Busy December Weekend, again!

On Friday, Brooke and I went shopping all day and that night Penn and I went to the Annual Encourager's Christmas Party at the Kitts! It is always so much fun. Nancy fixes red beans and rice(It reminds me of home!) and everyone brings an appetizer or dessert. We eat tons of food, read the real Christmas story from the bible, and then play dirty Santa. It is really funny! Everyone draws a word from the hat. The words are from the story Twas' the Night Before Christmas and when your word comes up you get to pick a present. This year I picked NIGHT! That's one of the best ones cause it is the first and last pick! You know how it goes "Twas the night" and "to all a good night!" All the other good stuff was "frozen", so we ended up stealing the gift that we brought! It was a $20 gift card to Lowe's. Penn is so silly. That was all him! By the way, I felt horrible all night. This sickness of mine is still lingering!

On Saturday, I felt a little better. We did lots of chores around the house and at 3:30PM we met the Sniders at Cheesecake Factory!! Can you say YUM? It is one of my faves as you probably already know. After stuffing ourselves, we went over to Zoolight Safari at the Birmingham Zoo to enjoy a fabulous night of lights, fun and holiday spirit! It’s the only place in Birmingham where it snows every night. It also has a synchronized light show set to some your favorite holiday tunes! Santa & Mrs. Claus appear nightly making a grand entrance in a beautiful horse drawn carriage. If you look closely, you may even see a very special elf in the mix! If you go, be sure to stop at the Barn in the Children’s Zoo where holiday crafts, photographs and the animals are all available for your enjoyment. You can also ride the train to experience a winter wonderland and in between, enjoy half a million lights, holiday music and plenty of festive spirit. It was the second night since it opened and very, very crowded! The line to get in moved fairly quickly though. When we walked through the gates Brooke and Ella just marveled at all the lights! The snow machine was a big hit too! I personally did not like the soapiness of it when the flakes landed; although, it was quite pretty floating in the air.
The night air was pretty chilly, so at least it felt pretty Christmas-like. We bundled up the girls and headed to see the animals. Brooke touched the alligator. She loves reptiles! She also mooed at the cow and baaad at the sheep, but thankfully did not get into touching them all that much. Can you say GERMS? After watching and dancing to the laser light show,
(Brooke and Ella are quite the dancers)
we decided to stand in line to see Santa. Well my goodness...Brooke TOTALLY freaked out and was shaking and crying hysterically and DID NOT agree to sit on Santa's lap at all! I was upset for my scrapbook sake, but what do you do? We had a nice time looking at all the lights, watching the train from a distance(no we did not want to wait in the train line for an hour with 2 toddlers), and visiting with each other. We also ran into the Turners from Church. We headed out the gates around 8ish. Oh...I do have to mention that Brooke's most favorite part of the night seemed to be playing with the regular old bubbles by the bubble machine.
Well...doesn't that beat all? We could have stayed at home and played with bubbles for FREE!

No really, all kidding aside~ it WAS a great family time!

On Sunday, we went to Sunday school, late worship, and out to Habanero's with some friends for lunch. Penn went to work around 3 and Brooke took a nap. When she woke up, I took her over to The Galleria to try the Santa picture thing one more time.(I know, I know, but I must have this for my scrapbook y'all!) I wanted to go there because I heard that the mommies can hold their child and they don't even know Santa is there and the mom just kinda slides out of the way. Well anyway, I looked on the website to check the hours of operation and it said it closed at 6! Great! I dressed Brooke, drove all the way there, found a spot to park, carried Brooke on my hip all the way to the Santa area, and guess what????? Oh yes, the line was closed at 5:ooPM. Yeah, it it had been closed for 45 minutes! I begged the little elf looking guy to let me in the line and he refused! I walked off and then went back to beg and plead some more! He still refused!!! I then begged the lady manager elf and you will never believe what she told me??? She told me that she had turned away people dying of CANCER and so why would she let MEin!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Is that not the most absurd thing you have heard a person say in your life? Especially during the Christmas season! Needless to say, I was a little peeved. I almost cried! I pouted all the way back to the car while Miss Brooke was as happy as a lark! No Santa for her. When asked if she wanted to see Santa or if she had seen Santa the night before she said with her eyes wide and shaking her head no: "Unhun..I do not wike him!!!!!!"
Oh well, so much for that!!! We sped like crazy back to Alabaster just in the nick of time. We wanted to see the Christmas music program at the church. What a talented bunch of people our church has. They are so many wonderful singers and musicians!
It was a lovely end to our busy December weekend!!!!

Let's Party!

Since the last time I blogged I have been in party mode! I started a week long marathon of merriment!
Saturday~I woke up feeling awful with a sore throat! Yikes! I have 3 parties to attend today. I just decided to suck it up and be a woman! I had to go to a baby shower brunch at 10:00AM for my friend Melinda who is having her first child, Braxton Jr. It was given by my friend Meredith at her new little home in Vestavia. The brunch was great! It was good to visit with all of my old school friends. Also, the decorations were just absolutely gorgeous! But, best of all, the cook (Mer's mom) made all the dishes for the brunch from a Paula Dean cookbook. Need I say more?
Next, I was off to decorate for the Annual Ladies Christmas Tea at church. We quickly decorated the Ladies Parlor and the guests all arrived with an ornament for the swap and their favorite Christmas goodies! The goodies all tasted so yummy. We also drew our secret angels for 2007. Mine is ???????? Yea right like I'm gonna say! I had Pam Turner last year. She had no clue, but she did say she thought it was somebody young. I guess I am young! My secret angel last year was Jennifer Scott. She was an awesome gift giver and she was in my top three for who it was. I could tell by the cute gifts!!!
Finally, I was on my way to the last stop of the day. A dinner party at Christy's. Her husband grilled out steaks. YUM! He is very handy on the grill. I must say the steaks were the biggest and juiciest I have ever seen. Thanks for having us over. Brooke and Penn had fun too!
By the end of the night, I was feeling extra horrible. I was on a mission to get some rest. I had to even skip church the next day. I stayed in bed until 4:00PM. I finally dragged my self out and went to the doctor. 20 dollars and 2 hours later they said I had NOTHING! Can you believe it? How could I feel that bad and it was just "allergies" Anyway, that was good that I didn't have some infectious disease, because I still had five more parties to make it to this week.
Monday~We threw a small girls night out baby shower for Michelle. She is having her 3rd girl, so we stocked her up with a few new fresh baby clothes and plenty of diapers and wipes! We had Mexican food, cake, and then went out to do a little Christmas shopping w/o any kids.
Tuesday~ Today's party was in honor of McKinley's third birthday. It was at Chick-Fil-A in Alabaster. We all ate and had cake. I even had seconds on the cake! Oink! Oink! Everyone seemed to have a wonderful time. McKinley got lots of presents at her party, but it was no thanks to me since I FORGOT her present at home! Good thing I saw her the next day to give it to her then!
Wednesday~Our bible study had a Christmas Brunch! Every year Nancy's throws an exceptional Christmas brunch at her home for our class. The decorations and food are out of this world! She always gets a special present for each of us. This year we received lovely Southern Living dove ornaments. The brunch and gifts were very special, as is each year!!
Thursday~ Another birthday!!! Today was a special birthday lunch for Connie at CPK at the Galleria. It is her favorite place to eat. We all chipped in and got her a nice big wall hanging from SL. I am pretty sure she had a good time inspite of her having pneumonia. Yuk!
Friday~ And for the finale----------da da ta da! A Christmas dinner party for 30 at my home!!!! Thankfully, Ashley kept Brooke all day, so that I could prepare. Thank you sooooooooo much Ashley!!! You were my life saver. I actually enjoyed preparing everything for the party, since I didn't have a little one to pick up after all day! The guest all brought a "Once Again Dirty Santa" gift and a dish. We had tons of food including Penn's famous Cajun fried turkey. After we ate, we played the once again dirty Santa game and it was too hysterical. (Good one Penny!)Everyone had a really nice time and I am now completely BEAT! I think I will stay in the bed all day tomorrow, especially since my "allergies" still have me feeling really AWFUL!
And that's the end of the marathon. It only took me 164 hours to run it! Whew!

Do-it-yourself Crafts

Today for playgroup we went to Do-it-yourself Crafts in Homewood to paint some pottery. This place is very laid back and they allow the kids to run around. The owner is a mom too; therefore, she knows how to deal with the little ones. The only suggestion I have for this place is to put up a gate between the party room and the pottery room, so the toddlers can't get their fingers onto the breakables when mommy has her head turned!
It is always a little overwhelming to go to paint it yourself pottery type places, because they have so many different choices of pottery and colors! By the time you make up your mind about what you want to do, the little one is ready to move on to the next stop. Needless to say today was pretty much the same, but you know my sweet Brooke is quite the trooper and did pretty well. The only trouble she got into was "fighting over the chalk for the big wall-sized chalk board" and "trying to swing in the infant swing."
Anyway, they had some very cute Christmas ornaments for $6 each. And if you bought three you got the fourth for free. Brooke picked out two mittens, one cross, and one Christmas Tree. We got Brooke to put her hand print on each of the mittens as a keepsake for Christmas 2006. We painted one hand red and one hand purple. Her age children will usually not comply to this, so I was thrilled! And Brooke painted the cross and Christmas tree all by herself. I know the ornaments will be cherished by our family for many years to come.
After working up an appetite painting, we headed to Donato's Pizza for our very own personal pizza. The pizza there has a sweet sauce with a thin and crispy crust. Pretty tasty ~without being to heavy. You can choose your own toppings. I had chicken and green peppers and Brooke just had plain cheese. She is just like her Momma~ she LOVES pizza! The kids and mommies had plenty to eat and then enjoyed a stocking filled with treats for dessert. (You know I had to make treat bags! It is one of my favorite things to do! Must be the teacher in me!)
After playgroup, we were off to get some MORE Christmas Shopping done. Hopefully the little ones will take a nap!;-)
Oh, someone please remind me to go back and pick up all of our pottery "goodies" next Saturday. And please pray that I will NOT break anything like I did last year!! I know, I am such a klutz! Sorry Becky!