Tuesday morning. Matthew is sleeping, Kylie is at school.

Things are good here. Busy lately. Last week I drove to mom and dad's for a MK party. My director, Cindy, came too. That was great because she got to explain all the marketing parts of the business while I did the class part. The kids were ok, Matthew kept trying to go to sleep but the ladies were so loud they would wake him up. Dad took care of Kylie and got Matthew to stay asleep. and I got 2 bookings off it so I'll be back in April and May. I think a couple of the ladies are considering doing the business too so that's wonderful. Mom wanted to do it but it's not worth it if she doesn't have parties and she doesn't think she can physically handle the parties and work full time. So maybe after she retires. But I hope one or two of the other ladies will consider it.

Matthew got sick while we were there. He had been battling a sinus infection but when I took him to the dr before I left, she said just to let it ride out. But then he started having fevers up in Chicago so I called the dr on the way home and got him in on Friday. He had an ear infection. Poor baby. Then after having the medicine for a few days, I noticed that he broke out in hives on sunday. Great. Back to the dr on Monday and he got a new prescription and is now alergic to penicilin, just like Kylie and I. And his ear infection is now in both ears. Can't wait for spring!!

Kylie had a fever too but seemed to be fine after some tylenol. I put her hair in braids yesterday and she looked very cute! I'll have to have mom teach me to do french braids when she is a little older. She loved it when I took them out and her hair was all kinky. Reminded me of Sarah's when she was little.

Dick's b-day was this past weekend, 70. Ray, Chris, Doug and Louise came in from Nebraska on Friday to surprise him. He wasn't very surprised but did appreciate it. Then he had a surprise party on Saturday night and wasn't surprised about that either! But he was very surprised when Sharon gave him his present, a new shitzu puppy. She is super cute and very well tempered. Kylie got to pick her name and picked Irish. Matthew crawled all over the place chasing her and Irish let him catch her most of the time. They will have lots of fun together.

I think we're going to West Virginia with Brett next week. He has to go for business and wants to take us along. And my MK conference is next weekend, Brett will be leaving for Denver with the hockey trip that weekend too.

Starting to plan Matthew's bday party. Brett wants Colts but I want turtles. I need to start designing his invites and figuring out the guest list. I might do a playdate party for some of his friends before his real party, like I did for Kylie. That would keep the guest list down. Needs to be a nice day out so we can put people outside. I'm not cooking lunch for everything like mom and I did for K, too expensive and too much work. Maybe subs from subway or something. Or maybe just cake and ice cream. But won't a turtle cake be so cool?? Much better then a Colts cake.

Monday afternoon. M is sleeping, K is snacking.

Things are good here. Weekend was fine, not too exciting. We went to art class this morning. Kylie does that while Matthew plays in the open gym with the other kids. A lady who is M's gymboree class was there, her name is Leah and I like her a lot. I think she's going to be my new friend. It would be good to have a boy Matthew's age for playdates and stuff.

My best friend, Sara, signed on a house in Brownsburg yesterday! They found one they like and it will be ready in 6 weeks. So she's very busy with Realtors, movers, and all that stuff right now. But soon she'll be home!

Kylie just peeled her own clementine! She used her toy screwdriver to break the peel and then peeled it. She's actually peeled two of them now. She did this all on her own while I was putting M down for a nap. She is a genius.

Brett is working a lot this week. He has a training class that he's teaching that will keep him busy. And this weekend he is going to Maryland to see his friend, Theresa, who got paralyzed last year. A bunch of his old co-workers are going to spend time with her. Don't know what I'll do this weekend. Probably go to late church. Maybe invite Ann over to watch Grey's Anatomy. That's a good idea.

MK is doing good. I've gotten several decent sized re-orders the past two weeks. I have mom's party next week and another silent party too. But I need to get a few more booked so I can get busier as spring/summer approach. Cindy will be coming to mom's party to give me my necklace/earring/ring set that I won last year. And I won another prize too that I need to pick out. One of my clients won a gold and garnet ring for having a big party in November so I'll pick that ring up for her while I'm there. Gotta get on the phone and make some calls.

Well, Kylie is done with her snack and wants to play Cinderella. So, gotta go!

We bought a new computer! I love it, flat screen that's big - 19inches. And it has Window's Vista, which seems to be pretty fancy.
Anyways, with all the transferring of data from Dick's laptop to the portable hard drive to the new computer, I managed to find that blog that I had written for Christmas. So, here it is:


Christmas 2006. What a busy and great weekend. We started off by driving up to my parents on Thursday evening. They moved a few months ago so this was a new house for Brett to go too ( I was there with the kids at Thanksgiving). We made good time and the kids were good in the car. Josh and Grandma were there in addition to my parents. We just spent the evening relaxing and getting ready for the weekend. Matthew and Kylie were both sick. Matthew was just recovering from RSV and a sinus/ear infection. Kylie had a very bad cough also, actually had a chest x-ray the day before to rule out pneumonia.

We were worried about Sarah making it in. Her flight had a lay-over in Denver, which was snowed in with a terrible blizzard. But she got her flight changed and ending up flying direct from Portland to O’hare. What an answer to prayer.

Friday - Brett and I left the kids with GG and Grandma and went shopping. Brett broke his “rules” by taking me. Since he hadn’t been to Huntley before, I showed him where some nice shops were as well as all the chain stores. We went to Target, DSW shoe warehouse, Dicks and some other places. I wanted a pair of sherpa boots and picked some out at DSW. They were the last ones in that size so Brett bought them for me. Major rule break!! Apparently, my slow walking, browsing and shoe buy cause me to only get a “C” grade from Brett. Last minute shopping is too stressful for me so I’ll happily leave it up to Brett!

Sarah got in a little late but it was so great to see her. We’ve been talking weekly and it’s helped our relationship a lot. She’s got such great dreams and experiences. Her life is pretty exciting. Josh seems to be doing good too. He is great with my kids and seems to be happy with his life. I hope both of them find love soon. Not that they need it to be happy, I think they’ve both figured out to be happy on their own. So now they are ready to share that. Kinda mushy, let me get back to the story…

Friday night we didn’t do much except go to bed early. Matthew isn’t sleeping well since he’s sick and wants to sleep with us. Which is fine but the bed is smaller so Brett and I are hugging the sides while Matthew takes the middle. Not comfy at all. I did get a book called “Healthy sleep habits, happy child” and I worked on reading it this weekend. I have so little time to read during the week so I tried to take advantage of some downtime to read it. I wasn’t the most social I could have been but if this book helps me get M to sleep, then our whole family will be better. I think I’m getting boarder-line depressed so I gotta get something fixed with this sleep problem. It’s not fair to get angry at Kylie for little things because I’m tired. But again, this is off the subject……

Saturday - Brett went shopping by himself to finish up. I stayed in to take care of the kids and stuff. M took good naps, right on schedule, according to my book. The Roberts arrived in the late afternoon. They had a tire blowout in Indy and had to get a new tire put on. Thank God they arrived safely. We went to church at Willow Creek. Man, they know how to put on a show. Our seats were in the second row, front and center. They had gymnasts hanging for the ceiling, great music, dancing, acting, angels, Mary, shepherds, the whole deal. And the lesson was good too. We were so close that I could smile at Bill Hybels and know that he saw. Kylie had a great time too. She was in the 3 year old room which was a huge open room. She had to climb up a slide to get in (security to slow some crazy person down if they tried to get in). She made a cute craft with stickers, watched a “Mary and Baby Jesus” movie and got to be Mary in some activity. She really enjoyed the Christmas story this year. We played “Mary, Joseph and Jesus” all month. M was in the nursery and wasn’t happy unless he was being walked around. But at least I didn’t get called out to get him.

Sunday - Christmas Eve. I went shopping with Sarah. She got something from Carters for M. Then we went to the grocery store and got Starbucks. It was really nice to be with just her for even just a little while. I’d love to go back to Portland to visit. It’s pretty hard with 2 kids now though. Maybe we can do another girls weekend in Vegas or somewhere when M gets older and I can leave him. We played some games today too. Pop culture Trivial Pursuit. It ended in a tie. But it was fun! Then it was dinner (yummy) and presents! Kylie loved passing them out for a few minutes but then got bored. Matthew was ok for a while but then got pretty fussy so Brett and I were going back and forth to his room to get him to sleep. Kinda a pain, we missed a lot of the present opening but that’s ok. Here is what we got:

Kylie - clothes, Nike shoes from Sarah, the famous Pony Castle from Josh (more on that later), a baby doll from mom and dad
Matthew - a circus train from mom and dad, Thomas the Train set from Josh, clothes and shoes from Sarah, clothes from GG
Brett - camera lens, Ipod car adapter, 88 jersey, DVD burner
We got a beautiful wooden clock and cross from my Grandma. Her twin brother, Reuben, made it for us.
Mary - frying pan from Josh, 2 pairs for yoga pants from Sarah, 3 sweaters from Mom and dad, my MK luggage, boots and a beautiful circle necklace from Brett, pink colts shirt from Brett.

Let me fill you in on the Pony Castle. Kylie liked playing with a My Little Pony castle over the summer at my friend Betsy’s house. Ever since, she has said she wants one. We were giving her ponies when she would go poop on the potty so she had plenty of ponies but wanted the castle. Anyways, every time anyone would ask what she wanted for Christmas, she would quickly answer “a pony castle”. That was the only thing she would say she wanted (sometimes a kitchen too). So, my family was asking for suggestions for Christmas presents and I told them that K wanted this castle. Josh said he would handle it. So, K is thinking that Santa was bringing it but we all knew she would get it on Christmas eve. But we also knew it had to be the last gift or she wouldn’t want to open up other gifts. So we kept it for last. It was a huge box. She tore the paper just a little bit and knew what it was. She SCREAMED “It’s a pony castle!!!!!!!!” and tore the rest of the paper off. Not only was it the castle but it was the deluxe so it came with 3 ponies. She had lots of fun playing with it and I know it will be played with daily for a long time.

After opening presents, K went to bed

Christmas morning - Up early. Santa came! Kylie was busy opening more presents and got some nice things. Santa left a card saying that K had a kitchen at home and M had a train table.

We had a really hard time getting Kylie to leave. We'll have to remember that next year, maybe leave in the early afternoon instead of first thing in the morning. Then we drove to D&S's for presents and dinner. It was different for K this time because everyone opens at the same time. But she got some great things too. Matthew got a Discovery Dome. K got a baby doll, crib and some other things. I got a cross necklace, Victoria's secret Pink sweatsuit. D&S also gave Brett and I each money in our stocking. A lot. So I bought some clothes and a Coach purse with mine. Love it!

Sharon made dinner for everyone too. So there was our family, John, Tonya (she's pregnant, due in July) and Alex, Art, Alicia, Jordan and Christian. It was good to see everyone. Sharon hasn't made dinner like that in a long time so I think people liked that.

So, that was Christmas!