Friday, December 28, 2007

Over already?

Is Christmas over already? I feel like retailers have been cramming Christmas down my throat since August. Now it's over and I'm a little melancholy.

Our Christmas shenanigans started off last Friday with a recreation of Christmas Eve a few days early to appease the in-laws since their only child was being taken hostage in Salina, Kansas for the actual day. On Saturday, Moe and Eric headed to Kansas City despite snowy weather. Ward came over and we gorged on Pei Wei, wine and beer. Em and Ben brought Ellie over a little later for a furious game of Catch Phrase. Man, I love that game.

Early Sunday, we packed up the Expedition with Baby Ellie and all and headed to Salina. Nick was home, so it was great to see him. My dad's kitchen has been remodeled and it is NICE. I could sleep on his new granite island. Mind you, we had to share steak knives as he and Barb are still gathering all of the necessities that a new, huge kitchen can handle. We spent the day drinking wine, eating candied nuts and playing more Catch Phrase following our dinner of halibut and salmon that my dad and brother caught in Alaska.

Off to mom's to hang with my "new brothers" Gabe, Andrew and Jeff. We had 11 people in my mom's house. Chris and I have been bumped from our room to make way for a baby crib. Luckily, we still had a bed.

We went to early church on Christmas Eve. Apparently that is when all of the children go to church because I could look out over the crowd and every thing was moving, kids coughing, moving, banging sets of keys meant for entertainment against the pew. No sermon. Ellie was great though. To Country Club for my new "dad's" family Christmas and then presents at my new "grandma's" house. She treated us like we were her own. Ellie was the star of the show being passed from lap to lap.

Christmas morning meant presents with my mom and siblings. Chris bought Ellie her first ornament on his own. It was very sweet! Mom got two presents that will eventually bring her to Kansas City - tickets to Reba and a gift certificate to the Culinary Center. We gave Nick a new Nano as a Christmas and birthday combo and because we don't know where he will end up after graduation when he enters the military full-time. I was most excited about Ben's gift...the Flight of the Conchords DVD.

Back to KC for more Christmas with the Lanes. Bean soup Christmas night and more wine. On Wednesday, we recreated Christmas morning and Chris was proud of his traditional "plucking bread", better known to me as "roll balls". We opened socking, which are giant panty hose legs stuffed to the brim with individually wrapped presents. Mine overflowed into an "annexed" bag. I am the definition of spoiled at that house. These aren't chumpy little thing either...Skittles, 6 pairs of socks, gift cards, hats, scarfs, Orange Bowl t-shirts, lotions, rice vinegar (yes, rice vinegar), you name it.

We stayed until 4 lounging around and talking. So...now it's over and I'm a little sad. Target has Valentine's Day stuff out already. On to the next holiday...

Thursday, December 13, 2007

Say it ain't so, Martha

A little birdie told me the VERY unfortunate news that Blueprint magazine is ceasing after the January/February issue. BIG Bummer! This is the only thing I actually hinted about for Christmas. Apparently they will keep their web site and blog going, but I'm such a magazine whore that I'm not sure I will survive this tragedy.

By the way, congrats to the Safers and welcome to baby Rowan. Please start a blog, Sue!



If you haven't seen the book yet, please check out the Post Secret blog here, where people send in their secrets via postcard. It's so clever! Love it.

Oh, and I did get back from Phoenix yesterday morning...finally. Talk about a long couple of days. At least I got to see Andi!

Tuesday, December 11, 2007

Lonely in Phoenix

Hi friends. Just a note to let you know that I'm currently stuck in sunny, 55 degree Phoenix. No flights are allowed back into Kansas City, so I'm here for another night. Hopefully I will be back tomorrow.

Wednesday, December 05, 2007

Tila Tequila and Unicorns

We developed a wonderful new tradition while decorating our Christmas tree this past week. While most sing carols and sip egg nog, Chris and I instead indulged in Tila Tequila's Shot at Love marathon on MTV. Now I thought The Hills was a bit of an embarrassment to admit to, but Tila Tequila is a whole other story. Pure trash, but a great holiday tradition, none the less. The season finale is right around the corner. Go Danni.

For those of you that haven't seen the Lane tree in person, you have surely heard about the ornaments that adorn the branches. I was shocked during our first year of marriage to bring our childhood ornaments together to decorate our first Christmas tree. As Chris tenderly unwrapped each and every ornament I noticed a plethora of horse ornaments. These were not just horse ornaments people! These were unicorns and Chris had dozens of them.

Apparently in the Lane family, if you state that you like something, it will quickly become the item that everyone gives you for Christmas and other special holidays. And so it goes that Chris had a thing for unicorns in his younger days and the collection grew and now it graces our tree every year and it is good for another annual laugh.

Perhaps the best ornament is a small book ornament that is the story of the unicorn "The Legendary Unicorn" is its title. So I actually cracked this "ornament" open for a little read this year. Among the unicorn poetry was some mention of the symbolism behind the unicorn. It said that "a unicorn symbolizes many things and is said to posses many mysterious powers. Not only does his horn purify poisoned and contaminated water, but if a soldier carries an amulet made from a unicorn horn, he will not be armed in battle. The horn from the captured beast was often ground into a power and taken as a love potion."

What!?

It goes on to say that one of the reasons that unicorns have vanished from the earth was because when Noah was gathering animals for the Ark, "the unicorns were too busy dancing in the meadows and missed the boat."

Oh that makes so much sense now.

You really must see these ornaments to gain a full appreciation of the humor behind them. Over the years, our friends have slowly latched on to my husband's affinity for the mythical beast and Chris is now the proud owner of one small fuzzy unicorn purse, a unicorn sweater and if Moe and Eric felt he was worthy, Chris could have had a larger-than-life-sized unicorn for a mere $800.

To sum it all up, please check out the YouTube video about Charlie the Unicorn and help shun the non-believer. Check it out.

Sunday, December 02, 2007

We're going to Miami

I wish we could go back to this summer at the Chicago Cubs game when the random Jayhawk fan behind us at the game declared that KU would go to the Orange Bowl. We laughed it off that day. Ha! The Jayhawks are going to Miami. Orange Bowl, baby.

Chris was so confident about which bowl we were going to go to that he booked our flights 30 minutes prior to the BCS selection show. Thank God for the internet, fan boards, blogs and text messaging for our clues to the outcome of our destination. Oh, and thank God for American Airlines points.

We spent much of the weekend decorating for the holidays only to find out that the outlet on the front of the house (the one we plug our outdoor lights into does not work). Boo. Cue the electrician because we WILL have lights on our house this year.

In the bottom of one of the ornament boxes I found this hat for Annie. Em gave it to her a few years ago and she absolutely hates it. We have to break it out once a year. It's a penguin with red earmuffs and it is good for an annual chuckle.
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