Visual.....

Sorry, I don't have time to dig up old blasts from the past so I'll leave you with a visual.

Picture it - a three year-old boy that has been fighting a cold for about 4 days. You know, the nice snotty, boogery nose kind of cold. Got that in your head?

Now, picture yourself walking down into your family room and seeing said three year-old on the couch laying on his back.

Now, picture big brother sticking his finger up the three-year old's nose trying to "clean things out so that he can breathe."

I guess they do love each other.

The Christmas Letter.....

Can I just say that I'm stoked that this NaBloPoMo is almost over?!! This is killing me.

This is the time of year when I start to stress about the annual Christmas Letter/Photo. I love receiving them - hate writing them. The last two years I haven't written a letter. We did a family photo in 2007 then in 2008 it was just a picture of the boys. I have no idea what this year will entail.

Do you (or your significant other) write a Christmas letter?
Do you do a family photo or just one of the kids (if you have them)?

Fake or Real?

Get your mind out of the gutter - I'm talking Christmas trees here people.

Growing up, our tree was always real. I remember a few times going out as a family and finding the perfect tree. As I got older and too cool to hang out with my family, I'm guessing my dad would go and cut it down as there weren't tree lots that I can remember. Especially in northern Minnesota.

Now that I have my own family, we have the debate every year. Mike prefers fake while I prefer real. Mike's won out for the past 7 years. I really haven't put up much of a fight though. This year I'm putting my foot down. We are getting a real tree.

Well, we put up our fake tree today. And we're getting a real one tomorrow. I get the real tree upstairs to decorate as Martha Stewarty as I possibly can. The tree downstairs is decorated ala Colton. He picked out the light combo - white lights, then colored than white than colored. I let go of my control issues and let him put the decorations wherever he wanted and didn't move one when he wasn't looking. The only thing I did was put the breakable glass decorations up at the top.

What kind of tree to you have?

The Day After.....

We were in the mall parking lot at 5:24am, got the third parking spot from the front. That's pretty much how our day went - very lucky. We scored some great deals and the lines were not bad at all. Eleven hours of shopping. There was no more room in the car so we had no choice but to stop. Wow - I'm exhausted and pretty sure I'm going to pass out by 7:00.

I picked up a movie for the boys tonight because I knew that I'd have no energy for playing. Got them all set up with popcorn mixed with M&Ms. They're in heaven and momma's happy too!

Tomorrow it's time to haul out the Christmas decorations.

Thanksgiving....

I hope everybody is having a wonderful Thanksgiving. Mine was fantastic. We had a delicious lunch with great company. I had hoped to get a family picture, but right after dinner Colton was in his play clothes begging his uncle E to go outside and play football. Oh well, guess there's always next year.

Right now I'm flipping through the ads coming up with a plan of attack for shopping tomorrow.

I had a hot topic for my Thoughts for Thursday, but all save that for tomorrow....

As Brett says, "Thank you for Happy Thanksgiving."

Almost Ready.....

I've got less than 24 hours before I host Thanksgiving. I think I'm ready. I'm putting my turkey in the brine tonight. I'm making Pioneer Woman's mashed potatoes this evening and then all I have left is the stuffing as my guests are bringing all the other fixings.

If I can just keep my house clean between now and 1:00 tomorrow......

Overheard.....

I picked up Brett from daycare today and as we were driving to get his brother, he was checking out the Christmas lights that people already have up and turned on. From the backseat I heard

• ooohhhhh pretty
• cool
• sweet, look at that one mom

Obviously the kid has an older brother.

About a month or so ago, Colton went through bout of forgetting his planner that is supposed to be signed every night. We told him there were consequences if this continues. Well, last night he forgot his planner. Tonight he had to write sentences. As he was sitting at the table, I heard him ask his brother to come over. Here's what I overheard.

"Here, what you're going to do, is write this letters."

"ok bra-bra."

"oh, man, you don't even know how to write."