Happy Holidays to Y’All from Snowy Texas
December 21, 2009 at 12:09 pm (Holidays, Home, Houston, Texas)
Christmas (tree) on the Farm
December 19, 2009 at 1:24 pm (Family, Holidays, Home, Kids)
He was hoping for the tallest tree on the lot. Our house is not that big.
My niece, totally loving the Christmas Tree farm.
How about that little guy? He’s perfect.
Child labor is one of the many benefits of having these guys around. Saw away, Boy.
And when you’re done sawing, start dragging.
And don’t forget to smile when we get the decorations up, when you remember exactly why it is we have a tree. I’m thinking someone is looking forward to a present or two.
I think maybe they’ve earned one or two.
Christmas Lights
December 17, 2009 at 9:25 am (Holidays, Houston, Photos)
In and around The Heights in Houston.
Have a little fun for Christmas
December 24, 2007 at 1:10 am (Friendship, Holidays)
Merry Christmas to you all. Hope you can find ways to have fun in all the Chaos.
Still standing with a smile
December 30, 2006 at 2:23 pm (Family, Holidays, Home)
We had a really great Christmas. The kids scored big since we’re close to family this year. Bryce is happily putting together his Bionicle village, and Salem is watching her new Narnia movie as I write. Bryce, Josh and Chris are dying of impatience to cash in their gift certificates for their Discovery Flights. Since an adult gets to fly with each of them, we’re excited too! Now if we could just figure out how to un-give the airsoft guns, sheesh.
Our normal family tradition is a big turkey feast on Christmas Eve, but this year we had to alter the schedule a bit. Grandpa was cool enough to get us football tickets. Score! Larry, Kelly and I took Salem, Bryce, Andre and Chris to watch the Texans beat the Colts for the first time ever. The fact that the game was tied up until the last 3 seconds when the Texans made a winning field goal made up for the fact that our seats were in the very, extremely, totally top row. Once the nosebleeds cleared up we got out the binoculars and enjoyed the game. I’m not complaining though, it was a lot of fun and free tickets are never bad!
So the turkey (and prime rib) feast was on Christmas day instead. It was a full, long day since the kids woke us up at 6:30am and we didn’t finish with the clean up until almost midnight. Still, there was something great about having 4 kids in the house all excited about sharing the holiday together. Even the BB gun incident didn’t kill the good mood.
Kelly, as usual, made a fine dinner. He loves to cook for an audience, and he is very good at it. Even the white meat was good, and I hate white meat. For the low, low price of doing the dishes, I once again escaped the torture of preparing even the smallest portion of the meal. Believe me when I say everyone is happier that way.
Now we’re enjoying laying around while watching our Christmas tree dry out, enjoying our new books and toys. New year’s eve will be spent with the kids, and probably include an IMAX showing of “Night at the Museum”. Can’t wait for that!
We hope you all had as nice a holiday as we did. To our family and friends whom we didn’t get to see this year, we miss you, and are really looking forward to seeing as many of you as we can this coming year.
Love to all.
Our Holiday
December 18, 2006 at 10:32 pm (Holidays, Home)
1. Egg Nog or Hot Chocolate? Hot Chocolate for Peg, everyone else likes Egg Nog. (Gross!)
2. Does Santa wrap presents or just sit them under the tree? Sits them under the tree.
3. Colored lights on tree/house or white? Colored this year, but we’ve done both
4. Do you hang mistletoe? I always forget to get it.
5 . When do you put your decorations up?Saturday after Thanksgiving
6. What is your favorite holiday dish? Anything I don’t have to cook. Oh, and Pie.
7. Favorite Holiday memory as a child? My Mom always forgetting to fill the stockings
8. When and how did you learn the truth about Santa? What truth?
9. Do you open a gift on Christmas Eve? Two. One with Kel’s family and one later at home before bed.
10. How do you decorate your Christmas Tree? Lights, Garland and our family ornaments, with a Mickey Mouse Santa on top.
11. Snow! Love it or Dread it? Love it on Christmas, but that’s enough for me. Kel and the kids love it.1
2. Can you ice skate? Yes
13. Do you remember your favorite holiday gift? A skating costume when I was 12
14. What’s the most important thing about the Holidays for you? Being with family and Seeing the kids so excited.
15. What is your favorite Holiday Dessert? Brownies!
16. What is your favorite holiday tradition?Raround in the car looking at lights with the kids and watching them open presents.
17. What tops your tree? An animated Mickey Mouse Santa.
18. Which do you prefer giving or Receiving? Depends on the gift! Usually giving.
19. What is your favorite Christmas Song? I saw Mommy kissing Santa Clause
20. Candy Canes! Yuck or Yum? Yum, but one is enough per year.
Hot chocolate and air conditioning
November 21, 2006 at 11:22 am (Holidays, Houston, Texas)
Now that it’s towards the end of November we are getting out our Christmas decorations and decking out the house. We’re having Thanksgiving dinner here on Thursday with the family and then it’s all downhill to the big day.
Also, we took the hard top off the Jeep and have been driving with the top down for two days.
I so don’t miss the frigid cold and ice of New Jersey.
A Christmas Meme
December 26, 2005 at 4:16 am (Holidays, Just for fun, questions)
1. Hot Chocolate or apple cider? Hot chocolate. Mmmmmm, chocolate.
2. Turkey or Ham? Ham, but I love turkey too.
3. Do you get a fake or real-you-cut-it-yourself Christmas tree? I grew up with a fake tree, so my old Christmas memories of assembling the branches are wonderful. We just got a fake tree last year again, but I did enjoy the smell of pine during those years I had a real tree.
4. Decorations on the outside of your house? Usually yes, but this year we were lazy. We do have light sculptures in the windows on the inside that you can see from the street though.
5. Snowball fights or sleddin’? Sledding! At least you get some wind through your hair before your face gets creamed into the snow!
7. Do you enjoy going downtown shopping? Not. I think Amazon was created just for me.
8. Favorite Christmas song? On the first day of Christmas my true love gave to me…BEER. Hoser.
10. How do you feel about Christmas movies? Love them and know them all by heart. The funnier the better.
11. When is it too early to start listening to Christmas music? No earlier than the 1st of December, please!
12. Stockings before or after presents? First thing. We go through them while the kids are fighting over who gets to hand out the big gifts.
13. Carolers, do you or do you not watch and listen to them? Not.
14. Go to someone else’s house or they come to you? Depends on where we are. Usually a combination of both, but this year we are blissfully on our own and really enjoying the quiet peace of it.
15. Do you read the Christmas Story? If so when? Sometimes, but not this year.
16. What do you do after presents and dinner? Play with the toys, read the books, watch the movies, nap, eat, nap, eat, then call family.
17. What is your favorite holiday smell? The whole turkey/ham dinner…mmmmmmm.
18. Ice skating or walking around the mall? Ice skating, or even driving spikes into my skull.
19. Do you open a present or presents on Christmas Eve, or wait until Christmas day? One gift on Christmas eve for the kids. We do the rest Christmas morning.
20. Favorite Christmas memory? Every single year growing up my mom forgot to fill our stockings. A legendary family tradition formed where we would check them first thing every Christmas morning, turn to Mom and tease her for forgetting once again, and she would yell, “Shit!”. Every. Single. Year.
21. Favorite Part about winter? The first good snowfall. And the end of it.
22. Ever been kissed under mistletoe? Has anyone not been?
OK, Vicki, Tag you’re it!
What a difference a year makes
December 18, 2005 at 5:10 am (Holidays, Kids, quantum leaps)
Kelly is a holiday freak. We simply cannot get through December without watching at least one Christmas movie per night. I think we own every DVD of every Christmas themed movie ever made. We’ve been watching them since long before the babies were even thought of.
I can guarantee you that we watched National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation at least six times last year. The Girl was one month shy of turning 11 during December of last year and she lived here.
She has to have seen it no less than 30 times during her life time.
She is watching it right now with her Dad and it’s like she’s discovered the Holy Grail of comedy! She is laughing at every single joke like they are brand new, rewinding to see all the physical comedy and Chevy Chase’s freakin’ hilarious facial expressions! She is cracking up! It’s like she has never before seen this amazing movie and why didn’t anyone tell her how funny it is??
Was her sense of humor just not evolved enough last year to get it? Has her brain developed enough this year that new comedy connections are possible like never before? Did she grow a new funny bone while we weren’t looking? How is it possible that she’s seen this a bajillion times before and barely cracked a smile, but this year it’s like Christmas crack?
I don’t know but her belly laugh is hard to resist.
The Turkey Vulture has landed, and taken off again
November 28, 2005 at 2:30 am (Family, Holidays, Home, Kids, New Jersey)
Phew! They came, they ate, they left.
We finished all the cleaning during the mad dash, except for putting the boxes away. The house was ready, the RV was ready, the kids were ready, the 9,000 pounds of groceries were ready to be cooked up by the chef.
All worries about space aside, we had a very good visit. The kids all had a blast. Even though it was minus a billion degrees outside, they still had to trek through the woods at the end of our street together at least twice a day because that’s what spies do. Only one lamp got broken and Kelly made the most fantastic, huge Thanksgiving feast you have ever seen. I think the table actually groaned with the weight of it. Oh, wait…that was me.
We really enjoyed the visit so much. Kelly and his brother had some very good conversations about politics in which no blood was shed. We laughed, we played card games, we ate, we stayed up way too late, we ate some more, and we really did have a good visit. Even the dogs behaved. Nothing was chewed up or pooped on this time. They stayed for 4 days and left about 3 hours ago. With holiday traffic today, I expect them to complete their 4 hour drive within about 9 hours. They better be extra safe because they took Salem home with them. They also left their son, Preston, here with us. Our kids have been trying to wrangle this swap for 3 years and would have risen up and eaten us if we hadn’t scheduled it. We’ll trade them back on Thursday. I miss her already.
I expect the boy and his cousin to be upstairs on the video games for the next 100 hours. Kind of like they have been for the last 100 hours. Small breaks will be taken for more spy trekking, I’m sure. And, of course the eating. Thank the gods for massive piles of leftovers. So, I hope you all had a good Thanksgiving, whether you spent it alone, with family, with friends, or among strangers.
