Let it Snow, Let it Snow

I love snow. I think it is beautiful. Howevah ~ enough is enough. Since the middle of December we have had a yard full of the white stuff.

First of all, I am annoyed I still have Christmas lights still on the house. Yes, we are THOSE neighbors. I will admit, there were two windows of opportunity to get them down when the roof had finally become dry, but both were work days and Ryan always said it could wait until the weekend. The weekend always brought more snow.

At least I got the pop-up Santa out of our yard as well as the lights off the little tree and the rope lights down from our entryway. Those were the only power cords I could free from the layers of ice during our one day of 50 degree weather. The blow-up snow man and penguin are still out there, but thankfully the snow has them buried. The two spiral Christmas trees are still visible, but I tried. Their cords won't budge.

Sigh, I will have to wait yet another week. If it hits March I will really have to hang my head. I have noticed that the other people in the neighborhood don't have theirs down either, but we were the only ones on our street that decorated this year. We look like the sore thumb.

Secondly, why does it snow EVERYTIME Ryan goes out of town? Shoveling really sucks arse. Thank the LORD for Bill. I love Bill. He is our retired neighbor. He was forced into early retirement due to a back injury and is chronically bored to tears. His favorite winter hobby? Attaching his snow blower with extra large blade attachment to the front of his riding lawn mower and obsessively plowing our street. He claims he only does it so HE can get out of the neighborhood, but he can't fool me. He does my driveway as well as five other neighbors. He's a sweetheart.

OH and ONE more snow story. My family cracks me up.

My brother answers a phone call from my mother:
"Hello"
"I am an AMAZING driver, do you know why? I almost got into a car accident."

How he kept a straight face is beyond me.

"What happened?"
"I was on the interstate" - she drives a very expensive, fast, non-snow friendly car, and she drives like the little old lady from Pasadena (for those who don't listen to 60s music, that is really, really fast)

"And the guy in front of me slammed on his brakes. I hit my brakes and they DIDN'T WORK!" - someone should really tell her that ice can do that when you are going 60 mph.

"There was a wall to the left of me and a car to the right of me. I started sliding all over the place and even sideways down the road, but I didn't hit anyone!!! Aren't you glad I am a GREAT driver?"

My brother politely ended the conversation without taking any shots at her. What a great son he is. He turned to me (the only part of the phone call I heard was his random yas and uh huhs) and said -

"Mom says becareful. The roads are really bad."

Thats my family. They keep me laughing endlessly.

-Sara

O Christmas Tree, O Christmas Tree!

Here it is. My lovely tree as it stood on Christmas day at 3:00 AM. When we first put the tree up it had beautiful gold bows all lined up in a corner about three feet off the ground care of my oldest. There were also dozens of mismatched ornaments scattered by kid hands. Those lasted about three days. A Monday hit and a group of two year olds had fun pulling them off and sorting them into buckets. When our angel was placed at the top, she stood up straight and proud. About two weeks later while I was plating lunch, the "triplets" tried to use the top of the toy box as a sled. They propped it up against the tree and tried to climb aboard. It didn't work so well. Ryan wanted to fix her, but I asked him not to touch her. Although slightly crooked, she seemed to be looking down on the kids as they played.

Notice that small red bag near the top? Yeah, I didn't either. It wasn't until I told the kids I saw something in the tree (referring to their MP3 players I hid in it) that my oldest spotted the red bag for Mommy. Sometimes that man of mine tears me up!


This beautiful tree was sent to us by our loyal listener Shawn. The gate cracks me up! The last time I used a gate was to keep three 11 months old in my family room. It wasn't long before the triplets figured out they could use their combined weight pry it from its spot. Next I tried using furniture to help reinforce the gate. It wasn't long before they were scaling it! That was the end of our gate phase.

I have to mention Shawn, I am super jealous of your gorgeous fireplace and red wall! I really do need to pull out some paint around here and have fun. Oh, and I dig the blue tree skirt. I love blue :)

And on to my FAVORITE tree this year! Andrea from Minnesota sends us this picture, and I have to admit, at first it confused me. It was one of those days where I was only half paying attention to the screen, but then it hit me - it's her tree! I will let her tell the story herself as she is the self proclaimed reigning champ of pathetic Christmas trees:


"I came to know my first pathetic Christmas tree when I was 19 years old. I had finally taken the plunge into true adulthood by leaving home and becoming roommates with my very best friend who was renting a 1 bedroom apartment. My friend and had both just been laid off from our jobs and had absolutely no money for Christmas that year. In an effort to be creative and different my friend and I took a tall house plant that I had gotten as a house warming gift when I first moved in, and attempted to decorate it. Unfortunately the only thing we could use as decorations was tinsel. When we tried to put anything heavier than that on our "Christmas Plant" The poor thing would tip over spilling dirt on the table it was placed on.

My next encounter with the pathetic tree happened in 2002. I had been in my own place with my daughter for a little over a year. I had just met and began dating my husband that fall, and this was our first Christmas together. We were given a tree by uncle. He had gotten the tree as a hand me down from one of his neighbors. We knew the tree was fairly old but nothing prepared us for what happened when got it set up and ready to decorate. The some of the plastic pine needles would fall off every time we place and ornament on it. Pine needles falling off is something I would expect from a live Christmas tree not from a fake tree. My uncle was not kidding when he said the tree was old. This tree was ancient. To add to the "antique" charm of this tree were the hand me down ornaments that were without hooks to hang them with. My husband, the creative man that he is, ran out and bought a couple boxes of paper clips and we used those as hooks for the ornaments.

Now we come to the lovely tree that you see in the photos. Once again we were given a hand me down tree. This time our tree came complete with missing parts for the tree stand. My mom tried to rectify the situation by purchasing a tree stand from a local thrift store. Unfortunately the stand she purchased was intended for the wide trunk of a live tree. No matter how hard we tried we could not get the skinny trunk or our imitation tree to fit. My daughter was totally heartbroken and had fears that without a tree Santa would not be stopping at our home on Christmas Eve night. The mom in shot straight into action. While my kids were in my daughter's room watching a movie and my husband was out getting more tape to wrap gifts, I got out all the construction paper we owned and got to work. When my husband came home and saw what I was doing and how hard I was working at it. He hugged me, called me creative and proclaimed my paper tree the best Christmas tree he has ever had.

I call all my unique Christmas trees pathetic purely for the humor factor. In all honestly there is something beautiful about each pathetic tree that I have had. The first symbolized my independence as an adult on her own. The second is a symbol of the first and many more Christmases to come with my husband. The last tree shows that a mother will do just about anything to ensure that their child/children have the happiest holiday possible."

I LOVE it! Thanks to the listeners for sharing their tree pictures!

- Sara

Real Pain in the...

On Sunday, we did what thousands of other families do the weekend after Thanksgiving. (no, we didn't sleep off our turkey hangovers with our hands in the waistband of our pants while snoring on the couch watching football...) We put up our Christmas decorations. Our little Jelly Bean was quite fascinated with the whole process. She thought the multicolored lights were "really pretty", the glass balls were "really shiny", the snowman that I put around the house were "really sparkly"...I think you get the picture. Any-who, as we were assembling the Christmas tree, which by the was "really scratchy" I tried to get her to work on one of her wooden puzzles that usually keep her occupied for a few minutes at a time, allowing her dad and I to get something quick finished up without her underfoot. She was working on one that had shapes on it. It included a hexagon and an octagon, which when put back into the wooden board in the exact way they were cut out, fit quite nicely, but if you happen to get them turned around a little, you have a tough time wedging the little suckers in. (The puzzle maker didn't make all the sides exact) The conversation we have while I'm putting up the tree goes something like this...

her: "Mommy, this puzzle isn't playing nice"
me: "It isn't? Keep trying, you'll get it figured out"
her: "(some kind of moaning groaning sound and a big sigh)"
me: "Are you getting it?"
her: "This is a pain in the butt, Mommy."
me: (after trying not to laugh out loud) "Who did you hear say that?"
her: "Me. I said it. Silly Mommy..."
me: (directed to the hubby) "We really need to start being careful what we say. That could have very easily been a little worse."
him: "Heh, yeah, but at least she used it in the right context."

Proud papa, all the way. Way to go Jelly Bean!