The Christmas Card Photo Shoot

This evening, I started a fire in the fireplace. Hutton has been asking me to "turn on the fireplace" all week, so I finally complied. Of course, we don't have a handy gas fireplace, that can be started with the flip of a switch. Nope, our involves all the campfire skills I never had. I got a fire going for a short time, and now our house smells like the interior of a wood stove. That's OK, though! Hutton enjoyed the fire!

So, as the fire was going, I thought, "Hmm, this would be a cute picture for the Christmas cards, since I haven't gotten around to taking any yet." I ran and grabbed my camera, handed the boys their stockings, and starting clicking away.

Twenty minutes, a hundred pictures, and numerous mumbled curses at the slowness of my camera's shutter speed later, I sat down to pick a picture. Lots of blurry shots, a few dark ones, and several bad shots were deleted immediately. The rest I slowly went through, saving ones I liked or thought were funny, then going through twice more, further culling the stack.

Now, I present you the select few pictures I thought were funny or cute, and the select one I will use for my card. (Click on a picture for a larger version, complete with oh-so-witty captioning.)


Oh, and for my eagle-eyed readers, you will notice that Hutton's stocking is, indeed, the stocking featured in the Land's End catalog from this post. Now, did my BFF get a good deal on that one a few years ago because Hutton's name was already on it? I kid!

Where Was I?

Oh yeah, I was talking about electricity. Well it went out Thursday the 14th, and stayed out for over a week. Fortunately, we got the hell out of dodge on Saturday, on our flight to visit family in Tennessee. We survived five days with my family, followed by a seven-hour drive to Florida to see Hubby's family. We survived still another five days there, and traveled another seven-hour drive back to Tennessee. Then we had our glorious five-hour flight home to Seatac yesterday. The angels sang as we drove up and the garage door opened with the simple push of a button. I happily went around turning on every light in the house.

The highlights and lowlights of our trip:

We saw lots of family. This is usually a highlight AND a lowlight at the same time. For instance, visiting Gran, my mom's mother, involves listening to lots of "woe is me" talk in a house that could double for a smokey bar. After hearing about Gran's miserable cold, then moving on to the thrilling travel photos, Hubby and I felt the need to change clothes and shower. We don't spend much time in smokey bars, either. Gran is 82, so her 60+ years of smoking seem to have done nothing to her health. Good genes, I guess. Hope I got those genes, too! We also visited my great-uncle in the rehab center where he's recovering from a fractured hip. I don't want to get old.

One night in Florida we visited some family friends/distant cousins of Hubby's in their as un-kid-friendly-as-possible home. Think fragile knicknacks on every surface. I ate my dinner in as few bites as possible, then circled through the house after the boys keeping them from touching anything. They did get some travel-size Etch-a-sketches, so that helped for about 30 seconds.

Hutton highlights: Every ceiling fan in every room that had one was turned on. The boy loves ceiling fans, and since we don't have any at home, he has to get his fill visiting relatives. He also found Nana's (Hubby's mom) microwave irresistible, as it was on a low countertop within easy reach. First he made do with just pressing the buttons as often as possible, followed by my hollow threats to "not touch the microwave...or else!" The best part was one day when I smelled something funny in the kitchen, hurried in, and found Hutton laughing maniacally about the "girl smiling!" I found the weird odor was coming from the microwave, which was cooking a box of Wheat Thins bearing Rachel Ray's image. Well, she was smiling, even after being microwaved. What a trooper!

Another highlight (in the sarcastic sense): one day I left my cell phone on the kitchen table at my mom's house, along with a glass of water. Figured this was OK since Hubby was sitting at the kitchen table. I was wrong. After I got out of the shower, Hutton was crying, Hubby was yelling, and my cellphone wasn't working. Fortunately, after dyring out, my cellphone works again.

This morning, after an oh-so-exciting New Year's Eve night spent going to bed around 10 pm (hey, we're still on Central Time!), we got a phone call from the kennel where the dogs and cat were staying. Something was wrong with our dog, Sally, and they wanted us to come pick her up. Pro: we got to spring the animals a day early, since the kennel wasn't technically open today. Con: Sally is unable to stand, and we took her to the emergency vet, who thinks she may have a slipped disk, but needs to do lots of tests and X-rays to be sure. They haven't called with the results yet, so please keep our sweet doggie in your thoughts.

Off to clean more, do more laundry, and put away more Christmas gifts. Oh yeah, I guess I need to write thank you notes, too. I really hate the day after coming home from a trip!

My Poor Children

My poor children are not getting any gifts from me for Christmas this year. Aren't I a heartless, uncaring mother?

Well, take a look at these pictures:



And those are only some of the toys. There are more downstairs. And this is after I've cleaned out a lot of what they don't play with.

I got out the Christmas stuff yesterday, so Santa's village has been incorporated into the rest of the Little People toys that are spread out around the room. Hutton likes to hook all the sets together in a circle, but in this case, it's more like a Gordian knot. Last week, I set up the train tracks on the train table, because before that they'd been all over the floor. So, for a day or so, one could walk into our playroom/office without stepping on toys. That's over now, as you can see from the pictures.

Don't worry, though. My poor, poor, deprived little boys will be getting more stuff from Go-Go and Nana (the names their grandmothers have given themselves). The two of them race to get to the Amazon wish list each year and buy everything. Mom (Go-Go) snapped everything up this year, so Nana will have to just wing it.