I'm Tired Y'all

I'm so ready for it to be 2008. Not because 2007 sucked or anything, but I'd like the month of running around like crazy people to just STOP ALREADY.

I want to clean my house. And finish the laundry and possibly even stay home for more than 45 minutes at a time.

On Saturday we finished up Christmas shopping and running errands. Then on Sunday we spent 13 hours at Mark's mom's house for a family Christmas party. On Monday I had to work (until 3!) and (poor Mark, I sent him to Walmart and the grocery store on Christmas Eve - he told everyone that he thought I hated him. lol) When I got home we got ready to go to my family Christmas get together and then we headed out to another family thing for Mark (his dad's family this time). We got home around 9 and got the house straightened up.

We read the Night Before Christmas (a tradition) and then watched Chelsea Handler and went to bed to wait for Santa. I got up early and took a shower and gave the pets their toys and treats from their stockings. (they had fun!) Awhile later, my mom got home and then I got Mark out of bed so we could open gifts.

THEN, we drove to my dad's and had breakfast (and more gifts) and then back to our house for a minute - and then to Mark's grandparents - and then home to wait on the turkey and loaf of bread that I made in our new breadmaker. The turkey took FOREVER. So we didn't get back to Mark's grandparents until like 7:00 or so. We played Win Lose or Draw. (fun!) and exchanged gifts.

And somewhere in all of that I washed all our new kitchen stuff and my mom cleaned out the cupboards so we had places to put everything. And I got the house straighted up, listened to my new radio thingy for my iPod and packed my cute new work bag.

And now it's back to the grind. Well, as grindy as you get considering I'm writing this from there. But whatever.

So, today, I will hit Target at lunch time. And after work I will um, eat more turkey and possibly go shopping with Mark to find good after Christmas deals on um, stuff. Then this weekend we are going to go out of town with some friends...but we'll be back for NYE and New Years Day - because we're cleaning the garage. We are CRAZY!

oh! and I got my SBS gift in the mail on Monday. My Secret Santa is Dawn of Alex Year One. She sent me some beautiful (and soft!) yarn, chocolate (yeah!) and a Starbucks card. She is now officially my new best friend. woohoo!

A Cruel Cruel World

The world is cruel place. Last night I there was a teaser on the E! news about Jamie Lynn Spears being pregnant - and our phone lines were down (including dsl) so I couldn't get online to check it out! Grrrr!

Know what's really funny? In July, an article appeared in the inquirer about how they thought JLS was preggers. But it turns out that she just had a pregnancy scare and had to pee on a stick. She wasn't pregnant. It also said that she got contraceptive advice from Britney. Not a good move there JLS!

Here's Your Sign

When calling the telephone company about the fact that our phone service is out - I was subjected to the following tele-prompt.

"Does the phone line that you are calling about having a dial tone?"
"Press 1 for yes and 2 for no"
::Presses 2 for NO::

"Are you calling from this line?"

Um, not if it doesn't have a dial tone! grrrr

A World Record

Today, we set a world record for the shortest amount of time spent at a family Christmas party. An hour and a half. It took me as long just to do my hair. I'm just sayin'.

First - the hair. Emily scrunched it for me. It turned out kind of cute.And also - Mark sat on the couch and needed to be lint rollered. shhh don't tell.

Here are some other random pictures, including an outtake from our photo shoot the other night (ha!)

Jack and his mama

Clyde

Salem

We call this Mark's "Fuck Grandma!" face - you know, from The Sweetest Thing?

Fun!

I've been telling Mark for a week - We need to pick a date to be pretty! What this means is, I wanted to take a photo to include in the Christmas cards for the grandparents and a couple aunts and uncles who like that sort of thing. (haha)

Being that it is the 12th and I have had the cards made out and ready to go since November 27th....I figured it was about time to do this whole picture thing.

So last night we tried several poses and we laughed our asses off (out takes will be posted tonight or tomorrow) The final product was pretty good. (see above)

*****

As a random funny - this morning as I kissed Mark goodbye (while he was still sleeping) he said..."Don't jump to conclusions. I've seen some ugly babies!" I couldn't help but laugh (and subsequently wake him up - but he remembered saying it and was laughing too) And the paranthesis: I LOVE THEM.

Starbucks Diaries

Today, as we headed to Starbucks for a bagel and hot chocolate, there was a man standing outside. I have seen this man before (in fact, I have bought him hot chocolate before) He's disheveled and carrying a duffle bag.

I get up to the counter to order my drink and bagel - and I order one more drink and a gingerbread.

But when we go to leave, the man is gone.

So, we walk through the park (where there are usually several homeless people hanging out) We see a man on a bench drinking something out of a paper bag. "I think he already has a drink" I say to my friend. "Indeed."

We see another man sitting at a table. He has his bag in front of him so I don't notice that he already has a drink. And when we get close enough and I start to say something, he reaches for his coffee. So instead of asking if he wants a drink, I say, "Oh! you have a drink. Do you like gingerbread?" He smiles and says yes, so I hand him the gingerbread. He thanks me and we walk on, laughing that we can't seem to give away a drink.

(this should tell you how much I love my coworkers since the thought of bringing it back to the office for someone was NEVER an option)

Instead, a young (20 something) guy wearing a beanie and riding a cool bike (the kind with tall handle bars) rides by. So I say, "hey! you thirsty?!" He screeches to a halt and says, "sure!" So he gets his free hot chocolate and I come back feeling like I racked up a little good karma, and a decent blog entry.

Holy Cookies!

Yesterday, while I was waiting for Mark to get home from washing his truck (a job that i knew would take awhile considering the amount of mud that i'm still cleaning out of my ears), I decide to make A BATCH of cookies. I had several recipes out over the weekend that I wanted to make, but I couldn't decide which one.

So, I prepared the dough for these cookies that you layer the two flavors of dough into a loaf pan and then chill it for a couple hours and then slice and bake (they are CUTE) and they are milk chocolate and butterscotch. (uh, yum!)

And then Mark got home and made dinner (yeah Mark!) and I got a wild hair and decided to keep making cookies. I made a batch of snickerdoodles (which is like 40000 cookies, I think) and then we (mom and I) made a frillion peppermint stick spritz. And finally I baked the choco butterscotch ones. So, I made about 100 cookies last night. I froze about 2/3 of them. So now I have those three and some peanut butter surprises in the freezer ready for xmas. (and about 4 other recipes to make still)

Fun!

Did anyone else check out "Paranormal State" last night? OMG, SCARY! LOVED It!

I Suck At This

Um, yeah, so much for Holi-DAILY-eees. Oops.

I haven't been extremely boring, but I have been extremely lazy about downloading photos off my camera. And well, some of this stuff is much better with photos. Like, the fact that I spent most of today being Christmasy. We went and got the tree this morning. I put up the lights and garland in the front window and then we decorated the tree. I got out other decorations and was generally Christmasy. The tree is pretty. But you will never know because i haven't taken a picture yet. hehe. Maybe tomorrow.

Last night, the girls came over and we watched chick flicks and had "craft night." Which really meant that we went out to dinner and then attempted to craft. Actually, I attempted it. I was kind of ADD - I did a little crochet, a little paper crafting (cards) and I baked cookies. I was all over the place. As a general rule, we all got something done.

And that day, Mark and I went out 4x4 ing. (how do you put that into words?) It was muddy and slick and scary. And the truck, it is brown. There is little paint showing at this time. Tomorrow Mark will have to dedicate approximately 4 hours to looking for said truck.

So yeah, now you're all caught up. Exciting huh?

Cool Stuff!

Look! two posts today! woot!

Here are the pics of the two early xmas presents.

Look! It's Jesus!

And baseboards! Pretty!
And matchy!

I Had...

I had some pictures downloaded last night to post. You know, so I didn't miss posting any day in December. However, my computer had other ideas. Among the other pages that said computer REFUSED to load, was blogger. It just wasn't having it. In fact, THE BIG FOUR, were all impacted.

Bank of America
Gmail
Blogger
Ice.com

It was quite sad really. And I was going to show you how I got some of my decorating done - and show off a couple of early Christmas gifts. My mom's boyfriend (she helped) made a wooden nativity that hangs and has individual little people and shepards and animals and angles and the three wise guys. The other gift was an early present from mom. She put kickboard/baseboards in the kitchen! And they match the cabinets. See, when we moved in (4 years ago? 5?) my dad hadn't done that part yet. I've been bugging him for that long. It looks perfect now! yeah!

Last night we got to sleep peacefully and no one fought or banged on the window to wake us up (read; hi! Jack!) Salem took his medicine last night with little incident and then sat on the window seat with Jack with NO HISSING! I made chocolate chip cookies. I watched ANTM and that bitch Bianca went home. (Although, can anyone tell me why they fixed Joanie's one snaggletooth two seasons ago and yet, they won't fix the trainwreck in Jenah's mouth?) So, it was a good evening. Oh! and Mark brought home my new Cherry Chocolate LG phone. yeah!!

This morning I was awoken by the GIANT RING from the new phone, and Salem's sweet little meow. Then Jack walked across my face. And I finally took the hint and got up. Of course, it was raining, but I had no idea, so I did my hair (read: curling iron) I'm silly. AND to top off all the happiness....I finally saw Salem go PEE! (anytime you can ALL CAPS the word PEE, is a good time) So, apparently his medicine and new food are working and hopefully it was just a bladder infection this time around.

I may start calling this blog the bipolar blog because hi! wasn't I just totally pissed off the other day? hehe.