December 8th

A week of December has gone by . . .

I woke from a deep sleep this morning. It was still very dark so I thought it must be about 2:30am. But the clock read 6:35am! Wow, I slept very soundly all night. Haven't done that for quite some time. It was tempting to go back to bed, but the thought occured to me that the Y opens at 7am on Saturday and if I didn't go then I wouldn't go all day. So I put on my exercise clothes, ate a mandarin orange, grabbed my water and earphones and headed out the door. I was the first one to the Y. :)  The channel on the the treadmill TV was set to a Zumba Fitness infomercial. Seriously, I watched that for the first 30 minutes of walking! And was tempted to buy the DVD set. But I still had to walk 30 more minutes and the incredible deal only had 20 more seconds to call. (LOL)  It was a good work out and I'm SO happy that I went and did it first thing this morning.

As soon as I walked in the door at 8:15am, my cute neighbor arrived for her piano lesson. I used to babysit her when she was 4 months old. Now she is 6 and in first grade. It is fun to have her as a piano student.

After her lesson, I made some breakfast for the girls and myself (eggs, toast for them, frozen strawberries for me). I got ready for the day and we all headed down to the Venturing Crew Christmas tree lot to find our tree for the year. Krish was excited to see his friend, Jake, there. The boys all ran around the lot while the adults and girls hunted for the perfect tree. It didn't take long, maybe 10 minutes, and we found the Noble that we thought would fit best. About 8 feet, a few spaces for hanging ornaments, and little lopsided at the bottom (embrace imperfection). While they did a "butt-cut" on the tree and I paid the money for it, the kids filled up styrofoam cups with apple cider and hot cocoa. It was a brisk morning--a good one for a warm drink. I noticed the container that the cocoa and cider were in and made a mental note to find one for my wassail at the recital next Saturday.

We drove home with a tree lashed to our roof and mud on our shoes. This year our tree will be in the family room again, but in a different corner. I bought a new bookshelf a few months ago and it is in the corner where we usually put the tree. So we are moving the tree across the room to the corner by the windows. We had to rearrange the couches so the loveseat is by the tree and the longer couch borders the eating area. It should work well for the holiday season. The tree was still wet from the rain this week so we didn't get to put the lights or ornaments on yet. We'll do that tomorrow after church.

I had an appointment to donate blood at 10:45 so I left after we put the tree in the stand. The blood bank bus was at the outlet mall. Ever since I was 16 I've donated blood. My blood type, O negative, is the universal donor. It doesn't bother me to give blood and I have good veins for it. So when I'm healthy and well, it's something I try to do every 8 weeks. The Carter's outlet was right by the bus so I stopped in there after donating to get a couple of pairs of pants for Merek. He came out of his room this morning in his shirt and unders and said, "Mom, I don't have any pants." He did have a clean pair folded in a pile of laundry in my room. We put those on him but I knew he was low on pants. He has grown quite a bit this fall. I bought him two sweatpants--size 5! Cannot believe my little baby is that big already!

Miranda had a babysitting job at 12:30pm. She left about the same time DH and Merek went to a birthday party at the swimming pool for Chase. Heather called and invited Bird and Krish to come down and play with her boys. Just me and Lina were left at home. She cleaned up the toy room for me (the kids had been playing in there earlier, making a fort and a big mess) then she watched her new Tinkerbell movie that she got for her birthday. I sat down for little creative time--using some brand-new product and some older product that I found while cleaning out a file. I decided that as I come across this older product, I either need to use it or toss it. If I can't figure out a way to use it now, then it isn't staying.

When Merek and DH returned home, I walked with Merek down to Heather's so he could play with Matthew for a bit. Heather and I visited as the boys played. She has four boys of her own, so add in my three--it was not quiet or calm. But it was fun. It is great to have them as neighbors and friends. Our families moved into the neighborhood the same week almost 8 years ago! Heather is a such a good friend. It's always nice to have a neighbor like that that you can rely on for anything.

The boys and I walked home. DH decided he wanted sushi for dinner. But I didn't really feel like that so he took the four kids with him. I stayed home and waited for Miranda. She got home a little while after they left. She had some homework to finish and worked on that while I made a couple of more cards.

Today we received four yummy treats--cinnamon apple slices that were left on our milkbox(I think Jen brought these over for me because they are a recipe of Paige's); orange rolls from the Barnards (always a favorite of mine; she dropped off a DVD with the Christmas Story that has pictures of little kids dressed up in the Nativity costumes--Merek is a wise man in it); Merek's friend, Brighton, brought him over some frosted sugar cookies; and Miranda brought home Oreo bark from the Wilcocks.

DH and the kids returned about 6:15pm and they were ready to watch the Tinkerbell movie. (DH was ready to watch the Gonzaga/Illinois basketball game). Miranda needed a newspaper for Social Studies on Monday. I drove her up to IGA to get one and we also bought some food for the two of us to eat for dinner.

Bird's house project still wasn't done so I told the kids they had to work on it for 15 minutes before they could watch the movie. Krish disappeared. I don't know where Miranda went. So just Lina and Bird worked on it. They asked me for some snowflake and star stickers. Lina made a snowman out of cottonballs. When she came upstairs to get the stickers from me, she asked if I had any stocking stickers. I didn't but I cut some stockings for her with my Slice. They worked on it for about 30 minutes, then realized it had been longer than 15 minutes. The house is about halfway done. It should be easy enough to finish up tomorrow.

While the kids watched their movie and DH watched his basketball game, I finished up a card. Then I moved about the house--changing the laundry, doing the dishes, practicing my music for tomorrow. Miranda and I are playing the prelude for church. We are playing a duet of "Angels We Have Heard on High" on the piano. Her part was supposed to be on the flute but she didn't have enough practice time this week with it, so she is going to play in an octave higher on the piano as a descant. It will sound good. I am also playing a solo of The First Noel. Since it's prelude music it probably won't get too much attention as people come into the chapel and find their seats. Not too much pressure :)

A couple of times today I thought about taking pictures of things but didn't. I did get a picture of the kids in front of the Christmas tree at the lot. Hmmm . . . maybe I'll use that for our cards. Some of the pics I thought about taking: Merek all bundled up to go pick out the tree; the tree on top of the van; Merek with his cookies and pictures from Brighton; Lina all dressed up wearing make-up, dangling earrings, a black felt hat, and my eyeglasses; and the growing number of Christmas cards on the door.

DH was very helpful tonight and folded lots of laundry for me. I told him I'd do the socks and underwear. He really doesn't like folding/matching those. I helped Krish clean out and organized his drawers a bit. Then the girls tried on some jeans that had been given to us. The ones that didn't fit went into a bag for donation. I filled up another donation bag with other clothes that have gotten too small or we just don't wear any longer. Need to do a little more purging before the pick-up on Wednesday.

Today I am thankful for recognizing that no one is perfect. Everyone had their problems, their struggles, their flaws. I don't need to compare myself to others, but instead, just be the best person I can be for me and my family and to be happy.