Stupid Comment Spam

Apologies to my readers/commenters, you are going to have to enter the word verification to leave a comment now. I've been spammed and I don't appreciate it!

I don't know why they call it word verification, when the letters make up no English words with which I am familiar!

The Tree is Up!

We got a gorgeous pre-lit 9' slim tree from Wal-Mart for a really great price. Brad picked it up last weekend, and we put it up yesterday. I was shocked at how quickly it went together. The thing is so beautiful! Now we just need to get ornaments on it.

I have to admit that I hate real trees. First of all, Brad and I are allergic to pretty much all kinds of Christmas trees. It's not fun to spend your holiday season sneezing and rubbing your itchy eyes. Other reasons I hate real trees include the following:

• They're high maintenance.
• I stress about them catching on fire.
• It's more trouble to go shopping for the perfect tree than to lug the fake one out of the attic each year.
• They leave needles EVERYWHERE.
• They're hard to get level and straight in the tree stand (at least, that was my experience growing up - seems like when we had real trees, they were always crooked).
• I can barely remember to water the plants on my front porch; having to water the tree in my living room is more than I want to hassle with.
• Getting rid of it at the end of the season seems like it would be a big production.

So Nyssa will grow up only having experienced a fake tree each Christmas. Poor, deprived child, huh?! :-)

Thanksgiving!

We went to Barrington, IL for the Thanksgiving holiday to celebrate with Brad's mom, her husband, and their daughter. We flew out Thursday morning and returned home late last night. It was a pretty good trip. It was cold, and it was snowing a little bit when we arrived.

To entertain ourselves on the drive from the airport to Barrington, I put the language for the Hertz Never Lost GPS on French. On the way back to the airport yesterday, it was on German. I wonder what the next people who rent the car are going to think. :-P

I was without a camera for most of the trip simply because I was being too lazy to carry it around with me. I missed a few good photo opportunities, such as the hundred or so geese all congregating around a sign that read, "Beware of dog."

We went to a mall on Friday afternoon. It actually wasn't very crowded at all, but then, this particular mall doesn't even have a Starbucks (I was sorely disappointed, as I have an addiction to the soy chai latte these days). The six of us posed for a photo with Santa. He was a pretty creepy Santa and looks none too pleased with our little group in the photo (that I will share later when I get to the disc that it's on).

Inside this mall there was a candy store called "Fannie May Candies." Are the mortgage industry and housing market in THAT much trouble?!

'Tis the season for Christmas carols. It's pretty sad that Thanksgiving weekend isn't even over yet and already I have grown weary of, "Let it Snow." I swear, if I hear it one more time, I may scream. *note to self, check iPod Christmas play list!

"Do You Hear What I Hear" used to be one of my favorite Christmas carols. That is, it was a favorite until yesterday when I realized just how incredibly dumb the following line is:

"A child, a child, shivers in the cold.
Let us bring him silver and gold."

I don't know about you, but if I knew that a child was shivering in the cold, I'd be bringing warm blankets and a nice coat, hat, and set of mittens! Gold? Silver? Really, now?

I am really just poking fun at the lyrics of the song, not the actual visitation of the wise men. Notes about the wise men - 1) the Bible never says there were three wise men. There were three gifts (gold, francensense, and myrrh). 2) They did not arrive the night of the birth of Christ, so nativity sets that have the wise men as part of them aren't really accurate. 3) My uncle's favorite joke of all time is the following:

Q: Did you know the wise men were firemen?
A: Yep, they came from afar. (a fire, said with a prominent west Texas accent).

I always thought it would be neat for our family to make a little birthday cake on Christmas day since it's Jesus' birthday (well, the day we celebrate, anyway). However, with Nyssa's birthday being the day after, that's a lot of cake to have sitting around! So I am going to let go of the idea of baking a cake for Christmas day.

I am FINALLY ready to celebrate Christmas! There were several stores that started putting out their Christmas decor in October, before Halloween! I like to celebrate my holidays in order, so let me please get through Thanksgiving with fall leaves, pumpkins, turkeys and other orange decor before you start pushing red and green and ornaments and lighted garlands on me, please!

I am mindful every day of the gift of Christ, but love the month-long emphasis of Christmas. I do get overwhelmed with the commercialism of the holiday and frustrated at the attempt of so many to reduce October/November/December to "The Holiday Season" and not make any mention of CHRISTMAS DAY in an effort to be politically correct. I could go on and on, but I will stay off my soap box for this one. Suffice it to say, we are celebrating Christmas in this home - celebrating the birth of Christ!

Little Pitchers have Big Ears

Brad and I were putting up the Christmas tree this afternoon. Nyssa was hanging out on my back while we fluffed the branches. I don't recall what happened, but something caused me to say, "Crap." Not two seconds later, a little voice from behind me said, "Bap." I paused for a minute, then looked wryly at Brad and asked him, "Did she just imitate me saying ,'Crap?!'"

Guess it's time to start REALLY watching what I say! I'm pretty mindful of my language anyway, but I don't want our 11-month-old (as of tomorrow) running around saying, "Crap! Crap!" That word does NOT need to be in her vocabulary list!

Trash? Treasure?

Got $10 to burn? Order a something!

http://www.somethingstore.com/index.html

Very, very weird.

Friday Ramblings

God's funny. Last night Brad told me the Ozarka water guy was coming today to deliver our monthly supply of water and a water cooler (we're water snobs, ok?). I asked him to find out what time he was coming so I could be home. Immediately upon waking up this morning, I called Brad this morning to find out what time and he told me all they gave him was a 5-hour window. I was NOT a happy camper about being stuck at home for five hours when I so desperately needed to go to the grocery store. I threw a small fit and so Brad called them back to ask them to move the delivery time to Tuesday. I wasn't thrilled with that either since that meant I had to get water from the grocery store in addition to everything else we needed, but at least I could get out. Not five minutes after I got off the phone with Brad, the Ozarka water guy showed up with our delivery. So we had that silly tiff for nothing! Note to self, don't make phone calls immediately after waking up in the morning.

I had a challenging time shopping today because I left our Beco carrier at home. I almost ALWAYS shop with Nyssa on my back, because it is just easier that way. She's out of my way back there, her arms and hands are contained so she can't grab at stuff, and she likes it best back there. I had a ring sling (one shoulder carrier) in my car, so I ended up using that half the time and letting her ride in the cart the rest of the time. What a pain that was! I seriously debated calling a babywearing friend of mine that lives in the area where I was shopping to see if I could borrow her Beco, but decided we would just make do this time. I will be putting a carrier in my car this evening so I don't get caught like that again!!! It was quite challenging.

While in the soda aisle I passed a woman who commented on Nyssa in the sling. She said, "You have your hands full, literally!" Well, no, actually I didn't - the purpose of the sling is so that I have my hands free! I didn't bother correcting her, what would the point have been?

I bought organic eggs. On the carton it states that the eggs are from vegetarian hens. Um...since when were chickens omnivores or carnivores? I'm a little disturbed at the idea of a chicken eating meat. On a really random side note, my cockatiel loves scrambled eggs. So what does that make her? She can't have cheese (birds lack the enzymes necessary to break down milk proteins), so would she be an ovo-vegetarian? And why do I keep trying to spell "vegetarian" with three Es, like "vegeterian?"

I ran across a very interesting video game toy this afternoon. It had what amounted to a stationary bike and the video game was a cycling route. It was geared toward children, since the bike was all kinds of crazy colored plastic and the object of the game was to collect letters of the alphabet in sequence. I guess if kids are going to play video games, they might as well get some physical exercise, too! I suppose it's no different than watching TV while riding the stationary bike at the gym.

In Order

could we please celebrate our holidays in order?

oh, and i discovered the lock buttons on the dish washer and oven, thankfully!