Smiling Mom

I love me some Santa Tor­ture.  It makes for great pictures!!

eClaire: AHHHHHHHH

BC: OK Santa, I know I wrote you, but I want some Light­ning McQueen water shoes.…Ice Ska­tes… NOT a Bar­bie Prin­cess Doll!!  But you can give that to my sister.…..

eClaire: AHHHHHHHHHH

BC: And.…Also.….One more thing.…

eClaire: AHHHHHHHHHH

Today was so much fun!

eClaire got a refur­bished trike. (Bas­ket, tas­sels, and bell added for the ‘girly effect’)

Santa brought eClaire a dolly this year for Christ­mas.

BC got a bike. It was SO much fun!

You just can’t beat a nice 72º Christ­mas in San Diego!

Hubby and I really enjoy pla­ying Santa!

The perks are great!!

This is NOT our Christ­mas Tree.

Nope, neither is this one!

You see, last year we went and cut down our own tree. We loved the expe­rience. We deci­ded that this would be our family’s tradition.

Then Hubby had sur­gery on his arm. And the whole ‘let’s saw down a tree and throw it on top of our man-van’ idea went out the win­dow. So our family hea­ded to our local Home Depot yes­ter­day to pick out our own small 3–4 foot tall tree.

Hubby was fee­ling bet­ter so he came too.

His eyes got big.

Really big.

He nee­ded a 6–7 foot tree.

We deci­ded on the one pic­tu­red above. It was the one! Beau­ti­ful, full, no holes. Perfect.

Now, step two. How do we get it home?

We deci­ded that I could bat my eyes and Hubby could flash his arm sling at the young guys at the front and maybe they would throw it on top of our man-van for us.

Our plan was devi­sed, pic­tu­res docu­men­ting the tree hunt were taken and we began lug­ging this per­fect tree up to the register.

BUT half way to the regis­ter, Hubby stopped.

He chan­ged his mind. He deci­ded that we should go this wee­kend to a tree farm after all to cut down that tree.

He had to go!

After much mini­mal good hear­ted gri­ping on my part, we tur­ned around and put the beau­ti­ful noble fur back with the others.

BC and eClaire were so confused.

“Change of plans guys!! You get to pick out a pot­ted Christ­mas tree!! Find the per­fect one! GO!” (what the kids didn’t know is that the ‘pot­ted Christ­mas tree’ was really a rose­mary bush sha­ped like a tree! shhh don’t tell!)

So off BC and eClaire went on a hunt for the new per­fect tree to bring home and decorate.

What do you think of the kids rose­mary bush Christ­mas tree?

Last year I offe­red to knit Christ­mas stoc­kings for all my sister-in-law’s fami­lies. No I’m not a great knit­ter and I’m not espe­cially fond of the whole knit­ting thing. But I do love me some tra­di­tion! My mom knit­ted stoc­kings for our family when we were young, and I loved them.

Home­made stockings=Christmas.

A few years ago, I con­ti­nued the tra­di­tion my mom began and took up knit­ting to make my family our own knit stoc­kings using the same basic pat­tern my mom used.

Jump for­ward to last year around this time, one of my sister-in-laws took me up on my offer to make her family their own stoc­kings. I ended up only get­ting one stoc­king done before Christ­mas. But I made a pro­mise to finish the other three before the next Christ­mas… the one in just over a month

Jump for­ward to Sep­tem­ber. I had one of those, Oh Sh*t moments when I rea­li­zed that I had three stoc­kings to go and only three months to com­plete the project.

Making these stoc­kings has been quite enjo­ya­ble. I’m so exci­ted that Hubby’s sister’s family will have something hand­made for them to use for every Christ­mas to come.

By Mon­day I’d finished the rest of the stoc­kings and just nee­ded to stitch the follo­wing names on the three stockings.

MOM

DAD

CADE

Nice, huh?

Notice anything wrong?

Anything?

Ohhhh, What?? I said CADE, but made COLE??

Do you think my SIL will notice my silly little mis­take?? I mean what’s a few let­ters any­way?? I got the C and E correct. Just mes­sed up on the A and the D…

You know what’s totally crazy? I wrote COLE on the stoc­king on MONDAY. MONDAY PEOPLE!! And I have shown this stoc­king to three family mem­bers aside from me who knew the baby’s name is CADE and it was only last night when another SIL of mine said, “COLE? Didn’t you mean CADE?”

To which I res­pon­ded, “Sh*t. Sh*t! SH*T!!!” and then burst out in hys­te­ri­cal laugh­ter. I couldn’t believe my mistake.

Last night I sta­yed up until very late and was for­ced to watch The Prac­tice and Kitchen Night­ma­res in order to correct my mis­take. And today I am finally done!

Only 8 months late, Happy last Christ­mas SIL!!

If you are just totally ena­mo­red by my knit­ting skillz and want the pat­tern I crea­ted for this stoc­king, just send me an email!

Happy Thanks­gi­ving!