The bakery at the supermarket had decorated cupcakes for the big game.

You could buy a half dozen where half (that’s three, for those of you not into higher math) had black frosting and the other half had yellow frosting.

OK.

Then there were other half dozen packages.  Half were green.

The other half were…orange.

Um.  Hum.

I bought eggs to make our own. 

We’ll be using green and yellow frosting.

We all just need to become saints.

My children have been lamenting their horrid lot in life.  They’ve been feeling deprived…poor unfortunate souls.  Their cruel parents have forced them to live in a place where it does not snow.  How ever would they survive the winter? 

So, when it did snow yesterday, I had to take a picture to prove to them that, so far, not a winter has passed them by without some white stuff. 

Don’t you see it filling the sky?  No?  Look really closely.  You might see some white streaks…

 We even had some accumulation.  On the porch furniture.  See it?

 Here’s a close up.  It’s not sand…it’s snow.  I assure you.

As I went through the winter clothes bucket, I found these Lands End boots.  They are infant size 6, and Mary is a size 7.  It seems pointless to donate them to the local thrift store, don’t you think? 

I can’t think of any little girls who live in colder climes.  If you or anyone you know needs them, please email me.  They are free to a good home.

The kids keep getting bigger, year after year, but the parents haven’t changed a bit.

Or have they?  (And I’m just in denial about everybody’s extra wrinkles and gray hairs, including my own?)

My hero for the day is Ginger Littleton who snuck up behind a crazed, gun-toting man with a death wish and whacked him on the arm with her purse.

For her courage, I commend her.

Unfortunately, all she did was annoy him.  She was very lucky he didn’t shoot her in the head.

The lesson to be learned: never take a purse to a gun fight.

Despite being a somewhat organized person, I’ve been flying by the seat of my pants this Advent season.  Things like, opening up my morning toothbrushing companion on December 8th to have it remind me that it’s a Holy Day of Obligation.  Or remembering at 4 pm on December 12th that the store didn’t have the Mexican dishes I planned to serve in honor of Our Lady of Guadalupe when I went shopping three days earlier and I now needed to run out and get them.

Christmas cards are another thing that I just hadn’t gotten around to thinking about until last weekend when I realized that time was beginning to run short.  Fortunately, I found out that Shutterfly was offering 50 free cards to approved bloggers who wrote about them.  (I got approved!  Woohoo!!).

I know for certain that Shutterfly is easy to use and has super fast delivery.  Bill came home from Afghanistan on December 18th and I used that homecoming photo for our cards. 

OK, so maybe the cards were a teeny bit late…but that was the fault of the addresser of envelopes (me!), not Shutterfly, I assure you.

Besides being quick and easy, I love that Shutterfly’s Christmas cards have the exact message you want to send.  You can make it Christ-centered if you choose, or you can make it more generic if that isn’t your style (or your audience’s style).  Shutterfly will also stamp and mail your cards for you if you want.  Expensive, but convenient.

Besides photo cards, Shutterfly offers loads of photo gifts.  Since my kids’ biggest present this year is a trip (not an easy thing to wrap!), I decided to make a photo puzzle which will serve as a clue to where we’re going.  Four of my children will get a section of the puzzle (the other two are too little to participate and their pictures aren’t in the photo clue anyway).  I think that will be a fun way to tell them the surprise, plus it gives me something to wrap and put under the tree.

I don’t think I’ve ever linked so much to one place in one post before, but there you go.  My whole-hearted endorsement of Shutterfly for all your photo-personalized desires.

Now I just need to get haircuts for the boys, coordinate clothing and get 8 people to smile all at once.

Today was one of those terrible, horrible, rotten, no-good days.  I must have gotten up on the wrong side of the bed.  I even screwed up making coffee.  Twice.

So when I pulled up to the gate this afternoon and handed the guard my ID and she asked me, “How are you today?”  I answered, “Fine, thank you,” even though I didn’t really mean it.  And I asked her, “How are you?” because I am polite, and because I really do care, in a small way, and strive hard to recognize that it is a person and not an automaton with whom I am dealing. 

And she answered, “I am blessed.  Thank you for asking.”

And I drove away thinking, “Maybe this isn’t such a  terrible, horrible, rotten, no-good day after all.”

Because, in the final analysis, I am blessed, too.  Big time.  And my grumpiness is an ungrateful forgetfulness of that fact.

“You don’t have a TV, do you?”

“Yes. We use it so the kids don’t hear us doing that which causes this.”

Breakfast: Pumpkin-Cranberry Bread

Lunch: Lemon Meringue Pie

Dinner: Apple Pie

I don’t typically have desserts during Advent, so I’m trying to get rid of leftovers.  At least I’m getting my fruits and veggies in.

I impart no significance to the Feast of St. Crispin except that Fritz is memorizing Shakespeare’s St. Crispin’s Day speech which really is a fabulous oratory.  Makes you want to pick up your sword and charge into a bunch of Frenchmen…(ok, not really).  But inspiring nonetheless. 

This day is call’d the feast of Crispian.

He that outlives this day, and comes safe home,
Will stand a tip-toe when this day is nam’d,
And rouse him at the name of Crispian.
He that shall live this day, and see old age,
Will yearly on the vigil feast his neighbours,
And say ‘To-morrow is Saint Crispian.’
Then will he strip his sleeve and show his scars,
And say ‘These wounds I had on Crispian’s day.’

Most people are familiar with the line “We few, we happy few, we band of brothers…” but my favorite bit is the ending.

And gentlemen in England now-a-bed
Shall think themselves accurs’d they were not here,
And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks
That fought with us upon Saint Crispin’s day.


And I wonder if men today hold their manhoods cheap while in the presence of our combat veterans.  But then I think that too many don’t even know what honor and glory are all about.