Holly Jolly Saturday

Saturday saw me at home, all day, with Levi and Molly...trying to make sense of the holiday explosion that had erupted at our house...I didn't think I could do it, but with some coffee, Christmas music, and cooperation (I like to call them the 3 C's), I got the tree up, most of the deco here or there, and the house nicely ordered before David and the 3 big ones arrived on the stoop at 5 pm. Whew! 'Twas so nice to have them home...until E. threw up...but it was nice to have them all snug and back in the cubby...I slept better last night!

this was where I thought we would put the tree but it really hindered the elliptical use...now that we have 2 couches in the living room, we couldn't put the tree where we usually do. bummer.

Love the action shots of levi and molly here....

aforementioned explosion. what to do...


how magical...that little blob on the floor by the skirt? a tiny tree...that Levi put there and told us that it was the tree's baby. I didn't realize it was still there when I took this pic. We really like the tree in this spot!!

we've put this ornament on our tree for the 16th time...our first Christmas together...

these two mugs, taking naps while I did the tree stuff...how cute is this pic though?

David and I went out for some coffee last night...and Levi got to go with us...you can see him peeking thru...wait, there's one where he shows up...never fear...

David loves Panda Bear Express (his name for it)...

I know it seems like I take a lot of these self-portraits of me and whoever I'm with lately...but I figured it was the only way I'd show up in pix (that I could control anyways)...and since I don't have a lot of pix of my mom from my younger years, I wanted to reverse that trend for my kids. Though the pix are 99% of the time unflattering, that's ok. There I'll be. for posterity...

Off to take my walk/run...hope you are relaxing, kicking back, getting stuff accomplished, enjoying your day....hugs!

weekend update

This picture is significant for many reasons, some of which I won't bore you with, but this girl is not even 15 months old yet. She watched the big kids for a minute or two, when we first got into the park...it didn't take her very long and she figured out how to go up the stairs, up the steps, to the highest slide (not high for us but for her? yeah)...she'd throw herself down and slide her buns down ... back around again, and again. Tom got a cute little video of it but of course, I know not how to get that on here and besides, with dial up, it would take me two days to upload it...it's taken me most of this day to get these pix up here. I find it's better to blog in the middle of the night...they upload in super high speed (for me).

I didn't take any pix of Levi in the park (loser) because he was hiding the whole time...

Monday, Monday. Can't trust that day....

I have no reason not to trust it, it's just hard to get going in the right direction again. ahhhh!

~Saturday was all soccer...Levi actually kicked the ball! Woo Hoo! His coach (Wendy) and I shared a moment of utter surprise across the field!

~Melanie had a double "header" and won both of her games...she played hard and did a good job! In her first game, we got to hear the referee threaten the other team's coach. "If I have to talk to you again, I will be kicking u out of this game, sir!"

~The boys won 2-0...and to think they didn't even want to be there. It was hot, and when you have 3 games to endure, it makes ya kinda bitter in the muggy September heat. We must not be cut from the soccer cloth...imagine if we were a part of a travel team??? We like soccer, but on our terms. Thanks for coming out to the kids' games, Beck, Piper, Nora and Tom...you guys rock!

~That night, David and I were planning to go to the Irish Fest with Jeff and Nicky...rain moved in and we ended up at Cheesecake Factory (David and I were first timers)...it was nice to get out of the house, away from inquiring kid minds (we love our kids) and to just be "grown-up" for a minute or two (that's how fast it went)...though, from the looks of some of the pix I took, I am hardly grown up. Couldn't let an evening pass by where I put chocolate on my teeth. David was thrilled...Jeff wasn't surprised either and Nicky was a bit freaked out. I'm a classy dame!

such a non-flattering photo of me, what's new? I need my hair cut really, really bad but I am not photogenic. David, on the other hand, is trying to look like this. He loves my chocolate on the teeth hillbilly impression EVERY TIME!

~We vowed to get to bed earlier that night, ended our date by 11:15, picked up Levi at my sister's house, rented "Unbreakable" (3rd movie in our M. Night Shymalan marathon)...got home to Mom and the rest of the crew and proceeded to watch said movie when we got home, well after midnight...great movie, doesn't do much for my sleeping patterns though. We had the windows open that evening, which freaked me out anyways, but then I kept "hearing" things, spooking myself with the woodland creatures around here...something was mewling outside the windows so I had Davey boy get up with me to check it out. It was such a Brady Bunch moment. "Mike, get your shotgun"...hee hee. different show.

~Amazing worship service yesterday...we really enjoy the 45-60 minutes of true worship, communion, to no one but the one true God. Good message by Pastor Randy on John 12. Great, caring people...we continue to be blessed!

~I'm adopting something that my dear cuz, Tory, does at the end of her posts ...Things I learned today include the following: It doesn't pay to stay up late on Saturday night...watching one of "those" Shymalan movies especially. Another thing? a "Christian" singer that I used to listen to back in the 90's, Ray Boltz (Watch the Lamb, Thank You, etc), came out of the "closet"...that bothers me more than I thought it would and it just doesn't match up...Lastly, when you get 9 kids together on a Sunday evening in a clean house, you CAN keep it that way. not without some diligence, but it can be done.

Now if my pix would upload. I love dial up. I love dial up. Choose JOY. Choose JOY.

update: It's now 3 pm, 9/22/08. I've been uploading pix one at a time all day...and now I'm over it...I've got to look into some form of high speed...David talks about it like it makes sense to him but it makes no sense to me whatsoever, what is available, how it works, blah blah blah. Help!! Hellllp. See ya later...much later.