This conversation took place on the way to Daniel's Moms house to drop off a gift at around 7:30pm

Me: "Are you sure your Mom isn't in bed yet?"

Daniel: (a shocked look on his face) "What?! Why would you say that?"

Me: "Well because she is old Daniel. That's what old people do"

Daniel: (still in a shocked disbelieving state) "I can't believe you just said that!"

Me: (confused) "Said what?"

Daniel: "I can't believe you asked if she was Dead!"

Me:(totally confused) What?!

I was a little lost at this point, but quickly realized where the conversation went wrong.

Me: Daniel, I said, Are you sure she is not in BED! Not DEAD!

Dear Sister,
I am hoping you guys are well and staying cool down in the land of the amazon! I miss our daily phone calls and praying you never do this to me again, but again I'm hoping you are having a wonderful time.... while I suffer.



Today it was a rocking chair. It was a golden oak, very nicely made, now just broken into pieces. I felt sad for whoever lost their sweet chair. It happens I guess.


"Oh DEAR! I hope they didn't lose GRANDMA too!"


Tomorrows Topic: "A Good Old fashion Groping at the Company Christmas Party" (it may or may not be as bad as it sounds!)
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*My sister and her family are visiting her husbands side of the family in Brazil this holiday season. My sister and I talk on the phone several times a day. It is expensive to call Brazil so frequently as you can imagine. So for 15 days I will be writing her letters and I will be emailing her and posting them here.

Her and her family living in Las Cruces is bad enough! Having them on a completely different continent gives me anxiety!

A little back story:

Our house was a bit of a disaster in progress. From boxes of misc. Christmas decor to boxes of various wedding doodads. Craft projects litter my kitchen table and laundry has consumed the entire southwest corner of our bedroom. Only patches of my desk top can actually be seen under all the mail, christmas lists, blank Cd's, and a paper plate from Daniel's serving of cake the other night. OK so do you have a picture in your head yet of the state of our holiday home? ......Great....
So the other night Daniel came home from work and after cleaning up and changing, he picked up an arm full of laundry and headed to the laundry room (who am I kidding? the Garage that houses our Washer and dryer) and started the wash. He then went and took out the trash, put a fresh liner in the can and quickly moved on to the dishes in the sink. Meanwhile, I am taking care of Sterling. How could I expect my little four year to watch Jane and the dragon all by himself in our bedroom? Besides it was a very good episode.

After the program ended I followed Daniel around the house complaining about the lack of ideas we had for Christmas gifts. It is so stressful trying to figure out what to get everyone that is both practical and thoughtful and in our budget. I laid on the bed trying to brainstorm while I watched him fold the first load of freshly laundered clothes. I had to follow him back into the kitchen to continue our conversation when he went back to finish cleaning the counter tops. I talked and went through Store ads. He cleaned and listened.
Coming up with creative gift ideas is hard work I tell you!

I went back into our bedroom with a pen and blank piece of paper determined to be inspired by great gift ideas. After 2 mins I had nothing. I thought maybe if I closed my eyes that my visual imagination would take flight and the ideas would come flooding in.

I dozed off...

About 20 minutes later I hear toys being thrown in to various bins and buckets.

Daniel is cleaning Sterling's room while I stand in the doorway still complaining about my failed attempt at creating a list of gifts for our family members.

He seemed busy so I went to look through the store adds again. I came up with a few ideas ran them by Daniel real quick and then headed to the store.

After 2 hours of shopping I returned home with Christmas PJ's, an Audio book, and a new dress for myself.

I put it away in our closet and sat on the bed explaining to Daniel that I still was at a loss on some gifts. He listened thoughtfully while folding yet another load of laundry.

This time I helped.
Love, Your not so Homemaker Sister

Tomorrows Topic: "Grandma Got Ran Over on the Freeway" (thought provoking isn't it)

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*My sister and her family are visiting her husbands side of the family in Brazil this holiday season. My sister and I talk on the phone several times a day. It is expensive to call Brazil so frequently as you can imagine. So for 15 days I will be writing her letters and I will be emailing her and posting them here.

Her and her family living in Las Cruces is bad enough! Having them on a completely different continent gives me anxiety!
However I will Press on for the next 15 days, through frequent emails and a lot of talking to myself.

*My sister and her family are visiting her husbands side of the family in Brazil this holiday season. My sister and I talk on the phone several times a day. It is expenisve to call Brazil so frequently as you can imagine. So for 15 days I will be writing her letters and I will be emailing her and posting them here.
Her and her family living in Las Cruces is bad enough! Having them on a completely different continent gives me anxiety!


However I will Press on for the next 15 days, through frequent emails and a lot of talking to myself.






 I realized at 10:30pm last night that today would be Sterling's last day of preschool until January. He is having a little christmas party in his class today complete with a visit from Santa. It dawns on me that I completely forgot to come up with a super adorable teachers gift for Miss. Jena! How could I have forgotten?!! Now you know me, I can't walk in with a simple pre-packaged holiday tin full of hot chocolate with a plastic bow taped to the top! It has to be a handmade treasure! A craft that will leave the other mothers ooohing and awing at my creative genius for weeks to come!


But what?!


It's 10:30 at night! I'm in my pajama's!

I quickly assess what I have on hand. I have done tons of christmas shopping in the last few weeks, surely I have bought something meaningful and uber cute to gift the preschool teacher with.


Ideas that ran through my head:

1. I could sew up the cute scarf I saw on a blog tutorial. (but we live in AZ. Does she like Scarves, I have supplies for only one scarf and I really want it for myself)

2. I could whip up a batch of honey butter and rolls. (but then I will have to make a whole batch of honey butter and I need those supplies for saturday so it will be fresh for family gift giving)

3. I could make a cute scrapbook of all the little kids in her class and have each child contribute a little picture they've drawn. (um hello! It's 10:30pm. the night before. DUH!)

4. I could make one of those super cute aprons! (again it's 10:30 and the fabric store is closed)

5. I made a set of really cute countdown blocks and had given them away all but one set. (but I wanted to keep that for myself as well. I know I'm selfish that way)



I had a hard time coming up with something that was just going to take a young preschool teachers breath away.

So I pulled out a bottle of Bath and Body works hand soap and some tile coasters I had left over from the Bridal shower I did back in March. Two random objects with nothing in common. STELLAR!

I wrapped them in various bits of ribbon and raffia this morning, slapped a tag on 'em and called it good.

So much for my breath takingly, Super Adorable, crafty gift. Oh well maybe his teacher next year will have better luck!



Hope your forgotten gift giving goes better than mine so far!



Love, Your Not so Super Adorable Craft giving Sister.





You catch it, You clean it! Sterling was the only one to catch a fish on his birthday!