the holidays!

If ever there's a time to feel like a full time housewife, it must be Christmas!

Good Lord, is anyone else in here going full speed ahead?

Can't wait for Christmas to get here so we can all sit back and relax........

Let's not forget to take time to see Christ in the faces of others as we run through the days. Just putting a smile on our faces can make a difference to others. Smile and the world smiles with you!

I have a gift wrapping tip.

I buy one or two nice things and a lot of small gifts for everyone so they have a lot to unwrap. Often the one and two dollar things are the most loved of all. The shopping would kill me except that I do it all year.

Anyway, my tree is decorated in snow and irredescents like an ice tree. I wrap everything in white. I use butcher paper that I get at the school supply store for the larger things and tissue paper for the smaller things that I sort of wad wrap and throw into one of those white bags from the hobby store which I reuse year aftr year. I don't use bows or ribbons. Instead I write everyone's name real big on their gifts and sacks in glitter glue. I usually add a little of the very sparkly fine glitter from the hobby shop to the names and that's it.

The sparkling gifts look fabulous under the sparkly tree and when everyone comes in, they all start speculating and teasing about the gifts and it adds to the fun. (Nice for us older santas who can't read the small print on gift tags too.)

We've already had Christmas here. Huge dinner for husband's family and mine and all our kids and grandkids Sunday. After dinner Santa me and Santa him distributed the gifts and everyone opened with the youngest opening first beginning with my daughter's unborn and my husband's son's six month old and ending with our parents then us. It was a blast. And everyone is so excited to come in and see their names sparkling under the tree.

We're still cleaning up the debri and will go to church together on Christmas Eve and to visit our parents for a while Christmas Day, but other than that we're resting. Our first Christmas together will be just for us.

Peace.

smile

smile...what a great post. Aren't you just sooo clever. I would love to see a photo of your tree. It absolutely sounds lovely. And the gift wrapping too. I hope you took pic's...oh please scan them in and share with us, would cha?

You put a lot of thought and care into sharing your Christmas time with others. I bet they are very grateful for your efforts. I know I would be. Wanna adopt?

I sure appreciate your offer of adoption, but my child rearing days are OVER!! Amen.

I would welcome more grandchildren though. They're all play and no work. I say everyone oughtta' start out with grandkids. Of course if we did we'd all have had dozens.

Reminds me, my husband's son devised some Nazi rule about everyone getting his kids (our grandkidsn) clothes for Christmas. Imagine that! Well, we ignored it. We got all the grankids a bunch of loud, messy, obnoxious toys. The kind that they would never have have been allowed to own due to the parental sanity clause (which does not apply to grandparents who do not have to put up with the noise except for Christmas).

When the grandkids started opening their gifts they were delighted, but my husband's son, reminded us that he had asked everyone to get his kids clothing. Well, we informed him, "Hey, we're grandparents and we're immune to those silly sanity laws." Pretty soon all the guys, father, sons, and grandsons were busily making a huge mess and a lot of of noise playing with the obnoxious toys.

I think we got that straightened out.

Merry Christmas.

smile

P.S. I'll let you know if I find someone ready t

I sure appreciate your offer of adoption, but my child rearing days are OVER!! Amen.

I would welcome more grandchildren though. They're all play and no work. I say everyone oughtta' start out with grandkids. Of course if we did we'd all have had dozens.

Reminds me, my husband's son devised some Nazi rule about everyone getting his kids (our grandkidsn) clothes for Christmas. Imagine that! Well, we ignored it. We got all the grankids a bunch of loud, messy, obnoxious toys. The kind that they would never have have been allowed to own due to the parental sanity clause (which does not apply to grandparents who do not have to put up with the noise except for Christmas).

When the grandkids started opening their gifts they were delighted, but my husband's son, reminded us that he had asked everyone to get his kids clothing. Well, we informed him, "Hey, we're grandparents and we're immune to those silly sanity laws." Pretty soon all the guys, father, sons, and grandsons were busily making a huge mess and a lot of of noise playing with the obnoxious toys.

I think we got that straightened out.

Merry Christmas.

smile

P.S. I'll let you know if I find someone ready to adopt.

Guilty!

Smilin, oops...I remember a day when the grandparents would ask what to oget the kids and I would tell them exactly what to get.

My reasoning was, they asked, and I wnated to make sure the kids got everything they wanted.

We would always give one of the toys, jackets, sports equipment to the grandparents to give so the kids would be happy with what they received from them. One grandparent always wanted to give the kids the biggest and best gift they asked for which made it hard for Santa.

Anyway, when I have grandkids I am giving them what I want to give them and I'm not even asking the parents.

Oh, do you think he wanted them to get clothes so he wouldn't have to buy them? OR do you think it was he didn't want to listen to all the whistles, sirens, and clangs?

I'm just making my way through the board here...

.. I don't think people are allowed to say what you get as a gift.

I do remember just being really irritated when my mother-in-law insisted on gettting the kids big boxes of godzillion-pieced building things....but actually, they really liked them but ouch!... the single Lego, in the middle of the night, on my way to get water? OUCH!!

I like the idea of getting gobs of little things throughout the year and the glitter glue. I need to plan better for next year.

Kate

P.S. I want to do a photo quilt for all four of my kids next year ... has anyone had any experience with transferring photographs to fabric? Like the quilt in "StepMom". Let me know.