Hello, Coy? This here's the Illustrous Potentate...

This morning started on a funny note with a little boy waking us up saying it was "Seven Nine...Time to wake up". We did need to wake up to get the girls to church for choir program practice, but really? We all rushed around, knocked the sleepy cobwebs out of our heads, shoved Honey Nut Cheerios down our gullets and the skedaddled(the girls and I)to church for practice for the big show tomorrow. As often happens when the kids get together in little groups away from the parents, they start hatching plans. After they sang their little tiny piece, they came at us like a pack of wolves. The Fountain City Christmas parade was to start shortly and they wanted to go. Out church was having a float, but there was no way that the kids could get through the traffic to the float in time. So we sat in front of the bank and waited to see friends, acquaintances and many local celebrities who were to be appearing in various classic cars and on floats of all shapes and sizes. Sad news though...the traditional float of Santa wrestling someone in a cage match(last year it was Elvis I believe) was not marching along with the rest this year. Elvis, however, did make an appearance this year singing on a float with the local high school swim team. I do believe he appeared to be the '70's Elvis as best I could tell. It was cold enough, he wasn't wiping off copious amounts of perspiration, but I still think it was him. We saw one of my personal favorites today, the Shriners. They always arrive in style and always makeme start singing Ray Steven's "Shriners' Convention". While he's most known in the south, he has been famous for a long time. This guy here I feel is probably the head of the shrine:



The other shriners were in little minature go cart sports cars.



Loud and entertaining for all. Seeing as how I had not prepared my self or my children to stand out in the cold for the duration of the parade, I walked back to the car in a stiff legged robotic way. The girls had snuggled under a blanket with their friends, so they were fine.

Later I took G to do her shopping for her daddy and siblings with 5,000 of our closest friends at Target and Bed, Bath and Beyond. Bless her heart, she was so very concerned and considerate about each person's gift. She weighed every option available before making her final decision. I'm an adult, I realize, but even I can only stomach so long in the billfold and purse section before I want to beg a Target team member to let me slip comfortably into the fetal position behind the jewelry counter. Probably a frowned upon practice, but I can't imagine that I would be the first to make that request. Maybe I am. No judgement zone here, friends.

The kids are going to bed early tonight. Tomorrow starts an insane week off with a bang and they need all the sleep they can get...and the hub and I need time to unwind. Maybe have a beverage...with ice cream in it. I know what you were thinking. Have a nice evening. I'll be in a ice warm fetal position soon.
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Soggy la la laaaa, we decked the halls

This torrential rain really needs to move on, people. I woke up this morning to the lovely pitter patter sound of rain on the roof. With a half an hour left before the alarm was the blast music at me, I settled back in to get some sleep. When the torrents started, all I could think of was buckets of water puring into the basement and everything floating in a horrible mess. Sooo I got up and made the bed, feeling a sense of dread about going downstairs. After waking up sleepy people, getting myself ready for the day and making sure everyone was on their way to being ready, I sucked it up and went to the dungeon. Thankfully I went down to happily discover that there were no woodworking tools or bins of summer clothes floating at my feet. I put a few things up in case our luck ran out during the day and went up to pour out some Honey Nut Cheerios for the kids. But the rain has continued to pour and dampen my mood to the point of making me hibernate. Today was B's day off, so we did some Christmas shopping and building supply shopping. Riveting, I know. Even the most exciting people have to have a boring day...not that we are exciting people by any stretch of the imagination.

After the kidlets got home and got their school business out of the way, we started to deck the halls. There is a yearly fight over who gets to hang the Christmas Pickle ornament. Luckily after a dinner discussion trying to avoid a picklefight later on in the evening, G was the child chosen to be the pickle caretaker for this year:



She hid it somewhere within the boughs of the tree. I hope her siblings can find it. The evening turned out fine, better than I had expected. I have carried a fair amount of guilt this season already when it comes to the kids. As usual because I am embarrassed about the under construction state of our house, I have not encouraged the kids to invite any friends over for sleepovers or just to hang out. No one to come over and make Christmas cookies with them or watch Charlie Brown find his pitiful tree. Because of my insecurity, they are rarely invited anywhere because, heck, people want someone to reciprocate when it comes to playdates and I totally understand that. We no longer really have a Sunday School class to claim us since I work with the kids on Sundays and the hub is often recruited to be in a Sunday school classroom when we are understaffed. So no Christmas parties, no Christmas events. I'm not whining for an invite...simply stating the reality I have created. So when I heard them speak of friends getting together with disappointment in their voices, I feel crappy. Luckily they enjoyed hearing Christmas music, arguing over who got to put up what ornament, reminiscing about where the came from and singing a little bit as well. There were more smiles than complaints, more giggles than grumps. We have some awfully forgiving children. Talk about blessed.

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Oh BalmyTannenbaum

I started the process of getting the house decorated for Christmas today. This process would have normally started the Saturday after Black Friday, but since it was puke fest over here it had to be delayed. I almost had a Griswold moment when I was trying to put wreaths on the windows this morning. The hook on one of the little suction cups did not want to hold the wreath on the boy's window. It started falling, I went to grab it and had a bit of a Huggies moment when I realized that I was diving for something that was sliding down the roof and crashing to the ground. No fake fir wreath is worth a body cast. Once the wreath was safely in place and my feet were on solid ground, I went to work hanging the stockings. It was a bittersweet moment when I brought out Cosby's wreath. Our first Chirstmas without her will be a quiet one. No sounds of her barking at Santa or chewing her traditional Christmas bone on her new bed. She's in a better place and we all know that.

Enough of the downer. The hub and I took the kids to get the tree this evening. Through the years, we have found ourselves at some pretty shady tree vendors. The tree farm that had half naked mannequins in old junker cars, Frasier Firs in a padlocked chain link dog pen and nudie magazines by the cash register comes to mind. Or the farm that boasted firs at the top of the hill and we drove 2 miles in 4 wheel drive to find that it was all a sham. We did go to a nice tree farm owned by parents' neighbors at the time. They were horitculture and forestry professors and ran a class act farm. Cut your own, Santa appearance, hot chocolate and snacks. We have played it safe the last few years and have gone to the Christmas tree gypsies not far from our house. They have had their own excitement including the owner who staggered over to the hub and asked him to get a gun and shoot him dead so he could get the h&%# out of there. That is the unknown "Deck the Halls" verse that doesn't get a lot of play. We got the tree in mood killing 70 degree weather, took it home and got it home and watered. Tomorrow will bring with it hopefully cooler weather, the decorating and the viewing of our newest holiday DVD, "John Denver and the Muppets: A Christmas Together". Happy holidays everybody!


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Instagrammy double whammy

I have officially taken a drink of the Instagram kool-aid. This Advent season, our church is conducting a sort of social media experiment. Each day is assigned a word and people are asked to post on Instagram or Facebook(Twitter might be acceptable as well) a picture that makes them think of that word. Today was "Salvation" and my first attempt at snapping a picture I felt best captured the word. This is a bit of a stretch for me as I have never been one to paint a picture or photograph something somewhat obscure and give it a profound and common name. For example, if someone painted this picture:



and on the tag it says "Persistence", I would have been the one to say to myself, "Huh?". So who am I to take a picture of something, name it and assume that another person would agree with or understand my opinion? No one. BUT, that is the beauty of this season of Advent. It is a time of great anticipation for all of us, waiting and watching for the day when a little baby was born and changed the world forever. But it is also a very personal time for me, finding the beauty, the wonder, the excitement in the journey to the manger. So when I went to the art store, one of my favorite places ever, and saw the rows of beautifully colored pastels and pencils and watercolors and paints, I saw the beautiful light of the world in so many radiant colors. Sorry...my attempt to get deep for a second.

Whatever you do to celebrate or reflect during this season, enjoy the excitement and wonder. The gift we were given is the best one ever...and He was wrapped in cloth and put to bed in a manger....how beautiful is that?


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What IS the frequency, Kenneth?

Today was a big day for me, cough cough. I made a purchase on the work credit card for the first time. Well, a purchase online from Home Depot. I have purchased many things on the internet. I actually should have several interesting things arriving sometime, used children's books to be exact. I'm wild like that. So when I went online to puchase a utility cart, yes, a utility cart from the orange home improvement store, I had no idea that I would emerge and hour and a half later feeling as though a cavity search had just been executed...and I was the recipient. Working where I do, we are a tax exempt organization. One would think that the space provided on the website for this particular ID number would be sufficient to provide proof of a tax exempt status. After three failed attempts and two phone calls later, I felt the need to drink a gallon of water and ready myself for the obligatory urine test that seemed to be the logical next step on the way to purchase a black resin utility cart with which I plan to transport toys and bouncy seats and boppys and crib sheets from one end of the hall to another. I also learned that in order to get a cart that was black vs beige, you have to pay $32.03 extra. Black dye to color the cart costs that much extra. Who knew? Also, even though I am ordering it for my area of work, I am not allowed to pick it up at the store since my name is not on the credit card and I have to have a photo ID that matches the credit card. Good grief. It is not like I bought rare Swatch watches from overseas. It's a utility cart that may have milk or apple juice spilled on it and need to be hosed off outside in the parking lot.

Either way, the cart is ordered. It better be what I ordered or someone else may be drinking a gallon of water in preparation for something....fa la la la laaaaa...la la la la.


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Power of positive thinking

Once again I am faced with a funny tummy and praying for a false alarm. My lunch choice was not the best decision. I won't tell you what it was, but it involved Thanksgiving leftovers and could be described as the poor girl's Friends "Moist Maker". If you haven't had the pleasure of viewiing that particular episode, you must...it is "The One with Ross's Sandwich". I am hoping that my brain is particularly open to suggestion at this point. The boy came home with reports of his teacher and three+ classmates succumbing to the stomach virus over Thanksgiving Break. I got to spend two plus hours with them the Tuesday before Turkey Day and, of course, got many a hug and secret whispered into my ear. So the combination of yet another puke report and a "Moist Maker" gone bad has hopefully just turned my stomach for the evening.

As I sit here typing, I am also helping G with long division. Anyone who knows me well at all is probably laughing with great gusto at this point in their day. Talk about the blind leading the blind. Truth be known, our oldest surpassed my math knowledge when she graduated from elementary school. Yes, I do have a college degree that required some trig/calculus and a senior level statistics class. I did what I had to do to pass the class (study/tutor/copious amounts of flash cards) and then lost every bit of that information two minutes post exam...never to be accessed again. As I have discussed previously, several female classmates and I had a little crush on our professor and made sure we got to every extra study session. The crush ended when we found out he was married and had heroically delivered his newborn baby on the side of the highway, along with a friendly and helpful truckdriver. I pulled a solid B+ in Zachary Stoumbos's Statistics class. He was a wonderful professor who passed away from leukemia at the young age of 44. He made the class almost enjoyable for a numbers hater like me. For that, I am etermally grateful. Got kind of deep there going from long division to former college professors. But the truth is that when you find the right person to teach you information that is difficult for you personally, it makes all the difference. I hope my children find those people early and are able to develop a healthy respect for subjects that may not be their favorites.

Enough of that. The evil Moist Maker is wearing off, I think, and I believe she finished her math homework without shedding any tears. That's a check in the win column as far as I am concerned. Now to get them settled down for the night and try to stay awake long enough to see Red's fate on the fall finale of The Blacklist. We'll see.


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A day off...well, not really

Today was my first Sunday off since probably May when we went to the world of the mouse for our vacation...boy I'd like to be back at that resort for another break. Anyway, we certainly have not been there recently in any way shape or form here recently. We all woke this morning later than usual, but somewhat rested. The mini hibernation was definitely needed. The hub woke with a weak, but renewed outlook on life. Mean wife that I am, I employed him, once he felt ready, to be in charge of the transport of all sick person clothes, blankets and sheets to the basement and into the washer. I soaked everything with Lysol and wiped down with everything else. The comforter has been put outside to air and sheets have been sanitzed. We will have no hot water for showers tonight, but those sheets will be clean. S and I have yet to succumb and I hope we can keep it that way. I will still make her go to bed with her hair up and a trash can by her side. Go ahead and call me paranoid. I will wear that title proudly.

As I write, te boy and G are riveted to an episode of Good Eats on how to make crackers. I think the episode on Phyllo dough is next on the schedule. Anything that teaches them a love for food and the science behind it is okay by me. Local celebrity sighting of the day: I saw our favorite radio personality, Frank Murphy, at our local Kroger today. Star struck as usual, I went up to reintroduce myself. I was very pleaed that he recognized me from our last meeting two years ago. He remembered the date and place and sent his best to the hub A class act he is as always. It of course never fails that I see one of our favorites plus several people from church when I run out in my grub pants and shirt, covered at least by my nice coat. I know I looked like one of those poor kids who escaped from the Temple of Doom, squinting and blinded by the sun that I had not seen in several days. Luckily I was just escaping from the sick house and not child labor by a heart ripper outer in a cave. I digress. Pray the stomach health holds. We really need a string of healthiness for a while. Really need it.

Time to go boil some noodles, peel some bananas and have some applesauce. Bland diets for the patients. Yum.


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