Jan
We have entered the six weeks before Liv's birthday time frame.

Feb
I just did our taxes and we only owe $2k!

March
February is so looong. It seems like Liv's birthday was months ago...

April
Fiction:
March--Geraldine Brooks~ I read this for a book group that is going to meet next week.

May
Laying in bed this morning, I was listening to the noises come from the kids room. An occasional very soft rustle. Not the sounds of a first grader getting dressed, rather the quiet sound of pages turning. I knew what it was.

June
know it has been awhile, but since last monday!

July
Summer, summer, where are you?
I want to go to the wading pool. I want to swelter upon walking out the door.

August
In a different time zone, my body still wakes up at 7MA CDT. So I got to see the sun rise over the hill on the other side of town.

September
Liv's first day of school

October
Not really running, as I have not been to the gym now in over a week. I skipped cycle class this week, felling I really did get an extensive amount of exercise this past weekend.

November
Halloween photo

December
Need to write the Holiday letter.

Thank goodness it is Monday and I get to be at work. I also hit cycle class and the scale at the gym. Not as bad as it could be!

My children, man.
We went to a new friend's house yesterday. she has a five year old. and somehow, my kids were just not as good as I had hoped they would be. But, in retrospect, they were fine and I was touchy. For lots of reasons the main one being that is was Sunday afternoon of a four day weekend. Including Xmas. Wow.

So, we survived the blizzard of the decade. It wasn't that bad, really, but it did snow a lot. and sleeted. and rained. and then froze. So first there was snow, then slush and now ice.

The kids slept on Xmas eve, Santa came, we didn't even have to construct anything this year, just wrap and then Xmas morning was pretty relaxed. Everyone got what they wanted. Xav got many legos, including three new power miner sets, one space police set and one "normal" one that made a car. Liv got her pillow pet, some Webkinz and some castle legos.

Jim got computer games and bourbon. And I got bath bombs and purple dice from the kids and the two CDs I really really wanted from Jim. It was good all the way around.

Then we headed off to Alice's over very slushy roads. Jim drove. We took all our cookies and some booze. Wine, sparkling wine and Hot Buttered rum mix, with the rum.

I have had every person I have given a Hot buttered Rum to this year say "I have never had this drink before!" Has no one besides me grown up with this drink? I mean, I know coconuthead drinks them, but what about the rest of you?

And on Xmas night, I got to go out and see Sherlock Holmes. Yes, he is as hot as we expected. it is true. Yummy. And now there are so many good movies to go an see. I am sure I will not get to see lots of them, but they are there!

The rest of the weekend was not bad. We cleaned, we built legos, we played computer games. Played in the snow and read (one more book to finish before the end of the year!)

Sunday, we played games. I got to play Agricola, which was quite fun, though I lost miserably. But that is generally the case when I play games. I think I like to play board games, but I am beginning to think maybe I don't. It would be nice to lose by a close call now and then.

Anyway. I am very happy to see the butt end of Xmas. I like New Years better.

I hope everyone had a nice Christmas.

Do you want to share what were your favorite gifts that you received?

Here's mine:



And here's a video of my kitty's present:

My kids are rearranging the presents under the tree. that was my stupid idea. But they are taping up the "cracks" in the wrapping. In two days the packages will be entirely tape.

So, Olivia wanted a pillow pet for Xmas. I looked on-line--they were all sold out. I looked on e-bay--they wanted $80 for a *pillow*. A cute pillow, yes, but still.
Fortunately, Santa will prevail. Today, Liv told me she was certain Santa would make her a pillow pet. After telling her a week ago there was no way I could get her a pillow pet, I went to the Mall of America today and found not only pillow pets at their normal price (like $25) but the *unicorn* pillow pet, the one I thought it would be impossible to find. Yet there were piles of them.

Turns out, according to the women who has been selling them for eight year, pillow pets are so popular this year because they had a commercial (shown on Qubo which is where my kids discovered them) that come out in September and there has been a run on these things. Also, 13 shipping containers sat waiting for customs to clear them for three weeks. And this woman has a two year old who has already opened her presents but they will just wrap them up again and give her the same ones, since she is two.

I am told that other people don't do this. Other people don't go out for a drink and come back telling about Matt the bartender who shops for his Christmas presents on Christmas Eve because otherwise he over thinks his choices. Jim tells me very few other people do this. If only I could turn it into a marketable skill. J says I should run for the state Senate and give Larry Pogemiller a run for his money.

So, at the MOA I got legos for both kids, pillow pets for both kids and Webkinz, either for both kids or for one kid. It is going to be a lego party around here after gifts are opened as I ma not the only one that got them legos.

the stockings are going to be full of useful items. Mittens and flashlights, and yes, candy.
I fell like I have gone overboard this year, but I feel like that every year. And I haven't even bought anything for Santa to give to me under the tree. But I have dropped broad hints. We shall see.

Jim is making me dinner and I am staying out of the kitchen. He has said he is going to take over meal planning in the new year. I am piss poor at it, so that is a good thing. Also, I think he is taking the spring semester off and we are going to pay down some debt. Whoohoo.

... this song keeps dancing through my head.  This is essentially the only Christmas song that I've listened to this season, so that's probably the reason it's been stuck in my head.

( Hard Candy Christmas )

Dolly is awesome

The day is flying by. We will see how the afternoon goes.
The year is flying by. Isn't it about time to do a year in review based on the first sentence of each month?

I and more than 1/2 way through book #73 for the year. I am hoping to make it to 75, just becasue I like round numbers. I could have done a hundred if I hadn't gotten a boyfriend in September. Through the reading all off, but it has been worth it.

The weekend was good. No babysitter was available on Friday night, so Jim and I hung out at home and watched movies. "Julie and Julia" and "Grand Torino" Both of them good and well worth the $2 we ended up spending on each of them. We had a good time together, such a good time that Saturday morning, I woke up at 10:33. Halfway through Xavier's last theater class. When given the option, Liv chose to stay in as well and I went back to bed. A lovely start to a pretty relaxed weekend.

Saturday afternoon Liv went to brownies and I went to the salon. The blond is back, the asymmetry is gone and I have a lovely "I'm growing it out" haircut.

After three hours in the salon, I hit SYSL and met up with J for a beer and spring rolls. Saturday evening Jim went to the Adult spelling bee at the 331 club and I stayed home with my kids and J's two year old as he and his wife had a party to go to and isn't pretty much any party more fun without a two year old in tow? So Saturday night I watched "Toy Story" and "cars" and had a toddler fall asleep on my lap. When he was gone, Xav crawled into my lap and fell asleep. Jim came home with a nice buzz on and we had a good evening watching SNL and hanging out.

And slept till 10:30 again Sunday morning.
I awoke to the news that my grandmother is in the hospital--though things seem to be OK now. And had a phone call from my brother. He is headed to Afghanistan to run an airfield there. Ohm, the Places he goes!

After finally finishing up the ginger molasses cookies from a few days ago, and making gingerbread house dough for the kids, I headed out to do some Xmas shopping, intermingles with drinks with J. We hit HPB where I got 98% of my shopping done and then I took him to Axis* to get his belly button pierced. My holiday present to him.

Then we had some whiskey at Sally's and headed home, where JIm and the kids had made a lovely gingerbread house with trees and people included.

Sunday evening held the Home Depot holiday party. Possibly the best one yet. At least I didn't leave swearing never ever to attend another one. And the kids went and had fun too.

So Monday morning dawned (or didn't--it was sooo dark!) and I headed off to cycle class. I really need to get to the gym more. I feel better when I do. And I think I have found a melt-down team-mate, so that's a plus. More on the Melt-down in the new year.

And since it is nearly noon, I guess perhaps I should set Tetris aside and do lots and lots of work.

Happy Monday to all.

*They are having a sale for the holiday. All their jewelery is 15% off until 12/31/09.

Against the formerly unbeaten Saints!

after spending and hour screaming and whining (momma, MOMMA! MOMMY!!! he was at the top of the stairs) on the way out the door to the school bus Xavier says "I don't feel very appweciated. I'm never coming home from school." I laughed (a big belly laugh)and gave him a kiss and said "I appreciate you, you make me laugh!" I'm betting he will come home.

He has wanted lots more cuddles lately. Including in the middle of the night. First he pounded on my door at 4am and then when I laid down with him, he instructed me "put your arm under me and wrap it around me." very specific cuddling instructions.

Starting in the new year, we are scaling back after school activities, partly because we are contemplating what life would look like with only one car. My 13 year old Ford escort is cantankerous. We keep it going, but one day, the end will come.

That's all I've got.

I played hooky from work yesterday.  I had felt like not coming in on Wednesday, so when that episode happened I just decided to use one of my remaining sick days for Thursday.  This morning our receptionist tells me that rightwing nutjob guy is back in the hospital and wasn't here to answer phone calls in my absence (and will miss our Christmas lunch today*).  So shipping guy (aka boss's son) took calls.  Receptionist also mentioned that apparently VP wasn't real happy that I was out yesterday, probably because I had quotes to get for him.  Oh well.  Surprisingly, I feel NO guilt over this.  As I pointed out to receptionist  (and AR/office manager previously), if they don't want me to use sick days, then pay me for my unused ones.  Simple as dat !



*Bring on the Alaskan King Crab Legs!!!!!!!

The light is coming, the light is coming.
I think perhaps I have problems with solstices in general, as I am usually kind of a mess around the summer solstice too.

I have cards to mail and cookies to bake, though I have baked plenty so far.
Last night we made spritz cookies. and it was a total "we." I mixed up the dough, Xav and Liv both used the cookie press to press some out and then Liv wanted sprinkles on them, so I set her up with a thin frosting and she frosted and sprinkled.

When I was giving her the frosting, I had her taste an unfrosted cookie
"Taste this," I said. She did.
"see how rich it is?" she nodded.
"so it does not need a lot of frosting, just a little bit."

Later when Xav wanted to help frost, as I was giving him his own bowl of frosting Liv said,
"Xavier, taste this," He did.
"see how rich it is?" he nodded.
"so it does not need a lot of frosting, just a little bit."
all said in exactly the same tone of voice I used with her.

Kids are so funny.
I do love them.

Where would we be without them?
Mexico. in the sun, on the beach avoiding December altogether!

I was fuming mad today. So mad that I referred to people at my job as "a bunch of c___s___ers!" - not to their faces but to a vendor. I still mean it, though I am not angry about it anymore. I've elaborated on my difficulties at work numerous times, so here's this one. The job called for the new version of a cylinder that we use. It's made of aluminum instead of steel. It costs $340ea. We'll call this one NewCylinder. The old cylinder was made of steel and cost $530. We'll call this one OldCylinder. They are functionally equivalent. Every place that we have tested NewCylinder it works fine. No problems that I am aware of. We avoid using them at our largest customer (UPS), because they have so many of the steel OldCylinders, and ... well, why invite problems. Whatever! This new job is not for UPS , so it's irrelevent. Anyway, I ordered 4pc of NewCylinder because that's what was put on the drawings, they came in, etc. I learned today that VicePres told production to use OldCylinders on this job and the job has since shipped out. We now have 4pc of New Cylinder sitting on our shelf (and 4pc fewer of OldCylinder in our stock). That's a $3480 inventory discrepancy. No one changed the drawings to reflect the change (hence, if the customer tries to reorder the cylinders on their machine, they'll get NewCylinder instead of the OldCylinder that is actually on their machine), no one changed the inventory, the order costs, etc. Response so far seems to be: meh, business as usual.

Yesterday was a long day. After work I drove down to Schaumburg for a chiropractor appointment. I was on my way there and was at a stoplight on the corner of Roselle and Golf. There are frequently people walking around this huge and busy intersection collecting money for charities and such, so I wasn't surprised to see a guy walking around with a reflective traffic vest on. As he started approaching my car I noticed that on the front of his vest he had a picture of the current president below the words "Obama Sucks," and under the picture "LaRouche.[com/org?]." As he got closer, I flipped him off (even though Obama isn't high on my list right now) and he nonchalantly walked away pretending not to have noticed. After my appointment, I grabbed a "World's Greatest Burger" at Fuddruckers! Mmmmm.

I didn't get home until about 7:00 and had to leave by 7:30. While I was home I heard a VERY strange noise. It was seemingly coming from my bathroom, and it sounded somewhat like squeaky animals or rodents (or even birds) in the walls. This completely freaked my cat out and freaked me out more than a little.

I went to my LoA meeting. One of the women wasn't there, but another one was - a friend of another. I didn't much care for this new person and kinda hope she doesn't come back (I know, I'm awful). She was extremely skeptical, as I was/am, which is fine, but she cited how it was "against her religion" and that she "believes in Jesus and angels" but not spirits and channeling. I'm trying to be open-minded and accepting, but she came across as way too close-minded and ..... Republican-like (LOL). Anyway, it was a lot of fun despite this; we joked around and had a good discussion.

I got home at almost 9:30 and was just sitting around winding down when I heard that noise in the bathroom again. The cat again freaked a bit and I was dismayed and a little annoyed. It seemed to be coming from the vent in the ceiling of the bathroom, though I can't be at all sure. I was tempted to take off the cover, but I had visions of a mouse or rat launching itself onto my face. AAACCCKKKK!!!! If this persists, I may go upstairs and ask my neighbor if she hears anything strange or has any information.

I was half-tempted to call in sick today, to use one of the sick days that I'll lose at the end of the year. But my dedication (Ha!!) won out, and here I am sitting at my desk ..... not working but instead posting to LJ. :-)