Christmas Phase 2

Well, Christmas Phase 1 was a lot better than Christmas phase 2. I hardly took any pictures. Christmas eve was great with church and just spending time at home watching Christmas movies - Elf and Polar Express. Then Christmas morning hit and all was going great and then I got slammed with the blues. I couldn't shake it. I know I have a lot to be thankful for but man I had one big pity party. I think it is just all my family history and current mess that hit me and it becomes more apparent on holidays. Luckily Matt entertained the kids and they had fun playing Runescape which they have all gotten freakishly involved with playing. So today is better and honestly I am glad Christmas is over. I think next year I will need to plan ahead and Matt and I will need to figre out somewhere to go on Christmas if it is just us or do something so I don't fall into the "pit of despair" again.

Christmas Phase 1
So the pre-Christmas phase one was having one of my nieces come over and spend the night. I loved having her over and adding some more estrogen to this male dominated house. I took all the kids to see Night at the Museum which I thought was great and good for the whole family. The bad part about having my niece over was that I had not finished hers and her sister's Christmas gifts yet. So I did her sisters in front of her which was an altered jewelry box from Bare Elements. I used some papers from the Magnolia line and the colors matched her room. Loved how it turned out and I think she liked it too. The real dilemma was how to finish Michaels's fuzzy pink poncho without her seeing so I stayed up late and then hid in my room for a while in the morning. I got it done though but I was pushing it. She really like it and it was exactly what she asked for. I gave them each of their presents at my SIL house. We had Christmas there with Matt's side of the family. The food was so good - thanks Vikkee and it was fun to open our presents.

Look what I found while I was over there! A picture that my husband drew when he was a little boy. My SIL has all kinds of old holiday artwork up around her house (which is a cute idea) and I was looking at this thinking one of my nieces drew it and I see my husbands name at the top. How cute was he to draw Santa and his sleigh. I can't believe she was able to keep it for so long!

All I have to say is WOW what a good movie. My friend Susan and I had the chance to sneak away from all the Christmas stuff left to do and went to see this movie lasy night. First of all this makes me love Will Smith even more. He did such a great job and is there anything he can't do - he does funny movies, action, serious etc. I just hope he doesn't go off the deep end some day(like Tom Cruise) because I would be crushed.

I just can't even begin to explain this movie. It is so simple is some ways but in others it is very profound. They did a great job capturing the "desperateness" of the situation and the inner strength he had to perservere. It stirred up so much emotion in me I had to keep myself from sobbing at the end but Susan had red eyes too so I didn't feel too weird. I grew up with a single Mom and things were rough (okay not standing in the line hoping to get a cot at the homeless shelter rough) but there were times we had to live with other people and my Mom struggled to make ends meet. I remember in elementary school I had to walk from school to an outdoor shopping center and wait for my mother to pick me up when she got off work. Can you imagine a little girl just wandering around a shopping center for hours by herself? I certainly was protected. When I got older I would take a bus and I was a latch key kid. Some of the scenes with the boy in the movie I could really relate too. Looking at other families and wishing I could have a family like that. I think kids who grow up in that situation have to grow up too fast. They carry a lot of their parent's burdens and worries. Sometimes I wonder how my mother did it (even though it sure could have been better and some of that she could have prevented but still single parents have it rough). I just think of my boys. They haven't had to deal with a lot of the stuff I did when I was their age. I hope they never do and I hope I can do that for them.

Anyway - see the movie and tell me what you think!!

Whew - I have been so busy!! With good stuff but busy!! Here's a cute pic from Timmy's play performance. That finished up last weekend but another round starts at the end of January so we will see if he wants to do it (I am sure he will). This week was filled with lots of Christmas stuff and I have lots of Christmas stuff still left to do. The boys finished up their week before two weeks off. I think I am more excited then they are - no dreaded homework for me to help them with. They both had their class parties. Santa even paid a visit to Tyler's (don't look at Santa too closely because the more I look at him the scarier he looks to me). Timmy had a rough start to the school year and Matt and I had had it up to hear so we got him moved to another class. He seems to be doing much better and the teacher actually told him she is happy he is in her class - almost made me cry when he said that. Apparently from observing at his class party- she let's boys be boys and goof off and be silly and loud (when apropiate of course like during a party) and then they get it out of their system and are able to calm down when it is time to teach. Last night I attended my first cookie swap that Sylvia threw. She is the queen of parties and it was fun. I LOVE how she decorates her house. I had to ask her a ton of questions about the swap but now I think I got it. I'll be ready for next year! I am came away with a TON of yummy cookies that I will have to share because I don't think we can eat them all. Oh I forgot to mention that I got together with two of my former high school girls (I was their church youth leader for 4 years) this last Thursday. Sam and I played tennis finally and she is SO good. She kicked my butt but it was fun. Then we had lunch with Amanda and caught up on college life and the struggle with which path to take in school. Such a hard decision - so many choices! So glad they still want to hang out with me and we hope to get together with the rest of the girls when they come home.

So here is my to-do list
1. Christmas cards still need to be put together and mailed out. But I got my prints for the house and I am SO excited. That is my Christmas present this year. Now to find the perfect frames. Thanks Shannon for being awesome.
2. I got volunteered to make the decorations for tonight's white elephant swap at our church. Apparently I am good at decorating? So I need to make 4 and I found great deals at Michael's. I'll tell you how much when I post pictures of the finished product. I also have to decorate the room too. Found all this out yesterday.
3. I still need to mail out some gifts - yikes it is getting close!
4. Still need to get some gifts for people here and finished up knitting some gifts.

So much to do - so little time!

"Rudolph with your nose so bright, won't you DRAW my sleigh tonight?!" This kid cracks me up. This is exactly the scene I walked into on the way home tonight from one of Timmy's play performances. Tyler is wearing his reindeer antlers from his school performance (which was so cute by the way and it cracks me up that I think any school performance is just as good as a broadway play). He is freeze framing one of his cartoons on tv and drawing the character's expressions. Does he draw better this way? I don't know but I say let the artist be. Note the present in front of him. He keeps wrapping up "presents" for us and putting them under the tree. Sometimes he decides they aren't really presents and takes them back out and opens them himself.

So Christmas is in full swing. Here are some brief notes:

1. Thanks to those that gave me their input on our family photos. I think we decided on one (won't say which one) and our Christmas cards may even be a Montez original design this year. So excited! Can't wait to get that crossed off my to do list.

2. Knitting up some evening bags and trying to finish up my orders. Have not put them online yet to sell. Debating that. Got a request from my neice that her Christmas present be a pink, fuzzy poncho. How can I say no? So I have that project going as well.

3. Participating in a picture a day for a month project. That has been fun but almost forgot one day but I snapped a pic before I went to bed. Hard part will be the journaling and I better start on that before I get too far.

4. Have a cookie swap coming up. Never participated in one and not a very good cook so I have to find a good and easy recipe - any suggestions?

My pictures are DONE! (click on gallery then find our name on list and click enter gallery). The problem is I can't decide which one is my favorite family photo. What do you think? My top favs (the ones that you say WOW and kind of gasp when you first see them) is #17 and #22. Thanks so much to Shannon Montez for the great photography. It's great to have friends with skills!

'Tis the Season! Well, Christmas is officially underway. On Saturday I got together with the Garage Girls and we exchanged our Secret Santa gifts. Look at what I got (plus Suzy gave us a gift certificate that I couldn't spend fast enough)!!

Then I headed over to my SIL with my MIL for our annual Christmas Tea. My SIL attends Twin Lakes church in Aptos and each year they put on a Christmas tea. The decorations are beautiful and the programs puts you right in the Christmas mood. This year they had a great speaker who was full of sass and told it to us like any Southern Lady should. She was from Texas but she reminded me of my grandmother with her Southern ways. What a great reminder that the season is not about all the stuff and stress but about Jesus and loving your family.

Do you think this tree will fit on our house?! Today we cut down our Christmas tree which is a tradition for us. I realized though that we have have other traditions like - getting out of the car and checking out one or two farms deciding we don't like it and get back in the car to go to another one, being indecisive about what tree to cut down so we end up walking up and down hills and end up way to far away from our car, not securing the tree tight enough on the roof of our car so we drive nervously down the freeway and usually we have to pull over and fix it before it flys off, never being able to get the tree perfectly straight in the holder (this usually creates a big debate year after year with my husband on what the definition of "straight" is) and last but not least having half of a strand of lights burn out after I put them on the very pokey tree!