Christmas Likes....

I got this on email and thought I'd post it here (copying after my wonderful cousin, Bink).

1. Wrapping paper or gift bags? Wrapping, except for gifts that are really odd shaped or when I'm "wrapping" at the last minute.

2. Real tree or artificial? Artificial this year

3. When do you put up the tree? The weekend after Thanksgiving.

4. When do you take the tree down? New Year's-ish.

5. Do you like eggnog? I like Soy Nog.

6. What was your favorite gift received as a child? I don't think I remember any!

7. Do you have a nativity scene? Yes - a very old one.

8. Hardest person to buy for? Dad.

9. Easiest person to buy for? Lacey and Leah.

10. Worst Christmas gift you ever received? Can't think of one to mention.

11. Mail or email cards? Mail.

12. Favorite Christmas Movie? Elf.

13. When do you start shopping for Christmas? September or so.....

14. Have you ever recycled a Christmas present? Nope.

15. Favorite thing to eat at Christmas? Cookies. :-)

16. Clear lights or colored on the tree? Clear.

17. Favorite Christmas song? Silent Night.......or on a lighter note, Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree

18. Travel for Christmas or stay at home? Stay home.

19. Can you name all of Santa's reindeers? Dasher, Dancer, Prancer, Vixen, Commet, Cupid, Donner, Blitzen

20. Angel on the tree top or a star? A reindeer that Lacey made.

21. Open the presents Christmas Eve or morning? One of Christmas Eve (PJs), the rest on Christmas morning.

22. Most annoying thing about this time of year? All of the news about shopping.

23. What I love most about Christmas? Just about everything else! I love the wonder that children feel!

Merry Christmas!

On Christmas Eve (a.k.a., Butch's birthday), we were quite busy. I went with Dee, Rick, Kristina, Jess & JD to mom's grave to put up a wreath and new winter mini flag. (We are really bad about getting down there and will make it a resolution for 2008 to do it more....even though we tried that for 2007 and failed.) Then, we went to Dad's (where Butch and the girls were waiting) and gave him his present.........a new leather recliner. His old one was falling apart....literally.

We were able to come home for a short bit before getting ready for 5:00 church. It's the family service and is really cute b/c the kids do a lot of it. And, you don't feel bad when your kids are making noise because it is the family service. :-)

Then, we headed home for dinner (mexican casserole) and ice cream cake for B's birthday. Lacey even sang for him. Our tongues turned blue from the yummy ice cream cake.

Before the ice cream cake, Lacey opened 1 gift for her and 1 for Leah. Of course, it was new PJs. That was always a tradition for us growing up, so I think I'll do the same now. Lacey got a new princess nightgown, with robe and slippers. She was very pleased. Leah got a new Piglet sleeper. Lacey actually slept in her robe.

I was exhausted on Christmas morning b/c Leah slept horribly. Her 2nd tooth is coming in and seems to be really giving her a tough time. She woke up early, too......6:20 or so. She was actually back down for a nap by the time that Lacey woke up for presents.

When Lacey woke up and was calling for me, I went into her room and told her Santa had come and brought presents. When I asked her if she wanted to go see, she said "no". So, I had to make sure she realized that Santa wasn't here anymore.....then she was okay coming downstairs. She does not like to be close to the man in the red suit.

Two of the things that Santa left (unwrapped) were her favs......Barbie, Island Princess and the Belle baby doll. With those and the crayons, markers and new coloring books, she would have been happy. Because she was fine with those things, it took a long time to get her focused enough to open everything. And, I actually had to open a few things for her.

Here's a picture of the tree before the chaos....

Leah woke a little while later and Butch opened up her gifts for her. She enjoyed the paper, but really like the books and things, too. She was cranky some through the day b/c of those darn teeth.

Rick, Kristina, Jess, JD, Dad, Dee, Buck, Kristin & Kyle all came for dinner later in the day. Even though we "hosted", we got off pretty easy because Dad did the stuffed ham and Buck did a fried turkey. We always do pot-luck, so Kristina brought a couple of dishes and we just had a few things to do for dinner. What did we have, you ask? Besides the meat, we had broccoli casserole, grean bean casserole, corn pudding, sweet potato casserole, strawberry spinach salad, gravy & rolls. For dessert, we had carrot cake and pistachio torte (and cookies, of course).

Between dinner & dessert, we opened gifts. More toys for the girls and also some clothes. Lacey was (again) thrilled --- especially since she got more princess things. Here she is showing off the dress that Grandma made for her:

It was a busy day and at the end, you wonder where it went. But, it was fun (even with the few tantrums from Lacey) and we enjoyed the company, the food and the wine. :-)

Each year, we do a pic of all of the cousins....here is the one for 2007.....with the newest "member", Leah:

Some Sad News

I hadn't blogged about this last week, but wanted to do so now so that you can keep my boss & her family in your prayers. Her only child, 25-year old Blythe, was killed while serving in the Peace Corps on 12/6. I can't imagine what Joan and her husband are going through. They received the news while out of town (together, thankfully), at a business dinner. At any time, this is horrible news for a parent to hear, but at this time of year, it must be ever more awful.

http://www.beepcentral.com/story.aspx?story=20567

Santa came for a visit to our neighborhood last night. He was riding on the local fire trucks. :-) They do it every year, but this is the first year we walked Lacey down the street for it just because they come sort of "late" (8:00).....after her old bedtime. She was so excited.

I think I'm nearly done Christmas shopping. Just a handful of things left (thankfully). I need to get the gifts for you out of towners wrapped so I can get those in the mail.

We still haven't gotten Christmas cards done. I haven't been able to get Lacey to cooperate for a picture in her dress. Of course, the last 3 days were shot since she had hives......wait a minute.....that's another story. Re the cards, we may end up sending them late or just doing New Year's cards. We'll see.

Hives......so Sunday morning, Lacey & Butch played downstairs in the basement for quite a bit. It's unfinished and a mess. Open insullation. Cat hair, etc. You get the picture. She was rolling around on the rug down there and I think that may be what caused the hives. They aren't too bad now, but on Sunday....wow. Dr. Jill says they commonly stick around for a couple of days. They go away with Benadryl, then come back (in different spots) when the meds wear off. Hopefully we are at the end of this now.

Both Lacey & I have colds. I think Leah is getting one, too. Blah. Oh well, better now than in 2 weeks.

I had Lisa start Leah on lunch this week. She has been diving for her dinner, so I figure she is hungry. Hopefully she'll go back to being a good sleeper soon......either food will help or maybe those darn teeth will come in. :-) Or, she'll just keep waking every 4-5 hours.

Frisbee 2000 - 12/8/2007

Well, he was doing somewhat better yesterday and we expected to bring him home today. However, he took a turn for the worse overnight. We spoke to the vet around 9:15 this morning and she said that he needed a blood transfusion if we were to continue. She agreed, though, that it was a gamble. He simply wasn't responding well. I asked about bringing him home for the weekend, but she didn't think he would last until Monday. We decided to euthanize him today and to do it there so he wasn't stressed any further.

When we got to the vet around 11:30, he didn't even wag his tail or lift his head. He was so anemic from all of the fluids he was receiving that he was too weak. And, even with all the fluids, his kidney counts didn't ever get very low. We spent several minutes petting him and talking to him.

It was heart-breaking to let him go. I can't believe that my fun-loving 7 year old goofy dog is now gone. I know we did the right thing in letting him go, but I'm just so angry that he got so sick in the first place.....from a freakin' tick.

We will miss him tremendously. It has already felt strange over the last few days with no barking and no one licking up our messes on the floor.

Frisbee

I am so sad. Frisbee was diagnosed this week with kidney disease and Lyme disease. He had been a little weird about his eating habits for the past few weeks -- not interested in his food, but devouring Kramer's food -- and begging at the table (more than normal). Nancy mentioned during their visit that she thought he'd lost weight. We didn't think so....until Sunday when we decided to weigh him. He had gone from 30-32 pounds or so down to 25. That's more than 20%. More than 10% is an issue. So, I bought different food on Monday to see if he would eat canned dog food....he ate it....and then vomited a few hours later. So, I made an appt. at the vet for Wed. Because of his young age (7), she was surprised that he had kidney disease, which is why they decided to test for Lyme disease, too. Apparently Lyme disease can cause kidney problems if left untreated. Looking back through the spring and summer, there are only 2 instances that we now realize were related to Lyme.....2 times that he limped.....for a day....and then appeared to be fine. He seemed fine otherwise.

We have always just used the flea/tick stuff in the spring/summer months. I would suggest that if you live in an area with Lyme disease to use it all year long. And, I've learned that there is a vaccine which is 75% effective. Get it. We had a horrible infestation in our yard this year and had to put pesticides down twice. It was awful.

Kidney disease is fatal. We learned that with Toonces. It's the same *&%^ illness that we lost him to 15 months ago. The vet estimated 6-12 months for Frisbee when we spoke on Wednesday. They kept him in the hospital that night to give IV fluids and flush his system. Thursday, they tested blood again and it was better, but not great, so they kept him overnight again. Today, she called to say that he had vomited a few times last night (not good at all) and they really wanted to keep him until tomorrow morning. Based on all of this, I'm not sure we even have 6 months with him.

Day by day. I visited him yesterday & Butch is going this afternoon. If we get him home tomorrow and the weekend doesn't go well, I imagine we'll be making big decisions. I am hoping that he will at least do better through the holidays, but based on how things have gone so far, I'm not sure how likely that is. I don't want to put him through lots of treatment and antibiotics (for the Lyme disease) if he isn't going to have a good quality of life.

He is truly the best dog ever. He has tolerated a ton from Lacey and barely growled at her. He has been annoying as hell with the loud barking, but wow, what a watch dog. The teeth are shown if someone he doesn't know shows up. I have never worried about being safe.

Give your dog a hug today. And, take issues with ticks very seriously.

"Shake Your Booty"

Last night, Lacey was playing with her Little People (who "live" on the coffee table and end tables.....I guess each table is a new town or something). So, she turns several of the Little People around so their backs are facing her and says (a few times) "Shake Your Booty". Butch was sitting right there and I was in the kitchen, but he didn't even hear her. (He tunes her out when she's playing.) I asked him if she said what I thought she said. She said it again a few minutes later and he did hear her......yes, we heard correctly.

No clue where she got that from. We do let her watch some inappropriate TV, but it's not anything like that. Maybe the older girls at daycare.......too funny.

Thanksgiving and Leah's Baptism

Butch was off the day before Thanksgiving and our office closed at 1:00. So, I worked at home that day and we kept the girls home. We headed out for family pictures that afternoon. Amazingly, both girls cooperated. After pictures, we treated Lacey to Cold Stone Creamery. Okay, you're right....it was an excuse for me to get to go.

Chuck & Nancy came for a visit over Thanksgiving weekend. They arrived on Turkey Day around noon. (They were going to come the day before, but we suggested waiting since traffic is a nightmare around here the day before.) Anyway, we were invited over to Dee's around 1:00ish and dinner was to be around 3:00. But....Leah actually took a *good* nap that day. And, I was not about to wake her up. No way. So, we didn't get over to Dee's until about 3:00. (There were some other's that were late, too, though.) Dinner got moved to about 4:00.

There were about 15-16 people there....including Dee & family, Rick & family, us, Dad, Calvin (Buck's dad), Steve & Amy & kids. (Steve is Buck's bro.) They have 2 little girls, too. Riley is about 5 and Camryn is around Lacey's age. Dee had been wanting to get Lacey together with them for a while....but Lacey is a shy girl and wasn't much up for playing at first. Even later, she wasn't much for playing "with" them by herself. Oh well.

Dinner was YUM-O! Turkey, stuffed ham, gravy, mashed potatoes, broccoli casserole, corn pudding, sweet potato casserole, salad, mac & cheese, biscuits......I don't think I'm forgetting anything. It was so good. After everyone had time for the food to settle, out came the desserts. And, by then....it was time for us to head home right after because of sleepy little ones.

We didn't do much the rest of the weekend. Relax, visit, eat, etc. Well....until Sunday. Sunday was Leah's baptism. It went smoothly. Leah's dress was beautiful. Nancy made it.

I hate sitting in the front of church. I suppose we didn't have to, but everyone else in the fam would want to since they'd want to take pictures, etc. (And, we'd want them to take pics.) Trying to keep Lacey quiet was a struggle at first. She never comes to church. She always goes to the nursery. Anyway, after acting up a bit in the beginning, she took her binks and rested. Leah seemed to really like the water - kind of funny. The pastor walked Leah around the church after the baptism and she enjoyed that, too. After all of the excitement, Lacey fell asleep on me and Leah fell asleep on Butch.

We headed back to the house after church for Italian Meatball Stew and a little football. Everyone left at half-time.....our TV isn't big enough. :-) I'm not joking here. Hehe.

Not much else is going on. I've started Christmas shopping - most of it online.

I have to head to NY on Tuesday and am not looking forward to it. At least I don't travel a lot anymore.

I'd better get myself organized for tomorrow. Bottles to prepare, ironing, etc.

Leah is 5 month's old!

4 months

5 months

She's getting to be so much fun. Just this last week, she has started to sit a little better, but you still need to catch her when she starts to lose her balance. She loves to play with her toys. I was putting her to bed the other night and she laughed at "nothing". I was just getting her jammies on and she laughed. So cute.

I weighed her last night & she's up to 17 pounds. We started her on cereal a few weeks ago and she's eaten some fruits, too.....bananas, pears, apples. Bananas are her fav.

We started letting her cry at bedtime a little over a week ago to try to get her back to sleeping through. It's been okay. At least she goes down easily now and we don't have to bounce or rock her to sleep anymore. Out of maybe 9 nights, she's slept "through" twice. Hopefully that will come (soon). She slept so great until 3 months old.

I'll do an update on everything else later. They both just woke from naps....