To Do List

You are hereby warned that I like to complain. There are only four more days until Christmas. I feel like this is the most prepared I've been at this point and yet I still feel like I need an extra week....at least. I think there is 2/3 of the wrapping yet to do. (It would have been 100% of it left had Jon not taking all the ruffians to the movie yesterday.) I haven't baked or created anything other than basic meals. The nativity still isn't on display. The pine garland I bought at Costco the weekend of Thanksgiving (that I was hoping to bring in the house to have that pine smell) is still rolled up and tied laying in the garage. The Christmas cards are sitting in the mailbox because I barely missed the mail carrier on Saturday morning(and didn't realize it until evening). The kids still need to bring gifts to their teachers and friends. The wished-for new stockings aren't, (and won't be) made. And last, but not least, we haven't gone to look at Christmas lights anywhere.

As most years go Jon's work has some deadline that needs to be met before he can take any time off during the holidays and works so much that by the time he does get time off he is sick and can't enjoy it. Luckily he isn't sick yet, but what having this oh-so-important deadline means is that he has been spending nearly 80 hours a week (during the normal 5 day work-week) plus some time on the weekend trying to meet the deadline for the last several weeks. Three out of the five days this last week he averaged going in to work around 7:30 a.m. and came home at 12:30a.m. Tuesday he came home at a normal time because he was so tired and Friday he came home around 10:30 p.m. He should be putting time in this weekend but apparently he just can't make himself since he is currently playing a video game. This means that he will be spending the majority of the day tomorrow working (and possibly Tues) even though he originally planned on having this whole week off. I was planning on him having the whole week off!

My kids are on the school track this year that gives them a break from Thanksgiving through the new year. That is about 6 weeks of four kids home all day, everyday, hardly any relief at night because they go to sleep so late and Jon isn't home to help me keep my sanity. I honestly don't know how single mothers do it! (I feel like a single mother the majority of the time but I know I don't have it nearly as bad as a truly single mother.) So the point of mentioning my kids being home is that there is that much less time that I've had to get ready for Christmas. There's only so much I can do with four kids by my side. It would be different if I could use that little zapper in the movie Men In Black and erase their memory of everything I just bought and where I hid it in the house!

I honestly thought that I would have been completely done with everything by last week (minus wrapping) and just enjoy the time with my kids (whether Jon was here or not) doing fun things. We still have a couple days though, and there are some plans in the works to go to Temple Square to look at the lights. I still want to do some baking even if it is only on Christmas Eve day. Jon said he wants to take the kids sledding and with the approaching storms there will be plenty of snow to do so, which would give me some more wrapping time. So I still have hope for a peaceful and relaxing Christmas eve and day and the plus side of it is that Jon has soooo many hours in that he doesn't have to use any of his vacation time AND he'll still have some overtime hours to cover him for the next two weeks.

Oh, and one thing I managed to get Jon to do on a Saturday a couple weeks ago is put lights on the house for the first time ever....and possibly the last! :) Here is some proof:
I changed my font at thecutestblogontheblock.com

Just for Elfin Fun

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Sibling Rivalry

Here's yet another event that happened in October...

It was just after getting Tanner's costume in the mail and Ethan and he were both taking their turns putting it on. They were outside playing for some time before I heard screaming/crying and then Ethan (the victim) walked in the house. He said that Tanner threw a rock at him. Just as I was figuring out where his injury was I started to see a stream of blood running from the top of his head. I grabbed the camera that was nearby and took a picture because it looked severe enough to justify photo documentation.


The wound itself didn't look horrible but after wiping the blood up and putting pressure on it, it wouldn't stop bleeding. It was like a slow leak. I kept waivering between taking him to the dr and letting it heal on its own. I even called our family doctor's nurse to ask her opinion and in the end, (after a couple more hours of deliberation) I didn't take him in. It was only about a 1/2 inch long contusion that looked kinda like a big paper-cut.

Now that all is said and done I think that if I were to have brought him in they probably would have put a couple stitches in it. It took a couple weeks at least to heal and you can still see it on his head. I still don't know how Tanner, being almost a foot shorter than Ethan, managed to throw (according to Ethan, a small rock) on top of Ethan's head. Here are the photos:

The Month of October, part III

I almost didn't post about this but thought I should throw in the little bit of fun we had too. Two days after the anniversary party we had a fun family activity. We went to Black Island Farms (just down the road in Syracuse) which is a working farm and in the fall becomes fair-like. It is quite pricey, in my opinion, but definitely fun and you can spend several hours there.

They had:

• Animals you can buy food for and feed over a fence
• Mini-maze for toddlers made out of hay bales



• Giant slide and two medium slides made from hay bales and giant sheets of plastic

• Tube slide with a tower
• Paint ball gallery (for an extra $1)




• Corn husk shooter (for an extra $1)
• Tractor-pulled train for little kiddos
• Dried corn kernel "sand"-box





• Toddler slide
• Pumpkin shaped bounce-house
• Pig-races
• Concession stand
• Kid corn maze
• Regular corn maze
• Pumpkin patch "hay"-ride

(This was after picking pumpkins on the way back. I love this pic! lol!)

• Vegetables for sale

We did all these things except for the train ride and corn husk shooter. We had a good time except by the time we did the pumpkin patch thing, everyone else was too, and we had to wait a while and then it was dark.

We told the kids very clearly while we were waiting our turn that they must pick a pumpkin that they can carry themselves because Daddy and Mommy cannot carry the pumpkins and Garrett and make it to the van. So we get off the tractor and within 1 minute Savannah found her pumpkin and sat on it. It was probably one of the biggest ones in the field. It had to be, but I couldn't really see in the dark. Well, she got it anyway and it was quite tricky getting everyone off the tractor and to the van. In fact, Garrett didn't even get a pumpkin because it was pretty much impossible to carry 6 pumpkins plus one kid with two adults.

Anyway, it was fun and was nice to get out as a family and do something out of the ordinary, and especially nice after the party and before costume craziness.

The Month of October, part II

*Deep Breath* The anniversary party is over! I can relax now. Oh, wait, halloween is exactly 2 weeks away and I only have parts to the costumes! Yes, this was the predicament I was in. Maybe not such a big deal on the surface, however I knew I was making/sewing 2 of the 4 costumes and they were not run-of-the-mill costumes. Oh no, it was costumes that were going to take every ounce of creativity and spare time I had. And "spare time" is not very frequent considering 4 kids and schedules and a 18 month old that is very "busy".

Oh heck, speaking of spare time, I really don't have much so I'm going to leave out a lot of detail for everyone's sake. ;) Ethan wanted to be Link. Link? you ask...Yes, the character that saves Princess Zelda from Gannon in the video game Zelda. That gave Savannah an idea--she wants to be Princess Zelda.

I think in my "mommy-brain" coma I, for some reason, agree to these costumes and buy parts for them at the beginning of October. So after the anniversary party I still had to actually buy the pattern I was going to use for Savannah, buy all the notions to go with it, and cut out and sew everything. I got Ethan's cut out and the main part of it (a peter pan pattern that I adjusted a bit) sewn in one day and felt pretty good about it, although I knew that it was the easy one. The next few days I tried to make the little parts to his costume like the hat, boot-covers, and gloves (which never happened).

There were several days in between Ethan's and Savannah's costumes that I simply couldn't do anything on them because of errands, appointments, school,...exhaustion. I finally realized that I could no longer procrastinate starting Savannah's costume. I had bought tons of white costume satin and needed to get going on it even though I only had about 4 days left....I think. My Mom was at Costco and called to tell me (w/3 days left) that they had a Barbie bride costume that was white and maybe I could use that. I had already spent til the wee hours of the morning the night before cutting out all the pieces for her dress (and it was a very frustrating thing in itself) so I was very torn. If the rest of the assembly for the dress was going to be as frustrating as the cutting out I definitely wanted the premade dress. On the other hand, if I didn't make the dress, all the money for fabric and time I spent cutting out pieces would have been a complete waste. So we decide for her to buy the dress and then if needed, depending on what I decide, return it later.

That night when I finally was able to get to it I made the decision to just start making the dress and then if I had trouble, I would quit and resort to the barbie dress. So I sewed, and sewed, and sewed. I think I finally quit at about 3:30 a.m. I made the whole dress except for the hemming. This takes us to Wednesday, halloween being on Friday. The remainder of my time was spent (among other things, of course) trying to figure out the details of the costume. Things like the shoulder armor, the apron thing, the gloves' detail, and the vest. I worked on her costume until the absolute last second.

You might be impressed with the costumes until you look at the pictures I was going off from. At the same time, if you knew how many little details there are and then imagine trying to adapt them into a kid's one-day costume, you might still be impressed so I'm going to include both pictures below. (Another side-note is all the time I spent on the computer just trying to find a good picture of Link and Zelda. There are all kinds of versions of these two since the game is from the 80's through recent times. I went with images from more recent games.)

I forgot to mention Tanner's and Garrett's costumes!! Tanner is in love with SpeedRacer and HotWheels so this basic costume was perfect that I found online. A little pricey, actually, but worth it compared to how little time I had.Garrett is a very busy little boy, as I have mentioned, so when I saw this costume on OldNavy.com I just had to buy it. It was a perfect fit for my little stinker.