Christmas

Another Christmas has come and gone.

(My oldest brother Scott and his son Trevor.)
This is the first Christmas in 18 years that all of us siblings have actually been together.

We gave the kids a Wii for Christmas. It's getting played about 8 hours a day.

(My right shoulder is a little sore after playing with the Wii. Does that mean I'm getting old?)

Christmas Band Concert

Last night was the girls first band concert for the school year. They are both playing the flute, so now we have a grand total of 3 flute players in the house.

Emily is in the Beginning Band and practices all the time, and when I say all the time.....I mean ALL THE TIME. She was quite nervous last night before the concert started.

Kelsey is in both the Jazz and Symphonic Bands. She plays the flute for both and also accompanies the Jazz Band on the piano on a few songs. The Jazz Band practices before school at 7:25 in the morning twice a week. Even though she hasn't taken piano lessons for about a year and a half, she completely taught herself the songs, and they were not easy. Kelsey really seems to have a very natural gift on the piano and I really need to talk her into resuming her lessons. I can just picture her rolling her eyes when she reads this. She practices up in her room on a keyboard with the volume turned down so no one can hear her. (I think she doesn't want her mother critiquing her.)

A Few Of My Favorite Things

It's amazing to see how much they change from year to year.

Twelve

Emily turned 12 on the 4th of December. She celebrated with some of her friends at the house and had a little sleep over.

She is such a kind child and I'm so proud to say she's mine. After each present that she opened she would jump up and give each person a hug. We gave her a little projector that helps you design clothes, the girls disappeared upstairs for the rest of the night having their own Project Runway contest.

A few things about Miss Em....

She might just be one the sweetest girls you could ever meet.

Has a really good singing voice. She loves to sing songs by Taylor Swift and Colbie Caillat. She wants to try out for American Idol in 4 more years.

Started playing the flute this year and she practices without being asked all the time.

Can be a real drama queen, she has been like that since she was about one.

Loves little children and babies. She would like another baby in the house...says she'll take care of it and it could sleep in her room. I find this funny because she thinks feeding the dogs is a lot of work.

Received her first secret love note yesterday in her locker at school. The unknown boy says he wants to take her out on a date.....HHhhmmm.....I don't think so!

She is just a little obsessed with the Twilight series and has read every book 3-4 times.

Always tries to do her best and takes her school work very seriously. She wants to go to the University of Washington when she graduates from high school.

Is having trouble deciding what she will be when she grows up. A Dr. that doesn't have to see blood, a teacher, a mom, a singer or an actress. I think she'd be great at any of those things!

Happy 12th Birthday Emily!! We love you!

(I crushed up candy canes and sprinkled them on her cupcakes. Our favorite is candy cane crushed and sprinkled on home made frosted sugar cookies.)

I've been struggling a little lately with the fact that my kids are growing up so fast. I want to keep them little for just a little longer. I have been reading a book by the sappy love lady Delilah that's on the radio. The book is called "Love Somebody Today". Each chapter is about the scripture Ecclesiastes 3:1-8. The scripture that begins like this: To everything there is a season, And a time to every purpose under heaven. Each chapter discusses each subject: A time to be born, plant, build up, weep, laugh, mourn, dance, embrace etc. In one of the chapters it talks about different types of mourning and how she has mourned her children growing up. I read this last night. "For now I will watch as they pull away from my protective arms and strive to find their own way. I will mourn their growing up, and I will rejoice that I have had the privilege to do so."

I'm so thankful that I have these 3 wonderful children in my life, they are everything to me. Emily, thank you for still feeling young enough to cuddle with me and squish me in the rocking chair. I will cherish it forever.

How to Not Save Time or Money on A Christmas Tree

The day after Thanksgiving....
9-11a.m. Try to talk Mike into saving money by just cutting down a tree in the yard. I show him the tree I have in mind. He shoots the idea down, tells me it isn't full enough for him. Spend the next 2 hours trying to find a "cheap" place on the Internet that's in our area that we can go and cut down a tree. Come across an ad on Craigslist advertising any tree up to 23 feet tall for $25.00. Sounds good, the ad is expired, but figure it's worth checking out.
1 p.m. Leave to drive about 20 minutes away to meet my brother with his jeep and go to the christmas tree place. After a few attempts to turn into the wrong place, we arrive at the correct location. There are no trees in the price range we are hoping for. We ALWAYS get a Noble Fir, they are my favorite, but the lady wants $75.00 for a 12 ft. noble. I spot a really big Douglas Fir and the lady says we can have it for $40. Decide for once, we can try a different type of tree. Mike and Brett tie the tree to Brett's jeep and off we go.
3 p.m. We arrive home and put the tree in the stand, we get it to stand up perfectly straight on the first attempt. Spend forever giving it water, can't believe how much water it's taking to fill up the stand.

4 p.m. Leave to go get a fast and early dinner at Taco Bell and stop to pick up some more clear lights.

5 p.m. Arrive home to find that there is a huge wet spot underneath the tree. Get a little freaked out when I discover that the carpet underneath the tree is completely soaked. We take down the tree and discover that our tree stand that we've had since 1994 is a piece of junk and no longer holds water....thus the reason for me having to fill and fill the stupid thing up.

5:30 p.m. Get out the shop vac to suck up all the water....not much comes up. Try to put the tree in another stand that we have, but the trunk is too big.

6 p.m. Run back out to the store to buy a new stand. The cheapest stand that will hold a 12 ft. tree is $60.00. Foolishly decide to buy the one for $19.99 that says it will hold a 10 ft. tree. Buy more lights.

7 p.m. Arrive home and attempt to put the tree in the new stand. No matter what we do, the tree will not stand straight. We fight with what I'm now referring to as the "Beast" for at least an hour, trying not to use any bad words, out loud anyways.

8 p.m. Get the tree pretty straight, but the tree is too heavy for the dumb stand we bought. Tree tries to fall over. Mike takes advantage of the little holes on the bottom of the stand and literally screws the tree stand to the floor. Jacob comes running into the room yelling "What the heck was that sound?" Emily in a really monotone voice replies "Oh, that's just dad screwing the tree to the floor." Mike and I start laughing hysterically.

8:30 p.m. I start putting the lights on the tree.

9:30 p.m. Realize I still don't have enough lights and send Mike back off on another emergency light run.

10:30 p.m. After 1,750 lights, the tree is all lit up. Start putting on the decorations. Kelsey refuses to help decorate the tree and says over and over it's not even December yet. Whatever.
12 a.m. Finish decorating the tree. We all decide it might be one of our prettiest trees ever.

11 a.m. Get out the carpet cleaner.....Mike cleans and cleans the nice giant yellow spot that has been left behind by the tree.

24 hours later Stain is still there. Push chair over to hide nice new stained carpet.

Our house all lit up for Christmas.

Gianna's Slide Show

This is a slide show of all the pictures I took of Gianna. Mike and I picked the music and he put it together. Some of the pics. get a little cut off because the format isn't perfect for the blog. Enjoy!! :)

Introducing Gianna Rose

Mike and I were able to go to Santa Monica, CA. last Sunday. Mike had a business trip that he was going on until Thursday in L.A. and it so happened to just be the perfect timing because his sister was having her first baby. So I got to tag along and when we arrived Jenny went into labor. Jenny and I hung out all day together Monday counting contractions. Jenny ended up having a really long labor and after 12 hours of very consistent contractions went to the hospital and was only dilated to 1cm. Her contractions at that point were 2-3 minutes apart and nothing was changing. They admitted her and started pitocin at 3 a.m. and at 8a.m. there was still no change. We were all getting concerned that Jenny was going to end up with a cesarean, and then her body decided to go from 1cm to 10cm in an hour! Jenny was kind enough to let me stay in the room and be a part of Gianna's birth. I think that besides my own children being born, it was one of the neatest experiences I have ever had. So after a long intro, please meet my adorable, beautiful, darling little niece. (Hmm...can you tell I like her just a little?)

Gianna Rose

8 lbs. 3 ozs. 21 1/2 inches

Born Nov. 17th at 10:24a.m.

Jenny, Rob and Gianna

I told you she is darling!!!

A Good Use For Mike's Belt

Jacob jumps up and down from the counter about 20 times while he is doing homework. Every time I turn my back on him he runs off to play, runs laps through the house, chases the pets or uses the bathroom 5 times. I've been threatening all week that I was going to figure out a way to tie him to the stool. So tonight I decided to borrow Mike's belt. It worked for a few minutes until he pulled the belt around and unbuckled himself. Maybe I'll have to make it tighter next time!

Always Wanted One of Those

Jacob had an unpleasant little trip to the dentist today. He is a horrible little tooth grinder. It has created a very expensive problem in his mouth. He can't seem to keep any fillings in his mouth for more than 6-12 months. He has had a couple of fillings replaced up to 3 times. We are on our third dentist with him, who claims the problem is due to all the grinding.

Sometime in the last week he had two more fillings come out. There was so little left of his two teeth after the multiple replacements, the only thing they could do was to give him silver crowns. Last night I was explaining to him that they were going to give him two silver teeth. (As I was cringing inside.) His reply was comical. "Cool, I always wanted one of those." I'm glad at least somebody is happy about it.

Thankfully you can't see his new "silver teeth" when he smiles. He handled the crowns like a trooper and was rewarded with ditching the last 2 hours of school to come home for some Advil and video game playing. Next month he is going to see a specialist for his jaw. He has a very severe under bite that is going to require major surgery when he is older. We are hoping to avoid surgery by finding out about a new less invasive procedure that puts in some kind of implant to push his upper jaw forward.

Do you think it would be okay if I took a cup and a sign up by the freeway to collect donations for the McKean children's dental fund? Sigh....