Teaholic not quite anonymous

No, not together at the same time. YUCK. But I absolutely love Bob's Candy Canes. They MUST be Bob's though. Spangler (what crap!) Starburst, etc.. will not do! It must be Bob's Mint Candy Canes. I've been looking for them for a while and I finally found them at AC Moore's tonight! YIPPEE! I had one as soon as I got home. I was going to wait until tomorrow, but... I also bought three tins which I will fill with cherry fudge for gifts for the neighbors, etc.

Matt and Maddy went to Milwaukee Frozen Custard while I was in AC Moore's. She looked so grown up sitting in the chair when I walked in. I can't believe she's 2!!

Ok, onto the gin. I bought some gin a few weekends ago for martinis. For those of you that don't know, besides wine, I like martinis. None of that fruity daiquiri stuff for me. Wine coolers? Yuck! I bought what was on sale, a 'light lime flavored' gin. Man, it's not bad at all! It isn't the tried and true martini, but it's definitely not bad.

Today was a pretty uneventful day. I gave away my vacuum cleaner (the old one) to a family from one of my mom's groups. She's very happy to have it as I guess hers broke a few weeks ago. They've been looking into them, but haven't bought one. So when mine came up for free they jumped on it. I'm so glad someone is getting use out of it.

I'm still trying to give away our double mattress and box spring. The grandparents bought us a queen size mattress and box spring for our spare room for Christmas. Yes, it is a little self-serving. :) But we don't mind. The company will take away our other stuff for us, but honestly, it's not in bad shape so I'd like to give it to someone who can use it. If I can't get any takers through my mom's group I will open it up to Craigslist. I know I'll get 50 takers in a minute!

Matt vacuumed the entire house today. He loves to vacuum with the Dyson. I can't believe the amount that thing picks up. WOW. He even did all the stairs, too! We did do our grocery shopping for the week but I forgot/store didn't have a few things so I will need to go out tomorrow as well. That's ok, since we have some errands to run. Speaking of, I may just do those tonight. It'll be easier than tomorrow (when I want to get our Christmas stuff up).

Tea of the day: Bigelow Green Constant Comment and then Mint Herbal

So we started putting up the Christmas decorations tonight. Matt had to dig them out of the back of the new closet so that took a while. It looks nice though, I like our new tree. It's a lot smaller than our old one so we can't fit as many decorations. I'm going to try to give away the old one and also our desk chair that is in our basement. I'm hoping to fit our recliner down there somehow and maybe get a different chair for the living room after the tree is down.

But anyway, we really only had about forty minutes to decorate tonight before Maddy had to go to bed. So not everything is up yet. But it's getting there. I'll finish the rest tomorrow during the day.

Tea of the day: Coconut Aloha tea

Well, today was a busy day overall. I really got a lot done this morning... three loads of laundry washed and put away, bathrooms clean, stew made, and some more Christmas stuff put up. I didn't nearly get as much done as I wanted to with Christmas stuff though. I wound up taking some meds on an empty stomach and it really hit me hard. The more I moved around the more nauseous I became! I always make sure I take these with food, but today I just forgot.

This afternoon I received the other set of pictures in the mail so the remainder of my Christmas cards went out today. I only have the 8x10s for the grandparents I still need to get to them. Other than that, everything is in the mail now! Our china coffee/tea pot also came today via UPS.

We've had very high winds here today. It's been cold though, too. So I bundled up Maddy in a blanket and hat while we went out to get the mail. She was SO DISAPPOINTED that we weren't going somewhere! Once I got her back in the house she started to cry. Poor thing hates to be cooped up. She pepped up once I showed her the bubble wrap and had a field day jumping on it!

Well, that's it here. Have a good one!

Tea of the day: Mighty Leaf Orange Deluce,

Well, we've had two doctors visits in the house over the last couple of days. Fortunately, both of them have been well visits.

Yesterday, Matt came home from work and took the cats to the vets for their shots. This sentence does not at all describe the length or complexity of their visit. Of course, the visit starts in our own house. We have to dig out the cat carriers that we are using for storage in our newly organized closet. No big deal, just a bit time consuming. I do this as Matt is approaching the house. Joe, in all his wisdom, decides to go take a peek and gets inside! So I close the door behind him. Easy enough. I look for Ruthie. She's no where to be found. I finally found her under the bed upstairs. Obviously, I had been spotted taking out the carriers. Fortunately for me (not for Matt) he walks in at that second. So now it's his job to get Ruthie. Wouldn't you know it, Maddy asks for a bath at that same second. :) Off Maddy and I go to the bathtub. After about 15 minutes of using tuna as bait, he finally gets Ruthie into the carrier and they leave.

Of course, the car rides are NEVER pleasant. Ever. To or from.

They get to the vet and Ruthie is fine. Let's the doctor do whatever and ducks back into her carrier glad to be done. Then there's Joe... the sweet and patient one at home who never ever gets mad at Maddy for laying all over him. Well, he's a total psycho at the vets. Matt has to hold a towel over him. He's mewing and yelling so loud that the vet has other people come in the room to make sure she doesn't need help. Ok, that's said and done it turns out Ruthie is going to need some cleaning and scaling done to her teeth. Joe is fine. Clean bill of health (besides the bald belly but that's stress related).

After they get home, Ruthie goes psycho again, this time about Joe. Joe smells like a different place where other cats are. She even doesn't like Matt for a few minutes. She's hissing and growling. Mind you, this is now 7:30 at night and Matt has been in the house a total of 5 minutes and was gone with the cats for 2 hours at the vet. Maddy needs to go to bed. But if you've ever heard a cat being mad you know how loud and piercing it is--definitely not easy to sleep through. Of course, the craziest thing about this whole mess is that Ruthie was at the vets, too. So she TOO smells like a different cat. Does she notice this?!?! Ohhhnooo.... she thinks Joe's at fault (just like a woman, always blame the guy). After a while, they learn to avoid each other and we're pretty well off...

Until 3 am, where they are at it again in our bedroom. *sigh*

But the good news!! Maddy's doctors appointment went REALLY well. She did excellently. She followed directions and let the doctor check her out. She even opened her mouth and said ahh well enough that the doctor didn't need to use the tongue depressor. She had her finger pricked to get blood drawn for a test and she didn't even cry! She just watched them do it. What a BIG girl!!! I was so relieved and I couldn't stop praising her. She's in great health. She's in the 80th percentile for height and the 60th for weight. She spurted up three inches in the last three months! She also has a 2 year molar popping in the back right top. Of course, we still need to work on getting healthier food in her, less milk (her crutch) and more water.

Onto the mistletoe. I am all about having mistletoe hung in our house at Christmas. I have real mistletoe, but it is highly poisonous. Back when I taught in VA Beach our janitor who got to work at 6 am (I was shortly behind him at 6:15) would come and talk to me in my room (to my chagrin while I was trying to prep for the day. But he knew I was the only insane person who would be at work at that hour). I mentioned that I had been looking for artificial mistletoe but was unable to find any. Well, turns out that he moonlights as a floral arranger and knew where he could get some. So he brought some in for me the very next day! I have let it dry out and have saved it in the same box for the last 7 years. However, because it's so poisonous I'm afraid to hang it up even though it won't get bumped lest Maddy find it and eat a berry--or the cats, too. So today, while at Walmart before Maddy's visit I found these beaded branches that are reminiscent of mistletoe although it looks nothing like it. So I bought it! During Maddy's nap I attached some curling ribbon and hung it in the doorway between the kitchen and the living room. So that will do as mistletoe until the cats are gone and Maddy is old enough not to eat the dried stuff. It's really cute actually. Matt likes it, too.

Speaking of ornaments.. I still need to find my Christmas Pickle. It's a glass pickle that gets 'hidden' in the tree and the first person to find it gets a small gift. It's supposed to be a German tradition but now they think it's really an American one or maybe a Polish-German one. But I didn't take the opportunity to look for it when we hung ornaments so I think I'll go searching for it now.

Have a great night all!

Tea of the day: None. I was in such a hurry to get out the door to Walmart I didn't even have time for tea! I will make up for it and have some herbal stuff now.

We had our first snow today! We woke up to a light dusting but I guess we're supposed to have 2-4. I was soooo excited. I know all my WI readers are rolling their eyes right now since they've had a ton of snow and are probably tired of it by now, but I still love it. Maddy and I went out to play in it and she had a blast. The snowsuit is a bit big, but it fits her well. We don't have boots yet, but I'll look into buying some. She did have on mittens, but she doesn't like them as much as gloves so I put those on her instead. Of course, I do what I do every first snowfall. I heat up some hot chocolate! It was the lure of hot chocolate that got Maddy into the house. I think she would have stayed out there all day!

Tomorrow morning is St. Nick's. Maddy's stocking is all ready to go. I'm excited for her to see it. She still loves her advent calendar as do I. I love mine, too, but I'm good about not eating a ton of chocolate that is in it. I'll be sure to take pictures of Maddy's St. Nick opening. She'll love it this year.

So I've been getting rid of stuff lately. I'm giving away our office chair, our double bed and frame, our old Christmas tree and our vacuum cleaner! I'm so glad to be rid of it all but not just wasting it by throwing it out. They were all in fine condition and I'm glad someone can use it!

Tomorrow we get our entire heating system replaced (minus the humidifier that will be put on the new system). It's supposed to be a high of 35 tomorrow! So I think Maddy and I will spend our time elsewhere. Matt will be home to supervise the guys. I'm hoping to put our space heater in Maddy's room and we will hang out in there before nap to get her used to it. She hates loud fans and I know she won't like this one. But if I can get her adjusted to it at least she can get a comfortable nap. We'll most likely go out again in the afternoon as well. Dunno where, but we will!

Tea of the day: Plum Roobios herbal, I made a pot of it!

So what were the goods??

-Mini gel pens
-Curious George Note book
-Curious George mini plush
-Christmas sticky notes
-Santa Ornament
-Diego talking/light up toy
-Dora lunch box filled with m&ms
-Squeezy frog ball
-Princess Bracelets
-Christmas bell necklace
-Huge lollipop
-Stickers

It's a high of 37 today and it's 19 right now. We're going to be without heat since we're getting our new heating/cooling system put in. YESH! What a day to pick, huh?

So, we have our heat back on! They aren't quite finished yet with everything, but for the most part, it's set to go.

We spent most of the day just hanging out. Maddy LOVED having Daddy home. She also love the huge cardboard box that our heat pump came in! It's about 5 feet tall and 4 feet wide. We made her a play house out of it and she insisted that Daddy come inside, too.

The guys who worked on our heating system was REALLY great. We had a tight fit but they were able to work it around and get it all to fit. Matt calls our system sexy. HA! It does have a variable speed fan so that's pretty fun to hear it speed up and slow down. It's really well done. We were at 61 when the guys left and were up to 68 in a matter of minutes. I can't believe how fast it is. What is sad though, is that we didn't really notice that much difference in our old heating systems normal functioning and our almost no heat day. Kinda scary and sad at the same time.

Other than that, we ran out once today just to get out of the noise and banging to get to the post office. I mailed out a Christmas package to a friend in Iraq. I have to say, Maddy is such an easy going kid. The banging, pounding, cutting and screwing didn't seem to affect her at all.

Tea of the day: Orange Deluce tea, Mint herbal tea, x2, Rainforest Mate tea

Ok, I know it's only been two days, but I'm tired of having people in my house! Now it doesn't help that Maddy's down for her nap right now and they are banging around the basement. Of course I'm on pins and needles.

Add in that they didn't GET here today until 11:45 because they were waiting on some duct work to be custom made. But hello? There was enough OTHER work to do in our house this morning that didn't involve that duct work to definitely keep them busy. Now they probably won't finish up today--either. Grrr.. Well, they sure as heck better be here at 9 tomorrow, no later!

And of course, they have made a mess of our new bedroom drywall installing a return vent and need to take out a big chunk of our new bathroom drywall installing that vent. It's fine that they need to make a mess of it, but they either better fit it themselves or take money off our bill so we can have it fixed. A job isn't done until everything is put back the way it is supposed to be.

Not to mention, I have to do laundry and I can't get into my laundry room to do it. I'm doing it tomorrow AM whether they are here or not. I can't wait on it any longer. We're overflowing in laundry!

Not a whole lot else new here today. It's freezing rain/ice so we're not venturing out although I have a list the size of my arm for Target. Maybe tomorrow if the weather is better.

Tea of the day: Orange Deluce, Green Constant Comment, Plum Roobios

So, our heating and cooling system is installed. That includes the humidifier and air cleaning system as well. However, we have a gaping whole in our bathroom and our bedroom wall in marred up. By the time we are finished installing our heating vent in our spare bathroom we will most likely also have a hole in our bedroom ceiling as well--our NEW bedroom ceiling and bathroom. Well, whatever will get it to work.

I however, have a sore throat and ear thing going on. The right side of my lymph nodes are swollen. Here's hoping I'm not coming down with something bad and that Maddy doesn't catch it. It's been getting worse and not better though, so that's not good. I'm really, really hoping it's not strep. I haven't had that in at least three years.

Matt and Maddy are at Arby's right now. She hasn't been a very good eater today. So, it was time to bring out the big guns. She loves roast beef sandwiches. That will give me time to clean up the house and get her PJs prepped for bed, etc. When she gets home we'll do our night time routine and she'll go to bed.

Alrighty, speaking of, I better get on all that. Have a great weekend everyone!

No other symptoms, just a sore, white pussy spot on my throat. YUCK. Well, it's been a while, so at least that's good. Of course, it wouldn't go full blown until AFTER the doctor's offices are closed for the weekend. So now I'm going to need to go to urgent care. I could probably last the weekend if it were just me, but I need to get some antibiotics going to keep this away from Maddy and Matt. I really hope they don't get this. It'd be miserable to be two with strep throat!! I would know!

I had throat infections ALL the time as a kid. If I got sick, I never got stomach bugs or that kind of thing, I got strep. I'd be on antibiotics for 10 days and within a few days of being off it, the illness would come right back. So at four I had my tonsils out and that helped a lot. Still, about once a year I would get it. It was miserable.

The last time I had it was before I was pregnant so it was at least 3 years ago. I went into our family doctor and got a prescription for it. Well, Matt had a sore throat and ws going to Canada that week for an onsight so he went to the doctor. He saw some idiot (who we haven't gone back to) and because the strep test came out negative he wouldn't prescribe Matt antibiotics. Hello?? His wife is diagnosed with it, he has a sore throat and is leaving for a week to Canada!! Of course, he was in horrible pain the entire time he was gone and when he returned home and saw the doctor they did diagnose him with strep!! Sometimes using common sense helps.

When Matt described the intense pain of Strep, I knew he had it. It was kind of funny as a kid. I'd be five and go into the doctor and tell him I have strep. He got to the point where he didn't even make me open my mouth much because when you have strep, you KNOW you have it! He definitely stopped taking cultures to test for it. What's the point? Have you looked in my mouth? What else could it be!?

So anyway, I'm up planning all the things I'm going to wash as soon as the rest of the house is up, spray with lysol, etc. Thank goodness for herbal tea, it helps SO MUCH with the pain. I am up right now because I took two advil which should help let me get back to sleep. No fever yet though... that will come tomorrow.

So first thing tomorrow I need to get myself to Urgent Care (and wait for a couple hours with all the other sick people), get some antibiotics and get the prescription filled. I am hoping I at least get to do a little bit of shopping at Target while it gets filled! :)

Claire, don't worry. Matt will help you with the chair. I'll stay far, far away. You won't even have to come through the house but meet him in back anyway!

Tea: I wish. I don't want to wake anyone up so I'm just having cold water. Maybe I'll venture some anyway.

Ok, I was POSITIVE this morning at 1 am that I had strep. Now though, I think it could be a cold. My ears are still a bit ringing and I feel a bit stuffy headed/achy, but NOT like strep. Wonder if that white spots going to go away on it's own. We'll see. I'm also on antibiotics for my acne so I'm wondering if that's helping some, too. If it is strep I really want to get it taken care of before anyone else gets it. But I will bide my time and see what happens...

weird.

Tea of the day: Lots of different stuff... all herbal or green tea though. Caffeine does not help a cold (unless taking it with medicine)

So after some hemming and hawing I decided to go to Urgent care when Matt returned home from work (he went in for a bit today since he took off Thursday and Friday since the heat guys were here). He walked in at 4:50 and I walked out at 5. Maddy was crying hysterically at the gate yelling, "GO! GO!! GOO!!!" She of course, wanted to come with and get out of the house. That kid does NOT like being cooped up.

I was a bit nervous about what would happen. I knew I didn't have a fever. I wasn't all that achy and honestly, my throat didn't even hurt all that bad. However, the white spots were getting worse and not better, so I thought it was in Maddy's best interest to try to get some meds into me so she doesn't catch it.

I was very pleasantly surprised at how quickly I was seen and then discharged. They did prescribe a antibiotic for me so I was pretty happy with that.

I made it over to CVS, went inside to find out their pharmacy was closed. So I got back in my car to go to a different CVS which I knew was open.

But my car wouldn't start......

DAMMIT!

So I call Matt. He was out with Maddy at Mac Donalds so he came to get me. He tried jumping the car, but it didn't work. I'm pretty sure it was the starter.

So he dropped me off with Maddy at home. By this point, my throat was feeling pretty bad. Matt ran out to CVS to pick up my prescription. I quickly got Maddy into the bathtub and back out again after letting her play for a while. We watched some TV while I tried to get some food into her. Matt came home and I dropped her on him so I could get some cold water and hot soup. Now I'm drinking tea and it's SOOO nice.

I guess we'll need to get my car towed from the CVS parking lot tomorrow and over to the shop. At least I'm on antibiotics!

Tea of the day: Lots and lots of herbal tea

It seemed like we had a very busy day here again. Maddy was up at 5:30. Matt slept in since yesterday was my day to sleep in. He was still up by 8 though! Matt called the tow truck guys to get our car towed, literally around the corner, to the shop. We would have pushed it, honestly, if it weren't rainy and icky. But it's disgusting weather here and it's a busy road... no need for accidents. So after the $80 hook up fee and the $3 mileage fee, we were up to $83 already.

I was able to get a nice hot shower before Matt left to meet the tow truck guy. I used my new Bath and Body Works Exotic Coconut shower gel/lotion set that Matt very sweetly surprised me with last night. Turns out that the CVS has a Bath and Body Works just a couple shops down from it so while he waited for my antibiotic he went down and surprised me. He thought it reminded him of a lotion I used to use at Pottery class that was discontinued when I tried to find it and wouldn't you know it?! It really DOES smell like it. I was so surprised and amazed he remembered and then found the scent I like!!!

After dropping off the car at the shop and ok'ing them to put in a new starter, Matt went over to get his haircut and then to the grocery store for us. We put Maddy down for a nap and I hopped in the car to go to pottery lab to pick up my pots. The photo is above. Click on it to see a bigger version. I had 30 in the long run! Two are missing since I sent them to work with Matt. Then I ran to Trader Joe's and picked up my favorite soup, Roasted Tomato and Red Pepper. I also bought a lot of dried fruit for our fruity fudge I'm making for gifts this Christmas.

I came home just in time for Maddy to wake up and we all headed out to AC Moore where I was going to pick up more tins for the fudge but they were no longer on sale so I bought chinese take out christmas containers instead. They are cute and will definitely do the job. They are much cheaper, too. I bought a few other things as well. Nothing crazy. We are going to have a playgroup Christmas party this Friday and I bought a craft activity that I happened to stumble upon that I thought the kids would like for a really decent price. I also bought a cute sticker book set for .50 a piece, too. A steal!!! I needed to pick up a gift for my Secret Santa exchange so I did that at the same time. Then off to Wendy's for a Frosty for Maddy. Mmm... she loved that. They gave her a balloon, too.

We picked up the car after that, $550 later.... sigh... that's the way it goes! We came home, had dinner and now Maddy's getting prepped for bed.

It was a good weekend though. Very productive. I mean, we were able to get me into the doctor, get meds, have the car break and get fixed all before Matt needs to go back to work tomorrow. Better than him having to take off again!

Tea of the day: Haven't had much today, just my morning dose--Orange Deluce. I can tell though, since my throat hurts! So I'll be chugging more herbal tea tonight!

Ahh... You gotta love those mornings your kid sleeps in. Matt and I woke up naturally at 7:45. Maddy was still sound asleep! She was up once last night at 4, but after just three minutes of snuggles and a sip of milk she was ready to go back to bed. We finally went in to see her at 8 am. I think it's the way the new heat is set up. It dips down at night and then at 6, it goes up to 72. I'm pretty sure that's what made her sleep so long. I want to change it to 70 though. 72 is just TOO hot. Well, Matt hustled to get to work, I quickly made his lunch and off he went!

I worked on making a double batch of fruity fudge this morning. I only had a small sliver to make sure it was ok and I liked the way the fruit turned out. I liked the fruit last time, too, but it wasn't enough. I love it this time. I used a mixture of dried cherries, dried cranberries and a raisin mix bag. It's nice! After letting it solidify and then cutting it, I divided it into eight containers for Matt's coworkers and also printed off holiday tags. Needed to be careful though. One of the coworkers is Jewish and one is Muslim so they will just receive "Happy Holidays" containers. But, showing my ignorance, I don't even know if there is a holiday around this season for Muslims? I'll need to look that up. Of course there is Hanukkah so I can pass that off. :) Of course, Maddy did get to lick the bowl and I saved the scraps from one end for Matt. I will make another couple batches closer to the weekend for my mom's group holiday party/gift exchange and for our neighbors.

I'm tired now though. I keep forgetting I do have strep (although no longer contagious since I've been on antibiotics for 24 hours and I never did have a fever) since it never did really hit me all that hard. I'm sitting with a blanket, Christmas music on itunes and a hot cup of tea for as long as Maddy naps. She took a great nap yesterday! She slept for almost two full hours. Lately we've been lucky to get 45 minutes. So it's either her teeth are starting to feel better or her body is warding off my illness. I REALLY hope it's the former.

Most everyone should have received my Christmas letter by now. My mom has heard from a lot of relatives mentioning they've received it. I am fortunate that Maddy's birthday is near Christmas so I can put her birthday pictures in with the Christmas card. It works out nice that way, saves on postage.

Ok, well, not much else to say! Have a great week, everyone!

Tea of the day: Lipton Mango orange white tea, Bigelow Ginger snappish herbal tea (on my 2nd cup now)

So of course I've been dying to show you Maddy's 2 year pictures. But I've been wanting to wait until after all my Christmas cards were received. Well, I think the majority of them should be there by now (minus the ones on the way to UK & Iraq) so I thought I'd upload them. I think they turned out SOOOO well. I love 'em.

I also uploaded my Christmas card, so you online friends who read my blog who did not receive one in the mail. You can find it here and then the page after. I will warn you that it will take a while to download since it is such a big jpg file.

So Maddy woke up this morning with a fever. I saw this coming a mile away. I was hoping it wouldn't, but it is. It was inevitable. So I called the pediatrician right away and I barely had to wait on hold (wow!) and they were able to get me for 50 minutes later (double wow!). I quick ate something, got Maddy dressed and put on some makeup. We ran out the door to the doctor. She was an absolute angel the entire time. She didn't even freak out over the throat swap when they tested for strep.

But the throat swap came back negative. You'd think I'd be happy about this, right? Well, sure... if it actually turns out that way. But the kid obviously has a sore throat and a fever. I have been diagnosed with strep. I just took her in too early. They said they would test the culture over the next 24 hours to see how it comes out and I'm hoping that it shows up positive so we can get her on some meds before she really starts to feel crappy. I'm also hoping it shows up positive so that way we don't need to go into the doctor again! I mean, sick kids go there, after all! :) Or maybe we'll get really lucky and she'll just work through it on her own...doubtful, but maybe.

After the doctor we went to Giant. I NEEDED to get out of the house. We have been inside because of me being sick and the weather almost constantly minus a few little runs here and there. I didn't buy all that much, just some throat meds for Maddy, yogurt, cookies...etc. Anything that will make her happy, basically.

I did make another single batch of fudge today. Matt wants to deliver three more fudge containers to three other coworkers. So they are done and in the fridge hardening so they can be cut and put into containers for him to take to work.

Here's hoping she takes a nice long nap and feels better when she gets up or at least that the children's motrin helps her some. Well, on that note, this really IS her first real sickness besides three colds in the last two years. I can't complain about that.

Tea of the day: I finally had Lipton white tea with Mango when I returned home from Giant. I ran out of time before the doctor to have some tea! Now I'm having Bigelow Sweet Dreams herbal tea

So Maddy woke up about 10 last night, really warm. So we came downstairs and watched a bit of TV to let her cool off a bit. Of course, we plugged more fever reducer into her then. Then I put her back up to bed. She didn't fuss about going to bed. You could tell she didn't want to go though, but she tried to get cozy and went to sleep. About a half hour later she was up again. Poor kid.

So, her and I watched a bit of TV again and then we kicked daddy out of bed and her and I went to sleep. Or I guess you can call it sleep. I'd ask, "Who's bright idea was this one?" But it was mine, so I won't. :)

She did sleep on and off and I was able to monitor her temp and make sure she didn't get bundled up in blankets. Plus, I was able to give her water periodically through the night. So overall, it was a good thing. But how does a 2 year old take up more space than a 29 year old 6 foot 3 inch man? How does that happen? Well, she wanted to snuggle me so I had to keep pushing her away just a bit so she wouldn't snuggle me TOO much and again, get overheated.

She was up again at 4 and we did the meds/TV again for a bit and back off to bed we went. She watched TV with Matt so she enjoyed that. Speaking of poor Matt, since we got rid of the bed a bit early (he wanted it to go ASAP) he had to sleep on the basement couch. But it's better than sleeping with her.

I woke up feeling achy and cold this morning. I think I do have strep, but I think I'm getting something on top of it as well. YUCK. No party for us this Friday! She still has a fever and I am feeling bad again with a bit of a fever so what I have must be viral? Maybe what she has REALLY IS viral?? Hmm... not that I overly doubt doctors, butI know strep and I had it. She had a sore throat and it would just make logical sense.

She's still running between 99.6 and 101.5 periodically. I'm religiously pumping the meds ever four-six hours or when I feel they run out (no less than every four hours). She did have a bath this morning, she needed it and I thought it would make her feel a bit better. I didn't wash her hair though. Now we're both hanging out in sweats while I have a load of laundry going. And that is going to be the extent of our day around here today!

Need to call the doctor and see how the second strep test turned out...

Tea of the day:Orange Deluce, Ginger Snappish herbal and much, much more!

Who in their right mind gets Roseola at THIRTY?!?! ME!! That's who! You'd think that with all the illness I had as a kid I would have had this by now. Nope, obviously not. It's one of those illnesses that once you've had it you pretty much don't get it again. I have the telltale case including rash on my upper body. The good news is that I'm past the worst. I can't say that of Maddy. She still hasn't lost the fever portion yet. After two different doctor visits, that's what we came up with. We had Maddy's first and when the strep came back negative for the third time the doctor mentioned some normal kid's viruses and when he said, '...roseola with the fever and rash..." It perked my ears since I started the rash a couple days ago. SHEESH!

Well, at least I know what it is. I'm sad there's no medicine we can give Maddy that will help her get rid of it besides fever reducer to bring down the fever.

Anyway, that's it! Matt most likely won't get it because he's had it before. At least I have a name for it now.

Tea of the day: I had coffee this morning and now I'm having some white orchard herbal tea

I slept with Maddy again last night. She went to bed fine on her own in her own room but after she woke up twice I felt better sleeping with her so I could monitor her fever. It had a lot of ups and downs yesterday. Sometimes it would spike up to 103.2 and since I cannot sneak into her room without her waking up to monitor her, I did not mind sleeping with her to keep an eye on her. We were up three different times about four hours apart, but that also allowed me to pump the fever reducer into her at those times. I didn't sleep overly bad though. She would try to lay on me and she likes to put her head between the pillows in the middle of the bed like Daddy does...but other than that, she slept pretty well, too.

If I ever say, "her and I did...blah, blah" again, kick me. You'd think I'd know better!

A big rave for Cherokee Ultimate Tees and Polos. Normally when I was Matt's undershirts they go into the dryer. Well, accidentally, I threw my white long sleeve vneck tshirt into the dryer. Now, it's not that I wear clothes that are painted on clothes but they aren't the baggiest things in the face of the planet either. So when I pulled this white all cotton long sleeve tshirt out of the dryer I expected it to be unwearable. Nope! It was just the way it was when I threw it in the washer. This was its first wash, too. Not bad for $9!

It was kind of nice to get on the scale at the doctors today and see that I'm 20 lbs lighter than last time I was there in March. Whoo whoo! At the same time, the nurse at the pediatricians told me to get Maddy undressed to the diaper to weigh her. We were just there on Tuesday and she did not need to get undressed for that one and I told her I would prefer not to and she basically commanded me to do it again. I did take off her pants but I left on her shirt--she didn't need to get chilled. I also asked why she needs to get weighed again when she was just weighed twice in the last two weeks at the office. She wasn't the nicest doing the strep test, either. Fortunately, the majority of the nurses minus one or two have decent bedside manners.

Ok, need to figure out dinner.

Not on paper, but on us. Yep, we're both spotted now. Not that much and mine seem to be fading, but still. Ah well, at least that's the last legs of this illness. We are still contagious (not as much as with fever but still are) until the spots disappear which should be quickly according to everything I've read.

It was a rough night last night. Maddy did not sleep with me since she didn't have a fever that needed monitoring. She was not happy about that fact and made it very clear. She was up at least four times. The last was at 5:15 and Matt went to the couch with her and we all slept until 8 am when I heard..

BEEP, BEEP, BEEP of a truck.

Yep, the heating guys were here. They finished rather quickly and were gone by 11:30. We called our drywall guy to come and give us an estimate on repairing the drywall cutting they had to do for the vents and he will send out his crew next week to get that done. They will also put on the closet doors into the 47 inch pocket since they misjudged the amount of opening they would need to make it 48 inches. So by the end of next week we'll have the two new vents, the drywall will be repaired, there will be a new queen bed with our old comforter (which I need to go get cleaned soon). A lot needs to happen before then since I have a ton of toys and junk spread out all over the place.

Other than that, I'm off to write some thank you notes for a few gifts we've received in the mail over the last few days. I need to balance the checkbook, too. Let's face it, paying for a new heating system isn't cheap! Have a good weekend everyone! Happy birthday, Dad!

Tea of the day: I had coffee this morning. I will have herbal tea when Maddy gets up.

Maddy has had her fill of this house. She is so stir crazy and when she's not stir crazy she's comatose watching TV. So today we all went down to the end of our court to see Santa on the firetruck. It's nice because it allows Maddy to get some fresh air without being around a whole lot of germs and also doesn't really give much of an opportunity for our germs to get spread around either. Click on the picture above to see the Santa pictures. Maddy did not want to go to Santa to say hi. She'd rather stay in Matt's arms. But she did enjoy watching everything going on. She loved seeing the firetruck and hearing the sirens and seeing the lights!

Maddy slept most of the night last night. She woke up once at 10 and went right back to sleep. Then she was up at 5:15 wanting Daddy. So they went to the couch and slept until 7:15. I feel rather guilty about that as I get to go back to bed with the whole queen bed to myself while Matt and Maddy go sleep on the couch. She did NOT want to sleep with him in our bed and REALLY wanted to go to the couch so Matt gave in. I don't know why she wanted to go to the couch so bad, but she did. After I got up at 7:15 I sent Matt back off to bed until 9:10 when he got up. We all hustled around and ran out the door to see Santa. Of course, we finished off the experience with hot chocolate and whip cream.

Matt left not long after to go to Lowes. He's upstairs right now in the attic insulating Maddy's attic access door. Maddy's room is consistantly a couple degrees colder than the rest of the house and it freaks out Matt. So he's on the hunt to fix that right now.

But I knew he wouldn't be home before her nap so when Maddy laid down for a nap, I did, too! And Matt was home before she woke up from her nap so when she did get up I was able to keep sleeping. It was SOOOOO nice.

I organized my tea a bit today. While I still have a lot left it surprises me how much I've already gone through after my initial buying spree. I have organized by caffeinated and decaffeinated and then by type inside of two bins. I've been going through a lot of tea because of my throat. Love it and it definitely helps!

Tea of the day: Orange Deluce this morning, strawberry cream rooibos (which is really just plain rooibos but the cheap idiots call it that because it does have that natural flavoring) and also some African Nectar. I'll have more later.

So today was quite productive. We washed/cleaned all the floors in the house. That feels really good. It really looks great, too! We also sorted through all of Maddy's toys and she's getting a dozen for Christmas and the rest are being saved for spring/summer. Then I sorted through the spare room and organized a bit. Then I did the same thing in the laundry room! It took a while, but it looks really good now and there's so much more space. After Maddy went to bed we wrapped all her gifts for Christmas.

Maddy's feeling MUCH better. She took a wonderful nap today, to my chagrin. I wish I had taken a nap during it instead of spending it cleaning! But, that's the way it goes. Maybe tomorrow she'll take as good of one. Her spots are virtually gone. She had hundreds easily but they were gone one day later. Mine are almost gone too. I only have 15 but as an adult everything takes longer to heal.

We are all feeling much better now though!!! YEAH!

I am so excited for Mom's Night Out tomorrow night. We have our Secret Santa exchange and our appetizer, dessert and cocktail party. I am bringing the cosmos and also my fruity fudge. It will be a blast, I know! It'll be great to have some time out after being stuck in the house all day long for the last week with a kid who wasn't feeling good.

Tea of the day: Orange Deluce Tea

You Gotta have friends
The feelings oh so strong
Oh you gotta have friends
to make the day last long...

Don't know if you knew it, but I'm a closet Bette Midler lover. Yep. Experience the Divine is one of my favorite CDs. That's right up there with Amy Grant Christmas CD. Now, I'm not too fond of Amy herself anymore or her singing, but that girl can put out a Christmas CD!

Anyway, I digress. I am very, very lucky. I have a ton of very dear friends. In the last week I've received such nice letters from friends dating back to grade school. I've caught up with friends from High School, college, old coworkers who've become near and dear to me and I've had a Christmas party with my mom's group. I am a very, very lucky individual to have so many good friends.

That said, I do believe in the saying, 'You reap what you sow.' I try really hard to keep in touch with friends. Now, just because I try doesn't mean I'm wonderful at it. But I do try. As long as there is some positive effort put forth from the other end, I'm more than willing to keep up my end of the deal.

So anyway, tonight I am feeling quite content.

"A friend is someone we turn to when our spirits need a lift, A friends is someone we treasure for our friendship is a gift. A friend is someone who fills our lives with beauty, joy, and grace And makes the whole world we live in a better and happier place."
By: Jean Kyler McManus

Tea of the day: Republic of Tea Christmas Tea--Thanks Secret Santa Megan!

No, I didn't get a massage, I'm talking about my drywall. :)

So we had the same crew come out who put up all the drywall in our spare room, created our bathroom, and painted four rooms after fixing the drywall in those rooms. Again, they are so good at what they do. I am so impressed with the professionalism and the skilled craftsmanship of their jobs. Plus, they arrived early (to Matt's chagrin since he hadn't quite fixed part of the drywall vent they needed to work around)!! I love it when work crews show up EARLY!

Maddy and I stopped at the post office today. I know you probably expect me to complain about this, but NOPE! I love the automated teller. I was mailing a Christmas gift to a friend and her family and I was in and out in four minutes flat. Plus, they had a guy working the automated machine to help people. I didn't need the help and was done in two minutes. Then Maddy, who was so good to stay so close to me the entire time, went to wonder around the post office boxes. She loves to listen to them drop the mail in the boxes. We quick stopped at Giant on the way home and now she's down for a nap.

I need to call the mattress place to see what time our bed is coming tomorrow. Because if it's in the afternoon, Maddy and I can go to our local mom's group Christmas party. We'll see! Alrighty, I need to wrap another gift. But I need to find something to put it in, first!

Tea of the day: Nothing, I had coffee this morning. I will definitely have some of my new stuff this afternoon when Maddy is up though!

Well, our spare room is almost finished. Tomorrow our queen bed gets delivered. I won't know what time until they call between 7-8 and give me a two hour window. I am supposed to have a playgroup Christmas party tomorrow (a different one) but we'll see if that happens or not. It depends on the window. The room looks GREAT though. It's coming back together again.

Tonight Maddy and I went to the mall. I figured we may as well since I knew Matt wouldn't be home before Maddy's bedtime since he was home until almost 1 today because of the drywall guys. So he needed to work late tonight to catch up on stuff he missed this morning. I mainly went to get a new cell phone. We received a brochure in the mail for a $50 rebate for a $50 phone. There was a one time start up fee which I did know about ahead of time so I guess you could call it a $20 phone. But my phone was actually cracking and the plastic shell was falling apart, so I really did need one. Maddy was very good waiting for me at the store while it became activated. Then we rode the escalators and elevators a bit. We looked some more at the animal display that is out for Christmas. She promptly asked for a pretzel because that's what we had last time we were at the mall while we watched the animals, but I told her we were going to Arby's for dinner instead. We did and she asked for a shake and their shake machine was out (I kid you not, REALLY, I swear!). But she did get potato cakes instead and a juice box so she was happy. We walked the mall TWICE upper and lower floors. She didn't want to be held but was very good about holding my hand the entire time. We hung to the right to not block 'traffic' too much since her little legs just aren't that fast. Speaking of traffic, getting OUT of the mall was a bit horrendous, but we made it. Just glad there wasn't a fire or something. That would have been scary.

So I was thinking about this year's resolutions. Here goes:

For me:
Working out regularly again. I lost my schedule back in September when Maddy was having some rough nights sleep. 6:00 was just too early to get out of bed when I wasn't sleeping very well. I just kind of lost it and it never came back. So it's on my New Years Resolution.

Continue to eat well. Not that today was any example. Sheesh, it was a bad BAD snacking day around here today.

Have better posture. I slouch a lot.

Take my multivitamin. Why is this so hard for me?? Honestly!? I should be doing this all the time. I always used to!

Now, for the house:

Eat at the table for dinner. I hate to admit it, but we have been eating in front of the TV. It's mainly because I'm able to sneak more food into Maddy if she's distracted and since she's there, we may as well be, too. Also, she had a really hard time having daddy get home from work and not being able to play with him because as soon as he came home we went straight to the table to eat. Well, no more of that. We're eating at the table like civilized beings!! She doesn't have to sit with us, but she'll soon figure out that if she wants to hang out with Daddy (which she definitely does) she's going to need to sit in her booster seat and sit with us at the table for dinner. The first couple weeks will be tough, I'm sure, but she'll get used ot it.

Watch less TV. That's mainly for Maddy. It's just too easy for me to let her continue to watch TV because it makes it easier for me to get things done. I use it as a babysitter way too often. So come January, I'll need to figure out how much and when. What isn't an issue. Her programming is fine.

...without them, I honestly think I'd go crazy.

Click on the photo to enlarge it. (Christine, thanks for taking this picture!)

Well, we're starting to have a real guest bedroom again. You would have never thought so last week. It had a whole bunch of junk in it, a computer cart and no bed! The queen arrived today and after some rigamaroling I was able to get it situated. They do set up when they come, but after they left I decided I didn't like it the way it was. It took up too much room. It wasn't the width that was the problem, more the length of it! It was very close to the dresser where the double bed wasn't before so it was a bit tight walking through.

So I turned it on the side against another wall. I was pretty impressed with myself. A queen mattress isn't light and in a tight space it's not easy to manage either. I had to lift it on end and then spin it so it was horizontal instead of vertical. Easier said than done. There were times I was laughing so hard I thought I was going to pee my pants. Once I thought I was seriously stuck behind it and it took a minute or two to work my way out. Then once I was so made I growled at the thing while I threw it against the wall! LOL! It all got done though and now it's situated. It looks good where it is although it may be hard to make the bed but, oh well, at least I have room to walk around.

I also made a little coffee bar down there, too. I always kept a coffee pot in the bedroom to perk water at night for tea. Well, now I added hot chocolate, apple cider, coffee, coffee drink, splenda, powdered creamer and mugs. It's kind of cute and I think I will get some use out of that at night while Maddy's asleep.

The bedroom is FULL now though. There is NO MORE ROOM for anything else. It's cute, but full! I did finally wrap the last of Maddy's gifts. I had to wrap this one in a gift bag since I couldn't find a box that would work for it. But I'm done and it's all done. Good thing, Christmas is next week. Speaking of, what are we having for dinner? Hmm.. good question. Maybe I should start figuring that out!

No big plans for tomorrow. I think we may wind up going to Chuck-e-cheese for a while. But we'll see.

Tea of the day: A new Organic Oolong from a friend of mine! Waves to Joy! Loved it! I had three cups.

Well, this morning Maddy and I ran out to get a few things done. But before I could do that I needed to make dinner plans from now through Christmas. Can I say, I get SO TIRED of planning dinner?!? *sigh*

Anyway, after the meals were planned and we were both dressed to go, Maddy and I got out of the house. She was thrilled of course, dancing around the living room yelling, "Go, go, go!" That girl is certainly not a homebody. Well, first we stopped at the ATM to deposit a couple checks. One was reimbursement for Matt's trip to PA and the other was a rebate check for our heating/cooling sytem. Because our new system is so energy efficient we qualified for some government rebate stuff. But I guess we were a little past the date of getting it, but the company said not to worry about it, they will make sure we get it. And they did! The company cut us a check!! It wasn't supposed to come from them, but I guess they felt like we should get it even if it doesn't come through for them. Again, this place has done great for us. They've come through on EVERYTHING they said they would do even when it wasn't as easy as they thought it would be. They were always on time and did great work.

But anyway, back to the ATM. I love what Bank of America has done for deposits. It reads the check and lets me know the amount that's on it and then I just ok it! No more envelopes or punching in numbers. It really can't be simpler. Plus, the receipt shows a print of the checks. Very convenient!

After the bank we went to Chuck-e-cheese for a while. I only brought 25 tokens along and a snack since I wasn't taking the diaper bag and I was just taking my purse. Maddy had a really GOOD time. There wasn't any whining when things didn't go right. She remembered where all her favorite stuff was and she did well leaving even though she didn't want to be done. A little developmental step I noticed is that her fine motor skills are really getting great. She was able to put the coin in the slot without much trouble. When she was 18 months or so it was harder for her and she'd need help. It was nice to see that chuck-e-cheese was fresh to her again and she enjoyed it. We won't be back for about another month now, at least.

We went grocery shopping after Chuck-e-cheese. It went fine except she did not want to go into the cart. Well, too bad, kiddo. I have groceries to get and you aren't walking. Normally she loves to eat a snack in the cart that I bring along but because we just ate part of the snack at Chuck-e-cheese she didn't want anything there. Anyway, it wasn't the most pleasant experience but it could have gone worse as well.

We came home, unloaded all the groceries. I had spicy sushi rolls for lunch and she had chicken tenders. I love treating myself to sushi rolls when I go to bloom. Their rolls are good. I like Wegman's better, but these are good.

Well, that's it here. I need to clean! We have company coming for dinner tomorrow evening and I'm going out for breakfast tomorrow morning with a friend. Looking forward to both!

This morning I met with my friend and ex-coworker, Rosanna, for breakfast. It was such a nice time to sit around and chit-chat with her. I caught up on 'my kids' who I used to teach. I miss them. Pretty soon they will be moving on to middle school! We met at Silver Diner where I had crabcake Benedict. YUM. It's what I have every time we eat breakfast there and it's just heavenly. I'm pretty sure the waiter wanted to kill us since we sat around for quite a while after we were finished eating just talking. We finally wound up leaving but then we stood inside the front door forever so we decided to go sit in the waiting area and continue to talk.

After I left there, I went to Bed, Bath and Beyond to look for a bedskirt for my quilt I put on the bed downstairs. I found one that would work, but it was $34. Then I found another that would work on sale for $20, but it was white and the room isn't at all white, so I passed on that. I stood there debating on it for quite some time willing something less expensive and more to my tastes to pop at me. It never did. So I just put it all back and was going to come home to pick up Maddy and head off to Target to look there. Matt told me just to go onto Target by myself so I did. I walked back to the bedding section and right there against the wall was a bedskirt for $16! It is a great color, too, for the room. Yeah! I called Matt as I was checking out and he was SHOCKED at how fast I was at Target.

Speaking of fast, I expected to see a mad rush today at the stores I went to but it was pretty dead! Target wasn't any big deal, no line at all and parking was fine. Bed Bath and Beyond was fine, too. The restaurant was the most crowded but even then we didn't need to wait for a table. It was pretty surprising, overall.

I stopped at MacD's for some chicken nuggets for Maddy and Matt had vacuumed all the floors!! Then he went downstairs to do the spare room, too. I cleaned up a bit for the guests we were having over for dinner and played with Maddy. Maddy took a super-duper nap! So much so I'm surprised she went to bed tonight.

Dinner was a lot of fun tonight. We had our friends over and although they don't have kids are wonderful with them. Maddy thoroughly enjoyed her time. Matt froze his buns off grilling chicken (I boiled it first. He's not that much of a glutton for punishment :). It turned out great though. We had a couple simple sides and they just went home not long ago.

Grammie and Pa-pa come tomorrow! Maddy is so excited. I've also been telling her about Christmas and reading stories about Jesus and Santa. How weird, really, that is. I just keep trying to push that it's Jesus' birthday and Santa brings presents to us to remind us about how Jesus would get presents on his birthday. Dunno. Seems to be a good way to tie it all together. I can't seem to find my Christmas story book though that was quite well written for little ones. I'll need to keep looking for that.

I received two very nice ambition boosters today though. Both Rosanna and my neighbor remarked about my significant weight loss. It's fun when people notice. It's also fun fitting into almost all of my old clothes (minus a couple pair of pants that I just DON'T know if I'll ever fit back into. Afterall, having a baby DOES change the body shape forever). I was asked how much I lost by Rosanna and I realized I'm now close to 30 lbs down from my heaviest. I'd like to lose about four more pounds, but honestly, I'm quite happy with the weight loss I've had. So even if I don't lose more I'm happy. According to charts, even if I lost four more pounds I'd be at the higher end of average (BMI) weight for people my height and build, but I'm OK with that. I'm not striving to look like a teenager or a model. I just wanted to fit into my old clothes again, and I've done that much! So yippie!

Tea of the day: I had THREE cups of COFFEE today at breakfast. No wonder I was able to get out of Target that quickly. ;)

How do I know this, you ask? Well, I was there at 11:00. That's how I know. Why was I at Toys R Us at 11? Well, I asked Maddy what she wanted from Santa this year and she told me a necklace. WHAT?!? Ok, Ok... I see... so I ask again.. "Maddy, when Santa bring you presents, what present do you want?" Again--a necklace. Ok, well, I guess I need to go get a necklace. After all, it's not all that expensive and it's the first thing she's actually requested from Santa. Not to mention, she seemed to kind of get it... so... off to Toys R Us we went.

I didn't actually get her a necklace though. :) I did buy her a dress up kit with purse, cell phone, car keys, credit card, rings and bracelets. For good measure I also bought her a tool box kit too, since she loves to fix things with daddy's screw drivers. Jack of all trades, that's my girl!

Matt and I went out for a very nice dinner tonight--steak and lobster. We even purchased a bottle of wine. We normally will get a drink or two, but I hate buying the same bottle of wine I can get in the grocery store for half the price. Well, the markup wasn't that bad, so we bought one to share there. I have to say, it was heavenly. We also ordered calamari for an appetizer and I think it was the best I had yet. Very nice! We skipped dessert and drove down to DC to look at the Capital Christmas tree lights and the White House lights. It's neat living so close to DC.

Speaking of, I think Matt's parents, Maddy and I may drive into DC tomorrow to go check out the Christmas trees in the morning. It will be pretty dead because I'm sure no one will be at work anyway. Maddy's never seen DC so it would be a good outing for her. It's supposed to be a high of 50 so that's not bad either. I'll take the big stroller with us so that way if we have to walk she'll tolerate it better.

Maddy is having a great time with grammie and paw-paw. It's cute how she'll call to them from a different room, "Graaaaaandmaaaaa!" PaaaaaaPaaaaaa!" She'll run up to them and pull them by the hand to what she wants them to do. She's had a blast.

Ok, well, it's off to bed. It's after midnight so I guess I can wish you a happy Christmas eve day. I hope your Christmas is everything you hoped it would be and more. God bless and remember that Jesus is the reason for the Season! Lots of love.

Tea of the day: Papaya Green tea, I made a pot of it to share around the house this afternoon.

Merry Christmas, everyone! I hope you all had a great Christmas Eve day. I wrapped my last gift at 4:00 yesterday afternoon. :)

Our plans did not pan out yesterday to go into DC to look at the Holiday lights on the Mall. Maddy wound up sleeping with me for part fo the night last night because she's not feeling well. She's caught a cold, unfortunately, and has a little bit of a cough. No need to get her cold or expose her to so much outside air, so we stayed home and she had a blast playing with Grandma and Grandpa. Overall, the cold wasn't all that bad since she's been up and about playing--no fever.

This evening she went to bed fine, but after three hours woke up crying and feeling pretty miserable, so now tonight she's sleeping with daddy. I just heard them up so I went up to check out and see how things were.

On the way up, I noticed that Santa has already came to our house. I don't know how he got past me while I slept on the couch in the living room, but he did! ;-) Of course, I kept you-know-who's visit a secret from Maddypants because of you-know-why!

Well, I suppose I should try to go back to sleep. I hope everyone has a WONDERFUL Christmas Day filled with love, peace, happiness and joy because the promise of a Savior has come true.

Well, I must say, I think Christmas at our house went really well, despite Maddy feeling pretty crappy. She was great opening her gifts. She spent a lot of time on each one as she opened them, but I was able to redirect her back to opening gifts after she had some time to play with the one before. She also handled us opening our presents just fine, although she wanted attention from Grandma and Grandpa. But she didn't try to open ours and when she found out they were 'mama's and daddy's' she didn't try to insist on being part of it. She really isn't a 'mine' kind of girl. She shares well with friends and understands when we don't let her have something that is ours. I don't know, maybe it's because she's never really had to fight over something to have it or is not having things taken away from her from siblings, but she's not very possessive.

I would have to say that her favorite toys are her new cell phone (which came with a purse and other accessories) that looks JUST like mommy's (really, it does) and makes realistic sounds and her microwave. It has a turn table that actually works, a light, a timer and tells you when it's finished. She LOVES it because I use our microwave all the time. She especially loves the soup and bacon settings because that's how I make our soup and turkey bacon.

I have to say that I use our microwave 3x more than our stove. I use it for virtually everything. That's not to say I don't use our stove, I am just very efficient about it. I cook double batches of most everything I make and freeze half. The frozen stuff gets defrosted in the microwave to eat. I also always warm up left overs in the microwave as well.

I need to write some thank you notes for the gifts Maddy has received, so I'll get on that this afternoon. Right now I'm in the middle of a few loads of much needed laundry. I'm sitting down while I can though, while she's asleep. She slept a lot better last night. She slept straight from 7-1 and then 2:30-7. Even better, she slept in her own bed for that whole time. She and I tried to sleep together in bed but I think she just couldn't get comfortable so I rocked her for a bit and then laid her in her own bed. Out she went like a light! Yeah! So I went down to the couch and retrieved Matt who was down there.

Maddy had a great time with Grandma and Grandpa though. She was very snuggly so they were able to spend some great quality snuggle time together. I just hope they don't get her illness. Matt made a s'mores pie yesterday afternoon and the pudding part of the recipe was to DIE for. YUM... It reminded me of my grandmother's but I actually think this one was better. ;) The jambalaya went over well, too. It was really good if I do say so myself! Matt's mom steamed some fresh veggies and added some salt, pepper and smart balance and can I just say I thought those were HEAVENLY.

Maddy did really well at the dinner table on Christmas eve but not as well Christmas day. She wanted to be held by daddy and didn't want to sit in the big-girl chair at the table. But she was feverish and it had been a long day, so I didn't really blame her.

Matt's parents left this morning. Maddy was sad to see them go. But she will be seeing them soon while Matt takes his week of vacation and him and I go away for a few days. We don't know where, but somewhere within driving distance. Grandma and Grandpa said they'd be great with coming up for an extended weekend, so that's definitely something for all of us to look forward to.

I put up pictures of our gift opening in our gallery. So if you'd like to see them, click here.

Tea of the day: Coffee again! I'll have some afternoon tea soon though. I'm a bit chilly.

You can see why Maddy loves her phone so much. Hers really does look exactly like mine. She loves to play with it and then finds mine to hand to me to play with. It's really cute and she has a blast with it.

Speaking of phones. Matt is having so much fun with our phones lately. He has a free program he used to convert some of our mp3 to clips of our favorite songs. Then using the blue ray on the phones we can just upload it to our phones. Fun! I'm trying to figure out if I want to specialize ring tones for any particular person, but honestly, I very seldomly use my phone. It's fun to hear it ring now though.

Maddy is feeling much better today than yesterday. She's still congested but overall seems to be on the upswing. I still give her meds before bed and naps but other than that, she really hasn't needed it a lot. I'm hoping for a full nights sleep pretty soon!

She had a lot of fun playing with her new toys today. She was much more into it today than yesterday since she is feeling better. She's fun to watch, too. We've read a lot of books lately and just a lot of the connections she makes is so cool. It's really neat to honestly see her developing before my eyes. I know, I know, all kids do it.. and we've all done it to get to where we are today, but it's fun to see her make these leaps in critical thinking skills.

When Maddy woke up today from her nap she told me, "knock, knock!" Then she started to knock on the floor. I asked her why she was knocking on the floor and she said, "Grandma, grandpa, wake up!!" LOL! She thought they were taking a nap in the spare room. I had to remind her that we waved goodbye to them in the morning. Then she saw a show on the beach and said, "Go beach! Go, go, go!" I told her it was too cold to put on our swimsuit at the beach and we'd have to wait for summer. Then she said, "Dadda, beach." I guess she thought if she asked daddy he'd have a different answer for her. She forgot about it by the time he got home.

Ok, well, I'm off to hang out with Matt. It will be another early bedtime tonight in case she's up. Crossing my fingers that she won't be! The kiddo needs her sleep.

So Maddy slept straight from 7-5 this morning. Yeah!! She seems to be feeling much better. But even so, 5 am is too early to get up. So I brought her to bed with me (after she kept asking for the 'couch') and it took her a bit to fall back asleep, but the next time I looked at the clock it was NINE O'CLOCK IN THE MORNING!! WOW! It's been a LOOONG time since I've seen the sun shining brightly when I got out of bed. Normally it's just coming up or it's still dark.

Of course, Matt was late to work so he'll be working a bit later tonight to make up for it. That's ok, though. I was glad to get a shower before he left today so putting Maddy to bed on my own is well worth the sacrifice.

I'm trying to figure out what to do about New Years. I know Matt and I will stay in and we'll probably have a bottle of champagne. I'd like to have some kind of special treat with it, but I haven't figured out what, yet. I do know that we'll have shrimp and grits for dinner.

Ok, well, she'll be up soon! I don't think she'll take much of a nap today being that she slept so much this morning.

Tea of the day: Mighty Leaf Tropical Green tea, Bentley Earl Grey, Bentley Orange Spice, Bentley Mango Green Tea--there will be more, I assure you!

Well, that's how I felt both last night and this morning. Yesterday one of my friends had an impromptu mom's night in. Those are the best kind, really. We all just sit around and gab. We can gab more in a private house than a restaurant. Also, we'll normally have a drink or two, but last night I wanted tea so I just brought my own in a travel mug. Of course, I insisted on bringing a candy cane, too. I will be sad when mine are gone. I am addicted to these things. Anyway, it was a great time as always. I didn't make it home until Midnight!! Matt did wait up for me, but he said he didn't. He became preoccupied with his iPod and lost track of time. It was just so nice to get out and about. After being stuck in the house with Maddy being sick (fortunately I had the help of having company to preoccupy her) I was ready to get out.

Then this morning we braved the crowds and went to Walmart fast and over to Ulta. I had a freebie smashbox lipgloss duo from Ulta I could pick up starting this morning and I didn't want to miss out on it. Often times they will only get 20 in stock and they go out fast! I also had a 3.50 off a 10 purchase and a gift certificate so I picked up three more mascara that I love, Cover Girl Lash Exact (buy 2 get 1 free) and a headband. It was over $10 so I was able to use the coupon and also some of my gift certificate! Whoo whoo--add in free lipgloss and this makeup-addicted gal is a happy camper.

Then after a quick walmart run we came home. I did score a nice tree skirt that I love for 50% off so that was cool. I also bought Maddy three bracelet and necklace sets from Aunt Sandy since she received a gift certificate to Walmart. She loves them and loves being dressed up. I also bought a little project that I did during her nap, but I will need to wait to talk about that until after a little while. They are a surprise!

Ok, well, lots of stuff to do here. Have a great one!

Tea of the day: English breakfast, Cranberry Apple and pomegranate Green tea

Happy Saturday, everyone. Not a whole ton going on here today. I was able to sleep in this morning until 8. It was so nice. Maddy got up at 6 and Matt stayed up with her. Tomorrow is his day to sleep in. We have church to go to though, so he won't be able to sleep in much past 8:30. I had a hard time sleeping last night. I just woke up about 2 and was wide awake for two hours. I hate that.

After we all had breakfast Matt got a shower and then I did. I had talked about needing to go grocery shopping today for our week's groceries. By the time I got out of my shower (and really, I wasn't all that long) he was gone with Maddy! He stopped at the ATM and then went to Wegmans for groceries. While he was gone I went through some of Maddy's toys, collapsed and took her box fort out to the garbage since she no longer plays with it and vacuumed all the floors. When she gets up I'll wash the kitchen, bathroom and foyer floors and dust a bit, too.

Matt picked up some great items from the Wegman's salad bar for our lunch today. He knew he'd be getting home close to nap, so he wanted to eat fast before she went down. He did a great job of picking out some nice (and healthy) choices, too! Yum.

When Maddy went down for her nap I ran out to the post office to mail my little crafty projects I worked on yesterday during Maddy's nap. I stopped at Bloom to pick up a few things I forgot to put on Matt's list for the store (not that I knew he would be going).

We bought our things for New Years Eve today. We picked up two bottles of Martini and Rossi Asti, smoked Gouda wth crackers and smoked salmon with cream cheese, pepper on crackers. I'm excited for that. We haven't had crackers, cheese and smoked salmon for a very long time!

I haven't told Matt, but I'm starting to think about taking down the Christmas decorations. If I can get the boxes up I can most likely get things packed away during the week and get all the old stuff laid out. I want to get on that soon, though.

Ok, off to finish off my decaf caramel truffle coffee with splenda and creamer.

Tea of the day: Mighty Leaf Rainforest Mate

Well, I'm on the hunt. I'm looking for a single serve coffee maker that perks directly into a mug. Not hard, right? Well, I have a few other requirements, too. It must be able to perk regular ground coffee (and maybe pods, but I don't much care about that part) and preferably be white. Yes, I realize white is not the best color for a coffee pot, but honestly, the rest of our appliances are all white, so it would be nice to match it up. I don't want a brew station that perks a FULL POT of coffee but then holds it in an internal carafe. I don't care for the larger pod makers since space is of the essence and the smaller the better for us. I don't need anything super expensive since we don't drink a whole ton of coffee, anyway.

So if anyone has any clues on this, let me know. I've been unable to find a white one although I have found black and red. I'll settle for one of those colors if I have to.

I found it, I found it! Amazon happened to carry the Black and Decker in white so it's perfect for what I want. I bought two of them for $30. :)

Ruthie (the black and white one) is sleeping on my head at night. I sleep with my head sandwiched between two pillows. I always have since college. Noisy dorms will teach one really fast how to get some good sleep. Well, Ruthie has been climbing on top of the top pillow and snuggling down to sleep! I don't really mind it as she's basically a large purring heating pad. I can't hear a darn thing with her up there (besides her purring) so it's good that Matt is laying next to me in case Maddy wakes up. There are times that Ruthie will get up there without me even knowing she's there. I wake up with a cat on my head. Of course, as soon as I wake up Joe senses it and up he comes to say hi.

Maddy was a very good girl at church today. She had a couple really cute moments. We went to the contemporary service at 11 which works best for our schedule. There's no way we'd ever make it to a 9:30 traditional service without purposely getting up really early. But anyway, there's a lot of music at the contemporary service and today Maddy was clapping and dancing along. It was REALLY cute. Also, when Pastor said amen at the end of a prayer Maddy could be heard full blown, "AMEN!!" after him. She knows to whisper in church so when Matt was saying some communal words she looks at him and says, "Shhh!" She's a cute thing, that's for sure. Very good, too.

She's a trooper as well. She smacked her head on the pew in front of us bending down to get something and it was HARD. She didn't even cry. She's also getting a upper molar in now. Poor thing, she's just really crabby because of it. She's had a short fuse the last couple of days, a lot of no, a lot of throwing things in frustration and yelling.

I took a nice long nap today when Maddy did. Matt came up for a nap, too. I was so glad. I always sleep better when he's in bed. For some reason I get cold at nap time so if I can't warm up I can't sleep. So it's great to have my big heater laying next to me. Matt got up with her and finally at 4 he came up with a cup of decaf coffee for me to wake me up. I didn't realize I had slept for almost 2.5 hours! It was so nice though. I'm glad he woke me up when he did otherwise I probably wouldn't sleep tonight!

Matt and I are enjoying our Wii classic game set we received for Christmas from Grandma and Grandpa J. It's just perfect for us, really. Maddy's loved her train set the last few days and her new chair I bought for her at Walmart. I threw out her old couch since it was just too beat up to really try to clean anymore.

Tea of the day: Mighty Leaf Orange Deluce and will have a cup of herbal right now.