James Island

We had a great time last Saturday night when Papa loaded us all up into the RV and drove us to Charleston for the James Island Christmas Lights Spectacular!



While we goofed off waiting for it to get nice and dark, Marissa and her cousin Kayla roasted marshmallows and we took a scenic train ride around the lake.




It was truly awesome! Words cannot express the beauty of this dazzling display of lights!

A few quick shots

Here are a few quick shots from our Christmas morning celebration! Marissa was very happy..........



........but not nearly as happy as she was when the last present started ringing under the tree and she realized it was a cell phone to replace the old dinosaur one she had!

Yes, she is now a big kid with a phone that has a cool camera with a micro SD card, a rockin' MP3 player with headphones, games, and her fave part.....UNLIMITED TEXT!!!!! She was one happy camper!

Happy New Year!

Here is a toast to a happy, safe, prosperous and BLESSED 2009! We are packing up the family and heading to the beach for a couple of days. At midnight we will bring in the New Year watching fireworks on the sand and freezing our butts off! I hope wherever you are and whatever you do, you have a wonderful night and a great beginning to the New Year!

Merry Christmas!!!

Hello all of my bloggy friends! I hope you all have a very joyous day celebrating the birth of our Savior Jesus Christ! Many blessings to you and yours!

Overheard......

Today my 11 year old and her 9 year old friend are baking cookies. I am happily emailing and Facebook-ing. (see previous post for the story of my addiction.) As they work, they chat. I listen halfway...lost in my own world. I catch snippets about what raisins are made from, why do they call it ginger BREAD if it is a cookie, etc. Then something catches my ear.
Please note:
J-the 9 year old
M-the 11 year old

J- Do you still believe in Santa?
M- Of course!
J- Me too.
M- Not many 6th graders still believe but I do.
J-Yeah, most kids at my school don't either. (Makes reference to her younger cousin who does not believe)
M- Well, they are just 4th graders. They don't know.
J- Most kids in 2nd and 3rd grade don't believe either.
M- Well, they are just weirdos.
J- Wonder how many kindergarteners believe in Santa?
M- I think all.
J- No, I think even little kids think there is no Santa. But they are so cute!
M- Well, if kids don't believe in Santa then society is doing something to their brains.

I nearly fell out of my chair. It was too funny. Society?????

Ah...innocence. We need more of it!

Facebook

I have been a Myspace junkie for quite some time now but I recently discovered Facebook. I signed on a couple of years back, thinking it would be cool and hip to be friends with my nieces at LSU. (Who was I fooling? Me???? Cool and hip?) I never did anything with it.

Well, inspired by fellow blogger friend Jamie over at Happy To Be Me Blog, I went back on. IT had been so long I had to get a new password. How pitiful is it that I didn't have a clue what my password was??? Anyway, a few mouse clicks and I was at it.

What a mistake. It is so extremely addictive. Very easy to use, quick to upload pics, fun to navigate and guess what else???? I found a TON of family and friends that I thought were long lost on the site.

Now, I bet my poor little super poke pet on Myspace is just dying for some attention. Meanwhile, I am happily surfing around, looking and profiles and catching up with people I have not seen in over 20 years. I even found a girl who was my very very very best friend in middle school. Her name is Robin and I am so glad to say I found her and we actually had a nice chat tonight on the IM! How awesome is this???? I also found two bloggy friends...Cassandra and Miranda. It is so cool!!!!!

So, go on over and check it out,. but only if you want to spend a considerable amount of time yelling "HEY! I know her!!!!!" at your monitor. :) And while I will never be cool and/or hip, I am having fun!

Christmas Tea

Our Church hosted it's 3rd annual Christmas tea last night. This year's theme was "Christmas Memories". Everything was decorated with oil lamps, greenery, tea cups and white lights. The fellowship hall was BEAUTIFUL! The men escorted us to our tables, some dressed in tuxedos and some in their military dress uniforms. All of the ladies were dressed up, and we had elegant finger foods displayed on silver and glass trays. The speaker spoke on the subject of Jesus being the light of the world. The music was nice and the doorprizes were a big hit!
Here are a few pictures that I took. I am waiting to get copies of the ones others took. Enjoy!
It's awesome to have your Mother in Law as your live in hairdresser! She took great care of me and Marissa!


Here is our Christmas princess, all grown up. She asked PawPaw how she looked and he told her she looked cute. She was quite annoyed...and responded with "Cute? Cute? Cute is for toddlers!!!!" You can thrown in your own dose of sarcasm here and eye rolling for the full effect.


This next picture is sure to cause people to take a second look. Yes, that is me...and NO, that is not my sister next to me. Steph and I always get asked if we are sisters and when I see photos I understand why. Don't hate us because we are beautiful LOL!

The fellowship hall was lovely.

This year our daughters were invited to attend with us. Our princess and Steph's princess looked so beautiful!

I invited my cousin Virginia and her daughter Kayla to accompany us. Everyone had a great time!

I was gifted with this cute award from The Fabulously Sweet Cecile. Check my blog list to see Sweet Cecile's great blog!

I am to pass this along to five blogs that I find fabulous ... there are so many that I find fabulous it's going to be hard to choose!Fabulous' Award Rules:1. You have to pass it on to 5 fabulous blogs.2. You have to list 5 of your fabulous addictions.3. Make sure you include the person that gave you the award and link it back to them.

My 5 Fabulous Addictions:
1. Internet....blogging....emailing....e-coupon printing....
2. My family. They are all truly fabulous.
3. My Savior. I know many may think that is an odd thing to call an addition, but an addition is something we cannot live a day without right? Well, I couldn't live one minute without Him.
4. Chocolate. 'Nuff said.
5. Scrapbooking is definitely an addiction, although I have not had much time to do it lately. :( Hopefully that will change VERY soon.

Ok, now the passing on part.....I will choose Miranda at Keeper of The Cheerios, Heather at Wanting What You Have, Jamie at Happy to Be Me, Cassandra at Tripping Around the Sun and my daughter at The Life Of a Ladybug.

Have fun guys!

WHAT?????

Yesterday I posted about an extraordinary and very common sense article pertaining to current economic times and how people are coping. A little later I flipped the pages of the next section of the SAME paper only to find this RIDICULOUS article.

Seems this lady in LA has built a rather extraordinary doghouse. Or rather, she has HAD it built. To the tune of $20,000. This dog house has heat and air, hardwood floor, ceiling fans, lighting, a vintage dresser to hold dog clothes......it goes on and on.


Check it out here:
http://www.latimes.com/features/lifestyle/la-hm-doghouse6-2008dec06,0,6314671.story

Here is what I don't get. People in our own neighborhoods are starving. Kids go to bed every night hungry and cold. People can't get a job. Senior citizens have to choose between food and their medicine. I could go on and on.

Now don't get me wrong.....I am a pet lover. I have 3 cats. They eat store brand catfood. They live in our modest home, not a cat palace. This is what pets DO.

I sure could have thought of ways to help a lot of people with $20,000....plus the money she spent to move it to their new home on a flat bed truck, with the aid of a crane. (I did not see a cost estimate on that.) I am glad these folks have their wealth and love their pets. I wish them no ill will. I just wonder where their priorities truly are.

The Morning News....

I don't usually read the newspaper commentary section. I don't know what made me turn there today, but I am sure glad I did. I ran across a commentary by Boston Globe writer Ellen Goodman that really struck a chord in me.

The title of the article in our local paper is "Thrift is New Normal". The title alone caught my eye, as I blog about being thrifty on my other blog. (What? You don't read it? Shame on you! Now follow the blog list link.....)

I read the article, which is basically about the current recession and economic times and the way retailers are reacting and was amazed by some of the one liners that stood out to me. Some of my favorites are:
~~These days the media are full of people saying bye-bye to bling-bling~~
~~These days Change You Can Believe In is what's jingling in your pocket~~
~~Thrift is the new normal~~
~~Sixty percent off is the new black~~
~~Cutting back is in. Retail therapy is out.~~

You will have to read the whole article to see what I mean. It was a really good commentary on excessive spending and "keeping up with the Jonses". Check it out at
http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2008/12/12/an_upside_to_the_economic_downside/

Children's Book Festival

A few weeks ago we took Riss to the Children's Book Festival downtown in the park. It was the 3rd year we have been. Marissa was so excited to find that her all time favorite children's author would be there. Marissa has been a big fan of the Arthur books since she was about a year old. She had an Arthur birthday party, we had Arthur dishes, books, posters, movies, Tshirts, stuffed animals....you name it. We even had Arthur ice cream at her party and I recently bought her Arthur paper plates (Hefty Zoo Pals) at Kroger.

Imagine how thrilled she was to not only SEE Marc Brown, the author of the Arthur books, but......

...to actually meet him and have her picture made with him!

Of course, we also saw the Arthur costumed character and listened to Marc Brown tell his story about how he got the idea for Arthur. We really enjoyed when he showed us all how to draw each character from the books!


It was an awesome day!

Decorating.....

Ok, I have not posted in a few days because right after my whole Sarah Palin experience, we started decorating the house. So far we have 2 big trees totally finished, the set of 3 Mary Joseph and baby Jesus small trees are done, Marissa has her tree set up in her room with everything except the tree topper star which we CANNOT FIND, and the village is set up. There is some greenery thrown over the kitchen window, there is a load of Christmas dishtowels in the dryer, the Christmas dishes are in the cabinet and there is a fiber optic Santa strapped to my front door.

The 6 ft tree in my scrapbook room is leaning against the wall, cold and dark. I cannot find the small tree that goes in our bathroom. The hot pink color scheme in the hall bathroom has prevented any sort of decorating in there. (Anyone want a techni-colored Christmas?)

The few gifts we have managed to buy are shoved in my closet. The 400 billion rolls of after-Christmas-sale-purchased gift wrap are leaning on my computer desk.

Yep...I will probably get it all together the day before Christmas Eve...only to have to take it all down the next week. Is it just me or does it seem like more work than usual this year?

Guess where I was yesterday?

I have never been much of a political person. I have never followed political news or polls or anything like that. I have voted every year in the presidential elections since I was 18, but never really did anything for the primaries or the local elections. It may come as a surprise then that I went to a rally for Senator Saxby Chambliss yesterday.



But I had an ulterior motive.....
Guess who the guest speaker was?


Here I am standing in front of who I fully believe will be President of our great country in the VERY near future!

GO SARAH!!!!! Palin 2012!