Like I mentioned in the last post, I feel like I can't get ahead of myself these days! It's not stressing me out though, surprisingly! I feel like I'm doing just enough to get by and do the things I want to do. I don't want to rush the holidays, but I am really looking forward to January to sort of start over, enjoy a calendar with a little more white space and some much needed time to just stay at home.
With that said, the holidays are in full swing over here! I got my Christmas cards in the mail this week (they were stuffed and addressed for about a week before they actually made it to the mailbox) and Heath put up the rest of our lights on Sunday. Did you know that half of our lights stayed up since last year? They did. The thing was, we were soooo busy this year! It seemed like every weekend was jam packed with things to do...things that were more fun than getting on a ladder to take the lights down. Heath managed to get them off the right side of the house. It was the left side (the tallest side) that managed to stay up. There were a couple weekends in the late winter/spring that he did think about getting them down, but it was always too windy. So, as the weeks went on, and we arrived in August, we decided to just leave 'em up. I think Heath intends to step it up a little each year, and I love that.
Backing up a little bit...on Saturday afternoon, Brody and I had our first experiences as Salvation Army Bell Ringers! I'd always wanted to do it, Heath was never interested, so I figured that since I had a little side kick we'd give it a try! I figured that he would be entertained by talking to all the people passing by. And he was...for the first 30 minutes of our 2 hour shift! He had probably 99% of the people that walked past dropping money in! One woman put in a $20 bill because she thought he was so cute! He sang Jingle Bells for a little bit and was having a good time. Then he started to get bored. He noticed that there was a sidewalk that ran about 50 yards down to the end of the building. He took off running down the sidewalk...It was really busy and I was worried he'd wander into the parking lot, so I left my purse and took off after him with my apron on and bell in hand. This happened a couple of times. Luckily, Heath's grandpa was sitting right inside the door while his grandma was shopping and offered to have Brody sit with him for a few minutes. I was so grateful! I had planned for Heath to come take him to the bathroom after an hour, so by the time he arrived, I was ready for him to take Brody home! I did the last half of the shift myself. I would like to do it again next year, but if I do I need to have a second adult there with me! I have to say that I was amazed by people's generosity. I would say that about 90% of the people walking in or out of the store put money in the kettle. Also, I had a lot of people thanking me for volunteering. I didn't anticipate that, but now I get it and will thank others for ringing, too.
Saturday night, we went to Tammy and Greg's (Heath's aunt and uncle) for a Mallicoat Cousin Christmas! It was a good time, and they had a great turnout. Madelyn got to play with Dylynn and Brody got to play with Nicholas and Garrett. Unfortunately, I didn't get any pictures of the boys!
On Sunday, after Heath put the lights up, we headed up to the Plaza for dinner and to see the lights! I didn't have my camera because I thought I lost it, so I had to rely on my crappy cell phone camera! I woke up at 3:00 in the morning on Sunday night and couldn't fall back asleep because I was so upset about it. Then, I realized that I forgot which coat I wore on Saturday...went into the coat closet and checked another pocket and there it was. What a relief! Even though I would LOVE a new DSLR camera, it's not really in the budget right now and we paid $400 for my camera a year ago. When we are in town, we usually celebrate our anniversary at the Plaza, so we see the lights then. Now that we have kids, we'll be making a separate trip each year. For some reason, Brody got the idea that we were going to a toy store. Luckily, there is a really fun toy store there that we spent a good amount of time in. It made me wish I wasn't done shopping for them! We found a lot of fun stuff! We mostly just walked around, went into the new Sur La Table store and in the Sav-Art Gallery to see our friend Jenny! Then we went to dinner at California Pizza Kitchen. Heath was in the mood for some pizza after being in Taiwan! It turned out to be a great choice because they have these huge ice cream sundaes for $1 with the kids meals!
I also managed to bake my cookies for my Mothers and More cookie exchange. I thought I had picked a winner this year, but unfortunately I didn't even get 3rd place. I made White Chocolate Cherry Shortbread cookies. They were pretty good, but I think everyone was in the mood for chocolate because it seemed that all the winners were chocolate cookies! I didn't manage to take any pictures of the cookies or at the exchange, but I did get this one of Madelyn enjoying her cookie. Love it when she keeps her pig tails in...doesn't happen often. In fact, these lasted a good 20 minutes. Possibly a record.
I think that catches me up to today...and I have a feeling this isn't the last of the catch up posts you'll see over the next couple of weeks. We have some fun stuff planned for this weekend! A friend's Christmas party, Ugly Sweater pub crawl, another cookie exchange, Holiday Express train at Union Station, Crown Center, Brody's Christmas Song performance at church....I think that's everything. And at some point I plan to clean the bathrooms, vacuum the floors, wrap gifts, and bake more cookies! Only one more week 'til Christmas and we're going to make the most of it!
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