I am addicted to facebook. When Carey first asked me to her friend, I honestly didn't get it. Of course I wanted to be her friend so I accepted and it's all been downhill from there. It's been amazing to be reconnected with people I graduated with coming up on 20 years ago. Some of those friends I have known all my life. I think it's realizing how small the world really is. Kind of makes you feel safe and content knowing you have so many friends in your world that you thought you'd never see again.

But, last week I got a few of those "you've been tagged in a photo" comments. When I clicked on the photos, I almost died. Um, these are pictures from cheerleading days when my hair was huge and kind of blondish-orangish color. So I realized these pictures could turn up at any time for everyone to see and comment on. And they're in my facebook albums. But I never put them there. Oh yeah, someone else did. ugh. I'm kind of scared! I wonder who will tag another crazy hair photo? It's out of my control I guess. I will just have to hope and pray no photos turn up that I would rather have in the confines of my high school photo album for my eyes only.

Either way, I love this facebook thing. Big hair or no big hair.

I don't know what it is about being in church that makes me want to cry. I don't know if it's watching my son diligently taking sermon notes, soaking in the words. Or maybe it's listening to my girls sing their little hearts out on songs they know, even if they're off key. Or maybe it's seeing a guy with a pink mohawk sitting in a pew all by himself, worshipping God because God doesn't care what you look like. Or maybe it's just God revealing himself.

I don't know what it is but if I think about too much while I'm sitting in church, the tears would stream down. It's kind of strange. Or maybe not. All I know is, Sunday mornings sure have more meaning now than they ever did before.

And that's a good thing.

...some beautiful kids from a few recent appointments...

Ow.

That's all I can say right now. It's 3 in the morning and i can't sleep because I am in pain! Making a long story short, no one told me it was going to snow today. So I put on my snazzy brown boots with the cute heels and headed out. Then it started to snow! Who knew? Apparantly more people than me as I was the one of the few people out and about with high heeled boots on. Anyhoo, I needed to drop off a CD to a client of mine after picking up my girls from school and before going to Brody's BB game. Needless to say I was in a hurry, got out of my jeep, took a few steps and boom...there I was, on the ground. It was a hard fall but yet, slow motion. I remember thinking as I was heading down, "...my race, my race..." which is not for a few weeks yet but still...

Thank God I didn't break a bone, hit my head or really anything else serious. But as I sit here with an ice pack on my hip and some sore muscles, I feel like I got hit by a car. Ow.

Note to self...pay closer attention to the weather forecast and don't wear my snazzy brown boots on days where there is even a slight chance of snow. Ugh.

Thanks for your vacation advice. And I'm glad Vegas was vetoed out of the list. Personally, I never really wanted to go there but didn't want to miss out on something. Just in case it was great place to visit. Belize sounds heavenly, so does Cancun. But hubby wants to stay in the country this year. If you knew him you would know he just couldn't relax in Mexico. So, we're leaning towards San Antonio. The Riverwalk, the Alamo, warmth...I'm already looking forward to it. Thanks again to all you seasoned travelers...

In the meantime, I'm going to cuddle up in my blanket and sit in front of the electric fireplace which surprisingly enough, warms even me up. And i'm always cold.

So today as we wait for the big vikings/eagles football game, hubby and I are contemplating where to go for our 15th anniversary. It's not until May, but this cold, crappy weather is starting to get old. It doesn't help when the current football game is in Miami where it's 80 degrees, sunny, warm...did I mention warm? And I just got a family picture from my wonderful brother who spent the holidays at their home in Palm Springs. Everything is green, lush, warm...did I mention warm? Umm...next time I may just invite ourselves along.

The finalists for our getaway in May have come down to:

San Antonio
Arizona
Vegas
Anywhere warm

Any advice here would be great. The last place we went together childless was Sacramento/San Fransisco. We honestly don't know places that don't involve amusment parks, zoos, reptile gardens...you get the idea. I want this to be just for us. No kids. Must do some more research and hope it warms up here in the meantime.

Did I mention Miami is 80 degrees today?!

This is what I did today...now I better get to more important things!

Christmas cards...check.

Christmas cookies...check.

Presents wrapped...check.

List of presents still needed...check.

One last trip to the store to get the Santa present for Emerson who changed her mind...check.

Hubby just bought a new bow and said that was his xmas present, decided to still give him the coat I already bought him...check.

Birthday cake for Madison tomorrow...check.

Ready for the blizzard...check.

So why does it still seem like I have a million things to do?!

Did you know Santa can fly a plane??

He can. Now you know. His reindeer were sick so the plane brought him to town. If you look closely, you can see him in the plane as he landed at Yankton's airport. We were lucky enough to see him land safe and sound. Brody came along to help me with keeping track of his sisters (although he did admit this whole event was kind of cool for the little kids)): So the girls got to tell him what they wanted which is totally different than the first list so we'll see if Santa pulls through. Whether Santa comes by plane, car or sleigh, the kids were just oohed and aaahed over the deal. That really was pretty cool.

Madison and her friend as blue angels in the Nutcracker...

Ringlets, ringlets, ringlets...

Here is the Yankton Lewis & Clarks Runners Club after we ran the Nike Cross Country race in Sioux Falls. We placed 3rd!!

Dress rehearsal night...oh she looks like an angel!

NO, I HAVE NOT FALLEN OFF THE FACE OF THE EARTH...although there are days when I think I may have. Or should have at the rate I was going. So I have been following your posts, keeping up with your stories and adventures, smiling, laughing and learning from them. I always knew this time of year was busy for our household, but the last month seems to have been one of those months when something was always going on. Unfortunately, my blog has suffered in the busy-ness of the season. But here I am, watching Y&R from the DVR (which I have learned is an amazing feature to the television techonology..do you know it really only takes 30 minutes to watch a 60 minute program?), eating doritos and just enjoying my time. No monkeys but hey, you can't have it all. Where do I begin to catch up? Maybe just a short summary will do the trick...

-joined facebook

-managed to ringlet daughter's hair for Nutcracker production and endless rehearsals (pictures to follow)

-photography business boomed for last minute family xmas photos

-enjoyed a fabulous Thanksgiving with family

-ran a Nike cross country road race with the runners club from Yankton, placed 3rd with the team and 5th individually

-celebrated youngest daughters 7th birthday!

-planning other daughters 9th birthday party on the 20th

-son started basketball practice with his school

-learned after a panic attack that pictures that corrupt on a memory card are really not gone forever. $40 later, clients pictures were retrieved.

-hunting with hubby one more time before season ends

-xmas shopping for friends and family

-thinking about my wonderful, amazing friends all the time

I am sorry for not being in blog-land for awhile. I mean it when i say, even amonst the chaos of everyday life, you are always on mind and in my prayers.

See you in the next post...

My little elves...

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

I bought starch today. I've never ever bought starch before in my life. But today I did. And it's not for clothes or anything related to laundry. It's for madison's hair. yes, her hair.

Because madison is a little blue angel in the Nutcracker production, her hair needs to be in ringlets. I think I posted that before. So I have these foam rollers and began practicing. It worked! her hair was ringlet-y to me. I thought we were set. But come to find out, we're not. Apparantly, roller ringlets are not the ringlets they want. They want the "Nellie Olson" ringlets. You know, from Little House on the Prairie. Tight, glued together curls. Being a newbie to the production, I asked some other moms how they got the infamous "nellie" ringlets. This is what I found out:

Take an old curling iron, spray a section of hair with starch, roll it up in the iron, spray some more starch, slide iron out leaving a solid lump of hair hoping to resemble a ringlet. After dress rehearsals and shows, curling iron will need to be thrown away. Seriously? Starch? Since my blue angel is in the front, I figured I better get my starch. Saturday is a full dress rehearsal, so I'll be sure and post a photo of the starch-girl.

I wonder, did Nellie Olson use starch in her hair? Hmmmm, I guess we'll never know...

I pulled out one of my favorite Christmas figurines this weekend...I have a few from Fitz and Floyd but this one tops them all. I wish you could see the details from the photo but it doesn't do it justice. I don't know, I may just keep him out all year long but for now, this Santa really gets me in the spirit of the upcoming holidays.

Packers 37
Bears 3

Life is good for the Pack-Man.

The new Discovery Bridge in Yankton...connecting our town with the state of Nebraska. Pretty impressive. Especially at night with all the lights luminating on the river. It's one of those bridges we drive across just to drive across. If you ever come this way, you must drive into Nebraska, even for just a minute. It will give you goosebumps, I promise.

Packers 27
Vikings 28


Need I say more?

You may have noticed our son's hair is a little different lately. It's called, "I give up on arguing about getting a haircut.: He's a great kid but if there has been one thing we disagree on, it's his hair. He has wanted to grow it long forever. He likes that shaggy look. And it didn't help when his Chicago cousin came to visit and had the shaggy hair he loves. So I decided a couple of months ago to stop fighting him about it and just let it be. I thought he would see how "bad" it looks long. I thought a cute girl would tell him she likes short, clean cut hair. I thought he would come home begging for a haircut. But instead, the curls are showing and after getting used to it, I honestly think it looks pretty good on him. The down side is, he has to shower every morning or it resembles a bird's nest. So long hair it is for awhile I guess. Could be worse...like wanting it green.

It doesn't happen very often with varying schedules but everyone was home tonight. So I bribed my family, set the self-timer, had 10 seconds to get into position and this was the picture we got. Not bad for scrambling. Funny how I take hundreds of other people's families but to get one of my own is, well, not so easy! But again, it's not bad. Maybe Christmas card material?

I am working late tonight, catching up on weekend appointments. I was completely booked. I had everything...a wedding, families, kids and a senior boy thrown in the mix. And since it was so nice outside, everyone wanted in. So I did my best to accomodate. And thanks to supportive friends and family, I got my appointments in, my daughter's made it to dance and Nutcracker rehearsal and the boys went pheasant hunting. I even managed to run some miles, in the dark but nonetheless, they were miles. Scheww. I was wiped last night. Thought you might like to see a sample. I can't complain about business but honestly, it tired me out. I treated myself to a Mike's Lemonade, put my feet up and didn't get on my computer all night long. Now that was relaxing...