The Abyss

As I'm standing on the brink of 2014, my toes curling over the edge, heart pounding, stomach in nervous contortions, I'm not sure if I'm looking into a new adventure, a grand ride on the roller coaster of life, or if I'm about to step off into an abyss, doing a perfect swan dive as I clench my eyes tight and pray for a soft landing and no scary deep sea monsters at the bottom.....

The thoughts of a dark abyss turned my mind's attention to a known unfathomably chasm in my own house.  In previous years, my husband has had to do many plumbing projects in our bathroom.  It's gotten so that he's done so many, pulled the nails out of this little kick board so many times, that it no longer wants to stay connected to the wall.  

So every day, when I use the facilities, I am staring right into this horrible abyss.  It's full of thick cobwebs and I swear to goodness, something furry that I am loath to investigate.  I just push the scale up to the loose board and it sort of props itself up enough. 

I do not believe in making new years' resolutions.  I don't make bucket lists.  But the first thing on my 2014 to do list is to dig some nails out of the junk drawer and hammer this board back tight to the wall.

Or maybe first thing on my to do list should be to organize the junk drawer.  I can never find what I'm looking for when I finally wrench it open!

Our Christmas Report

Christmas Eve pajamas....a must have for every well dressed kid on Christmas morning!

Olive is positive Leah needs help opening gifts.

Sarah figures out her stocking....sadly it was empty by the time she did!

Emma is pretty sure the big present has her name on it.

It may have been a quieter Christmas this year, with my husband out to sea and my son moving out, but it was still magical to wake up (or actually, be woken up!) by an excited daughter who cheered and grinned with every opened package and immediately tried on all her new clothes and gave 99% of them a thumbs up!  

My best gift this year?  It was when my daughter turned to me and said, "You're a pretty cool Mom." 

I know I am.....now don't you forget it!!

The Eve Of The Eve

It's the Eve of the Eve

The start of parties galore

Of cookies and laughter

And torn wrapping paper

It's carols and family

And small children dancing

Eyes full of twinkles and

Hopeful Santa wishes

It's home and it's joyful

And it's all I could ask for

Paper Counting

Over the last few months, I have gathered paper at any garage sale I wandered through.  Various sizes of index cards, foam shapes, stickers.  If the price was right, I bought it.

I am the craft Aunt.  The one who would rather pull out glue and paper instead of playing a game.  I've crafted my way through all the nephews sleepovers and when I used to babysit regularly, after nap time was craft time.

So for Christmas last year, at my sister's advice, I gave them boxes of paper, glue, markers, and tape.  This year, I'm doing the same thing, times five.  I know I have 1,000 sheets of white paper.  So that is 200 in each box.

And yes.  I counted.

My daughter said that was silly, that their Moms would just dump it all in a box for sharing and it is not worth counting each page.  True, very true, but for that moment, on Christmas day, when they open their boxes, they will know it is even Steven, equal and fair, right down to how many stickers each boy gets.

Or rather, I will know it.  And that makes me very happy.

Sweater Envy

For two days in a row, I have been on the receiving end of some very serious sweater envy.  It feels really nice when something you are wearing (and love) is found to be as drool worthy as you thought it was!  

At the bank, the teller raved about my (very tasteful) snowflake Christmas sweater.  It looks so warm and perfect for the season!  Where did I get it, if I don't mind her asking?

I don't mind.  Value Village.  This past spring, I happened to hit a sweet sale: all sweaters 50% off.  I love cardigan sweaters and I love super sales and I found some wonderful deals, that I then had to wait six months to wear.  Snowflake sweaters don't wear well in spring time!

But when I pulled it out from the depths of my furiously jam packed closet this week, I started to second guess myself.  Snowflakes?  Really?  Seems almost too close to ugly sweater territory.  I tried it on and remembered why I bought it!  It's warm and cozy and cute and fits just right.

I don't mind sharing where I got my wonderful sweater....but it won't help the teller buy one.  At Value Village, clothes are usually one of a kind!

The next day I wore a sweater my sister loved.  Where did I get it, she asked.  Oh, um, remember the garage sale we were both just at?  And I went back later?  Um, there.  It was just waiting for me and my 25 cents to come along!

She may have scored two perfect pyrex dishes and lids, but I got a drool worthy sweater.  It seems pretty even!

The Reasons I Can And The Reason I Won't

Since my husband is out to sea for another 40 day patrol, and the kids were gone with friends, there was no one here to tell me it was too late or they were too tired or didn't I just want to watch TV instead of doing some late night shopping.....

All reasons why I can throw on a jacket, grab the keys, and do some Christmas shopping at 8:30 PM on a Saturday night.

It was all going so well, too.  I found everything on my list, there were no lines to wait for anything, I was on a roll.

Until I got out to the parking lot, the dark, wet, rainy parking lot, and my hands were full of bags because I didn't want to hassle with pushing a cart back inside, and I walked to my white Chevy Tahoe, pushed the unlock button on the key fob in my hand, opened the back door and put my stuff down on an empty seat, that before I'd gone into this last store had been full of shopping bags.

I've been robbed, I thought, with a sick sinking feeling.  And whoever did it was super stinky, because my car still smells like them.  I looked to the steering wheel and saw two car fresheners hanging there.  And they were thoughtful thieves too, trying to mask their bad odor!

Or, this is not my car.

No, this is a white Chevy Tahoe, parked exactly the same direction as mine, in the exact same spot as mine, only one row over.  

I quickly pulled my bags out, shut their car door, and walked over to my white Chevy Tahoe, with all of it's bags of gifts still inside, and no horrible stench, and got in, locked my doors and got the heck out of there.

The reasons I can are clear; the reason I won't go shopping that late again is because in the dark, all white Chevy Tahoes look alike.

It's a pretty common car in these parts!

December Love

My favorite season is summer, but it is closely followed by December.  I love the season of giving, the Christmas music, the family gatherings, the trees and cookies and the love.

But mostly I love the lights.

I must have a moth soul because if it's bright and shiny, I'm drawn to it like a flame!  It could explain why I love Vegas so....

I love lights on the tree, and around the house and seeing the glow of lights on a dark, cold night makes me grin.  It makes me want to bundle up, hold tight to three dog's leashes, and walk with my honey through our neighborhood, oohing and aahing as I go.

And when we wind our way back home,  we can have copious amounts of hot cocoa with marshmallows and snuggle under a blanket with the glow of the tree lights warming our hearts.



This post inspired by prompt #1 at Mam's Losin' It!

Paperclips For The Paperless

We are going paperless
So please ignore the pile of paper on my desk
And in my inbox
And my to be scanned box
And the leaning tower of registrations about to topple off the shelf
And the mounds under my desk
Because we are going paperless.

I can't wait.  I'm sick of all the paperclips we use to hold paper we don't talk about together.....

I scoop handfuls off my desk morning, noon, and night.  I pick them up from the loving embrace of the carpet beneath my desk.  If I move anything I find clips hiding, shirking their clip duties.

We're going paperless, don't you know!

A Mother's Hearing

Today is Super Saturday.  That means it is the first Saturday of the month, and our local hardware store (over 100 years old) has a 20% off everything sale.  My husband and I had a list of things we needed and wanted (my list started with the free popcorn and moved on to the free cookies).

As I was munching my popcorn, standing in the kitchen housewares aisle, drooling over the brightly colored spatulas and flour sack dish towels, I heard it.

The sound of coughing.

Now, a regular Super Saturday finds the Hardware store jam packed, but today was also the Santa Parade and a celebration of our small town holiday season, so the store was filled to the brim with shoppers.  And colds abound in this winter season.

But I heard a cough in that sea of people and I knew who it was.  I left the aisle I was in and aisles away, found my son sweeping spilled popcorn.  He works at the hardware store and I try not to embarrassingly seek him out when I am there, but that cough...

He's good, just getting the cold everyone has and I waited till he stopped home for lunch to feel his forehead for fever.

It makes me wonder, though, this cough that will still wake me from a dead sleep, and even in a crowd of people I recognize it as his, in 30 years will my Mother's hearing still be as keen as it is now?

I can hope.