Oh what a beautiful morning, oh what a beautiful day, I've got a wonderful feeling, everything's going my...oh wait, I forgot this is my life!

So far this morning...

Got up late. (no shower)
Dog saw cat while taking his morning pee & ran off. (maybe he'll get cold & come back)
Welcomed an extra kid. (babysitting all day)
Played pioneer. (chopped wood for fire)
Took a call from the city. (about dog, what a surprise)
Bundled kids for a trek to the garage. (to find dog)
Dug out drift in front of garage. (about 2 ft deep)
Wrestled van onto driveway. (took a few tries)
Found dog. (who did NOT want to get in the van)
Took 5 tries to get up driveway. (and actually made it into garage)
Un-bundled kids. (me first, I have ice in my boot, mom help)
Fixed 2 boo-boos. (band aids go fast in this house)
Rescued extra kid from my kids. (she's 3 & they play very rough)
Discovered daughter cutting up my brush. (took the bristles right off)
Scolded boys for riding old crib mattress down stairs. (miraculously nobody was hurt)

And all this before 9:30!

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Interesting Sam pronunciation:

Sam "hey mom, a question mark means a question & a es-qu-ash-kon (exclamation) mark means a question too!"
Mom "gotta work on that buddy."

I had to have him repeat that a bunch of times before I could figure out how to spell it. And I'm so not correcting him...it's just too cute for that!

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I have recently learned to be grateful that Chris is working in Ellensburg. At first I was very resentful & angry. I mean, we just moved away from there to be closer to work & now he's working right back where we came from! But the general contractor at this particular job is tarping & heating the job which means they can work all winter, even in extreme temperatures. Chris found out last week that they are the only crew working right now. All the other jobs are shut down due to nasty weather. So once again, God knows what He's doing & I haven't a clue.
Go figure :)

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Yesterday I finally finished decorating the house for Christmas. Now I just have to finish the gifts I'm making & wrap everything. Every year I plan on getting it all done early & every year I go right down to the wire. Nothing like a little added stress to spice up my everyday life.
We are getting up early on Christmas morning to open our gifts & have breakfast together. Then we will make the trek to my sister's house in Richland & spend 2 days with the rest of my family. Should be a blast & a little deja-vu, to see all our kids playing together, just like we did with our cousins when we were kids. You see, my sister bought my Grandparents old house & we spent many-a Christmas playing in the basement. Now it's come full circle & we're the boring adults talking upstairs.

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I introduced my kids to the movie Rudolph yesterday & naturally they loved it. It was so much fun to see them enjoying what I've loved for so long. Today I'm going to see if I can find A Charlie Brown Christmas online for them. I just love sharing all the old traditions with them & knowing they will pass them on to their kids someday. The best part though is sharing the real reason for the season, our Lord & Savior Jesus Christ. We've always told them a bible story every night before bed but at this time of year we linger on the story of His birth. I want them to understand from an early age that Christmas has nothing to do with santa & getting lots of stuff. It's about celebrating the King of Kings & what He came here to do for us.
So we talk a lot about how santa is a character & it's fun to pretend he's real but he's not really real. And when you see santa at the store or he comes to your school party he's just a man dressed up in a costume like at Halloween. But I also make sure to tell them not to ruin it for other kids who might think santa is real.

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We took our annual trek to see the Christmas lights Saturday night. As usual we got started too late & didn't get to finish our list. But we did see some beautiful houses in parts of Spokane we hadn't been to before & it was magical for the kids. We can't afford to put up much by the way of lights so it's fun to check out the families who can keep the power companies happy.

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Random recipe:
I made some yummy waffles for breakfast the other day. I use the recipe from the better homes and gardens cookbook (aka red & white book) but I use half whole wheat flour & I add a scoop or 2 of wheat germ so I can pretend it's good for us. I also make my own syrup which tastes so much better than that crap from the store...well, unless you buy the real thing which of course, is fabulously yummy. To make syrup you just boil 2 parts sugar & 1 part water with a little vanilla & maple flavoring until it's slightly thickened (emphasis on the slightly, if you boil it too long you'll end up with sugar-crystal'y syrup.) What made these waffles so great was that his time I didn't know I had run out of maple flavoring. I improvised & threw a couple of cinnamon sticks in & it turned out so good I don't know if I'll make it any other way.

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Hey I blogged today, can you believe it?
Have a wonderful day & enjoy your snow if you have it :)