Christmas in the City

One of the things I love most about living in a small town in the midwest is that December is still Christmastime and it's an all out celebration. Our little town holds a numerous Holiday Events. Some of them ( such as the touring of lovely homes all decked out for the holidays) predate our nation, and some are not quite so old but still have been going on longer than we've been around. The first major Christmas event is Christmas in the City which is held each year on the Friday after Thanksgiving. The town's Christmas lights get lit, there are carolers, wagon/sleigh rides, and some many free events and activities that it doesn't seem possible that such a little town could put it all on- until you meet the people here, and then of course it does. So this post includes pictures from the night after Thanksgiving. Our girls all danced in the Nutcracker which is also part of the celebration. alot of time and work goes into the performance both from the dancers and the teachers, and it's another one of the great free events going on during December.

The last picture is of course of our very own home, all decked out and ready for Christmas. We're still snow free, but thanks to my awesome husband, at least we've got great lights. And yes, those are the old fashioned big bulbed lights that we love so much.

Halloween and other old news

As we get ready for Christmas, I really wanted to get these pics posted. We had a great Halloween. We got to spend it with great friends. I LOVED Shawn's Halloween costume. He got a lot of great comments on it. He did NOT get near as many comments as our friend Eric did. His costume really says all that needs to be said on it. We also had a great time at preschool carving pumpkins. Lily was especially happy to be able to do a "potato head" style pumpkin this year. It really worked out nicely.

Now,

the WORST gifts EVER

I know this post needs some really great pics, but I'm really far behind on baking pies, so the pics will come later.
Anyway, this time of year my favorite stories are always the ones about the worst presents people ever got. I can't wait to read them b/c I laugh so hard that I almost wet myself. So, please share here the worst gifts you've ever gotten. Here are my 2 favorite.

1. the year one of Shawn's boss's gave us a Thanksgiving turkey. He did that every year ans normally that's a very kind gift. That particular year, he was out of town and din't get the turkeys to his employees until 2 weeks after Thanksgiving. This again, would not be so bad except that the turkeys had sat in his garage for the 2 weeks during an unexpected warm spell. When he got around to handing out the turkeys, they were already rancid- and he still handed them out! (One guy left his in the bed of his truck and would shoot it full of nails from his nail gun until a cat dragged it off.

and 2. someone once gave us a joint gift of a set of glasses. As we opened them, she announced that she had recieved the same set the year before and had chosen to keep 1/2 the set. When we got them home we found a little "extra" gift in our half- mouse droppings. Needless to say, we never used those glasses.

Now it's your turn- what crazy, wierd gifts have you received that made you think "what were they Thinking?" BTW please don't use the names of the gift givers or post one here from a giver that reads this blog. :)

Pumpkins, pumpkins in the patch

My family LOVES pumpkins. Each year we go to the same pumpkin patch which is really more low-tech amusement park than patch. This year we tried to convince our girls to go to the Fall Lightshow (http://www.bluffvalley.com/ ) which is actually cheaper and can be enjoyed (at least at some level) from your car incase of inclement weather, however, the youngest two daughters were adamant that we must attend the pumpkin patch. So attend we did. As we arrived, the snow was meltong off the roof of the harvest town buildings. You can see in the shot of the beige building that it was indeed snowy, but we still had a great time. We did, however learn some things this year:

* While finishing the corn maze quickly is fine it's far MORE gratifying to do so with out ever falling in the mud. Shoes will all still need to be washed though......

* It's more fun to play jumbo size games.... like checkers

* Feeding the goats is always more fun if you have free corn

* And me telling every person I see that i like their Red Sox cap does eventually pay off- as i met a family from the town next to my hometown. (They live in Boxborough) The dad is from Massachusetts and has lived their forever while the wife is from Rochester. We're pretty much living mirror image lives.

Anyway, we had a ton of fun and can't wait to go again next year- though we hope to do so without the snow.

My poor sick family.

This fall has been really hard on so many family and friends as far as illnesses go. So, I really shouldn't be surprised that my family has also been sick. Emily and Shawn both had really bad sore throats and coughs/colds. Emily was able to throw hers off after about 4-5 days, but Shawn just continued to be sick. He missed more than a week of work- including 2 days he'd scheduled off to do fun stuff with the girls over their fall break. We ended up spending fall break at home and weren't able to do anything fun at all. In fact Shawn is still coughing now, 2 and 1/2 weeks later. Poor little Lily threw up on Sunday (on her dad and all over our bed) at 3 a.m. and was then just fine all day Sunday and until late Monday night when she spiked a fever that was over 103. She tossed and turned and whimpered all night, but finally woke this morning in a much happier state. Luckily, we are now able to control her fever w/ medicine, but she's still a sick little Bean. We're just hoping that her fever is gone in time to go trick-or-treating this weekend.

I also had a bad cold that continues to linger but isn't so bad now. The only one of us not to get sick? Charlie. i say that it's the 2+ hours a day she spends swimming that keeps her so healthy. Either way, I'm glad that one of us has stayed healthy!

Minnesota IS nice

While I am often homesick and just wish that I could get back to New England- where the seafood is fabulous, the people are fun and fall colors are beautiful, I have to admit that this week has been a great week to remind me home fabulous the nice people of Minnesota can be. First, several people have called me up out of the blue to say really nice things about my children. Then I received a raise at work . (Wahoo), a great friend dropped off fabulous cookies as well as a cute basket of fall treats, another sent cookies with Shawn, our neighbor sent over some cake and another great friend heard that I wasn't feeling well and brought my family dinner, and another friend is bringing Em home from school so my sick Lily can stay in her PJs on the couch. Add to that the fact that we finally had a sunny and warm day yesterday after 2 weeks of rain and the fact that our tree actually did turn a beautiful shade of red and orange (instead of the ugly brown leaves it started dropping a week ago), and the sky is that beautiful October blue. I know you can't tell it from my poor pictures, but I swear it's that exact October Blue. So, while I miss New England so much- especially during the fall, I've got to admit that the great friends and joys of this October day, really do make it so nice to be in Minnesota.

A reminder of home

We stopped in Owatonna, about 45 minutes from home not long ago and decided to stretch our legs. Shawn asked a friend where a good place to get ice cream was and she immediately responded w/o hesitation "Blast". So we went to Blast knowing that we'd get great ice cream, and were excited to find a reminder of home. Blast is an old fashioned order outside ice cream stand. Like Kimballs and Dairy

Joy, you order your food at 1 window and pick up at the other. The ice creams were HUGE (Em is about 1/3 of the way through a small in the pic above) and really cheap (less than $10 for all of us including a tip) and well worth it. We hope to go back one day this spring and enjoy pizza in the parlor above, take a nice stroll and the beautiful trail, and then finish it all off with some great ice cream.