Happy 2007!

Happy New Year! Wow! 2007! How did that happen?!?

I've always enjoyed Mondays for a new start, so I really enjoy the new year. When I was a girl, I always started my diary first thing on New Year's morning. I was telling my own kids how much I enjoyed keeping a diary when I was a kid. So, Keri Lynn and Kathleen were both writing down their dearest thoughts while we all sat around the family room watching football and Biggest Looser marathon. I got to thinking that I still like to write in my diary, but now it's called a BLOG!

May I say at this moment that I love to watch The Biggest Looser, but I hate to miss episodes and not know the people involved. So I'd rather watch it in one big swipe. And that's exactly what I (mostly) did. Nearly 13 hours straight of Biggest Looser, only interrupted (ironically) when Keith took me to lunch for ribs! We also stopped by Michaels for yarn that I needed and hhgreggs to check out the new dishwashers on sale.

Since Ginny's visit last week, I've been busy working on crochet projects, too. She always inspires me to get back into crochet, so there I was, sitting on the couch, crocheting the cutest capelette and matching hat (two sets) and watching people lose hundreds of thousands of pounds while I digested ribs!

It did have an impact on me, though. I am going to lose weight this year. My habits needs some tweaking! More on that later . . .

Christmas went by in a bit of a blur.

Just to illustrate how much of a procrastinator I am, I'll tell you all about what happened two days before Christmas.

I went Christmas shopping.

I had already bought and sent gifts to family in California, but I had not gotten a thing for any of my kids yet. Part of the reason of why I waited was that I thought Keith might want to go with me to get the gifts, but when the day came when we had both money and time at the same time, he was wiped out. So I took myself off to Target and then to Michaels TWO days before Christmas. I've always been a procrastinator before, and sometimes it causes pain, but other times it's not so bad. This time, fortunately, it wasn't too bad.

I got some things that were the last things available -- the last two laser guns for the little boys, the very last remote control car for Kristofer, and a lot of things on sale. So I greedily held on to the cart while traveling around Target in quick fashion. Halfway through, I had to go to the bathroom VERY BADLY. But I couldn't chance someone taking my cart of toys that I had so carefully picked out. So I waited until I got to Michaels, a few stores down.

I got into Michaels with the express purpose of finding a restroom AND QUICK. I knew where the restrooms were at other Michaels stores, and essentially traversed the whole store twice before I finally found an employee to ask, "Please TELL. ME. WHERE. THE. RESTROOM. IS!" Never have I been so relieved (so to speak!)

Once I was back to relative sanity, I went back to the task at hand and got cross-stitch projects for Keri Lynn and Kathleen, a neat book on making your own machines for Kristofer . . . and then I was on to much more "important" things. Crochet projects for ME! Yippee! The total time I took looking through crochet books, studying yarns, picking out yarns, putting yarns back, etc. easily exceeded the time actually spent Christmas shopping for the kids. (Sad, very sad.) I wanted to make an afghan, but couldn't find one that was perfect, and -- in the long run -- finally decided I really didn't have the time to make one anyway. There were only a few days of actual vacation left!

So anyway, I got home late, and went to bed even later. This only began a vicious cycle.

"Very late to bed, semi-late to rise makes a homemaker . . . grumpy!"

Christmas Eve evening, I came home from getting much needed groceries, and Keith came home from helping in the Christmas Eve service (which the rest of us stayed home from because we were tired), and we opened up Grandpa Stan's Christmas present to all of us -- two new Veggie Tale videos and The Pirates of Caribbean 2. Once the kids were in bed, Keith watched the Pirates while I wrapped presents. Wrapping ALWAYS takes so much longer than I anticipate. You'd think I'd learn to give it more time! So it was another late night.

Christmas Day, Keith and I awoke to seven giddy kids. We took pictures and prolonged the agony as much as possible -- that's the job of the parent, you know, to prolong agony. We opened up gifts from family and the kids opened up the gifts we'd gotten them. It was a lot of fun. Even Kody got a couple of presents this year! Thank you so much to Mom and Rich, Dan and Jessica, Stan, Alice -- for adding an extra special bit of Christmas for us! Keri Lynn bought presents for her brothers and sisters with her own babysitting money. She gave Keith and I cold hard cash for a date night -- isn't that sweet! Hmm. Who are we going to get to babysit?
Later that evening, we broke out the Monopoly Here and Now version that Grandma Alice gave us. That was fun. There are airports instead of railroads. You get two million dollars instead of two hundred dollars for passing "Go". The tokens that go around the board are things like a cell phone or laptop.

By then, I was EXHAUSTED. This vacation time can be really tiring!

The day after Christmas became a mad rush to put things in order for house guests. I steam cleaned the chairs and carpets. Kids cleaned up rooms.

Ginny came with her kids on Tuesday and stayed through Saturday morning. The kids completely entertained themselves. We all got to bed late every single night, but also got to sleep in a bit, too.

We pretty much stayed close to home except for a trip to the dollar theater in Fayeteville where we went to go see Facing the Giants. Our family had not gone to see it yet, but Ginny and kids had seen in a couple of times at least. I'm planning to get it when it comes out on DVD. It was a very powerful movie and I highly recommend it.

Ginny and I also went out a few times shopping at Michaels and Goodwill. We also had dinner at Panera Bread. Ginny had been there before, but I hadn't. WOW! Talk about flavor. Panera Bread specializes in bread -- shocking, huh! -- but it also has some amazing salads, sandwiches, soups and baked goods. It's an Italian Bistro of sorts with Wii connectors and other yuppy-type delights. I felt very chic eating there and knew I would never be able to get Keith to set foot in such a place! But it is perfect for girlfriends. So we sat and gabbed and ate food bursting with flavor.

At home, we ate pretty well, too. We made a couple of batches of that easy fudge and then I tried to make some divinity. The divinity was tricky because you really need a candy thermometer to make it come out just right. I don't think I let the sugar dissolve enough, though, so it was a little on the gooey side. Ginny taught me how to make fried cheese toast, and I will never think of cheese and bread in the same way again -- Mmmmm-mmmmm!
All in all, it was a successful time together. The kids are already planning the next get-together. We think we're going to have the Kings over again for a few days in the summer, then make a kid swap where Ginny takes the girls back to her house and I'll keep the boys. Then, we'll come down to Florida to visit with them for a few more days and swap back kids again.
We don't start back to school until this Thursday. I'm thankful for a little longer reprieve as we adjust back to real life. Eating too much, watching too much TV, not exercising, going to bed too late and getting up too late can be REALLY EXHAUSTING!

Next on the agenda is Konner's birthday. He turns SIX on January 4. He's really excited.
Keith shot off fireworks for the New Year, and Konner had a encounter with one of them. But it wasn't one of the big bad fireworks that got him, but the kind that you hold like sparklers. The burning ash got on his cheek and took off a layer of skin. We hope he doesn't scar. It hurt him initially, but it hasn't bothered him much since except for itching. It's kind of like getting sunburned, I think. We'll have to keep an eye on it.

I have not gotten even close to sending out our Christmas letters. This is a BAD sign for me. If I don't even have the letter ready to be printed out after the New Year, it usually doesn't get done at all. My biggest motivation, though, is to get people to go to my blog and find out about how we're doing that way. By next year, I may be at the point where I'm just sending out postcards saying "Go to blog" and just be done with it. However, there are still plenty of people on my Christmas letter list that don't have much to do with computers, so I don't know if I'll really do that or if perhaps I'll just curtail the list. I really enjoy the letters that I get from everyone else, but that's been dwindling, too, with the onset of digital pictures and web pages.