Goodbye Turkey, Hello Ham!

We had a great trip to Nebraska for Thanksgiving this year. Grace was the best traveler the whole trip and Gary and Norma Jean went along as well. Gary hadn't been back since he moved here last February and was glad to see the family again.

Grace got spoiled by Aunt Jan and Uncle Kelly and I did some shopping on Black Friday (AFTER the craziness calmed down) and the Huskers beat Colorado so all was right with the world.

We got home Sat. night about 6 pm and I'd been telling Grace we would put up our Christmas stuff when we got home. Of course by the time we actually GOT home, my ambition had waned. Hers, however, had not!

I dug out her little tree and ornaments and she decorated it up last night.



Today I got out EVERY DECORATION WE OWN and went to putting them all up and out and around the house. We skipped church, slept in, fixed breakfast and then just messed around all day. It was GREAT! I wish I had another week to keep doing it!

I got everything up except for some outside decorations around the porch. Grace has been asking for outside Christmas lights and Bryon decided he'd do some for her. He couldn't find what he wanted at Walmart today so he'll have to go on the great light hunt this week. He wants those old fashioned, fat colored bulbs.

I finally got him to put up icicle lights the first year we were in the house and had the big FAMILY Christmas gathering. He cussed and grumbled the whole time, finally got them up, plugged them in and then only half of them worked. He was NOT happy. Then to top it off, squirrels ate the plugs off the ends. Hopefully we'll have better luck this time. Of course now it will probably just be Ruger eating the lights.

I have SEVEN Christmas trees up in the house! Last year we got four topiary trees with lights on them the day after Christmas and we thought we could put out on the front porch instead of lights on the house. Good idea, but NOW we have Ruger who is a one dog destruction crew. He'd destroy those trees in no time I'm sure. So I put them up around the house instead. I decided anything that's NOT used this year, goes to the garage sale pile.







It pretty much looks like Christmas exploded at the Medley house right now, but I figure this will be one of Grace's best years for remembering Christmas.

I told her the other day, I sure hope Santa brings her some new socks for Christmas. She asked me why and I told her because she REALLY needs some. She said, "Well I'm not going to tell him!" I guess she didn't want to use up her gift luck on socks! Oh well, Santa already found a few. I think I'll have her open that box first!

Bruuuhaaahahahahahaha!

Deer Season 2009

I just realized I didn't get any mention in about Bryon's deer season this year. He and his Dad both got button bucks (which didn't even count as bucks because the only thing that proved they were boys were testicles!) opening morning, then on Sunday of the first weekend he got a nice 8 point.

His friend Chris got a huge 11 point that same weekend.

Vamped Out

First of all, sorry I've been delinquent in blogging. I spent a week in Rolla working and staying at the Hampton Inn, then that SATURDAY at an all day mandatory meeting for work as well. NOT FUN! Last week I pretty much spent catching up on everything.

Bryon and Grace did a great job keeping the house clean and all the animals alive, so I suppose they CAN live without me after all :) But I still don't like being gone. The next big college drive is February 2-5 so I've already got my reservation made.

I have to admit it WAS nice sleeping in a king sized bed, and having my evening snackage ready and waiting for me when I got back to the hotel. The staff at the Hampton is AWESOME and they had breakfast every morning which was GREAT and FREE! I certainly am NOT complaining about that.

I also got the rest of the Laurell K. Hamilton Anita Blake Vampire Hunter series read. Yeah, there were 17 books in the series. It was the longest series of books I've ever read. The next book is Flirt and it comes out in February (AFTER the blood drive unfortunately) and then another this summer. I'll read them because I'm in too deep now to quit, but I think I'm pretty vamped out for now.

I'm looking forward to getting through some of my tower of texts in the next few weeks that have been piling up while I gave my attention to the vampires.

So many books, so little time.

No Gift Christmas ... Too Much Stuff .. and Fun with Nature

The family is all in. No gifts are being exchanged again this year. I'm VERY happy about that! That means...NO SHOPPING! NO fighting the crowds in the brain sucking flourescent lights. No Made in China, lead based crap that's going to break and fall apart in ten minutes. No lame junk that people don't really want and NOT spending $1200 on all that STUFF.

Of course, there is the Grace exemption. Bryon and I and the rest of the family are allowed to buy gifts for Grace, but honestly, after her birthday and having SEVENTEEN guests who brought gifts... I just can't really think of much she needs.

I finally cleaned off her desk in her room last week and organized all her art supplies into a container and she has A LOT of stuff! Seriously. We are one box away from a Dateline episode on HOARDING.

I'm afraid she has some of that RICE HOARDING in her genes because she wants to keep every little piece of EVERYTHING. I have to hide things and wait until she forgets about them then throw them out. Same thing with artwork from school. She wants to keep everything including empty Kleenex boxes (with pretty designs) etc. No, I say, NO!

Do NOT however, look at my own little collection of scrapbooking and crafting paraphenallia upstairs. Mine of course is much more sophisticated. It is. Really.

She also collects TONS of rocks. And leaves. And sticks. And pine cones. And shells. And nuts. And berries. And EVERYTHING. I finally cleaned up all her little piles and stashes and put them into a bucket.



It was a LOT of stuff. Of course, it's hard to argue with collecting "stuff" from nature. It costs nothing and gives her lots of pleasure.

On vacation she picked up a TON of rocks and stuff. We stuffed them into the Pacifica under the tire and forgot all about them until I vacuumed out Bryon's car last weekend and found them again. She had a whole gallon ziplock full of things. She sat out on the back deck organizing them into a pencil box and came in asking for more containers. I had just bought two little containers for the art supplies reorganization so I gave those to her... here is what she came up with... all on her own.



I'm thinking she's a naturalist in the making.

Candy Negotiations

Grace turned 5 on Oct. 23 and of course immediately started collecting more candy. It is so the Candy Season. I'm afraid she totally has my sweet tooth. Fortunately for me she's EXTREMELY generous AND prefers the hard, sweet and sour candies to the gooey chocolate that I love.

She also knows I like the "YELLOW" candies (not banana though). She constantly scours through her birthday and Halloween stash to trick or treat me with chocolate. Is that a good deal or WHAT!

I've always told her she can have TWO pieces of candy a day and many mornings she'll go to her stash and pick out what she's going to have after school and lay it out on the counter. We Medley girls don't miss many meals OR snacks and like to plan ahead!

A few days after her birthday I was on the computer and she came in and said, "Mama, I have a good idea, how about now since I'm FIVE, I get THREE pieces of candy a day...since now I'M FIVE!?!"

How can you argue with that logic?

I said yes. Daddy says he would have said NO but I figure for one thing she's using good negotiation skills and for two, the candy will just be gone that much faster. It's the same logic that allows me to justify eating an entire box of Thin Mint Girl Scout Cookies in a day. I asked Bryon one time if it was bad if I just ate the entire row of cookies. He said, "You're going to eat them sometime right?".

Yes, Yes I am.

Naked Day

Grace has really been playing with all her birthday Barbies and accessories. We moved her Barbie Dream House upstairs to the playroom so she wouldn't have to pick it all up every night... you can probably see why...



Of course, like all Barbies, they are mostly naked. She has trouble getting their little clothes on and off still.

I went upstairs to check on her and she had almost ALL of them naked and I asked her why. She said Barbie was going to school naked... because it was Naked Day. I told her I hope we never have that at my work :)