The Catch-up Christmas Post

Yeah, I know I'm a lazy blogger, and with Christmas come and gone, no one is really all that interested in seeing pictures of the event anymore. We're probably all on Christmas overload. But bear with me, since I feel obligated to talk about it.

I worked a half a day on Christmas eve, and then made the mad dash all over town. One of my coworkers was kind enough to volunteer her husband to play Santa for us and assmeble J's new bike, which is really the only thing that he asked for this year. Bless them for doing this for us! I never would have found the time to do it around here AND keep it a secret.

That freed me up to get all of the other gifts wrapped and under the tree before picking munchkin up from Abuela's house.

He and the nephew came home to find a tree just brimming with presents, and much inspection ensued.

At one point the nephew took a header straight down into a pile of gifts, and required assistance to get out without ripping half of them open. Gotta love the enthusiasm of little boys.

That night, before bed, J had to go outside and sprinkle glittered oatmeal on the lawn. He received this as a goodie at his school Christmas party with a little poem attached that read "Sprinkle on the lawn at night. The moon will make it sparkle bright! As Santa's reindeer fly and roam, this will guide them to your home!" What a cute little idea!


Of course, we left a note for Santa along with cookies and milk, and a bowl of carrots and celery for the reindeer. Can't have enough things to bribe Santa with, I suppose.

Morning arrived, and J was so excited to step out into the living room to find that Santa hadn't forgotten him!


It was a little strange, this being the first year that my parents haven't been here for the holidays. But we made the best of it by making use of Skype to all be together during the gift opening. It wasn't quite the same, but it did work out well, and it was really nice to get to be together in some way.

J loved all of his gifts, but the winner of the day was the Snuggie made for him by Nana. He's been pining for one ever since seeing the commercial for it several months ago, and begging me to order him one. Funny what captures a child's heart. Nana did an amazing job, making his out of dinosaur fleece, and even managing to package it along with the very same identical book light that comes with the 'real' one. Way to go Nana! Despite it being 80 degrees on Christmas day, J stayed snuggled under it for the rest of the day, not even getting up to open the rest of his gifts.



Handmade Christmas was a huge success, I think. Everything received and everything given seemed to be a hit. Of course, there were plenty of purchased gifts for the boys as well, but certainly not the amount as in years past. And the fact that the handmade ones were loved more by J than the store bought ones made me a super-proud Mama.

This post is getting long, so I'll save the handmade recap for another time. I don't know if we'll all agree to do it again this year, but I know that I'm certainly up for trying to keep the tradition up.

Hope everyone's 2009 is off to a great start.

Wow, it's really here

It's hard to believe that it's Christmas already, isn't it? I mean, weren't we just at Easter? Crazy how fast this year has gone by!

So it's Christmas eve already, and I'm not ready at all. Well, I mean, the things that needed shipping got shipped, but all the gifts that have come in the mail still need to be unloaded from their boxes and put under the tree. All the gifts for those living here still need wrapping. I've got to work this morning, then make a delivery to a needy coworker-- I'm giving J's old bike and some clothes and toys to her grandson. No child should get totally screwed on Christmas, and J doesn't use the bike anyways. He's so big his knees bang the handlebars. :)I hope Santa got his request for a new one. :)

I'm being a bit of a flake, but there's a picture I wanted to post here, just to prove to you guys exactly how stubborn my boy is, or maybe how wonderful his school is...

The Christmas pageant was a week ago, and J's class had been chosen to play the role of "townspeople". They asked that we dress the children in dark clothing and sandals to go under their costumes.

I didn't worry much about exactly what dark clothing he was wearing. After all, it was going to be under a costume.



Now, I know it's a bad picture, but my little camera can only zoom so far, but do you see him? Yup! The one right there in the center of the stage refusing to wear a costume at all and carrying Dino, no less! To be honest I'm surprised he went up at all. I had promised him that if he tried and changed his mind, he could always come sit with us and just watch. He's not much for performances, despite his ham-ish nature at home.

So he stands there, center stage in his beach break t-shirt, tossing a dino around while the other children sing and look so sincere. Seriously, do you see the little girl angel on the right? How precious! And the girl that played Mary? OMG, she could bring you to tears in that way that only a 4 year old actress could. She was beyond words sweet.

And then we get to the part where they sing "Mighty Day", and my kid whips a harmonica out of his pocket and starts totally rocking it. I wanted to bury my head, but at the same time I was laughing my butt off because these are the moments that we're going to remember forever. It's what makes J who he is. And honestly, besides putting a tiny kink in the preschool play, what was he hurting?

I went to retrieve him from his class after the play, and thankfully his teacher was on the same page with me. She adores my kid, understands his quirks, and we couldn't be luckier to have her.

Anyway, I'm off to work, then home to wrap presents! Eeek! Merry Christmas, everyone!

Christmas Recap

With the final hours of the year trickling by, I figured I had better try and squeeze in the Christmas recap. And holy crap! What in incredible Christmas we all had!

Of course, Santa and the family was more than generous with the gifting to the J-man. Between the Hot Wheels and the Planet Heroes and the Legos and the puzzles, my house is starting to look more like a Toys R Us research lab.

We did Christmas morning here at home, opening gifts from family out of state, and of course, reveling in the spoils of Santa. J was a little upset that Santa only nibbled at the humongous plate of cookies that he and Steven decorated together, but he got over it quickly as he dove into the goodies left under the tree.

He got all sorts of cool stuff, including this really neat Black and Decker drill and flashlight set with a battery pack that slides off-- Just like Dada's tools!

And here's the picture proving that he's way too familiar with the world of vet med:


Yes, he IS looking in the dog's ears with the flashlight. The picture I don't have to share with you is the one of him using the drill to "clean" the poor dog's ears. And sweet Kelli- she just stands there and takes it. She's perfectly content so long as someone's touching her.

After we opened all of our gifts at home, we packed ourselves in the car and headed over to my parent's house for round two where J was, once again, thoroughly spoiled. The whole time, I sat wondering where in the world all of these new toys were going to go! Some of the hits of the day (aside from the Planet Heroes, which he lusted after for months), were his Smart Cycle, and a giant flatbed Tonka truck complete with a battery operated bulldozer. The thing is about 3 feet long, and super cool.

He played so hard and for so long that around 5 pm, he actually fell asleep standing up. Yeah, I know, I thought that was only something done in cartoons, too. But sure enough, he did, standing right in the middle of the back porch, and when he did, he crashed, hitting his head on the table on the way down, and he slept until nearly 10.
Can you see the bump on his forehead?


The day was full of excellent goodies, and the kids were overjoyed and surprised by everything, but the biggest surprise of the day was mine. You see, when making my Christmas wish list this year, I included such useful things as a new set of headphones (Thanks Mom! They're great!), a new travel coffee mug to keep my car from having the aroma of week old spillage (thanks Jess. It's the best one I've ever used, right down to the clip that holds it to my purse handle!), a subscription to Interweave Knits (which I also got, thanks to Mom), and various other little stuff that I really needed and wanted, and never would have bought for myself. But at the end of the list, and more as a joke than anything else, I asked for a spinning wheel.

Yeah, I know, that's pretty steep, and more than I would ever want or expect anyone to spend, ever. I should have known that if it was on the list, and Dad had even a glimpse of it, it'd end up under the tree. But still, it took my breath away as the paper was torn from the box, revealing this:



Oh my goodness! It is the most lovely and wonderful thing ever, and I'm completely in love!

Of course, before I could play with it, I had to finish it and assemble it, and that my friends, is another post entirely.

You know, my SIL got one, too. She received hers almost a month ago, and how she managed to not spill it to me in all that time amazes me. She's a stronger woman than I!

I'll leave you now with just some of my favorite shots from the holiday.





Happy New Year everyone.

Does anyone, ever?

True to form, it's Christmas eve, and even though I didn't set very many knitting goals for Christmas, I've still managed to fall short. Of course, I knew about 3 weeks ago that one of the things I was working on was not going to get finished. It just wasn't turning out the way I wanted it to, and so I quit while I was behind. Of course, without that gift, it put my shopping in a pinch, and I have yet to find the right substitute for this recipient. You see, I was really excited about this one. The pattern screamed this person's name to me, and I thought it would have been perfect. The yarn I chose for it was the skein I went to the end of the earth--or at least to the Orlando Needleworks Show for, and I had high hopes. Alas, the yarn did not do what I expected it to do, and I guess I can chalk this failure up to inexperience and getting in over my head. Of course, if I'd bothered to swatch first, I'd have known what the yarn was going to do. No big deal, though. I found a replacement pattern that I think will be lovely in this yarn, and so it's not a total loss. It's just not going to be a Christmas present. But I wish the recipient could know the lengths I went to to TRY and make something special. Now they're going to end up with a last minute gift certificate, which makes me feel somewhat ass-like.

I decided that my falling water scarf, which I've actually had done for a while, besides weaving in the ends, would make a nice gift for one of my grandmothers, and so that was an easy thing to accomplish. Yay me! One knitted gift done.

While I was busy hemming and hawing over the above mentioned failed project, I grabbed a ball of stash yarn and cast on for something I hadn't even planned on making. It turned out quite lovely, and it amazed me how I could create something on the fly like that, and have it turn out perfectly, while the planned and thought-out projects always seem to go to crap on me. I can't show you a picture of the finished object because obviously, I haven't gifted it yet, but here's a small peek.


Sorry about the picture being washed out, but it just wouldn't photograph well without the flash. Still, it's lovely in person--heathered gray and a subtle pink for the snowflake design.

Then last weekend, because I'm insane, I went and cast on for another scarf, thinking that if I gave one to one grandmother, I should probably make one for the other. I was going to do the same pattern, but since I was fresh out of laceweight yarn, I ended up choosing the Irish Hiking Scarf. It's a lovely and simple knit that I can do with my eyes closed. Unfortunately, I'm only about 1/3 of the way through it as we speak, and yes, it really is Christmas eve. Ugh! So much for that. But, my dad is leaving to go to TN on the 27th, and if I can' finish it before then, perhaps he can take it with him and deliver it a few days late. So, all hope is not quite lost yet.

So that's the saga of my Christmas knitting. Sorry if your gift isn't finished in time, but as you can see, it certainly wasn't for lack of trying/thought.

I can hardly believe that it's Christmas eve already. Every year time seems to move just a little more quickly, doesn't it? In all, 2007 hasn't been a bad year, but I'm hoping that 2008 will bring some long-overdue changes around here. In the meantime, I wish you and yours a very happy holiday, filled with family, love and laughter.

A Jolly Old Elf

After therapy and a bad haircut (I swear no one understands how to cut curly hair!), I took J to visit with Santa at the mall. He was all excited about it until it was actually his turn.

J's going through this phase right now where he's scared of things. All kinds of things. Things that he's never been afraid of before. The sound of the vacuum, the monsters he imagines in the closet, the bath tub drain sucking him down from all the way across the bathroom, and now, we can add fat guys in red suits to the list.

Uncle B, if you're reading this, yes, that is SO a "chingrin" he's got on his face.


He was very brave when I told him that it was ok to sit on Santa's knee and tell him what he wanted for Christmas, and he did so, hesitantly. But it went downhill from there. Santa couldn't understand what he was telling him he wanted, and J just got upset and looked at me and said, "Mama, I thought Santa already knew what I wanted."

It was truly distressing to him, but he thanked Santa, reminded him that had been a good boy, and then grabbed my hand and nearly dragged me through the gate to "safety." I guess all kids go through this stage, huh?

We're staying in the holiday spirit, though. Earlier in the week J and his big cousin worked together to create this:


I've done a small bit of Christmas knitting, even though I vowed to not stress myself out with gift knitting this year. Just a few things, and if I don't finish them I've got backups.

Lots of other stuff going on at the moment, but I'll fill you in on those later. For now, let's just get through the holidays, right?