The funniest story of 2010

So as 2010 comes to a close I have failed to post what was the funniest story of 2010 and it only happened about 3 weeks ago.

Rowan has been learning to use On Demand on the TV so she and Lily can watch Caillou whenever they want - how Caillou has become THE show in our house is completely beyond me - but I digress.

Like I said, a few weeks ago we were eating dinner and Rowan asks if she can be excused to go watch Caillou.  I ask her if she thinks she can get it on okay and she says yes.  She is gone a couple of minutes and comes back to say she could not find it.  I tell her she has to sit and wait then until we are all done.  About 5 minutes later we all finish eating and Rowan asks if I can come help her with Caillou now.  Sure I say, grabbing dishes to bring into the kitchen with me.  I come into the kitchen and glance at the TV to see where she got stuck and see hard core porn on the tv - not just porn - hard core porn.  Sweet mother of God.

I scream and grab for the remote to try and change the channel wondering how the hell there is channel broadcasting this at dinnertime!  That's when I realize - it is not on TV - it is On Demand - and Rowan bought it, bought it!! For $13.99!  And it's called "One Hole Two Poles" - *GASP* 

I looked at Parker and said "You have to call Comcast".

While he is on the phone I hear him say - "Yes ma'am, we just figured out how to put parental controls on."

Not so much at the time but now, damn funny story to tell.

360 days til Christmas

Maybe if I remind myself of that now I will be more prepared next year.  The trip the week before Thanksgiving this year threw me all off my holiday game.  I wouldn't trade that trip for anything but it did cause some agita with the holidays but another Christmas has come and gone now.  The girls were spoiled like normal and it was a quiet one this year with just the four of us and Joe and Diane.  I did a tortiere on Christmas Eve and the traditional wreath on Christmas morning but for dinner on Christmas we had stuffed shells, sausage, meatballs, garlic bread and caesar salad.  It was fantastic!!!   May have to do that again next year or do something non traditional at least, like tacos!  Funny how I can start planning the food for next year but will do all my gift shopping in the last 3 weeks again.  LOL.

We also broke with more tradition and did three things differently this year:
1) We did not go to church on Christmas Eve - last year the service was not as good as it has been in the past because of the change in pastors and this year none of us was really willing to go so, so be it
2) Instead we went over to Paul and JoAnn's get together for an hour or so so they could all see the girls and we could see all of them - it was nice
3) Diane was little miss impatient this year and wanted the girls to open all their presents from them on Christmas Eve.  Parker resisted for a few hours but eventually caved - the girls were thrilled!

Lily could not have been more thrilled with that shovel - kept saying she was going to help Daddy in the snow with it.  Then there was bubble wrap in another package and that was the end - favourite gift hands down, bubble wrap.

After that excitement had died down they got the cookies and milk ready for Santa and laid their stockings out.  Then they got to hold Marschelle and say good bye until next year.

A few giggles but not too many concerns about Santa coming into their room and they were off to dream of sugar plums and presents.

Everyone slept until 730 on Christmas morning - except Joe and Diane, I think they were up earlier waiting for us! 

Santa had come while we slept.

An hour and a half later everything was open and the playing had begun.

Fa La La La La, La La La La

4 days til Christmas and my true love gave to me - the shortest day of the year.  Happy Winter Solstice.

So the truth is the girls are done and most of the food is bought.  Most of the baking is done, house is decorated inside and out, now I just have to clean the house and wrap the other 90% of gifts.  Argh.

Still didn't stop us from partaking in another holiday festival this past Saturday.  We went out to Koziar's Christmas Village about an hour and a half away.  Heard good things about it, figured it was worth a look.  Just the four of us went - it was a long drive and in retrospect going the Saturday before Christmas was probably a bad idea because it was packed, packed!  The girls seemed to enjoy it though and that's all that counts.

Lily's first haircut

Poor Lily -she is so the second child.  Rowan's first haircut was a photographed and videotaped affair with both Parker and I in attendance.  Lily's was at school from one of the teachers (Miss Sheena) and neither Parker nor I were there.  She really needed one and kept telling me she did not want it get it done - then another girl at school had her haircut and apparently all Lily wanted then was to get her haircut.  So we arranged it and thankfully Ali took some pictures for us at least - and of course they saved a lock of hair.

Her curls bounced back tight as ever so it seems she is destined to have curly hair for awhile still.

It's beginning to look alot like Christmas

Just not a white one yet unfortunately.

Good news though, Parker is done with his jury duty.  It lasted 8 days with him not getting home until almost 8pm every night and one night not getting home until 1230am!  But it is done - we survived and now we can scramble for Christmas.

Better news - my back is almost back to normal.  Still not 100% but I can pretty much function now and that is a huge difference from a week ago so, Phew.

This past Friday was Joe's birthday so the four of us went up there on Saturday for a get together.  Rowan and Lily made a recording singing Happy Birthday to him.  Very cute and he loved it.  Saturday was also the Dads Breakfast with Santa at Rowan's school.  Parker was a volunteer and had to be there at 6am!  Breakfast was between 8-11 so the girls and I made it over there around 930 and stayed until about 1045 or so.  We ate, the girls made some crafts, talked to Santa and generally ran around having a great time and loving the fact that their dad was involved in everything.

Yesterday was raining on and off and after figuring out what all we had to do to prepare for Christmas still and what we wanted to do with the kids we decided yesterday would be a good day for a train ride.  We took McKenzie with us and grabbed the train down to the city to see the light show at Macy's.

The kids had a great time on the train.  We got to the city about half an hour before the show started so we walked the couple of blocks to Macy's and grabbed our spot on the 3rd floor for the best view.  The show starts on the hour, every hour, and lasted about 12 minutes.  It was cute - alot of hype that it maybe does not live up to for adults but the three kids we had loved it and oohed and ahhed along the way.

Also on the 3rd floor Macy's has something called the Dickens Village - I thought it would be like Byer's Choice with doll displays depicting the story but I was wrong.  These were large animatronics that led you through the whole thing.  It was really good - so good in fact we went through it twice!

After that we walked over to the Reading Terminal Market to try and grab some lunch but it was packed and trying to watch three kids amongst a surging crowd was a little nerve wracking so we headed back out and went to the Field House attached to  Market St East.  That made us right near the train home, so a few stores later we were back on the train and on the way home.