We've been swimming the last two nights. There are three very good reasons for this:

1. Swimming at night = No bath for Peeler. Yes, we're lazy.

2. Swimming at night = Very tired Peeler when we get done.

3. We are very boring people and sitting in the house sucks.

We finally got smart tonight and brough P's pajamas with us to the pool so that when we were done we could just change her right out of her suit into the pj's. Worked well. Smart mommy.

I must say it's been a good week. First, I got my iPod. Second, Donald got a 20% raise at work. Then, we got our deposit in the mail from our old apartment. Today, Donald got a really nice Christmas bonus from work. Oh yeah, can't forget that I have the perfect Christmas present for Donald. Will have to tell you about that later, though, because he might read this.

We are so excited for Christmas. Well, at least I am. Donald is the grinch :o) Peeler has sooo much stuff under the tree already, and we're expecting two more boxes from Wisconsin today! Speaking of, I wish UPS would hurry up and get here because I'd really like to take a shower and got to CVS.

We've got the extra room almost cleaned out. The plan is to put a bed in there for my dad, and also use it as a playroom for P. Right now all of her toys are in the living room, and it's driving me crazy. I just need to be able to shut the door on the chaos, know what I mean?

The Hooters shop went better than expected. Mystery shopping is when you go to a business, rate the service, etc, then go home and fill out a questionnaire about it. You usually get paid to eat there or make a purchase, plus a fee. It's kinda fun...it's like you're spying on the employees, hehe. You basically just watch for all those things that companies require, then report on it. Easy cheesy. Anyway, the food was yummy, so that's what matters.

We had a quiet weekend, mostly. Saturday we had just a few Christmas errands to finish up, but it was crazy out there! Traffic on County Line Rd. was horrific - I think it took us about 20 mintues to drive from FedEx to our house, which is only about 2 miles away. Nuts. Donald was going crazy by the time we got home.

Today I went to CVS and Wal-Fart to get some groceries. I hate Wal-Mart. I usually go to Kroger, but I had a gift card for WM, so I went. Bleh. That place is my own personal hell. At least Donald stayed home with the kiddo so I could drive the cart in peace.

We went swimming tonight - we always go swimming on Sunday nights. A few weeks ago, Donald *invented* backwards swimming. LOL, don't ask. Anyway, he was being all big and bad about how he could almost swim all the way across the pool backwards and how hard it was. Soooo...I gave it a try and got all the way across the pool on the first try. LOL. He says he doesn't like being beaten at his own game. I'm a pretty good swimmer though (or at least I used to be), so maybe he shouldn't get too sad. He had to re-take swim all four years of high school :o( Poor Donald.

We kinda had a lazy weekend around here. Today I went through all of our CVS stuff and organized it so we can give more away and then donate the rest to a women's shelter. I also finished decorating the cookies and got a few tins ready to be mailed out to Wisconsin. We went swimming this evening for about an hour, then came back and just hung out.

Tomorrow we're going to Pearl River for two days just for the fun of it. We get coupons in the mail every month for two free nights, so why not. We're leaving after Peeler's swim lesson and we'll be back Wednesday morning.

Don't let me forget - I need to post a picture of all our CVS goodies! Seeing is believing :o)

The baking stage of sugar cookie maddness is over. Tomorrow the icing will begin. I believe I have about 9 dozen in all, so it should take me awhile! All I have is time, though. Heh.

Donald's sick now. I seem to have escaped the wrath of the germies for now. Hopefully it continues that way.

I have lots of stuff to write about schwooping around in my head right now, but no energy to write about it. Here's my list
~CVS and the crazy Kleenex lady
~Pictures of Peeler "helping" me make cookies today
~Entertaining Peeler while I'm on the phone and why I hate talking on the phone
~Boat parade on the Reservoir tomorrow night

Okay, maybe that's it. So I have a list, now I have to write about it. We'll see :o)

First, I have all of my baking and decorating supplies ready to go for tomorrow. Tomorrow night I'm baking and cooking till the cows come home. I'm sending goodies to some of my teacher friends at the church, my mom, and my dad in California. I think it's so sad that we're not going to get to be with any of our family this year, so I guess I'm providing myself with sweets for therapy. Hum.


Second, Donald and I bought Peeler a set of Mega Blocks for Christmas, but we couldn't contain ourselves and had to get them out to play with last night. We made some robot-looking guy, which Peeler promptly destroyed. We also came to understand why the Mega Bloks were so cheap and the Legos were so expensive: the Mega Bloks suck. They don't stay together for anything! Guess we should have spent the extra $20 for the real thing. Oh well, I doubt Peeler will care. Anyway, I forgot to take a pic of the robot guy, so here we are cleaning up. Note Donald's reach-y thing....since I bought him that, he won't bend over to pick anything up, not even toys. Lazy man.

Finally, I had to entertain myself for a while today by decorating Peeler with a bow. She didn't like it.

Finished, finally.....on to better things

Okay, so I just submitted my last task for my last class of the last term (never mind that the term ended a week ago), so that entitles me to some fun, right? Good...because I wasted like 3 hours today watching movies. First, if you haven't seen March of the Penguins, watch it, because it is awesome. I never thought I'd tear up over a penguin, but I did. Very good. Second, I watched the documentary, Jesus Camp. Also highly recommended but for entirely different reasons. That movie is frightening on so many different levels, and when I muster up enough brain function to write about it, I will.

Okay, on to Christmas cookies. For some reason, I like baking Christmas cookies. So far I've made some chocolate Andies mint cookies and almond bark pretzels (okay so really not a cookie but whatever). I think I'm going to make some sugar cookies, but beyond that I'm stumped. Anyone have any good suggestions? I'm not really one for all the "traditional" Christmas cookies, if you know what I mean....and simpler is better. I want to try Gingerbread, but I've never made it before, and I only like the soft kind. So I dunno, we'll see.

Ohh yes....I got everything done today that I wanted to do! Peeler (who's feeling much better) and I went to the Post Office, CVS, and the grocery store. So all of my Christmas cards and packages are mailed!!! Yippeeee! Tomorow I want to run to Target to pick up some tins for cookies so I can mail some to the far-away family, but I need to be home between 2-5 because I have something extra-special coming via UPS!!!! So excited!!!!!