Short version

Oy. Busy. Here's a quick run-down of what we've been up to:

- A couple weeks ago, Nathan took me to The Melting Pot (yum! omg...we'd not been there before and it was awesome!) and then to see an improv show at The Lincoln Center. It was two guys who used to be on that tv show "Whose Line is it Anyway?" and it was fabulously hilarious! 

- We finally decorated the tree. :)

- We (well, Asher and I, since Micah was still recovering from croup and Noah volunteered to watch him rather than go talk to (mostly younger) kids) had a great time at a cookie exchange with friends. Yummy! Honestly, though, for all that we love the cookies, we were mostly thrilled with the time with friends...so blessed!

- I started back to boot camp after two weeks off thanks to walking pneumonia. Ouch. It's rather unfair how quickly one loses any gains in fitness! ;)

- I managed to get a picture of the boys with Santa up in Old Town Fort Collins:

Hee hee. Noah forgot that I told him last year that last year was the last time I'd make him be in the picture. Don't tell. :) Just saying...I'm not one to squander an opportunity, lol. I fed him well just beforehand, so he wasn't actually as grumpy as he looks. (Mostly, he was just worried that people were staring at him, lol.)

- Asher earned his high red belt in karate!

So proud of the boy! Only two more belts before he'll test for his black belt!

- The next day (12/14/13), Asher also had a winter clarinet recital. He performed about half a dozen songs and sounded wonderful. (His instructor noted that at least one or two of the songs were ones that he normally doesn't assign until students have been taking lessons for a couple years...Asher's only been taking lessons since September and was included.)

- The day after that, Noah and Micah had another JOAD tournament. :) This one was down in Denver and they both did a dandy job and are happy to now have a wee break for Christmas. 

- And, as of yesterday, all of our Christmas packages and cards are now officially in the mail!! (The ones we plan to hand deliver don't count, lol.) Whew!

So, that's what we've been up to. We'll wrap up our homeschooling on Friday and then have a lovely (and much needed) little break...

Oh the weather outside is frightful...

...but inside it's so delightful. ;)

Yup, despite the single digit temperatures of late and my and Nathan's bouts with walking pneumonia, we've managed to get into the holiday spirit around here... 

We hung the outside lights just after Thanksgiving (before the snow, fortunately)...well, Nathan and the boys hung them. I tried to help but was coughing too much and got sent back indoors after I snapped a few pictures. ;)

A few days later, though, I made snowflakes with the boys for the first time in years. It was our art lesson for the week, lol:

The top two pictures are mine, then Micah, Asher and Noah. (Micah had a LOT more but I didn't get pictures of *all* of them, lol.) Btw, coffee filters make excellent paper snowflakes! They're already circular and are much easier to cut than paper, making for considerably less frustration. (Noah, though, did make one using actual paper so that he could attend to more detail, lol. It's that bottom left one.)

I'm still trying to figure out a good way to display these. Let me know if you have any ideas! (They're more fragile than paper so I'm not sure that taping them to walls will work or whether I could glue them to paper...)

We also braved the cold (with a stop to buy warmer winter socks for all three boys and gloves for Noah since apparently we've outgrown those as well, lol) to pick out our tree:

(The boys also took that as an opportunity to have a bit of a snowball fight throughout the lot.)

Beyond that, our elf is back, the boys decided they didn't want a lego advent calendar this year, and I'm hoping to get cards & packages in the mail this week. We'll actually put up indoor decorations and trim the tree later tonight...

(We'd been planning on attending the Options winter program tonight, where Micah was slated to perform with his piano class. But. Micah woke up with croup this morning, so we'll just have more time to trim the tree, right? Sigh. No worries. He's gotten croup every year or so since he was a baby (which is why he's more susceptible) so we know the drill. He's already been to the doctor for meds and is feeling better. He mostly just gets mad at the inability to talk for awhile, lol. Fortunately, none of the rest of us seem to ever get it from him (as it mostly affects small kids anyhow). Also, very thankful that Nathan was able to adjust his work schedule this morning so he could get Micah into the open appointment slot, pick up the prescription, and dose Micah (while I took Asher to Options and ran the backlog of errands I'd been needing to run).) 

Okay. Off to finish up a few more things before picking up Asher and then getting out the boxes of ornaments and decorations... :)

Checking in...

Many thanks to all who have checked on me! I'm doing much better now, thanks. Fever's been gone a few days and (knock on wood) I think I'm down to just the occasional coughing bout. Whew. (Course the single digit temperatures and incredibly dry air aren't helping matters...do you hear that, Mother Nature?) ;)

Aside from all that, just a few random thoughts from my sleep deprived mind:

- I'm pretty sure that the Monday Night Football game this week (between the Seahawks and the Saints) was a little birthday gift for my dad, who would have been 64 on Monday and was a staunch Seahawks fan. ;)

- Incessant coughing = headache. Bleh. (Better today but still worth complaining about, lol.)

- Neighbors rock...particularly neighbors who have snow blowers and are kind enough to clear your portion of the sidewalk also.

- I was randomly surfing online late at night over the break and scored an awesome deal on dvd sets of seasons 1-6 of The Big Bang Theory. Feeling giddy. (Thanks to Netflix for introducing me to the show...which is a lovely little distraction when you need a distraction.)

Okay. Need to go get back to afternoon schoolwork now. :) (Ha, don't think the boys will agree with me but there's another benefit of homeschooling...school doesn't have to stop just because the teacher is sick, lol.)

PSA

Remember how Nathan was diagnosed with walking pneumonia a couple weeks ago?

And how we thought it was awesome that none of the rest of us got it?

Did you know that the incubation period for walking pneumonia is 15-25 days?

Yeah. I didn't know that either. I do now. Bleh.

(Many apologies and healthy thoughts to any I came into contact with prior to figuring out I have what Nathan had...hopefully you're safe, as I probably didn't kiss you or sleep with you, lol.)

Five on Friday: Post-Thanksgiving recap edition

1. I think Noah may be in a food coma. Still. It's after 11:30am on Friday and he's still asleep. (His alarm has gone off and we've all taken turns trying to wake him up, for the record.) The boy did eat more turkey and mashed potatoes yesterday than the other four of us combined. No, I don't think I'm exaggerating. ;)

2. Thankful for the ability to just text folks...as my voice was AWOL yesterday morning. (Yeah, feeling a bit under the weather but nothing horrible. Still, no Black Friday mayhem for me today. :) Which is perfectly dandy with me.)

3. Thankful, too, for friends who don't care if you come to drop things off at their house in your pajamas since that's how you decided to spend your Thanksgiving. ;)

4. Though it's not very Thanksgiving-y, we spent the last couple days watching an entire season of Top Shot off of Apple TV. It was lovely...nice down time and this particular season (All Stars) had a lot less people drama and just focused on the challenges and respecting each other. (This came about, btw, because we don't have cable or satellite so couldn't watch our traditional Punkin Chunkin this year. It'll come out on Apple TV before long, though, and we'll watch it then.)

5. Question. Pumpkin pie...do you eat the crust last or save a bite out of the middle (the nice pumpkiney part) for your last bite? We had a bit of a debate here. Noah and I like to save a bite out of the middle. Nathan thinks that's just wrong, lol.