Watching and waiting.

We are currently in the midst of the Great Tooth Watch, as Michaela is mere moments away from losing one of her front teeth. It is so loose that when she wiggles it, you can see the top of the whole tooth. She is quite fearful of body parts of hers just falling off so you can imagine how this is ringing her chimes. She fights me to brush her teeth in fear that she will push it out and then swallow the tooth and I feel like telling her that if she doesn't brush her teeth soon, ALL of her teeth will fall out from neglect... but I refrain. I am eager to see it gone so she can eat and maintain dental hygiene again, but am a little sad that she will look different. I have loved her gap-toothed smile since she was a baby and I will miss it.

In other news, we had a great Thanksgiving... very quiet and fun and low-key. My parents came over and we ate and played games and ate some more. I even coaxed my mom into doing a craft project. I did lots of baking and cooking and yes, my new handmade apron looked FANTASTIC. Dan made delicious appetizers of scallops wrapped in bacon and pigs in a blanket ("From scratch!" he proudly declared and I asked, "Using a tube of crescent rolls and a package of Ballpark franks is from scratch?" As my friend Michelle said after I told her this story: "Using meat grinder would be making it from scratch..."). The girls were great and we all named things we were thankful for at dinner, which was very sweet.

That's a bottle of Sam Adams Winter Ale, which makes the presence of a beer bottle in the middle of this lovely Thanksgiving picture of my mom and I slightly less tacky.

Our Thanksgiving craft: placecards. Super cute.

Our purple and orange frosted cupcakes and sugar cookies.

We decorated for Christmas the day after Thanksgiving, as is our tradition, and Jenna has discovered a new favorite toy:




Yes, this a fairly-white-trash Hip Swingin' Santa, who was all the rage a few years ago but I was actually not going to put out this year because I'm kind of sick of looking at him. But Jennameister saw him and her eyes lit up: a new baby! She has named him Santy and drags him around the house and I have to hold him, feed him, play with him, etc, etc, etc. just like her other babies. Today she actually put baby clothes on him and I have to be honest: I felt a little bad for the guy. So... I took his picture and posted it on the Internet for all to see.


I am in full Christmas mode here, shopping and wrapping and carding and crafting and planning and QVC- watching. Because nothing is funnier than hearing the hosts say, "Ladies, you have bought gifts for everyone else... isn't it time you treated yourself??" and like a good consumer, charged by Henry Paulson to keep the US economy alive and kicking, I nod my hypnotized head and with slightly glazed-over eyes, I say, "Why, yes... yes, I should treat myself!!!"

But I don't.

Because QVC is a gateway drug... next I'd hit HSN and eventually work up to Shop NBC, which has the ugliest jewelry I've ever seen, and the next thing I know I'll be homeless, incoherent and buying loose jewels off of the late night infomercials on channel 3 on our cablebox from some Rescue Mission telephone. And that's really dirty.