Christmas get to know you

Received this from my little sister, and I will 'be in the holiday spirit' and play along...

1. Wrapping paper or gift bags? wrapping paper has more originality and chance to be creative with toppings. Which we all know is right up my ally.

2. Real or Artificial tree ? Real for sure. Nothing beats the process, picking it out, the smell, the needles on the ground being eaten by Ginger...

3. When do you put up the tree? When we get a chance.

4. When do you take the tree down? After the epiphany, when the three wisemen finally reached baby Jesus. Jan. 6th. Sometimes longer depending on the start of school chaos...

5. Do you like Eggnog? Soy Nog- on the news this morning too!

6. Favourite Gift you received as a child? My very own "ghetto-blaster"

7. Do you have a nativity scene? No.

8. Hardest person to buy for? Definately my Dad

9. Easiest person to buy for? My nephew Parker and new little niece Rowan.

10. Worst Christmas gift ever received? Probabaly some sort of matching outfit with one of my sisters....

11. Christmas Cards...Snail mail or E-mail? Mail for sure!

12. Favorite Christmas Movie? Miracle on 34ths St.

13. When do you start shopping for Christmas? EEEHH! When Report Cards and the Christmas Concert are done.

14. Have you ever 'recycled' a Christmas present? Not a "Chrisitmas" present...jk

15. Favorite thing to eat at Christmas? Appies

16. Clear lights or colored on the tree? clear all the way.

17. Favorite Christmas Song? So this is Christmas .. and what have we done...another year over, and a new one just begun...

18. Travel at Christmas or Stay Home? A little of both.

19. Can you name Santa's Reindeer?Rudolph, Comet, Dasher, Donner, Prancer, Vixen? Very tempted to use Google... but I will be honest. I think I'm missing one...

20. Do you have an Angel or a Star on top of your tree? We use a star. Grew up with a Angel though. Some ridonculous crochet thingie...

21. Open the Presents Christmas Eve or Morning? Dale & I exchange cards Christmas Eve.One Christmas Eve and the rest Christmas morning - and sometimes Christmas afternoon if we swap mom and dad's house that day!

22. Most annoying thing about this time of the year ? Report Cards and Christmas Concert Prep and stress.

23. Shopping...Mall or online? I do a bit of both.

24. Do you decorate outside for Christmas or just inside (or at all?) Both.

25. Favorite Christmas cookie? Do rumballs count?

26. Do you own Christmas clothing or jewelry? I'm a teacher.... Don't tell Dale....

27. Do you believe in Santa? Love the spirit of it. What do you mean do I believe?? Don't we all?

WHO DONE IT!??

Last night Dale and I hosted a Murder Mystery Party.

For me, the planning of it was just as much fun as the party itself. Everybody did a great job getting into their characters too!

There were a few too many guests we wanted to invite for the number of characters, so I decided to be Lorraine, the dead lady. We had to figure out who killed me.

Here are the profiles of the guests. Take a guess who did it and I will reveal at the end of the post~

Madame Rose

a.k.a Cluny

Lorraine's psychic and confident.

Lorraine

a.k.a Me

Killed by potassium Cyanide. Who did it??!!

Here I am. Spooky eh?!! I had a lot of fun gtting ready! By the end of the night, Dale had to tell me to wash off my makeup becuase looked to gross! Apparently he doesn't love me for "whats inside that counts!"

Vanessa Cross

a.k.a Tasha

Daughter of Lorraine's.

David Cross

a.k.a Jaron

Vanessa Cross's husband. A politicain, and Lorraine was NOT happy that he was married to Vanessa.

The Butler

a.k.a Jeff

Another 'add in' character. We liked him though because he served us food and drinks !

Susanne Smythe

a.k.a Katie

Lorraine's best friend. Classy woman, living the high life, but with no apparent means of support...Dr. Thomas Blackman

a.k.a Corey

Lorraine's corrupt doctor

Anthony Lockwood

a.k.a My geeky husband

Lorraine's husband (his second wife) and he also remarried 12 months after Lorraine's death to a woman he was having an affair with. Geesh Dale!

Jessica Cates Lockwood

a.k.a. Freya

A washed up actress who is now married to Anthony Lockwood. Nice velvet dress and fur coat Freya!

Shawn Easton

a.k.a. Jason

Son of Anthony from his first marriage. A drunk/druggie that is a racecar driver, living life in the fast lane!

The murderer!??? Cluny- The psychic!

It was really fun! Definately a must-do again!

YAY! I'm a very proud new Auntie!

Jenn and Kurtis had a little girl this morning at 3:45.

8 lbs. 8 oz.

YAY!

Can't wait to see them all at Christmas!

Couch-licious

Is it bad to be so happy and addicted to something so materialistic??!

I guess we have just gone so long, convincing oursleves we either couldn't afford, or didn't need new couches. Probably more so the first.

But holy dina! I am so happy!

• Bye -bye futon (otherwise known as the puked-on, thanks to our fine friends ...cough cough Katie & Jess et al)


• Dale and I each get our own couch! No more squishy sharesies


• We can invite friends over in the winter months as well (summer we have our nice new deck/patio set)


• Dog hair just wipes off!??(x2) No more vaccumming the couch!


• We can start nesting, being of our nice 'married couple' things!
• Maybe the trim will make its way back on now that the new window is finally in too??!!

Don't push your luck Heather....

Fridge-tastic

Dale and I have saved our pennies for a few big ticket items - a new fridge and a set of leather couches.

The fridge arrived today!

YAY!

It makes such a difference in our humble little home. SO many shelves inside, and it forced us to clean out our 101 bottles of condiments. Its hard to imagine not having the freezer at the bottom before- all that bending down to get to the veggie crisper we had to do before!I absolutely love it now.

We then were able to pop out the white face plate of our dishwasher, and give it a make-over by popping in a sheet of stainless steel for $40!

Here are some before and afters of the fridge.

Dale was too quick for me to get a before of the dishwasher, but the after looks like a competely different one ( I'll help you imagine - the before- think WHITE)

How to Avoid Stress ( without having to hide in your basement)

Report Card season is upon us. Any teachers out there will know the stress related to this tedious, unruly task. I have gathered some stress relieving tips- feel free to use if you want.

For those of you who aren't teachers, now is the time to be extra nice to those teachers around you. AND if you see them doing these wacky things, understand they are being proactive before they pull all their hair out.

• jam marshmallows up your nose and try to sneeze them out
• tatoo "out to lunch" on your forehead
• leaf through a magazine and draw underwear and or mustaches on people
• go shopping, buy tons, sweat in it, return it the next day
• dance naked in your bathroom
• make wax figurines out of your earwax

Maybe these will help. I might try one or two. Let me know if you have any other suggestions.

Halloweenie

All in all, besides the pumpkin fiasco, the 31st of October was fun. I dressed up as an identical set of cowgirls with my classroom CEA ( Certified Education Assistant who works with a boy in my class who has Autism). It was a fun day, the kids looked spectacular, the Grade 6's did a spooky pumpkin display, and several of my kids told scary stories at an assembly ( a class project we had been working on). The rest told their scary stories by candlight in the classroom ( mummy candles we had made with our buddy class.



Good times . Good times.



Surprinsingly, very few kids came to our door this year. We spruce up our house and then attract fewer kids!? Weird.



Check out last years Halloween post. Funny to look back.