Happy Holidays to all!

Just popping in this morning to wish you all a beautiful and family-filled day! Hope you manage to stay warm (it's started snowing here again--which is fine...and we're under a high wind warning--which is not as fine, as I dislike wind and it means I had to deflate my lovely inflatables, lol).

And, just for the record, my code this year was awesome. No one even came close to breaking it. ;) 

Each package had two numbers (separated by a semi-colon) and one or two letters. From the two numbers, you needed to add the numbers in the hundreds and tens column. If that sum was divisible by 7, it was Asher's...divisible by 8, it was Noah's...or ended in 5, it was Micah's. (I started out with divisible by 5 but then neglected to pay attention and used sums for the older two that were also divisible by five, so changed it.) The letters meant nothing...except that if there was an N it was from Noah and an A meant from Asher. (Micah wrapped his own gifts this year.)

(So, for instance, in the package above...add 28 and 00. That equals 28. Which is divisible by 7. So this is for Asher. No N, so it's from parents.)

Bwahaahaaa. ;)

I'll end with a version of our holiday card photo:

From our family to yours... 

(PS For whatever reason, the post office has returned a few of the cards I mailed earlier in the week...with no indication that they're addressed wrong or have insufficient postage or anything. It looks like they may have gone through the machine backward or something and thus been delivered to our return address (which was on the back). I'll try to mail them again tomorrow. Sorry.)

Ridiculously happy

So. Look what Nathan just brought home...

Yesterday, Home Depot's inflatables went on sale! This beauty wasn't available online but our local store had one left...the floor model. Hooray!! And now our yard looks like this:

And I am ridiculously happy about it. ;) 

Merry Christmas Eve, y'all!

Brewery Lights

In our continued efforts to get into the holiday spirit today, after schoolwork and having a friend over and karate, we headed up to the Anheuser Busch Brewery Lights celebration. A friend at boot camp told me about it awhile ago and we finally found the time to go...

The entire thing is free and open to the public. We took advantage of the free beer samples, hot cocoa and hot cider, wandered thru the tree maze, and enjoyed the digital light show. We did also pay for food from the beirgarten (which wasn't fantastic or anything but also wasn't unreasonably priced) and a family smores kit...which we then proceeded to make at one of the fires. (That was definitely the highlight for us, and by the end Micah was simply burning the roasting stick provided. Because I have boys, people. And they like fire, lol.)

Fortunately, it wasn't as cold as it has been, and it was a lovely new experience for us to try together. :) If you're local and haven't been, you should go!

Finally.

Just so you know...we finally put out the inflatables yesterday. :) 

Ta da. :)

Things that happened over the weekend...

1. Asher & Micah went to black belt club at karate. 

2. Micah and I shoveled snow.

3. I updated JOAD stats for our team.

4. Nathan led Asher and Ocean on their Wright Stuff build. They're working on a new plane/kit.

5. I cut Nathan and Noah's hair.

6. I had to double check that I still had enough tape for wrapping after Asher started randomly making tape beards on himself and taping his hands together. Weirdo. ;) 

7. Micah, Nathan and I made 205 cookies (yes, that's a little over 17 dozen)...for neighbors, coaches and us. They're yummy!

8. The annual watching of "Elf" happened. :)

9. Noah had JOAD practice.

10. We finally decorated our tree!

Yes, it's been sitting in the front room for a week...naked. We haven't managed to get any other indoor decorations up yet, but at least we got the tree decorated. :) I love that the process is so traditionally festive...with everyone doing his/her part. And I love all our ornaments, each with a story. Happy!

And now it's Monday. Asher and Micah are at their last day of Options before break and I'm trying to finish up Christmas shopping, do a bit more baking and get these last few packages in the mail. Wish me luck! :)