CA Girl

It just isn't Christmas until I see my favorite commercial! Last year, I never saw it. It was just sad. This year I see it almost every night. I can't help but love it. But Christmas comes with or without my favorite commercial because Christmas isn't about Hershey Kisses ringing out We Wish You a Merry Christmas. It's about something that could never be duplicated and something that can only be best told by a blanket toting kid named Linus. From our house to yours, have yourselves a Merry Christmas!

After another day of dealing with the house, signing papers, and spending the better part of the day in my car I came to the conclusion that some of the Christmas traditions would have to be suspended until next week. These traditions are homemade candies. Every year since I got married, I have made homemade peanut butter cups and homemade butterfigners. They are very tasty and very time consuming! I will be sharing the process with you next week. One thing I do, is keep my promises. Something I learned from my mother. She never promised me anything that she didn't intend to keep. If she knew she couldn't keep a promise, she would say, "I won't promise you..." I do this now. My kids know that my promises are just that. A promise. I promised we would gift wrap. I specified that I wanted to just sit and rest a while. It had been a trying day. Well, I fell asleep. For just about 30 minutes. But hey, 30 minutes of shuteye can do a mind a world of good.

Yesterday I went to make our down payment on our house. We are now officially in Escrow. If only it were as simple as that sentence. Getting there is half the battle. Finding the place was an adventure in and of itself! I knew right where it was. I should know better by now. I haven't learned. GPS was invented for two kinds of people: geeks and hopeless people with no sense of direction. Guess which one I am. After some wrong turns and ending in a different part of town, I did manage to find my way with my pal GPS. No, mine does not have a name. I arrived at the Escrow office and I marched in there ready to write my check. It was at that exact moment that I realized I had no clue what I was doing. I didn't even know what to say. "Ummm hi. I'm buying a house. And I am supposed to write a check for the down payment...so that we can open escrow." Yeah...that sounds right. It went more like this.... "I am opening escrow today." "Are y

Before I begin, I want to say thank you all so much for your well wishes. I am doing better. Still coughing, but then that always lingers. Have you ever planned out something to the letter only to have life explode in your face and thus mocking your sad attempt to follow through on your plans? Or is it just me? Last week I had the 10 days before Christmas mapped out. On Wednesday my plan was to go to my Mom's to do some wrapping and watch a Christmas special. I did that. Thursday was likely going to be more wrapping at home and some cleaning. Friday would be grocery shopping and wrapping. Saturday would be a joint effort to clean and do laundry. Sunday would be church and rest. Monday would be mailing the Christmas newsletters and lead into the week of Christmas with candy making, cookie baking and everything Christmas!!! As most of you know, Thursday I was very sick. I seriously do not remember the last time I felt that sick. I couldn't have pushed through even if