Our Christmas Tree Story

I put up the whole tree just once.  Its twelve feet of height (and the need for an eight foot ladder) overwhelmed me. 

The next year, I left a three foot section of it in the box.  I thought it looked much nicer.  However, when the boys saw my revamped tree after school, they were a little “put out” with me.

The following year, I left two sections in the box, and the “peanut gallery” had a fit.

Last week, I was secretly wondering how to make just the little tip of the tree fit securely in the stand.  (Don’t laugh.  What goes up, must come down…right?  And who usually takes it down?  Me, of course.)

As if they could read my mind, the boys insisted on taking over the job this year.

They hauled in the ladder, then carried in baskets of branches from the monster-sized box in the garage.  As they went, they sorted and fluffed each branch and hung them on the trunk. 

Every…single…one of them. 

All by themselves!

It’s the first time I didn’t get involved in the tree-building process and I have to say, that was nice.   Very nice.  And they did a wonderful job! 

When my husband got home, we hung the lights...

And the decorations.

And we now have a BIG beautiful tree.  Because, apparently, boys like big.  Enough to do the job themselves.  Which is saying something.

As for me, you know how you enjoy a dinner out so much more because you didn’t have to prepare it? 

I discovered, at least for me, it’s the same with Christmas trees!

Do you think the boys will insist on helping with the take-down? 

Lol! 

Yeah, me neither.

The boys are off from school now for two weeks.  So I’m not going to press myself to blog.  I’m hereby giving myself permission to not feel guilty about the scarcity of posts over the last few weeks, or the next two.  I want to enjoy this time with my family.  :)

 

Merry Christmas!

 

Let It Snow! Let It Snow! Let It Snow! And A Hard Look At Giving

So, what do you get when you combine six inches of snow, shopping for presents, decorating for Christmas, and vacation anticipation?

Very. Excited. Kids.  :)  What else?

We were putting the last of the lights on the outdoor trees when the first flakes started to fall.  I’m glad we hurried to get them done before last weekend’s storm.  They look beautiful at night! 

There is something extra special about the first snow of the season.  Especially when it comes before Christmas and lingers.  Even shopping seems more fun.  :)

And speaking of shopping, I’m not done yet.  Close.  But not quite there.  How about you?  I’m still thinking things through.

You know how we say that our giving of gifts is kind of  symbolic of the wonderful gift God gave us in Jesus?  Well, our pastor challenged that thinking this week. 

Gift giving is not bad, he said.  But he wondered if we are giving to the right people.  450 Billion dollars/year are spent in America ALONE on gift-giving.  If Jesus is the reason for the season, than shouldn’t our gifts be given as He gave?  How so?

Jesus healed the sick.

He raised the dead.

He cleansed the lepers.

He drove out demons.

Come to me all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. 

Matthew 11:28

Jesus gave to the truly needy.  He met actual needs.

We end up spending too much money, on too many gifts, for too many people who will use them too little.

Pastor Ken challenged us to examine our family’s giving at Christmas time and to find ways to really give as Jesus gave. 

Our church is raising money for the Nyaka School for AIDS orphans in Uganda.  We will be helping to ensure that the children of a second school in a village nearby have clean drinking water. 

As a family, we are thinking of contributing to this special Christmas Eve offering in the name of several family members whom we normally exchange with.  One idea of how to do it is to make the contribution, then print out little certificates of donation in their name and tuck them in a card.   

We have done something similar in the past with Samaritan’s purse.  Instead of exchanging gifts with extended family, we put our resources together to make as many shoebox gifts as possible.  Our family made up the boxes, while relatives donated the money for shipping.

I’m really liking the idea.  What do you think?

A Fun Gadget/Tool Every Man Will LOVE!

My Works For Me Wednesday tip this week is a gift idea for a gadget-minded-man on your list.

My husband recently got something similar to this temperature gun to check for energy leaks around the house.  

It’s an infrared thermometer that takes the surface temperature of whatever you point the little red laser sight/light at. 

 

It has helped him to locate a couple of drafty places that we were able to plug up.  And when it’s six little degrees out, that’s a pretty good thing.

Besides being a helpful tool, it’s also pretty fun to point at everything on God’s green earth.  I mean, come on, a laser gun with a purpose??  Who wouldn’t love that??  Just ask my husband.  I’m surprised he didn’t take it to work with him today.  Lol!

There are all makes and price ranges.  This is just one example of many on Amazon.  (I’m not an affiliate, btw.  It’s just an easy point of reference for me to show you.)

The Technical Details Of This Particular One:

• Take accurate temperature readings with this handheld gun
• Red laser pointer for precise aiming
• Measures in Celsius or Fahrenheit (Range: -32 to +380 C / +26 to +716 F)
• Auto Shut-off & Low Battery Indicator
• Powered by one 9-volt battery (included

This is the type of thing I wish I would known about and bought for him.  :)  Oh well.  At least I can pass on the tip!! 

My husband recently got one of these

Family Movie Night!

Grab the kids, the family dog, your favorite teddy bear, a snuggly blanket, and a bowl of popcorn!!  Family Movie Night airs on NBC Friday, Dec 3, 2010 - 7pm CST! It will feature A Walk In My Shoes and it looks really good! 

You can get more information about this at the web site.  Even the commercials are supposed to be family friendly.  :)

A strong showing during this broadcast will help open the door for future family-friendly movies to be shown.  So set your DVR and spread the word!  :) If you want, you can “like” it on facebook here.

Sadly, my satellite receivers are still not working after Monday night’s monster power surge.  And it doesn’t look like anyone will be able to look at them until next week some time.  I’m bummed.  You guys will have to let me know how it was!

And All Life Ends…

Or does it?  Monday, somewhere in the middle of the night, we suffered what some would call a significant loss.  It wasn’t readily apparent when I rolled out of bed. 

But rather the magnitude of the event revealed itself throughout the day as I discovered one thing after another.  Gone. 

First, the computers, and the server were all shut down.  Or frozen.  That was odd. 

Then later, the bedroom TV and it’s receiver wouldn’t power on.

“What’s with that?”  I thought.

When my little guy told me he couldn’t get the Wii to come on, I got a kind of sick feeling in the pit of my stomach.

As I had done with in the bedroom, I checked power supplies, reset things, and unplugged them for several minutes.  But nothing worked. 

From there, with dread, I systematically went through the house checking appliances and devices.

Sadly, the old Playstation 2 (which the boys bought with their own money off of Craig’s List) was gone, too. 

In a nutshell, that we know of so far, we lost three receivers, possibly two TVs, a Wii, and a Playstation. 

Thankfully, my husband is getting the computer stuff back up and running.  And the fridge and freezer still work. 

The only thing I can think of is that we encountered a major power surge. 

I dreaded telling the boys when they got home from school.  Surely for teenagers and preteens alike, all life ends with no TV or video games. 

But they handled it better than I did, even knowing that it will be some time before any of it can be replaced or repaired. 

In fact, they’re finding incredibly annoying creative ways to entertain themselves.  Last night, my 11 year-old sat upside down on the couch and watched me read.  When I found it difficult to concentrate and put down the book, several bored out of their mind boys followed me to the computer to look over my shoulder.  And eventually take over the keyboard.  And my seat.    

This afternoon, when I told them they could not play poker, not even for marshmallows, they and their friends gathered in the game room to hold bodily function contests.   

Lord have mercy.

It would seem that all life does NOT end.  But my sanity is about to give up the ghost.