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Christmas wrap-up
Dec. 26th, 2008 11:37 pmWhat happened to this week? I blinked, and Christmas was over. Now we are home, fat and happy and completely exhausted, with piles and piles of loot. My parents are way too generous but it makes for a great Christmas. :) They bought me, among other things, a microwave that goes over the stove. Yay for more counter space and hopefully a microwave that doesn't randomly shoot sparks! M got a drill press, a fancy huge dealio. He was super excited. I was excited, too, cause I kind of broke his current drill press, and I sort of promised to replace it if I broke it. I have been using it as a snap press for putting snaps on Evie's diapers, and as it turns out... that much pressure is kind of hard on the cheaper drill presses, and part of it warped. Oops! The old one was also too small for his needs so I sort of flippantly reassured him that oh, if snaps messed it up, I would totally buy him a good one, but I really didn't expect that I would actually need to do it. And now I don't! Yay. :)
Santa came on Tuesday morning and left Evelyn a little house of her very own. She loves it. It's so cute. We opened all of our family presents and then I headed off with the baby to have lunch with my ex-coworkers (great fun!) while M had some quality time with his bandsaw and a package of sausage. Not at the same time. E took a nap when we got home, and we got ready to leave for my parents house. Oh, if only we had gotten ready first and then let her sleep (late) in the car! It ended up taking us at least three hours to drive what should have been an hour and a half, because of freezing rain and icy road conditions, plus accident-related traffic jams. It was completely miserable, and yet... we saw a new wreck every two or three miles so it was hard to whine too strenuously because it could have been so much worse, you know? I actually got out of the car on the interstate to get in the back seat with a cranky Evelyn at one point while we were stuck in traffic. After we got through the big traffic jam, we contemplated stopping to let her out of the car seat for a few minutes, but the roads were getting so much worse that we really didn't feel like we had much of a choice but to keep going. We were SO glad to get to my parents at long last!
Anyway. Then there was the Christmas thing, and that was great fun. Evelyn had way more fun than she was really able to handle, because she's still exhausted. Unfortunately, she also seems to be coming down with something this evening. :( There was a stomach bug present at the Christmas Eve festivities so I am hoping that's not what she has.
I did something that I think turned out really well for Christmas Eve. I wrapped up a bunch (forty? fifty? I didn't count) of random toiletries and other free items that I've been picking up for the last few months and put them all in a large bag. Then I went around the room about three times, letting everyone pick out a random present to unwrap. It was lots of fun. There were some useful items (toothpaste!) and a few duds (poor 11-year-old cousin unwrapped the bad breath kit first thing!) and of course, the boxes of Preparation H and Just for Men hair dye, and some other general items--lip gloss, makeup, shampoo, razors, toothbrushes, candy, mouthwash, vitamins, batteries, Excedrin, etc. I would have put more stuff in but I finally ran out of time to wrap stuff. Everyone was giggling and laughing and it seemed to go over really well, which made me happy. I was second-guessing the whole plan the night before we left, afraid it would just end up being lame and weird and then everyone would make fun of me. Everyone really seemed to enjoy it, though. Being able to give stuff away is one of my favorite parts of couponing.
Anyway. My parents came down tonight in time for dinner and brought the rest of our Christmas loot, and they're spending the night to help us get the microwave installed and such tomorrow. (Carrie, I made your jalapeno chicken thing for them. They liked it too.) We went to bed early because we are all still pretty tired, but then somehow I haven't made it there yet. I'd better hit the hay because it seems pretty likely that I'll be up in the middle of the night with the baby... and if not, she'll wake us up early enough in the morning anyway. I so miss being able to stay up late and sleep in on the weekends.
Santa came on Tuesday morning and left Evelyn a little house of her very own. She loves it. It's so cute. We opened all of our family presents and then I headed off with the baby to have lunch with my ex-coworkers (great fun!) while M had some quality time with his bandsaw and a package of sausage. Not at the same time. E took a nap when we got home, and we got ready to leave for my parents house. Oh, if only we had gotten ready first and then let her sleep (late) in the car! It ended up taking us at least three hours to drive what should have been an hour and a half, because of freezing rain and icy road conditions, plus accident-related traffic jams. It was completely miserable, and yet... we saw a new wreck every two or three miles so it was hard to whine too strenuously because it could have been so much worse, you know? I actually got out of the car on the interstate to get in the back seat with a cranky Evelyn at one point while we were stuck in traffic. After we got through the big traffic jam, we contemplated stopping to let her out of the car seat for a few minutes, but the roads were getting so much worse that we really didn't feel like we had much of a choice but to keep going. We were SO glad to get to my parents at long last!
Anyway. Then there was the Christmas thing, and that was great fun. Evelyn had way more fun than she was really able to handle, because she's still exhausted. Unfortunately, she also seems to be coming down with something this evening. :( There was a stomach bug present at the Christmas Eve festivities so I am hoping that's not what she has.
I did something that I think turned out really well for Christmas Eve. I wrapped up a bunch (forty? fifty? I didn't count) of random toiletries and other free items that I've been picking up for the last few months and put them all in a large bag. Then I went around the room about three times, letting everyone pick out a random present to unwrap. It was lots of fun. There were some useful items (toothpaste!) and a few duds (poor 11-year-old cousin unwrapped the bad breath kit first thing!) and of course, the boxes of Preparation H and Just for Men hair dye, and some other general items--lip gloss, makeup, shampoo, razors, toothbrushes, candy, mouthwash, vitamins, batteries, Excedrin, etc. I would have put more stuff in but I finally ran out of time to wrap stuff. Everyone was giggling and laughing and it seemed to go over really well, which made me happy. I was second-guessing the whole plan the night before we left, afraid it would just end up being lame and weird and then everyone would make fun of me. Everyone really seemed to enjoy it, though. Being able to give stuff away is one of my favorite parts of couponing.
Anyway. My parents came down tonight in time for dinner and brought the rest of our Christmas loot, and they're spending the night to help us get the microwave installed and such tomorrow. (Carrie, I made your jalapeno chicken thing for them. They liked it too.) We went to bed early because we are all still pretty tired, but then somehow I haven't made it there yet. I'd better hit the hay because it seems pretty likely that I'll be up in the middle of the night with the baby... and if not, she'll wake us up early enough in the morning anyway. I so miss being able to stay up late and sleep in on the weekends.
