A Merry Christmas

Thankfully Christmas Day ended up a lot better than Christmas Eve!

Coming down the stairs to see what Santa left him.

Santa did pretty well this year! Ty liked all his presents.

The nativity play with Addy and Mora!

Trying out his new Karaoke machine.

I had the perfect Christmas Eve all planned out:

• A non-denominational community candlelight/Christmas carol service
• A relaxing dinner out at a nice restaurant
• An exciting drive to see the best lit homes of San Antonio
• Back at home, a short, spiritual reading of Luke II, retelling the Christmas story to Ty, more singing.
• A fun, happy opening of the Christmas Pajamas
• Excitement of going to bed, knowing Santa is going to visit.

What really happens:

• Tyler wakes up on the wrong side of the bed this morning, and whines all day long.
• Braving the crowds for some last minute shopping, waiting as other people buy the "limited, closeout" item at Circuit City that we want, but our sales guy doesn't know what he's doing and can't reserve it on the computer. Finally, after asking 25 different people for help, we get the last one, but not before waiting in a whole other long line to retrieve the item.
• Going to the bank to cash some checks, the bank teller gives us $250 instead of $25, so we have to turn around and wait in line again just to return money that she gave us erroneously! She was pretty thankful, though! :)
• All of us currently on anti-biotics (for the second course) crash midday and try to rest a little.
• We're still a bit fatigued, so we decide to ditch the candlelight service.
• Time to go out to eat! Only our desired restaurant is closed.
• Because of ravenous hunger, we decide to stay on the same road, so our choices are Sonic or Texas Roadhouse. We choose Roadhouse.
• As we are waiting for our table, Brad eats some of the peanuts that they have there. Ty doesn't like peanuts and tells Daddy to stop eating them. Daddy says he can eat them if he wants. Ty starts to gag because Daddy is eating the peanuts (if you know Ty, you know that he gags all the time when he thinks something we're eating is gross).
• Daddy continues to eat the peanuts.
• Ty continues to gag.
• Mommy asks Daddy to not eat any more peanuts.
• Daddy continues to eat peanuts.
• Tyler gags big, and then throws up all over Daddy.
• Tyler starts crying.
• Daddy takes Tyler to clean up puke.
• We finally get seated.
• Tyler won't walk to the table because "The peanuts make it dirty!". He's talking about the famous peanuts shells all over the floor.
• Tyler so tired and whiny, Daddy has him lay his head on his lap.
• Tyler doesn't quite have enough room for his legs to be straight, so he keeps pushing Daddy off the bench.
• Mommy and Daddy tell Tyler to knock it off.
• Tyler keeps pushing.
• Daddy finally moves over to sit next to Mommy and gives Tyler the whole bench.
• Mommy makes room for Daddy and in the process knocks her whole glass of ice water on Tyler.
• Tyler screams in horror!
• Daddy tries to use the cloth napkins to dry Tyler off.
• Now Tyler screams because the napkin was his "pillow".
• Mommy and Daddy decide to get the food "to go"
• Once we're in the car, Ty is just peachy keen happy.
• Mommy and Daddy aren't so happy with him.
• We skip the Christmas lights drive, just wanting to go home and eat!
• We get home and Daddy's order is without his mashed potatoes, rice, and beans! He's not too happy about it!
• After dinner, Tyler screams that he doesn't know how to pick up his toys that we tell him must be picked up before Santa can come.
• By this time, we just want him in bed, so we skip Luke II, play a round of Silent Night and call it good.
• Mom and Dad have a discussion on whether he should be able to open his new pajamas even though he's whining and not picking up his toys.
• We decide to just let him and get him in them and go to bed.
• Tyler happily opens his pajamas.
• Tired, whiny boy is out before his head hits the pillow.

How's that for expert parenting and creating the perfect holiday? Good thing there's tomorrow!

Merry Christmas!

Tourists in Our Own Town

We were so happy to have visitors this weekend! Brad's mom and dad are headed over to England to spend Christmas with Brad's sister, and they were able to work out a layover in San Antonio for a few days! Ty loved having his Grandma and Grandpa F here for awhile.


It's kinda funny, because although we live here, Brad's parents are the ones that showed us around downtown. They had been here several years ago for a week-long convention, and we had never really toured downtown and the Riverwalk. We had a great evening touring the Alamo, riding the boat down the Riverwalk, listening to live music, visiting Santa, and I ordered my first ribs at a restaurant (probably my last--they're just too messy).

Okay...secret's out: we don't HATE the Utes! We just happen to like BYU better. But Ty loves his Utah hat given to him by his birth family, and so we let him wear it.

Ty was tired by the end of the evening. Brad made a little pouch for him in his windbreaker, and he slept through the whole boat tour and dinner!

Dreame Weaver

I've been dreaming a lot lately. Most of my dreams are good, like last night when I dreamt I was a journalist and visited Nie Nie's house, to see if she's as perfect as she seems on her blog. In my dream she was, although Mr. Nielson was a tiny bit conceited.

But sometimes my dreams aren't as nice. I have several recurring dreams that always fool me into panicking, even though I KNOW they aren't real! The top three are:

1. Teeth Falling Out. I know this is a common one, and dream analyzers say that it means you feel like you're out of control. Hmmm. Consciously I don't feel that way, but do tend to be a bit of a control freak, so it's not way surprising.

2. Failing Math Class. This is always at BYU, and I find out at the end of the semester that I have this math class that I thought I had dropped. Now I only have two days to make everything up, and I know it's impossible! I always freak out because I know Dad will flip if I get an F. This is probably recurring because I tend to be a procrastinator in real life.

3. Snakes. This is a fairly new one, since we moved to Texas. It's based on reality. When we were in Houston, Brad was mowing the lawn and I heard this extrememly loud, almost girly (sorry, hun, but it's true) scream. I happened to be right by the window and looked out to see a snake slither away under the fence. YIKES! Now I dream about snakes all over in the house, on the driveway, etc. I think it just represents my total hatred for all things slimy and buggy and germ-infested.

What are your recurring dreams?

A Moment

"I'm sorry, Mommy."

A million things go through my head of what he could have done. It's morning and this is the first thing he says to me.

"Sorry for what?"

"Next time I'll give you hugs, too. Hugs and kisses, cause you're my best friend."

Ahhh...melt my heart! Last night when we were doing hugs and kisses before bedtime, he gave me kisses, but he decided he didn't want to give me hugs. I didn't really think much of it. But apparently he did, because that's the first thing he said to me this morning. Sweet thing.

There are moments in motherhood that make me want to pull out my hair. And then there are moments like these that make those other times totally worth it.

Let's Go Bowling!

March Madness online was so much fun last March. Come Bowling with me this year! I set up a group at ESPN.com to play Bowl Mania. Basically, you choose who will win the bowl games, and assign your confidence level to each game. It'll be so fun. So join us. Yeah, that means YOU! (It's just for fun, so even if you don't know anything about football, still join us) Everyone is welcome!You have until the first bowl game day, Dec 20, to make your selections.

Click HERE to get started. If you already have an espn profile, just sign in. If not-or like me you can't remember--sign up. It's free. It will ask if you want to start or join a group, so search for ours: Go BYU Cougs. Password is: riseandshout.

See you there!

Because I Have Nothing Else to Say...

Things I Sold This Week on Craigslist:

I bought these tables back in Utah, but they just don't fit the decor of the home. Oh well. I got as much as I paid for them.

This came with the house. I don't think the kitchen works with an island. Plus it's on wheels and swerves everywhere.



New kitchen has one over the oven.

This was a great D.I. find back in Utah (thanks, Sam), made twice of what I paid for it!

One of our lingering wedding presents. (If you happened to give this to us, I'm soooooooooo sorry! We just already have a couple.)

Sad to see these go, but the house came with the front-loading type.

Things Spoken For, Just Waiting to be Picked Up:

This is my most emotional sell. I slept in this bed all growing up. But it just wasn't working in our house. We needed a twin bed instead.

King bed frame, never used because we bought a whole bed.

Bathroom shelf--no emotional ties, no need for it.

No Calls Yet:

Used this in my classroom as a teacher. Surprised there are no calls!

No surprise here-the mirror I got to replace it with is way cuter.

Absolutely NOT for sale:

My TyTy: Black eye is almost all gone, just some shadowy remnants.