The Night Before Christmas...

And all were NOT sleeping!

A few years ago, I heard of a tradition taking your kids photos while they slept, the night before Christmas.  I loved the idea, and have done it ever since.

As I went into Connor's room to get my Christmas 2012 shot, THIS is what I found!  One very bad little cat!!  Fortunately for Fluffernutter, Connor is one of those deep sleepers that would need something a lot more obnoxious than a cat crawling on your head to wake up.

Anyway, here's Connor.  He looks so little, doesn't he?  I can almost still see his little 3-year old face before he turned into this big giant middle school kid who is 100x smarter than I am and refuses to wear Christmas pajamas any longer.   *sigh*  *sniff*  Awww, and look at his little hands folded!  Connor's such a proper, tidy sleeper.  Very unlike his brother and sister...

...but here's Noah in a surprisingly "normal" position. Usually he's flailed all over the place with his stomach out and hands "keeping warm" down his pants.  But look, he has a little smile!  Despite knowing we're having a "screen-free" Christmas, meaning NO NEW VIDEO GAMES, he's still a happy little No, excited for Christmas (assuming his huge Domo creature doesn't make a midnight snack out of him - doesn't it look like that thing is about to pounce??).

Here we go, this is classic, always ladylike (not!) Shelby - sideways with a zillion stuffed animals.  THIS, my dear Shelby, is why no one ever wants to do sleepovers with you!  Your 100+ horse/dinosaur/dragon posse and your sleeping acrobatics have actually been proven to wake the dead (meaning Connor!).

Heartwarmed.

So, we hosted our first annual "Ritchie Family Heartwarming Hot Chocolate Open House" this past weekend for our friends from church.  We'd talked about reviving our New Years parties from many years past but that seemed too overwhelming, and something like a Christmasy open house seemed much easier.  That's what we thought, anyway...

We put the kids to work with the preparations.  Here's Noah smashing candy canes for the hot chocolate toppings bar, entertaining himself by shouting, "I'll show YOU, candy cane!"

Noah and Shelby were also in charge of the grapes dipped in caramel.  And they actually did make more than they ate!

Anyway, we thought, oh, it will be nice to have a couple of friends drop in for a cup of hot chocolate and chat a bit, then move on, while a few more dropped by.  You know, a nice and peaceful and casual evening.

But ummmmmmm, as Shelby stated, "I think everyone on all the Earth who wasn't sick came to our party!"

We were overwhelmed by just how many of our local friends came by!  And you all came pretty much all at the same time, within about 20 minutes of the start time.  And then, ummmmmmmm, you didn't really leave after just a little while and one cup of hot chocolate.  But like I said, overwhelmed in a great way!

This was just the beginning…. and these are the only photos I had because after that I couldn't even get to my camera on the kitchen counter!

And sorry to those who couldn't find parking on our street (!), and sorry to anyone in addition to the Blanches who actually TRIED to leave after a while but couldn't because they couldn't get back to our front door.  Sorry, but that cracks me up.  In a good way!  I'm glad you stayed longer, Amy!

Love this photo of Kent (left) hanging with the kid crowd watching The Polar Express.  And now that I think about it, that is the EXACT spot where we found hot chocolate spilled on the carpet …. Hmmmm.

Rosie brought us a blinged out Christmas disco ball, knowing we were disco ball aficionados (after seeing one hanging in our car).  Fabulouso!  I hung that right up to add to the festivities going on at the stove with Mark, the hot chocolate brewer.

We also collected over 50 homemade snowflakes to send to the new school the Sandy Hook CT students will begin attending in January.  We have amazingly talented snowflake-making friends!

We bought 3 big ole' cans of hot chocolate mix and EIGHTY cups!  I thought we'd have oodles of extra stuff.  But nope, when the last guests left, we had ONE cup left.  We used up 79 cups????  I do feel horribly guilty about all that styrofoam in the landfills.  79!  Eeeep!  But there wasn't even enough hot chocolate left to fill that last cup anyway!

And thank you to those guests who brought food even though I told everyone not to worry about that.  Because we ran out of food at about 40 minutes.  Crikeys!  And I consider myself a pretty decent party planner.  FAIL on that one, Estelle!  But you all stuck around anyway!

We let visiting kids go play upstairs and evidently a second party was going on in Shelby's room, unbeknownst to all of us.  When Shelby discovered the state her room was left in, she, in all her fussiness, exclaimed, "My room is a wreck!  I just can't live like this!"  Drama much, little girl??

Some of you worried about our cleanup afterwards, but you didn't know that we had our own free in-house cleaning crew, Tiki & Wolfie. They are quite excellent and I highly recommend them.

While the cleanup crew worked, Mark and I had time to get a late night dinner at Taco Bell, come home and put our feet up and watch the finale of Next Iron Chef.

This is a great time of year, and we are blessed to have great friends.  Thank you one and all for coming out and visiting with us.  

See you next year!  :)

12/12/12 Commemorated! For, Like, The Next 15 Years...

So, it was about noon today, 12:00pm on 12/12/12, that I remembered - TODAY IS AN EPICALLY AWESOME and once-in-a-lifetime date!  I HAD to do something!!

I immediately called Mark at work to let him know of this critical emergency situation, and as I was talking to him and Googling "cool stuff to do on 12/12/12" I realized that at the KEY TIME on this date - 12:12 on 12/12/12 - we were talking about what to DO on 12/12/12.  Drat!  But we still had time to do SOMETHING even if we missed the magic hour and minute....

Buy 12 things for each kid?  Too expensive.  And darnit, our kids are already so spoiled that we've instituted a "no-screen" and 4-present limit this Christmas (and only one of those four is a "fun" present - yes, we're very scroogey parents this year, determined to reform our whiny whitebread suburban kids).

Give the kids each 12 bucks and take 'em on a shopping spree at the Dollar Store?  Possibly, but it'd just be buying cheapo lame-o toys that'd be broken and thrown away on 12/13/12.

Bake them 12 cookies each?  Ummmm, heck no.  Terrible idea. Too much sugar in late afternoon.  I know some charitable-minded people were baking 3 sets of a dozen cookies to give away to 3 families, but let's be real - 3 dozen cookies ain't leavin' my house (or hips) alive.

WHAT TO DO !  WHAT TO DO!!   Eeeeeeeeek....

And then I had a flash of inspiration!  Wouldn't it be fabulous to get a new pet and then name it Twelve?  YES! And then we'd have a long-term, commemorative reminder of 12/12/12 instead of just a one-day thing.  Brilliant, I yam!

Mark then (very lamely) suggested 12 new fish.  But every time we get new fish they get eaten by Hoover (a gigantic black so-ugly-he's-not-even-remotely-cute pleckosomething...) .  Which Mark knows.  Which is why he suggested that.  How rotten is that!

My entire life I've had little raggedy white hairy dogs.  My beloved Bichon, Casey, who we had for 15 years, passed away about 3 years ago and I've missed Casey himself of course, but also missed just having a little white hairy dog in my life.

My Caseylein

From time to time I scour Craigslist or the SPCA website or Bichon Rescue groups to see if there's a little Bichon that needs a home.  I'm totally against buying pets because there are just too many mixed breeds (that are WONDERFUL) that need homes.  Anyway, another little raggedy white hairy dog just never showed up.  Sadness continued to haunt my footsteps...

Okay, but seriously, I would send Mark photos of cute little white dogs from time to time, or put them on his desk, and every time I'd see one on the street I'd shriek and beg him to steal it from the owner for me. (I won't buy a purebred but I have no qualms about stealing one.)

While I was Googling hairy white dogs as fast as I could, Mark spotted a little teeny ad for a little teeny Maltese Bichon puppy!  The owner texted me this photo (an Amish couple that texts - who knew?), and look at the photo title - 12/12/12/14:12!  Coolness! 

After that photo, I was hurrying out of my pajamas, Mark was leaving work early, we were picking up kids early from school, throwing together towels and leashes and collars and driving an hour out to Waterloo to pick up MY NEW PRECIOUS!  I know, I know, I was supposed to do something for 12/12/12 for my kid gang, but hey, they were happy to get to play their DSs mid-week (DS videogame time is typically only on Friday nights) and eat potato chips on the drive, and that was commemoration enough for them.

So, introducing...... Wolfgang Ritchie!  Wolfie for short.  Derived from the German word for twelve which is "zwölf."  Yeah yeah, it's a stretch, but it works!  And I know that when you read above that I was going to name a pet Twelve, you thought that was dumb, right?!?  And it kinda was.  Wolfgang is much cooler.

Wolfie looks like a mini-Casey, grubby mouth and all.

And technically, we did have a "pet opening."  A few months ago, we had to put Chili (another 15-year pet for us) to sleep.  Sadly, Chili was old and ornery and never did like Tiki, our 2-year old lonely lab.

Chili.  Ornery but awesomely so.  Animals with attitudes are the BEST!

So of course, Tiki is OVERJOYED.  She believes that Wolfie is HER Precious. 

Finally, here's the sun setting on 12/12/12 with me and my little Wolfgang Wolfie Zwolfie.  12/12/12 commemorated in the nick of time!  Whew! 

A Christmas Tale That Tells Itself

This blog entry will be my least-wordy ever.   (HEY! I don't want to hear you clapping or cheering!!)

All you need to know is:

1)  I caved and bought an Elf on the Shelf (click here for blog post documenting that)

2) We named our elf Reaper.  (Yes, that was MY idea.  Teehee.  And because the kids seconded my nomination for this name, I'm pretty sure they don't know the meaning behind it.  Teehee.)

Now just view the photos and watch the story unfold...

Noah is absolutely terrified of Reaper.  Which means, IT'S WORKING!!!!!!  WOOHOO!!!!!

Spending Money Wisely

Spending money for a nice lunch out is always a wise choice!  UNLESS you spend it on Mexican food in New York.  Then it's always a surefire waste of money.  And yet I keep doing it, stupidly thinking that SOMEDAY it will get better.  Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice .....or 10 billion times, well what can I say?  I'm an idiot, but still a hopeful idiot.  Ay yi yi.

Anyway, here we are at lunch at bland & mediocre Cantina Laredo, sans Noah and Connor, who were stuck at school.  Yesssss!  We like to sneak away for lunch without 'em because it's a) cheaper (especially since Connor now thinks he's too manly to order from kids menus), b) MUCH quieter and MORE peaceful and c) we can sit in a booth.

To maintain this peace & quiet, I bribed Shelby with the promise of a Snickers bar to sit next to Daddy and play Tic Tac Toe with him.

They had a good time, and so did I, NOT having to play Tic Tac Toe with Shelby who CHEATS shamelessly.

After lunch, we decided to walk around a little, and then Shelby spotted Santa Claus.  ERG!  Now, we have never ever had our kids photographed with Santa.  I just think it's weird and creepy and we don't really even focus on Santa at Christmas.  I mean, my parents never took ME to get photographed sitting on Santa's lap, and look how I turned out?  I'm a glorious, productive member of society, right?!?  Though, you would think with my penchant for terrorizing my kids, I would LIKE this sitting-on-Santa practice......hmmmm....

And besides!, Connor never bought into the whole Santa thing and he's continually told Noah since Noah's birth that Santa was a fake.  As a matter of fact, a few weeks ago I found Noah crying in his bed, and I soon found out that EVIL BIG BROTHER Connor informed his sweet trusting little brother by way of a lovely, charming little bedtime story (NOT!) that there wasn't going to BE a Christmas this year because of the Mayan end of the world prediction for December 21.  Uggh!  CONNOR!

Anyway, Santa sorta slipped off our radar over the years, but Shelby still recognized him and immediately began shrieking, never having before seen Santa IN REAL LIFE.    So, we ventured over and I was thinking "Awwww, maybe we should finally do it, this whole creepy Santa's lap thing" and then I saw that they wanted $30 FOR THE STARTER PHOTO PACKAGE!  That's even more than they charge at theme parks for those photos of you at your horrible screaming best, and at least those document a (presumably) GOOD memory!

$30!!!!  For a creepy photo!  AY YI FREAKIN' YI.  That would NOT be money spent wisely.

Here's Mark dragging Shelby away from Santa.  She didn't take the turn of events well.

Mark then got the bright idea to go up to the second level where Shelby could look down and get a better look at Santa but without having to be assaulted by Santa's super-pushy sales squad.  And I cheerfully told her, "Shelby!  We can still take your photo with Santa!  Stand still!"

I doctored up that lovely, high-quality cell phone photo with a corny holiday frame and viola!  Pretty much the same thing for free!  *pats thrifty self on back*

Shelby refused to lose sight of Santa, constantly yelling down to him despite the fact that he only had attention for the PAYING customers.  She refused to leave and kept hiding behind this enormous plant-tree-thing.

We finally got her out of the mall and the waterworks stopped when I reminded her of the Snickers bar waiting in the car for her.  Now THAT was $2 wisely spent!

And since I didn't waste $30 on a disturbing Santa picture, I decided to make what I'm sure will turn out to be a VERY wise investment with that $30- an Elf on the Shelf!  I am NOT above using scare tactics (like a creepy plastic elf) to get my kids to start behaving better and parents SWEAR that this thing really works!  After some internet research, I found zillions of clever ideas to introduce Elf on the Shelf to your family, including elaborate family parties and red carpet events.  Pffffft.  I decided to go for the simpler, more direct route, you know, to let my kids know that this was SERIOUS. 

Here's a closeup of my investment.  This little scene will be their introduction to Elf on the Shelf tomorrow morning.  Merry Christmas, gang.  *heh heh heh*  Let the games begin...

Cat Behavior...Unexplained

So, our beloved little Fluffernutter (introduced to you in this post: http://markandestelle.blogspot.com/2012/07/another-summer-surprise-wednesday.html) is almost now a full-sized, grownup, mature cat.

In size, anyway.

In every other way, she's at that obnoxious I mean CUTE and ADORABLE post-kitten phase of getting into EVERYTHING.  And Fluffer's preferred choice of toy?

Tampons.



No matter where I hide them in my bathroom or closet she digs them back out.

It's interesting how quickly you get used to stuff being around that really shouldn't be around when you see it everyday.  Tampons, both opened and unopened, strewn around the floor everywhere?  Yep, that's pretty normal for these parts...

But at least the kids have finally stopped asking what exactly tampons are.  So it's all good.  Until we have company...

And in other unusual cat entertainment news,  Fluffernutter loves to watch me play Ticket to Ride.

But she doesn't watch The Walking Dead anymore since Shane turned into a zombie and they offed him.  I was upset about that, too.

McDonalds, always a hit for pets and kids (and look at Shelby's cute sparkly toes in the corner!)...

Fluffer has made friends (playthings) with everyone in the house (whether they liked it or not).

Meatball is on the side of "or not" in the friends department, but Troublenutter I mean Fluffernutter is very persistent.  I love Meatball's aggravated face here...

...and his resigned face here.

Meatball, it could be worse.  YOU could have to take your pets to the vet and always have to confirm, "YES his name is really Meatball" and "YES her name is Fluffernutter" and endure the looks and the snickering.

Yes (as if there were any doubt), I AM a crazy cat lady, because few things make me happier than a sight like this.  Although a 4-tiered kitty tower with FOUR cats on it would be even better (ooo did you just hear Mark scream?  Bet ya heard him in Vegas, Tawny!).  Sign me up for the next crazy cat lady pride parade!

And seriously, who DOESN'T want to come back as a pampered housecat like Finneaus in their next life???  Does she make it look good or WHAT?

OUR Traditional (but very un-traditional) Thanksgiving Tradition

Happy Thanksgiving 2012!

As has been the case for several years now, Mark is either just returning from an Africa trip right before Thanksgiving or just leaving for an Africa trip the day after Thanksgiving.

From this drunken-look photo, it's pretty obvious that Mark had just returned from a 3-week Africa trip and was suffering through jetlag.  AND, based on the lack of decorations or nice place settings, it's also even MORE obvious that Mark had just returned, and that I was too blimey exhausted to do anything special.  I feel compelled (meaning, my mom called me and chewed me out) to mention, however, that my mom was here for a long visit while Mark was gone and helped me out *immensely*. THANK YOU, MOM. So, truth be told, basically, I didn't do anything special for Thanksgiving because I'm basically a lazy schmuck.

Anyway, this travel schedule always means that I want as low-key a Thanksgiving holiday as possible - to either rest up & prepare for an upcoming long stretch of single parenthood, or to recover from a grueling long stretch of single parenthood that I just survived.  This typically means NO trips and usually NO company.   Oh, and again as evidenced by the photo, pajamas all day are a must - so NO clothes, either.  And I know it might be kinda rude and I absolutely don't mean to be, but I also typically turn down any invitations we receive to go to someone else's house - I just can't deal with clothes and belts and makeup and hoopla on Thanksgiving.  We're basically tired and smelly grubs in elastic pajama pants on Thanksgiving and you wouldn't want us over anyway, I promise.

Another Thanksgiving "issue" is that I don't particularly like ANY traditional Thanksgiving food (don't like turkey, don't like cranberries, don't like stuffing, don't like pie, and especially don't like sweet potatoes), so OUR particular traditional Thanksgiving consists of making everyone's favorite foods and then sharing the yummy smorgasboard.  It doesn't vary much from year to year, though I was surprised that Spongebob macaroni & cheese was NOT invited to our Thanksgiving this year - that's been on either Noah's or Shelby's menu wishlist for years.  Anyway, here's the lineup:

• Mark's most-thankful for foods:  Barbeque ribs
• My most-thankful for foods:  Diet Coke & Angie Bailey's special sauce wings (I believe this is 4 or 5 years in a row now for these??  They also make appearances for every Mothers Day and every birthday.)
• Connor's most-thankful for foods:  Pasta and ribs and pumpkin pie
• Noah's most-thankful for foods:  Fruit salad and french fries
• Shelby's most-thankful for foods:  Blueberry pancakes and french fries

~*~*~*~

We started a new tradition this year, instead of writing in our family's gratitude journal, that we'd write on gratitude leaves - thank you, Pinterest (your recipes basically suck but this crafty idea was a hit...sort of).   Anyway, some notable items for which we, the Ritchie family, were thankful:

• Sumo wrestlers
• James Bond
• Tylenol
• Mustaches
• And Diet Coke may have shown up more than once.  Or twice.  Or a dozen.  (Don't forget, Mark was gone for the entire Gratitude Wreath project and Diet Coke is seriously all that gets me through single parenthood).  

This SEEMED like a good idea....until the kids started to fight over who got what color leaf, who got to write, who got to pin, who got to write "Grandma" for the day, what COLOR pin for their leaf.... seriously.  I wanted to stick the pins in my eyes and ears and will be OH-SO-THANKFUL when I can document this lovely craft for our eternal family memories (hmmmfpph!) ...and then THROW IT OUT.  Don't count on it making it into our Thanksgiving traditions next year, folks.

I mentioned that we share our favorite foods, but I'm very thankful no one in my family likes spicy foods, so I get to enjoy ALL those yummy wings ALL by myself and don't have to share.  And Mark and I  have 4 weeks of Walking Dead episodes to catch up on now that he's home, and nothing says Happy Thanksgiving like a TV zombie apocalypse marathon, right?  So, Happy Thanksgiving to me after all.  :)