Festive Flop

I'm still chuckling over my recklessness on this one. Good thing kids are quite resilient. I did jokingly say, though, that I'll have to make a contribution to Aliza's future therapy fund for the trauma I inflicted tonight! lol.

I found out at 5:30 that my sister, Janell, and some friends were going to go to the Pocomoke Christmas Parade tonight. Jeremy was getting home late and I was in the holiday mood and I thought Aliza might like the music and lights so I decided to go along. We ate supper and headed out at 6:20 to meet Janell. The parade started at 7:00. Met Janell at her friend's house and they were still going to eat supper so Aliza and I headed down to Market St. We found a spot right about 7:00 and a little while later a family that I knew from my previous job showed up....all was going well.

Aliza started running around about 7:15. I was ok with that. But when this other Mom showed up she had her kids dressed in hats, gloves, snowpants, boots, etc. and she even had a thermos of hot chocolate with her.....and a bag of marshmallows! I started thinking...."I guess it is pretty cold out here." I had Aliza in her warmest coat with her hood up, but no special pants or shoes and I don't even own a pair of mittens for her. About the time this is going through my head Aliza takes a spill and her (very cold) hands slap the pavement. She CRIES and doesn't stop and Janell is nowhere to be seen and I'm not feeling very festive anymore. The "good" Mom lets Aliza borrow her little girl's mittens (she was taking them off anyway) and that helps a bit and Janell finally shows up and lets Aliza play with her cell phone and that helps a lot.

Now it is 7:35 and I realize that we have situated ourselves at the end of the parade route. Mental note to self is made for next time... Finally, the parade starts at 7:45 and we begin with a whole string of police cars who are all stopped in front of us which means that they all start blowing their sirens. No tears from Aliza, but she starts saying "no, no, no....." Then the Pocomoke High School marching band is next and I think that just maybe we will be redeemed because Aliza loves music, but the "no, no, no, no..." chant continues and I know that we are done in. The final clincher was the great big fire dog mascot that came walking towards us.

So we got back in the stroller, walked back to Janell's friends house only to find out that we had someone parked behind us in the driveway. My heart fell. My daughter is still saying "no, no, no..." I was able to drive through the backyard and thankfully there was a another driveway that I could leave from.

Aliza was still cold when we got home. Dada was waiting for her. And she told him about the parade...."No, no, no", "Boom, boom (that's the band)" and Brruummm....(car noises....that's the police cars)" We got her in some warm jammies and her room is the coziest in the house so now she is warm and sleeping soundly.

So the clincher for me was that when I opened my computer to write this blog the weather on my desktop says it is currently 27 degrees. I had NO IDEA it was that cold. I thought it was about 40. My, my, my I'll do better next time!!!!

Starting the Holiday Season

This afternoon I made a batch of Puppy Chow, our traditional official start of the holiday season. There are not many things that I could eat until I get sick, but Puppy Chow is one of them. Jeremy will be lucky if there is any left when he gets home!!

In case you are not familiar with Puppy Chow, it is a party mix of Rice Chex coated with melted chocolate chips, peanut butter and butter and then tossed in confectioner's sugar.

I've been loving Ali Edwards' blog this season. I think that she is really Martha Stewart in disguise. Maybe someday I'll have the free time to try some of her decorating and memorykeeping ideas.

I can't wait until my children are old enough to be excited about Christmas and to get involved in holiday preparations. So many fun things to look forward to!

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Living Beyond Yourself

I just finished an amazing Bible study on the Fruit of the Spirit by Beth Moore. It is called Living Beyond Yourself. I always thought the fruit of the spirit were "nice" relatively easy things to live out....love (I can love), joy (I'm generally happy), etc. Not the way Beth defines them. These fruit are the meat of our Christian walk and living them out takes "living beyond ourselves." By living out the fruit of the spirit we are able to handle the bumps and bruises that life deals us...we are able to do things we couldn't, feel things we didn't and know things we wouldn't without the infiltrating power of the Holy Spirit.

You can find out more about it by searching for Beth Moore in google. This particular study is available via internet so you could do it on your own or DVDs are available for small group studies.

Thankful

Happy Thanksgiving! A day late. The day after Thanksgiving always marks a day that will always be in my memory and makes me feel even more thankful than eating turkey on Thanksgiving day does. Today is 3 years since I was treated for thyroid cancer. I am thankful to be healthy, have a beautiful daughter and a voice to sing songs with Aliza.

I remember when my vocal cords were paralyzed and I didn't know if I would ever speak above a whisper again just crying because I wanted to be able to sing to my children. Aliza absolutely loves music and singing songs and frequently as I sing with her I get choked up just because I feel so thankful that I can sing to her.

And since we are talking about thyroid issues.... This pregnancy has been hard on the thyroid levels. My levels dropped early in my pregnancy and I think they are low again. Most nights I am awake 2-3 hours during the night and I've had a couple times when I felt like I was going to pass out. Both could be attributed to thyroid. I go to the Dr. on Friday.

Grad School

Here I am....tyring to write a research paper and I find myself surfing the internet, writing random emails, and wishing someone would call so that I had a legitmate reason to cease writing. Research papers are instruments of torture. I'm so afraid that I won't cite something correctly or will paraphrase inaccurately and I'm rarely happy with the finished product. But I must be too hard on myself because my grades have always been very good. Maybe the most depressing part is that the subject matter is dry and the paper is always so uninteresting that no one will read it and I figure the professor must fall asleep repeatedly while grading. So....back to writing!!!!

Surprise Blessing

It was dark and rainy when I woke up this morning. Not a good combination for me. I have a tendency to just feel sad on really rainy days and being pregnant I could have cried all morning for no apparent reason. But my Mom called me at 10:00 and said that she and my Dad wanted to come lay a new kitchen floor for me this afternoon. Dad had some leftover laminate tiles from a rental and my floor was so old that it could literally not be kept clean. So this afternoon they laid the new floor. It looks so nice and clean and fresh. I felt so blessed that my parents would take an afternoon just to do something nice for me.

Sheats Family Reunion

Last weekend the Sheats family gathered to celebrate my Grandad's 80th birthday and my Gramma's 75th birthday. We hadn't been all together for 5 years so this was a special time of reconnecting and celebrating. We had 2 formal dinners....one to celebrate my cousin Hannah's wedding and the other for the birthday party. It takes a LONG time to set a table for 16 people.

I had one little mishap during the weekend. I was trying to catch my sister before she drove out of the driveway to Wal-Mart....I apparently forgot that I'm pregnant and jumped off the deck and took off running, but I tripped and did a face plant. My tummy was fine, but my nose and lip were red and the next morning my neck and arms were VERY sore. Oops!