B.S.C.

mission accomplished: december daily 2009

finished it up today. yay.  it's by no means perfect but i love it just the same. 

the sticker says "our family traditions"  perfect spot for it.

day 2:

 

the back of day 4: the back pages are a little boring.  i got a little tired of making sure those looked cute. most back pages have journaling on them.

  

    back page: i found a story that gracie had written about going to see santa and snowflake lane.

 

the envelope has two little notes i wrote about each girls' interests and traits. 

  

 

the back of day 7

  
 

 

friday the 11th, i did major shopping for the "christmas vacation" party. i put the receipts in this little bag, which i had already made for the 11th. how's that for fate?!

 
 

the back of day 12


the back of day 13

 

 

 

 

a post card from our yummy dinner at craftsteak in vegas

 

i didn't have a picture for this day, as we flew home from vegas. i printed off the "vegas highlights" from my blog which of course ended with the poopy dog story, that did in fact happen on the 21st. 

the back page, a picture gracie sketched of our tree 

 

 

 

 

sadly, i didn't put too much effort into christmas day. by this time, i was done.
 

 

december daily day 27 and 28: nutcracker

or as eric would call it... ball breaker.

gram and papa gave us tickets to the nutcracker for christmas. i decided that my dad and eric should go too. eric now hates me. 

the girls enjoyed the show though.

that pink thing is uniqua. which annie decided she wanted to christmas. we'd seen one at target awhile ago.  guess what they don't have them anymore.  it's the only thing she wanted from uncle todd. the 7.99 stuffie only cost $20.00 for overnight shipping. he's some  uncle, folks.
  

we got home and learned that eric's aunt (mike's sister in law) passed away that afternoon. sigh. i'm gonna miss aunt lue. she was spunky, a little sarcastic and not afraid to say what was on her mind. she reminded me of my grammy vi.  who was the queen of "i'll tell you like it is."  we are going to miss aunt lue. 

after we got the girls to bed, we watched the hangover.  there were parts we thought were funny, but with both of us feeling a little down, i think it wasn't as funny as we may have thought it to be had we watched it another time. 

today the girls, gram and i celebrated christmas with tami and lynda at mardini's in snohomish.  so mad at myself for not taking a picture. sigh.

december daily day 26: the aftermath

i was in a big hurry to get home to face the wrath of the shit heap we left as we headed out christmas morning.  sadly, no little elves came in and magically cleaned up our mess.  eric and i were left to do it. as he de-grizwold-ed the outside lights, i put away all the christmas decorations and un-trimmed the tree and even wrote the girls thank you notes with them. usually we leave the tree up through new year's but for some reason, i didn't have it in me. 

we still have lots of toys to find homes for, a ton of laundry to fold and this and that to put away.

we realized last night that i forgot to put the hockey tickets in eric's stocking. sadly, i put them in a place where even i can't find them--which is rather reminiscent of last year's hockey tickets. sigh. i'd link you to that story but i am too lazy to do that. 

the girls have been entertained ALL day loving all their new toys most of them were big hits this year. they are loving their nanos and i have a nice little recording of that to post later. annie is still totally in love with hampstie.  she takes him almost everywhere she goes. gracie is becoming more proficient with the ds as we navigate "tinkerbell and the lost treasure together."  that game has had me hitting my head against the wall.  we also had a little family game time (aren't we so normal rockwell?) with the two new games the girls got for christmas.  

note: we need to work on being better losers.

oh boy, the girls are falling apart.  time for bed. 

until tomorrow....

december daily day 25: next year we'll hit record

i must have jinxed myself in the last blog post because gracie went to bed with a sore tummy and proceeded to sleep just a few hours christmas eve.  we saw her at 2 and again at 4 and heard her various other times moving around in annie's room or going potty.  it was NOT because she was excited. she really didn't feel well. needless to say, we're all completely exhausted this evening.  it's exhausting anyway, but not getting a good night's sleep brought it to a whole new level. 

Christmas Morning

first we look to see if santa ate his cookies, look for the santa key and they read their notes. then we go into the family room to see if he left anything.

 

before the girls came downstairs, i got out the flip, turned it on and handed it to eric.  he's in charge of the recorder, i'm in charge of the camera.  he thought i hit the record button, i thought he would hit the record button when he was ready to record.  so we totally missed these great freak out reactions from the girls when they saw their stockings and presents from santa.  they each got two santa presents, that were wrapped and their stuffed stockings.  it's not like it was crazy gifts or anything.  they were totally pumped about the snowball makers and little miss and mr happy's in their stockings.  oh the simple things. 

being fairly irritated at the whole situation, i made everybody move the stockings and gifts into the living room so i could at least have better natural lighting for photos.

  

a gift from santa

 

annie got a dancing dora doll. it is ALL she wanted from santa. much to my chagrin, she NEVER waivered from that.

gracie got a DS lite and a game.  which of course later brought tears as gracie is not skilled in gaming as her mean mommy hasn't really allowed it--not that she's really asked. and i of course threatened to take it back to the store...which almost blew santa's cover if she hadn't been so emotional.

and i cannot express my elation quite enough when annie STACKED HER GIFTS.  oh, it gives me goosebumps.

  

a gift from gracie's teacher, mrs, kreutz. she is so patient, saving that gift until christmas morning. love that quality about her.

 
 

annie has been saying for at least 6 months that she wants a hampster.  let me just go on record saying

the following:

there is no way in hell there will EVER be a hampster in this house.

this was the next best option

 

it's actually quite hilarious and i quite love it.  annie has said multiple times

 "IT'S THE BEST GIFT EVER!!!!!"

which really yanks my chain because apparently all she needed was a $10 hampster that rolls in a ball (minus the $15 shipping, they really have you by the balls sometimes)

after santa gifts, the girls had gifts from us and some from family far away

great aunt jo and uncle harry, 

the girls loved their gifts, as evidenced by the photos...

  

 
 

then our traditional emans family christmas morning breakfast

German Apple Pancakes

  

and every year i forget that this recipe does not tell me how much melted butter to put in the batter.  the ingredients list says 2tbs melted butter.  well, you put 2 tbs in the pan when you caramelize the apples and then you're out of butter.  we just improvise and put 2 tbs in the batter, too.

after cleaning up a bit--had to get ready for the garbage man tomorrow, we headed to olympia for christmas with the emans side.

some sweet pictures

annie and grandma

 

annie and great grandma

 

and what kind of mother runs and grabs their camera when hampstie (annie's creative name) gets stuck in her kid's hair?  A GOOD ONE

 thanks uncle todd.  he was amazed at annie's smarts when she got it stuck again a mere 30 seconds later.

we're staying at grandma's tonight to keep her company. now it's 8:00. grandma just made her way to bed. annie is so tired and so wound up the kid can't sit still.  she looks like a wild banshee.  gracie's figuring out the ds. no tears yet.

merry christmas to all and to all a good night. 

december daily day 24: santa, why do you wear a red suit?

spent the afternoon at gram and papa's, visiting and dinner.  gram and gracie played a game of go fish.

the exposure may not be correct but i love this photo. in fact all these photos are not good exposure but that's what you get with poor lighting and evening lighting and no flash. but i love them anyway.

 annie just stopped by for a quick snuggle. she was too wound up to sit for any length of time.

 

after dinner, we went to the family friendly church service which was very cute. we were supposed to tell the people sitting by us what we'd like to thank God for.  annie said "baby Jesus."  then they walked around with microphones so some of the kids could share.  annie raised her hand. she spoke into the mic with her sweet little voice, sharing her name and "i'm thankful for baby Jesus."   umm...sweetest thing ever.

after worship we headed to our house where we exchanged gifts with gram and papa.  they gave gracie the 226 piece playmobil horse stable set.  it took a while to set up. daddy really brought his assembling skills to the table.

at 9:00 it was REALLY time for bed.

getting the cookies and milk ready.  we've never left carameletos for santa. i hope he liked them. 

 

 putting out the santa key

 writing santa a note.

annie asked me to write the following "santa, why do you wear a red suit?"  

thank you dogpile search. 

 

gracie writing her note. "Santa"  "do you have a magic snowglobe?"

 daddy reading "the night before christmas"  this copy was mine as a child.

 

lights out. and yes they are sleeping together.  we have a new rule in the house. they are allowed to have a "sleep over" any night they don't have school the next day.  it's the only time turd ball (that being annie) sleeps through the night.  i treasure fridays and saturdays.  AND  this christmas break because it's no school for TWO WEEKS!!!

 

we're watching a very christmas-y movie. x-men origins wolverine or whatever it's called.  no matter, who doesn't like an action filled movie with liev, hugh and ryan. 

we're ready for you, man in the big red suit.  

we're wishing our family and friends a very merry christmas.  may the joy of the season bring you peace now and throughout the new year.  

december daily day 23: a quick post

santa needs to wrap some presents

totally irritated with my husband.  when we decided to buy for each other's stockings i asked him for a list. that was over a week ago.  he never gave me one.  last night and today he's coming up with all these things i could have gotten him. 

guess what.

too late. 

he said it was a test to see how i'd do on my own. 

WHAT?

IDIOT. and you can be sure that i've told him that several times. 

he did however get to stay home today after he got word that a meeting was cancelled. that was a true gift.  i was NOT feeling well.  i think the dog gave me whatever it had.  enough said on that subject.

i am through day 14 in my december daily album.  i hope to finish it next week. wanted to document a couple more things in day 22 and 23

christmas jammies

 all the way from the paul frank store in vegas.  soooo cute! 

santa album

not loving the traditional ways of displaying santa photos, i premade this album that holds the santa photos from each year.  LOVE IT!  i think the idea came from kay C. many years ago.  or maybe it was kristie.  no matter, we all made them of course cause we're like peas in a pod.

on the left is the year annie would not be in the picture unless i was holding her.  so we have a photo with eric and i in it.(we actually have two years of photos with eric and i in them, lucky us.  being that annie was about 5 days old when we took her to see santa we didn't really want him holding her.) the one to the right is the first year annie would sit on his lap. 

 

i put it out on a side table or coffee table and the girls look at it form time to time.  the other night when gracie was looking at it, she asked me some very hard questions about why the santa looked different.  we talked about santa helpers. and then we got into a discussion about where santa goes when he delivers gifts.  bottom line, my answer was this "santa only goes to the houses of children who believe in him."  that ought to keep her believing.  she didn't bring it up again, but i was ready to discuss with her how she might hear kids at school say santa's not real, but how we'd like her to keep that to herself while annie is still young.  not being one to rock the boat, she'll probably believe in santa until she's 32 so she can keep getting santa gifts.

you would think i make this stuff up just for attention

my bsc morning-

1.once i finally tracked down the correct phone number for the snohomish post office, i called on the package that either was stolen from our doorstep or placed in the wrong mailbox. the lady was very nice and she tried calling the guy who delivers our mail.  she did, but he was out today, so i struck out there. 

when i told her that i can see on the tracking site that the package arrived on the 19th. she sweetly said "well those can be hard to read."

and the snarky bitchy part of me thought to myself, "yes, they can be hard to read...if you CAN'T READ."

***update-our sweet neighbor couple who lives next door is always very vigilant about watching our house when we are gone picked up the package and stored it for us. i called eric to tell him and he said "merry christmas." and i said "hold on buster, you're still wrapping it."***

2. my morning pee told me quickly something was not right.  i was certain i was sporting a nice little UTI.  sweet. we had a play date planned with the neighbors.  we went over and after and hour i knew that i had to go and get it over with or i would be at the walk in clinic forever and gracie had a play date at 1.  my bff jen offered to keep the girls and take them to her house should the playdate end before i got home.  that was like the best gift ever.  

the walk in check in goes smoothly and i get to pee in a cup right away.  there's just nothing like that.  why is it that women bare all by giving birth to children and are like totally ok with it but peeing in a cup is mortifying to no end?

i get called back ASAP too.  hector called me back.  super nice young man.  which is fine.  but i gotta say...not so comfortable with hector asking me when my last menstrual cycle started.  hats off to him for keeping a straight face.

3.  we're waiting in the pharmacy drive through and  a car pulls up next to us.  gracie says "oh look at that cute puppy."  i turn to look and i don't see any puppy. i look and look and tell her i don't see it.  then she says "oh that's not a puppy."

there was some sweet old great grandma-ish type of lady sitting in the passenger seat with really soft, grey, poodle-ish curled hair.  it was HILARIOUS.  but i couldn't laugh because i didn't want to make gracie feel bad. i think she already felt bad she thought the old lady was a poodle.

so i'm gonna go pee now.  watch the closer while i fold clothes. pee. work on my december daily album. pee. well, you get the picture.  

december daily day 19-20 and 21: who has time to blog when they're in vegas?

eric and i went to vegas saturday- monday.  his mom asked a couple weeks ago if she could have the girls for the weekend. not being ones to ever turn down the offer of spendovers, we said yes.  

eric came home from work about 5 days later "i'm not going out of town for work this week like i thought i would be so i'm going to be 1200 miles short of making mvp for alaska air. we should got to VEGAS for the NIGHT!" 

umm, no.  not going to vegas for the night. i'll go to cresent bar for the night.  i'll go to seattle for the night.  i'll go to bellingham for the night.  but i'm not going anywhere on a plane for just a night. 

"how 'bout two?"  

sold.

so we booked the trip on sunday and left the following saturday.  that is really spontaneous for me.  it felt a wee bit irresponsible and weird to do so right be fore christmas. but we went anyway.

we stayed here. it was beautiful.  it was built in march and you know me...  i like new and shiny.  the tiny draw back was that it was about a $30 cab ride to the strip.  but once we were there for a day we liked the fact that it was further away from the strip. it wasn't crowded and it kept out all the riff raff.

HIGHLIGHTS OF VEGAS 09

***booked an impromptu relaxation massage at the spa that quickly turned into more of a theraputic massage when i revealed the discomfort i'd been having in my buttocks and down my hammies. "oh that's probably your sciatic from working out. you just aren't getting a good enough stretch." once she was done stretching my...ass... and i had wiped the tears from my eyes, the rest of the massage was nice. and i gotta say i was a little uncomfortable having some one touch my arse like that. 

***eric was excited to place his first sports bet while i was getting a massage...which he promptly lost.  stupid saints.  he made up for it by winning on the huskies b-ball game.

***we went to the wine bar at the hotel for some tastings and cheese where i saw first hand the impact vegas has on young girls. apparently the demand for young beautiful people is quite high and having boobs the size of inflatable balloons increases your chances of getting hired and then getting big tips.  every little cocktail waitress i cam across, i wanted to say "honey your selling yourself short, get out of here!!!"  but then i told myself they were all working those jobs to put themselves through college.

***dinner at veloce cibo at the hotel.  very yummy. we went with a seafood theme and ordered colossal prawns. they were delicious but i am still feeling the guilt for not checking my seafood watch list app. i am SURE they were not on there.  i can't help but wonder if they were genetically enhanced. they were almost the size of my fist.

***eric playing pai gow and hitting a straight flush-winning about $350 and then some 

***deciding, after being on the strip saturday night, that vegas, no matter what the nevada ad council says, is NOT a good vacation for children. yet we saw tons of families.  lots of families from other countries. great. welcome to america. nothing like coming to vegas to ruin a little girls body image. we decided that in terms of "family vacations" it's a pretty cheap one to take. still not really a good reason to go.

***sunday walking the strip and brunch at Thomas Keller's Bouchon. nothing like an irish coffee and a pain au chocolat to start your day...followed with a mimosa and a croque madam. do you see food baby setting in?

***after endless walking, which was great because we needed it, we headed back to our hotel to get ready for dinner. instead of heading up to our room we sat a wheel of fortune machine and played together.  it was really fun. we plunked $60 in and then ran it up to $200 and cashed out.  nothing like bonding over a slot machine.

***after changing and heading back to the strip we had dinner at Craftsteak and the MGM.  i love watching top chef and i have to admit i have a little crush on tom colicchio.  i know, weird, no hot actor crushes for me. i have a thing for chefs.  sad. dinner was scrumptious. we did a 3 course tasting menu which gave us smaller portions and more flavors to try.  i think my favorite dishes were the caramelized cipollini onions and the pureed butternut squash. 

***or course after dinner i got an email about a suspicious charge on my credit card.  there's a whole back story  to that but i'll spare you. after being on the phone with them for 45 minutes, i couldn't figure out what the charge was so we suspended my card. 3.5 seconds AFTER i hung up the phone the lightbulb went on and i realized it was a charge for the silvertips tickets i purchased for eric's stocking. lame. merry christmas honey.

(which is kind of funny because after we got home last night we realized a present he ordered for me is missing--either stolen from our doorstep or placed in the wrong mailbox...it was that little instant camera i wanted  AND it also came out that he had bought me some boots i wanted, as a surprise from the girls for christmas, but i ruined it when i went and bought some boots on my own that night i went shopping with the gals.---we decided that we weren't meant to get each other things this christmas.)

***but i digress, the real and TRUE highlight of the trip was THIS...

we got to the airport and got all settled in to wait for our flight. the desk guy announced that there were a few first class seats that were available for upgrade for $50. we looked at each other knowingly and eric walked up to the counter and purchased them.  we sat in the back row of first class. fine. no problem.  until a bit less than halfway through the flight i start smelling this horrific smell.  like nothing i'd even smelled before.  i did the hand over the mouth thing to make sure it wasn't my breath. i smelled my sweater.  i smelled the glass of soda i'd been drinking.  it wouldn't go away.  i looked at eric several times (he was engrossed in a movie on his i touch) and he looked like her didn't smell anything (he was stuffed up).  it smelled worse than rotten hot garbage on a back street in mexico. finally there's  a little commotion behind me and this dude get up with this little carrier and heads to the first class bathroom. i was like, holy crap that's a dog!"  apparently the dog completely shit itself, nice diarrhea shit. i was so disgusted.  not being a dog lover in the first place. this did not help. so the due tries to clean up the dog...in the first class bathroom...completely destroying it in the process. then he comes out...and...GUESS WHAT THE NEW DISGUSTING SMELL IS????  yes, WET DOG which is almost as offensive to me as shit dog. so that was a REAL treat to get to smell all the way home.  

and so you know, the dog was not a service dog...it was some stupid little rat dog.  what's the point? no, i'm not bitter at all.  and if i offended you about my dog talk, well..i don't really care.

both of the poor pilots had to use the bathroom RIGHT after the incident.  it's a true miracle they didn't pass out from the smell. who would have flown the plane?

i want my money back.

december daily day 18: last day and baking day

i loved sending the girls off to school this morning with their gifts for their teachers and their lovingly handmade christmas cards. they both get so much joy out of giving presents to others.  as we were driving away from annie's fun friday preschool (an extra day she gets to go and it's pure crafty imaginative goodness) she says "momma, i think we should get my teachers gifts for valentine's day. i am also going to color them big pink hearts."  seriously, could we just get through christmas?  but i have to say she's my daughter because i'd be lying if i told you that i wasn't already thinking about what i could craft up for valentine's day.  i'm a sick, sick person. 

earlier in the week at separate time both girls cried because they did not want school to be out for break.  actually annie thought school was out for good. she just wasn't ready to let go.  i quickly explained "oh honey you get to go until MAY!!!"

and now they're done for two weeks and i am so excited to have them home.  actually, they'll be at grandma's for the weekend. saturday morning to monday around noonish.  but don't you worry, eric and will manage to fill the time.  we've got something up our sleeve...sleeves?

did some baking last night and today...5 pans of carameletos to deliver to neighbors in these darling martha baking boxes

i had heard on the martha radio show about these baking boxes at michael's. i had to run there on saturday and although i was frantically purchasing last minute items for our party in a mere two hours...i just had to check on these boxes.  it must have been fate as there was one pack left AND they were 40% off. SOLD. my only complaint is that they are kind of big and carameletos are kind of flat.  i couldn't fill them up unless i made one bath for each neighbor. and while i love them and think they are great and all. it takes forever to make carameletos cause you have to wait a long time before you can cut them up and package them.  and i only have three 9 by 13 pans. so sorry neighbors if you feel you got short changed.

after delivering to the neighbors and to a friend not far down the road i had to stop and put gas in my car because, according to the gas gauge i had 14 miles left. classic.  and this is when i know that i am truly losing my mind.  i drive by the QFC and glance over to see a man taking a photo of some big cases of soda that are sitting outside the store.  i of course get a little lost in thought about why he might be doing that.  it's a brief moment but when i snap back to reality, i can't remember why i am in that parking lot.  sigh.

O' Christmas tree, O' Christmas tree...

tree hunt 2009

i thought it might be fun to revisit christmas tree hunt's of the past.  this year we came out relatively unscathed.  ONE christmas tree lot.  amazing isn't it.  of course we had to walk the WHOLE lot before i went up to look at the pre cut trees like eric suggested in the first place. i think this is the shortest story that i've ever had about finding our tree...ever...

 

Let's take a walk back in time one year...to tree hunt 2008

First of all, i hopped in the truck and eric had Christmas music playing. love him! we headed off to westby's tree farm which is literally a couple miles from our house. we thought for sure they would be open since thanksgiving was late this year. WRONG!   gracie starts fussing that we'll never get a tree. we head down into the farmland of snohomish and head to this one we stopped at during the great christmas tree search of 2006.  eric wanted to try it out and i agreed all the time thinking in my head that it was going to be crap...and it was.  their trees were total crap.  i fell in love with my husband even more as he walked the rows critiquing the trees...just like i would.  i know that some of his traits had rubbed off on me, but i didn't think it had happened the other way. i was so happy NOT to be the one to complain and insist we go to another lot.  oh and of course annie didn't want to walk...sound familiar?  so i carried her part of the way but she was too damn heavy and her boots kept falling off her feet.  i finally set her down and made her walk.  Gracie apparently felt bad for her so she stayed behind to hold her hand and encourage her to keep walking. it's about at this point we both started thinking about the possibility of buying a fake tree. we kind of brought it up at the same time.   once we loaded ourselves in the truck, we headed to a farm out in machias also mentioned in the great christmas tree hunt of 2006.  as we are heading out to the tree farm we pass through downtown snohomish. gracie says "we've been here before"  i stupidly reply "this is where we had lunch the day we went to the pumpkin patch" which of course sets annie off on a mantra of "i'm hungry and thirsty"  so the rest of the way to the nursery, the entire time we're there and all they way back home annie chants "i'm hungry and thirsty" we arrive at the tree farm and lock annie in the car since she doesn't want to walk.  does this sound familiar?  gracie and daddy and i (all still in good spirits) set off looking for a tree and all we find are total dogs: not tall enough, not full enough, not green enough, bad branches at the bottom etc...again the fake tree is mentioned. i head back to the truck to check on annie and get her out on the promise of cider and candy cane... (we had hopes the apple cider and the candy cane would be enough to tide her over.   but, alas, the candy cane was "too minty" and the cider was a no go as well.) when i  see that there are some beautiful green, full, tall trees leaning up against some posts.  so i ask  the kid when they were cut.  "a couple of days ago he replies"  SOLD!  i tell annie to stand at the orange cone and not to move i run down the path calling for eric.  it was a like a version of marco polo. he gets the message and buys the first tree i show him. i wish i had taken a picture of how he had that damn tree strapped to the top of the car. it was true clark style.  we had some good laughs on the way home.  some one even rolled down their window at a stoplight to ask where we got our tree!  

so for a mere NINETY FIVE DOLLARS we got our grand fir tree.  did you just crap yourself? we've paid 70 something before, but never that much.  i guess the extra $$ was for the precut, which in eric's eyes, i am sure, was priceless.

i hope it fits through the door.  did i mention how huge it is?

***please note in addition to taking forever to find a tree the one we brought home had a frog in it***

AND two years ago...tree hunt 2007

i guess that i didn't have a story from that year, which i am sure there was one. i just didn't blog it.  i'm pretty sure this was the year that we went to three lots. one only had sparse nobles, the other had tons of spiders in their trees.  BUT i will not leave you without a story from christmas 2007 so i give you this little gem...

we got our santa pictures today.  they are so AWESOME!!!!  the girls are darling in them.  way exceeded my expectations!  if i can con jen in to letting me scan the photo, i'll post one tomorrow!  anyhoo, the day we went to get photos was a long one and a fun one...until the end...

we drove down to bell square and met daddy at nordys for photos.  then we went to z'tejas for lunch with daddy and everyone was in good spirits.  the girls then went to the paper source with me.  still so good. then we went to crate and barrel.  again still so good.  so then we drive back to lynnwood to check out some stores by alderwood mall. we stopped by starbucks and had a coffee break then drove over to barnes and noble.  annie had pooped her pants and i didnt have a diaper so i put her in some of gracie's spare panties.  thinking "she'll be ok she just pooped"  we get into the bookstore.minutes after they start playing with the thomas the train set in the back, i smell poop.  gracie's eyes were watering so i set out accusing her of leaking.  she swore she didn't.  it takes me a minute to figure out that its annie. as i am figuring it out she tells me that she pooped her pants and peed on the floor.  great!  i find a lady and tell her.  she was great and directed us to the bathroom.  we get into the stinky bathroom and annie starts touching the toilet.  gracie is freaking out about annie's smell (which is so ironic to me when she craps her pants herself) i take of annie's panties and the big old turd flops onto the floor which sends gracie into fits of being disgusted.  i am trying to keep annie from stepping in it while i am trying to pick up the crap which of course the tp doesn't protect me and i stick my finger in it. i go wash my hands while annie's touching the toilet and wet some paper towels to clean the sticky poop on her butt.  meanwhile i can't keep gracie still, she's touching everything.  i swear i almost had a panic attack.  never a dull moment...

and then there was 2006-the griswold year...

December 3rd, 2006

So our day started out great with a nice breakfast at the Maltby café, then we headed to our favorite spot to get a Christmas tree.  After about 30-45 minutes of searching, a trip to the bathroom, carrying Annie most of the way and gracie saying every tree was the perfect tree just so she could get a candy cane, we left without a tree.  Mommy just couldn’t find one tall enough.  The second tree farm was a bust and Gracie’s freak out about the mud on her boots and not getting a candy cane put us all over the edge.  After a trip to the gas station to fill up since we were about on empty, we went to the 3^rd tree farm- another favorite spot of ours.  By this time, Gracie wanted to stay in the car which was just fine with us so we locked her in a headed out. After about 10 minutes of searching we found a great, although huge, tree.  Against his better judgment, Eric was too tired and mad to say NO to me.   We tried to carry the tree to the truck, but I couldn’t carry Annie and the tree. Eric had to get someone to help us. Apparently it was so big that it almost broke the motor of the machine that puts netting around the tree so it’s easy to take home.  The parting words from the man who helped us put the tree up were “I don’t know where you’re gonna put that thing.” Good news was that Gracie got her candy cane, but she was ticked it was only a little one. She accused me of breaking it.  We got it home and set it in the entry for awhile.  We finally got it in the house to find that the base of the tree was so big that it almost didn’t fit in the tree stand.   We finally got it up and we felt like that scene in Christmas Vacation where Clark cuts the netting and branches fly everywhere.  All we could do was laugh at its hugeness. After a MAJOR haircut from Jean Paul, it’s still big but it will do. We sure as hell aren’t going out to get a different one.    Eric says all of his Christmas spirit is gone after today.

never a dull moment here, folks...