging Post Month, but then I realized that just may be too much excitement for you guys. :P

Have a great week. I'll plan to be back before Thanksgiving! :)

The Blog Has Been Updated

I just upgraded the template and a few other things. Look you can subscribe with any RSS feed reader. You can also subscribe via email, if that's easier. :) How cool is that????

I'm still looking for other ways to bring my blog to the 21st century...though I may need to start working on 22nd century stuff here pretty soon.

:)

I'm so glad it's Friday! Woohoo!

Spirit Week

It's Spirit Week at Ethan's school. Today was Crazy Sock Day. Ah yes, he had some pretty crazy socks on, but go ahead and click on the picture and check out how he "fixed" his shirt. LOL

Conversations with Ethan

PJ, Ethan, Megan and I were hanging out in the kitchen tonight. I was IMing with a friend, Melissa Washington.

Me to PJ: "I didn't know you went to school with Melissa Washington. She just told me a couple weeks ago."
PJ: "Really? I didn't realize you didn't know."
Ethan to PJ: "Wait! You went to school with George Washington's wife?!? Man! You are old!"
Me: "Not Martha Washington, Melissa Washington."
Ethan: "Oh. Okay."

In other news, Ethan made honor roll. Go Ethan! Sam and Megan both had As, Bs and Cs. Not too shabby either!

Marching Band Banquet Tonight...

Which includes Color Guard. I hope to be able to post a quick update and pics when I get home from it tonight. :)





Sam got her letter! She was also nominated as "Most Loudest" and that doesn't surprise us at all. :P

All I want for Christmas...

How did The Girls Next Door know this was on my Christmas list? Sheesh!

Quick Weekend Recap

It's Sunday morning and I should be in the shower, but I thought I'd pop on here real quick and knock out a post.

Friday night, it rained... so I didn't go to the football game (aww, shucks). Anyway, Megan still went, so after I dropped her off, I went home to get a few things done. Ethan was "cleaning" his room and Matt was "helping." After I picked the girls up, everyone got ready for bed. It was a late night. Matt stayed over. We have Brogan this weekend too.

Saturday, we got up and cleaned the house. Everyone cleaned their rooms, they raked leaves, I cleaned the bathrooms, we all vacuummed our rooms. We just organized in general for our Chili Cook-Off today. I also managed to get 95% of the laundry done! I baked 3 pumpkin pies and some cornbread too. For dinner we headed to the mall so we could let the kids do a little Christmas shopping. Another late night.

Sunday is just starting, but we're expecting people sometime around noon. The game is at 1 and a few of the attendees decided they wanted to make chili too, so now the contest is on for the best one. I threw all my ingredients into the crock pot about 45 minutes ago. Hopefully it'll turn out good since I'm making up the recipe as I go along. HA! Aside from football and chili today, I'll just have to put things back in order tonight when our guests are gone. A few things had to be rearranged to accommodate everyone. So, hopefully tonight won't be a late night!

Grocery Shopping...

So, I was reviewing the grocery shopping list the other day.

But wait, did you look closely? I have some very special requests on the list.

Ethan didn't get too specific, but I think he's tired of granola bars, fruit cups and the like. Though he said these in the pizza flavor were okay. I don't think they are healthy, but I'm pretty sure they're not downright unhealthy (I hope!).

PJ, on the other hand, was very specific. Unfortunately, I don't think it falls into the grocery budget. Maybe next month.

Friday Night Lights

So, tonight is the last football game for Samantha's high school. Let's just say that I'm not too excited about this. It's our weekend, so I'll have all the kids. And generally, if there's football, that means that we attend the game. So far this year, I've lucked out...one game was rained out and one game we organized a ride for her since she had a competition early the next morning. It's not that I don't want to support her in her extra curricular activities or with color guard, but let's be honest, I'd much prefer if I was supporting the kids (any of them) with an INSIDE activity.

I'm not a huge football fan. I'm not a huge sports fan. I can support the home team (it's hard when Sam's school plays Ethan's future school since they are then on opposing sides of the field!).

I don't like the cold. At all. Ever. The only good thing about the cold is that I can have a fire in our fantastic wood burning stove. And that means I can use some of this. Anyway, so there is a chance it will rain this evening. And if it rains, I already warned her that I'm not going. Ethan, Megan and I will just hang out at home and go pick Sam up at the appointed time. It's sprinking now, which makes me concerned it won't still be sprinkling tonight. I'd be lying if I said I didn't want it to rain. HA HA!

So, there's my conundrum...how to support your kids' interests when you 1) don't share the interest and 2) hate the cold. *sigh* oh well.

In other news, we've got a busy weekend. Cleaning up on Saturday and a Chili Cook-off/Football party (there's that sport again!) on Sunday.

Here's what $350 of firewood looks like

It's a cord of wood. A full cord, not a face cord. Two wood racks and then a whole other stack. Phew! We should be set for the whole winter!

Ready, Set, Save!

PJ and I met with a financial planner from Merrill Lynch the other day. Here’s what we learned.

1. We need to get our wills done.

2. We’re underinsured (life insurance).

3. All adults (age 21 and up) should be saving 12% of their income for retirement.

4. You should not have your money in a savings account that earns less than a 4% yield. Plug for ING Direct here. If you don't already have an account with ING Direct and you want one, talk to us...there's a little mutually beneficial referral bonus involved. :) **you don't want one. Talk to us about Emigrant Direct!

5. If you haven’t already heard it, you should have six months of your salary set aside in cash assets in the event something serious happens (obviously, whoever came up with this didn't have kids. HAHAHAHAHHAAH).

6. We’re at a very good debt to income ratio. :)

7. We might be able to retire when PJ turns 65, but I have to keep working until that time. So much for an early retirement. LOL

We discussed various other things, of course, but this was some of the important stuff.

In other news, I am NOT pleased with the election results for our area... *sigh*

I voted!

If you haven't voted, get out there and do it! PJ and I had both voted by 730am this morning.

Polo & Echo Turn Five Today!

It’s hard to believe that we’ve had Polo for almost five years now and Echo for about three and a half. How time has flown! It’s been a busy few years with a lot of learning about whippets, but our lives wouldn’t be the same without them.

They’ll be lucky if I remember to give them an extra rawhide today though. LOL



Happy Birthday, Polo and Echo!

Picture Updates

Here are the Halloween pics.

And pics from our vacation, including Ethan's birthday and us starting to clean up! :)

Reminder! Daylight Savings Time Ends

Remember to turn your clocks back one hour before going to bed tonight! Enjoy your extra hour of sleep. :)

November Birthdays

I'm trying to stay ahead of the game.

Heather, 11/15
Belynda, 11/17
Kelly W-R, 11/19
Mary, 11/27

Happy Birthday to you all!
ps did I forget anyone?