i made a most horrible discovery today. as i was executing proper hygiene after defication this afternoon, i looked up to spy WRINKLES under my occular cavities.

yes, folks....i've wrinkles.

my fat ass is surely going to get up off this chair and hit wal-mart tonight for some miracle cream.

I hope that everyone who actually reads this thing had a good Christmas. While not everything happened like it was planned, the Zoo had a great Christmas. Due to a hellacious snowstorm in southen Indiana, we stayed home for the holidays. It was really nice. I was able to get unlimited naps on Christmas Day! :) Aaron and the kids got me a cd player to use in my scrapcloset. I was pretty stoked about that. Aaron and I weren't supposed to exchange gifts, since we bought the camper, but Aaron always sneaks a present in on me. Makes me feel a right turd, too!

My mother-in-law bought me a cropper hopper...or a do-hickey that I can haul all my goods in when I want to crop with others. I thought that this was extremely thoughtful of her! She's sweet like that sometimes. I'm getting excited about getting back into the swing of cropping. There is so much to be done. Not that I would want to be caught up....What would I do with my time then? ;)

we've had a damn fine skippy weekend and beginning of the week.....i wound up sick this weekend, along with everyone else. collin got sick this afternoon... :( i feel really badly for him, as he doesn't get sick much these days.

i gave collin his nice cozy blanket this afternoon. i felt badly for him, so i told him that i was giving it to him early to help make him feel better....

i'm sad today....today's aaron's graduation for his master's degree, and i am at home with a sick girlie and a meanie boy.....i really wish i could have gone to see him...even though graduations are historically the most boring event known to mankind! :) but pawning the pukster off on my sister-in-law seems like cruel and unusual punishment, so i'm going to play mommy and stay home. which is good, because who else does a sick kiddo want, other than their mommy?

we took miss erin to the doc today and she only has a virus, according to them. she waited over twenty four hours before puking again, so i was surprised to get the wonderful gift of vomit all over me, my pillow (?!), and my hair.....i feel bad for my little munchkin.

trouble in zookeeper paradise....instead of getting better, the girl got worse and is now puking up bile.......wish me luck! :(

so much for getting the pressies done on time for collin's teacher....she'll just have to wait for her calendar until the first day of school....

still stuffy today.....and got a houseful of kiddos....*sigh* it will be spring soon, right? oh, wait..it's not even technically winter yet! ROFL

So here is a list of presents yet to make...am I a goof-ball or what?
6 cookie plates
5 calendars
2 journals
3 journal jars
2 blankets

bring on the sudafed....i think i can, i think i can, i think i can.....

*sniffle, cough*

wayhay...i got the kiddos' colds......go, me!

if aaron's not home in a few minutes so that i can go lay down, i'm going to cry..... :(

OK, folks....it's time to be honest....pretty please let me know what you think....it's freakout time in my gift giving...where i'm starting to doubt the intelligence of this decision.

oh...and the reindeer plate is what the parents got....yes...it SHOULD look like a four or five year-old made it! ;)

]

k....i really really hate it when i have sick kiddos... :( griffin is now back on his albuterol treatments....am hoping that this doesn't mean that we have to avoid the children's museum all winter now.....that would really suck! if i have to, i will...cos i really hate the thought of having to hospitalize either of the bubs....

crazy? why yes, i probably am....but until you've held a two pound baby to your chest after two weeks or over a month of waiting, you wouldn't understand the fear that even a sniffle brings to me. and yet griffin's wheezing again. in saner, more sleep-filled, well-feeling days, i can attribute this to a regular cold that all children will get, and that griffin was likely to have asthma anyway....but when i've spent nearly the entire night on the sofa with a girlie who was waking herself up coughing...and listening to the boy in his bed, coughing all the time....and not feeling well myself on top of it....i start to really get afraid. it could very well be irrational, but what the hell is a blog for if i can't whine in it? it's my damn diary after all! hehe

k....am taking my sleep-deprived, sinus-stuffed self off of here and finishing those christmas plates for the parents.....yes...cookie plates....tho with reindeer made with the kids' feet and hand prints.....will have to take a pic and show you all, as have secured the location of my digicam.....

back later, if you're lucky.......yeah, whatever....

For those of you who don't know me all that well, you might not know that I have a very addictive personality. You might, if you read the blog on a daily basis, but if you don't, you know now. I'm the one who always has to play a game until I've mastered it. I'm the one who has to read the book cover-to-cover as quickly as possible. I'm the one who stayed in her closet and created 40 pages of scrapbook pages last month. Oftentimes the rest of my life comes to a screeching halt while the obsession runs its course.

My current obsession has been making gifts for family for Christmas. So far, I've made three n0-sew blankets, two cookie plates and a journal. I still need to make one more blanket, two more journals, and three jars for the journals I'm giving my biological Mom, Gran, and Grandma. I think I'm going to be able to do it and have time to spare if I keep at it like this!

I'm not really in the Christmas spirit this year, per se, but I'm definitely in a giving mood right now. The only thing I fear about giving handmade gifts is that people won't like them. What if my Dad thinks the blanket looks like it's been made by my second grader? What if my Grandma Rayls really thinks that me giving her a guided journal is a crock of shit and looks like it to boot? I'm sure that they'll like the gifts, and think that I've probably done a fairly good job on them, but it's a fear I have nonetheless......if I could find my digi-cam at this point, I would have to upload pics of all of them for moral support.....So be prepared if pics show up. I'll be expecting feedback...and honest feedback at that! :)

Yesterday was a pretty busy day at the zoo. Actually, I spent very little time here, actually. I took the kids to the Children's Museum, and we had a blast. Tho, now we're all tired from it! :) It's wonderful to be able to leave the house! I feel like some sort of criminal, really, like I'm doing something I shouldn't!

I bought Mr. Dante the stuff to make a fleece blanket. I think he will love it. So that will make four blankets. I still need to get on the stick for the other stuff, though, or some people will be disappointed!

I was late yesterday for an appointment. An HOUR late! ROFL. I thought for sure that I'd be a single woman by the end of the day, because the appointment was for a health screening to get me life insurance! I felt so badly about it! Why is it that my brain can't function at full capacity right now??

SCORE

Stephanie: 3 lovely, warm blankets, 1 set of journal jar questions for Mom's Christmas gift
Scrooge (formerly known as Stephanie "Bah-Humbug" Byers): ZERO!!!

Roll, Christmas wagon, roll! :)

i'm feeling a bit of a bah-humbug lately.....but i went to wal-mart last night, to find some fleece to make my dad a blanket, and found these great kits to make these double-layered blankets that you tie the edges together.....and bought three. one for my dad, one for my stepdad, and one for collin. i came home and put collin's together last night about an hour's time. that got me in better spirits.... :)

i'm also doing a bunch of other home-made gifts this year. my mom is getting a journal and some pens...collin's teacher is going to get some magnets in addition to her giftcard that aaron bought...my grandma is going to get a decorative cookie plate.....

now the only person that we don't have bought for is aaron's dad.....what do you get a 51 year-old who has everything? hehe

alas, i knew that this day would come...but i am going out of the LP business.... :( it frustrates me that i posted a message on the team's board, trying to sell some of my business tools and they took it down and didn't even tell me why....grrr.......so...i sorted my leftover inventory....wowwwieee!! i spent way too much damn money on that stuff! of course, at the point that i bought that stuff, i was depressed and was using retail therapy to see if i could get better....i didn't until the stress left, but i have the leftovers of it to look at all the time! ROFLMFAO!!

other than that, not much new to report at the zoo. we put our tree up...or i should say that aaron and collin put the tree up. i am feeling very much like a hum-bug this year. :( perhaps i'll get into the holiday spirit later, but i'm not seeing it anywhere in the immediate future. aaron usually is less into christmas than i am, but he's even more into it than i am this year. perhaps it's time to up the meds? ;)

1. all christmas cards are made out....*massaging writer's cramps*
2. flipped open the shower gel this morning only to get a dallop of Bath and Body Works Pumpkin scent DIRECTLY into my eye.....i think i'd rather cut myself repeatedly with an x-acto rather than to experience that pain again....i think that ranks up there with the blood clot in the lung...i shit you not.

56 of these little buggers later, and i'm sick of elves, stamping, sewing and inking!! ROFL....some of you may be getting these in person, so pretend like you didn't see it here! hehehe

oh, shit!! you mean i have to sign, address, and mail them all now, too????