So… I’ve been a little remiss with this here blog.  But November is busy.  Especially with the knitting 24/7 that is going on around here.  But we’ve had birthdays, and there’s Thanksgiving and other social things going down, visits from family, visiting family… Oy.  You get the picture.  I feel something akin to a chicken (turkey?) with it’s head cut off these days.  I have several projects that I want desperately to get done by December.  I don’t think that’s realistically going to happen, but I am hoping to get as much done as I can.

Who knew that a year later, I would be a knitter bogged down with projects?

Anyhow, Thanksgiving is tomorrow (!).  We’re driving down into California to spend the day with some family and then we’re driving to San Jose that evening to stay at my parents’ place for the weekend.   I don’t think we thought the details of this endeavor all the way through as we neither have $ at the moment (we will… eventually!) and we also didn’t consider that we needed someone to watch the dogs.  WHOOPS.   We have it all figured out now, thankfully, but for a minute there I was wondering what the heck our problem was.  It’s almost like, “Oh yeah! We’re going to be gone for several days!  I forgot!”

Lame.

The good thing about not being paid for a few more days is that we won’t be tempted to try to do the Black Friday thing down in San Jose.  To be honest, I was a little nervous about attempting it.   Here in Reno, Black Friday is one thing.  But down in San Jose, it’s something else altogether.  I just don’t think I’m up for it.   Weep not, for Cyber Monday follows and I full intend to take advantage of that to the full extent of my abilities.

So far this year?  Not really feeling it yet.  I hope that happens soon.  So far it’s been stress, stress, stress.  You try to rise above it, but it’s hard when everyone else around you is stressed too.   I’m sure it’ll ease up.   For the moment, however, it’s hard to see beyond obligations, shopping and dollar signs.  I definitely don’t feel as with it as I did last year.  I guess you can’t have it together all the time, right?

So how is everyone else doing with the holidays this year?  Please tell me there is someone out there who is more together than I am.

Wow, I made it through NaBloPoMo!  Of course, was it ever really a question?  What with me being a Blog Posting Goddess and all.  I hardly even broke a sweat this year.  Go me.

Ahem.  Anyhow.

How many of you have a fridge full of leftovers?  We’ve had a goodly amount of turkey dinner redux this weekend, but we didn’t overdo it either.  Still, I’m looking forward to a turkey sandwhich for lunch today.  As it turns out, we don’t just have Thanksgiving leftovers around here.  I found a bunch of pictures on my iPhone and a couple on my camera that I have neglected to share.  So I’m putting them up for you to enjoy.  Isn’t that sweet of me?

This… well… there are no words.  It’s a display in the mall for a bathroom redecorating place.  And yes.  That’s a camoflage SHOWER.

Quite possibly the cutest little napper you’ll ever see.  Cozied up in our bed with her Build-a-Bear friend.

I think I took this on Thanksgiving.  She had taken a morning nap in her crib and woke up all smiles.  Aww!

dd1Waiting for our cups o’ joe (though, truthfully, only I got coffee.  Kile got tea and Harry got hot chocolate) at Starbucks drive-thru on Black Friday.

Liam enjoys a sampling of the chocolate candies I slaved away over all day Saturday that were going into our gift bags.

Beetoe ate half of them while we were out yesterday.

I don’t want to talk about it.

Liam tries out my boots.  The child has a serious shoe thing.

Happy December, ya’ll!  Let’s hope this month brings us some awesome things (and I’m not just talking presents here either).

I saw this on a blog yesterday but OF COURSE I was far too lazy to star the post so I could go back and remember where I saw it.  So… my apologies to the original mind behind this post.  I’m sorry I’m both so unoriginal and lazy.  You really think I would have learned by this point.  

So the idea here is that everyone knows the big things we’re thankful.  Our families.  Our health.  Our security.  Etc and so forth.  And I am very, very thankful every day that our lives are what they are.  I’m truly in a place that I never would have imagined 10 or 15 years ago.  And I love where I am.  I love my life (well… most of it).  The thing is, everyone knows I’m thankful for that.  So reading a post about how I’m so grateful for our family or Kile’s job security or the roof over our head isn’t quite too interesting.   (Not that anyone will be reading this anyhow because everyone is busy with family today but WHATEVER, work with me here!)

So instead, I’m going to post a list of completely and utterly superficial things that I am thankful for this Thanksgiving.  These things have virtually no importance or significance.  But I love them and am thankful for them all the same.  Plus, I’m thinking I can combine this with the whole “Days of Grace” series so… WOO HOO, two birds with one stone!  Love that! 

• Jack’s Big Music Show – for being a show that I can watch over and over and over again without wanting to scratch my eyes out.  And for being funny and entertaining on top of that. 
• Black Friday online sales – So that I don’t have to get up and leave the house at some ungodly hour tomorrow.  
• Amazon.com having Harry’s “big ticket” Christmas present in stock and at a great price yesterday.  Woo hoo!  
• Robert Pattinson.  *purrr*
• Vanilla Chai Spice creamer in my coffee.  
• My iPhone – It continues to rock my world.  
• My cozy jammies and robe – so wonderful on a chilly, wet morning like this!
• Owen Wilson – particularly in “You, Me and Dupree”, but I just love him in everything.  
• Mashed Potato Casserole.  Nuff said. 
• Robert Pattinson.  Oh, did I mention him already?
• Okay fine… Edward Cullen then.  *swoon*

I saw Carrisa posting her Thanksgiving menu and I got inspired to do the same.  Except ours is probably MORE pathetic since ours will only be for TWO adults and one nine year old. Liam may eat some table scraps.  Evie gets a jar.  Yeah, we just had to beat off the social invites this year with a STICK, I tell ya.

And even goofier?  I’m not the one who will be doing the vast majority of the cooking.  HEE!  Yeah, Kile is doing it because Kile is the bomb.  So, as far as I know, this is our menu:

• Turkey!  Of course!  I’m not sure how big it is, but it’s rather small.  We’d like to brine it but with the shopping and everything tonight?  Not sure if it’ll happen.  Chances are it’ll be your average turkey.  Which is fine by me because nothing beats turkey sandwiches the next day.
• Gravy.  Duh.
• Stuffing.  We don’t actually stuff the bird though, so it’s “okay”.  (That sound you heard was me rolling my eyes.)
• Mashed Potato Casserole.  It’s unbelievably bad for you but tastes SO good.  My mom always made this for Thanksgiving and Christmas and it’s pretty much not the holidays without it.
• Roasted Asparagus?  We’re still considering this one.  Pioneer Woman’s recipe, of course.
• Butternut Squash Puree.  I don’t care if you don’t like squash, you need to try this stuff at least once in your life.  IT WILL TAKE OVER YOUR SOUL.
• Rolls.  We’ve found that if you take Pillsbury pizza dough and make little balls out of it that they make FANTASTIC rolls.  So we’re gonna do that.
• We’re sorely tempted to try these green beans.  Don’t they look awesome?  If we do these, we probably will skip the asparagus.
• Cranberry sauce.  From the can.  What??
• Pumpkin Pie.  it’s not Thanksgiving without it!
• Cherry Pie?  This is my wish.  I would love cherry pie.
• Sparkling Apple Cider.  Martinelli’s.  Again, not Thanksgiving without it.
• Wine.  I’m thinking a nice Pinot Grigio.  You like how it seems like I know what I’m talking about?

And… that’s it.  I think that’s enough, don’t you?  GAH.  So what are you having?  And what’s your favorite?  Mine is the mashed potatoes.  BY FAR.  Though I do have a fondness for those turkey sandwhiches.

My left hand is KILLING me today.  Most specifically, it’s my middle and ring finger are the sorest, but it extends all the way down the hand to the wrist.  UGH.  I can’t find my wrist brace either, to stabilize it.  I know this is because of the knitting and I’m afraid I shouldn’t knit today just to give the hand a chance to recover.  This makes me pretty sad, actually.  My little shapeless monstrosity is taking a sort of… life.  And I’d like to “finish” it.  Whatever “it” is.  Maybe my hand will feel better later.  Or maybe I could take some ibuprofen to dull it.  What would you all do?  Am I that big a wimp that my stupid hand muscles can’t even take some simple knitting??

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We keep missing “How I Met Your Mother”.  It’s right when I’m putting Evie to sleep and Kile is playing Halo… It’s usually 8:30 before at least I make it downstairs (9pm for Kile).  You think I’d learn and just go ahead and set the DVR to record it already.  But our DVR sorta sucks rocks and I hate having to set up any sort of series recording because the stupid thing is completely unable to differentiate between repeats and new programs.  Drives me CRAZY.  (The plus side is that our ability to access OnDemand suddenly resurfaced last night.  Suh-WEET!)

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Kile is getting paid crazy early this month.  His deposit will go in tonight.  Which is great for the whole Thanksgiving and Christmas shopping thing.  But on the flip side of that is that it’ll be that much harder to make the money stretch the entirety of December, since he only gets paid once a month.  I expect to be scraping the bottom of the barrell come Christmas time.  And, can I just say, I HATE ONLY GETTING PAID ONCE A MONTH.  It is a friggin’ joke, I tell ya.  

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Speaking of shopping, we have big shopping plans for this weekend.  Not only do we need to buy all our groceries for the month _(whimper), but we’re going to do a lot of Christmas shopping too.  And yes, a good portion of that could possibly taking place on Black Friday.  GULP.  I’ve been familiarizing myself with the Black Friday 2008 webpage, checking out the deals on things we know we want to get.  But tell me this:  Why is Toy’s R Us the only store that has a play kitchen on sale on Friday?  That’s just not right.  

Anyhow, it’s entirely possible that I will get eaten alive by crowds.  Pray for me. 

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We’re going to finish decorating the Christmas tree on Thanksgiving day.  Won’t that be fun?  While food is cooking in the oven, we’ll all put together the trimmings.  The tree is up, mostly so that Liam will become accustomed to it.  So far, so good, he seems to barely notice it now.  Still, I’m not going to be putting too many ornaments down low where he can get to them.  I’m not STUPID, you know. 

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You all seemed to really enjoy the prehistoric photos I put up last night.  Perhaps I’ll have to go dig up some other gems to scan for “posterity” (and not at all for “humor”, oh no!).  In the meantime, check out my “Way Back Machine” set on Flickr cuz there’s some lovliness there too.