If only in my dreams

"I'll be home for Christmas
you can plan on me
please have snow and mistletoe
and presents under the tree.

Christmas Eve will find me
where the lovelight gleams
I'll be home for Christmas
if only in my dreams."



Merry Christmas everyone

Cookie Tins

Every Christmas I remember eating cookies out of tins. In fact I remember memorizing which cookies were in which tins so we could be fast about our cookie getting (just in case there weren't many left and we'd have to share if everyone else knew we were getting cookies out). So, when I went to take cookies to work today I thought about how cute it would be to have the tins to take them in. We used to use (heck, my mom still uses as in present tense) the same tins every year. But I'm not really sure how one would go about getting new ones for my use. Most of the tins out there are little and are meant for cookie giving, not cookie keeping. So, let me know if you see any around...

Delicious Christmasness

Today began Christmas cookie making. If you've never seen my mom making Christmas cookies you can't imagine the psycho-ness that led to my ability to do this. Whirligiggs are one of my favorite Christmas cookies out there and after watching the process a few years now Sandor decided to capture it for you...

mix, roll out the peanut butter dough and spread on the chocolate

roll it up

move it into the fridge with the famous Whirligigg arm move

cut and bake...and there you go

Nothing much beats cookies that look this simple, but are this hard to make...not to mention they look pretty...and taste delicious! Mmmm...the attempt to not eat my weight in chocolate may have just been lost :)

Santa's COMING!

A Long Underwear Kind of Day

Fun times on the beach in December counting shells (not joking, we really were). A little sun makes up for the wind. I sure am glad we were there yesterday instead of today...it's pouring buckets outside!

Sweater Weather

Pup dogs in their sweaters hanging out while we go to the store.

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Great, Grand, Wonderful

Some days the millions of pictures of babies is more than I can do. Or the 18 people I hear about every week who are pregnant. It's an interesting world when you want to be pregnant and you aren't. Have you ever gone shopping for a car and find one that you like, then while you are deciding whether you want to buy it you see a million cars of that make and model? You may have never really noticed that car before, or you never thought that car was that popular. That is much how it feels when you are in your early 30s and want to have a baby, it seems like EVERYONE either has kids or is having them...or both. It's like you went back to buy that car and the car salesman said 'no, we aren't selling those anymore', and you say 'but it's right over there, I can see one', and he says 'oh, we're selling it to other people, just not you'.

I tried to find the clip from Billy Madison when Chris Farley walks back on the bus and says 'everybody on the bus? great! grand! wonderful!' It cracks me up and somehow seems the appropriate phrase for the moment. I don't want people to think I'm being mean or bitter or not happy when other people are pregnant or have kids, I'm just making a reflection on how it feels to not be that person.

And this is why I need to limit my Facebook time. I also need to go to bed because there is a lot of scrapbooking to be had tomorrow...speaking of which, I was downloading pictures deciding what to print and this one is so cute from Thanksgiving - love it!

I also realized there have been a ton of pictures I haven't posted yet - I've been a fickle blogger this fall to be certain. Perhaps the winter will be better.

Ready for Winter

So pennsylvania in january, eh? Is this too much?

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Blog-land is growing

Brandy has (FINALLY) joined the blog world. Granted I'm a little biased, but I think she is hilarious, and thus perfect for a blog writer. Finishing grad school for the semester and then finally getting a date for John's departure to boot camp and mom's bone marrow transplant - and those two dates occurring in the same month - spurred her to need an outlet for entertainment over the next few months. Today we came up with a title for her blog, and she just finished writing her first post.

Her first statement is "Well, my mom has 'The Cancer". And because of this, I have to do "The Business". And when I think about "The Business", I get "The Diarrhea". " So, head on over to It Is what It Is for some entertainment.

By the way, in case you don't go to Brandy's blog - "The Business" is on the January 29th...which just so happens to be literally the ONLY timeframe in 2010 which is actually booked on my work calendar. Thus a 3 day conference on invasives will be handed over to some (likely unhappy, but) able bodies and I will instead head north for the bone marrow transplant. I'll essentially be the only person in the small apartment near Johns Hopkins that is not throwing up for 4 days...sweet. At least I'm not in jeopardy of being exposed to the swine flu being that our small apartment will also be sanitation central.

Just got this cute picture of the three of us from last Easter

The Mustache Montage

For Halloween this year Maia convinced Jason to grow out his beard and be Billy Mays. Jason, always up for a challenge (and a laugh) of course agreed. I have to say, it was possibly my favorite costume ever. One of the reasons is the mustache montage that followed. Jason figured that since he had grown out a full beard he may as well make the best of it. And thus, each day we were greeted with a new beard - in the words of his 2 year old Ellie - 'you have your new beard on today, Daddy?' It really was too hilarious not to share and thus...

Billy Mays as Billy Mays

Jason as Billy Mays (not bad, eh?)

And now for our transition through beard options...

the 'I'm gunna get you sucka' stache

the 'fu-man-chu'

the 'porn stache'

the 'executive' - the was many of our favorites because it looks like he's serious about this mustache

'the villian'

and 'Herr Powers' (he actually didn't walk around with this one, just for a photo op)

Ah, if only every week was a new beard-a-day week.

Red, White, and Green

Every year a Worchester Wreath Company in Harrington, Maine trucks 5,000 wreaths to Arlington Cemetery to be placed on graves. The wreaths are laid on a different set of graves each year with the goal to eventually have put one on each grave. How beautiful is that - not just the wreaths in the snow, but the love and care the people put into the project each year?

My Favorite Things

Anyone who knows me know that I love Christmas. I'm not kidding - I LOVE CHRISTMAS!!! So in celebration of that I thought I would recap what I've loved the first 5 days of December, which for all intents and purposes are the first 5 days of Christmas in my book.

Day 1: I loved walking into work surrounded by the decorations we did the night before. There is just something about Christmas decorations that makes me smile. Stockings, snowmen, Santas, candy canes, trees, holly, candles...how can you look at that and not smile? Add in there a balsam fir candle burning and you've got a great way to start the day!

Day 2: Christmas music! I know that a lot of people find Christmas music annoying and most of them use hearing it in stores too much as their excuse. My comment to that is spend less time at the stores! I can listen to Christmas music everyday through December if necessary, and not once find it annoying (much to Sandor's chagrin). Stefanie and I had to drive to Wilmington on Wednesday and within the first 10 minutes of the drive realized that we both LOVED Christmas music, which made the radio station selection quite easy for the rest of the drive :)

Day 3: With December 3rd came unpacking from my Wilmington trip, at which point I found my Christmas clothes! And thus promptly put on some Christmas slippers and chose a Christmas shirt for the next day. Now I am a bit conservative on this end as far as Christmas lovers goes. I like the plain shirts with a tiny Christmas something or another on them. But Christmas socks! They are awesome. And I happen to own a pair of underwear that sing Christmas carols...warning on these, don't wear them to a meeting and move wrong. It's an uncomfortable explanation of where the music is coming from with your boss and his boss.

Day 4: Decorating the Christmas tree - by far one of my favorites of the season. This specific aspect of my Christmas obsession does in fact seem to have grown on Sandor. The first year we were married he was very confused by why I wanted to set up the tree as early as I did. In my opinion, we've only got a month - use it well! This year he actually asked me when we were going to decorate, so Friday I left work a bit early, we got ourselves a recently cut tree from the mountains and decorated it up! I still remember pulling out Christmas ornaments when I was little from the big box my parents had Brandy and I paint that is stored up in the attic. And every ornament reminds me of someone, or something, or some time. It's so fun to open them all up. I'm definitly a random tree decorator. I love the theme trees, but I just have too many random ornaments that I love to leave them in the box :)



for an added touch, I made Sandor and I hot chocolate this year while we were decorating!

Day 5: My favorite thing for today would be Christmas traditions. I love the fact that everyone has their own tradition they remember, or a moment they can't forget, or a person that Christmas reminds them of. Some people could argue that it makes it less special that everyone has something of their own about Christmas that makes it special because then you aren't the only one, but I think that is exactly what makes Christmas so beautiful. Today I was introduced to a tradition of a tiny little town called Barrineau, SC. I have heard legends of this parade for years at my church, but this was the first year most of us experienced it. It was definitely an experience, and one that I'm glad I got to enjoy. I don't know what was more fun, seeing the parade, or watching others in our group see it. And then my pastor and I spent most of the trip back talking about what we remember about Christmas! It seemed very fitting after seeing someting that was a specific tradition to that town.

One of the floats from the parade. Let's just say this particular parade was like nothing I'd seen before.

And that was only 5 days - we've got 20 left...and 6 more in December if you want to stretch the season to New Years. Ahhh, glorious!

Now to lose 10 pounds!

We finally set the date, found the location, and made the invitations for the much talked about, but never actually planned WEDDING DRESS JEWELRY PARTY! Yes, ladies and gentlemen it is true, there is now a time when I can wear my wedding dress again. The only problem is when I tried it on a few weeks ago I had a solid 2 inch gap to close the zipper. Hmmmm, I feel like Christmas is not the time to lose weight, so I guess I'll have 15 days starting January 1st. And to be on the safe side, I'll go shopping for a white tube top and something to tie it together....because I AM wearing my dress. In case you want to join us - RSVP at the evite. Fun times ahead!

Early Christmas Present

Hello again. I apologize for the major lack of posts as of late. We were having some computer issues, leading to 1) no computer access for me since I (unlike the hubster) cannot hook into the internet on my phone and 2) a new computer is now sitting in our living room. Notice I said living room, not spare bedroom. That is because we now own a laptop - and we each have our Christmas present for each other.