Go, Fight, Snow?!?!

For those of you that don't know, I am the cheerleadering sponsor at Pisgah. I have been for a few years. Anyway, we have always gone to UCA Nationals in Orlando in February. Well, this year we decided to go to NCA Nationals in Dallas, which happened to be the first week in January, no biggie.

We left on a Thursday, we were suppose to return on the following Monday evening. We finally returned the next THURSDAY afternoon!!! Yep, you read that right, THREE extra days!!! Now, I love vacations and I will lengthen a vacation any time, but not without hubby and the sweet girl.

I have a LONG story about what all happened, but I won't go into all of that, because-really-do you care? Anyway here is the short version:

We arrived in Dallas at 11:30 Thursday evening with 18 kids and 5 adults, we were EXHAUSTED!!! We had flown from Memphis to Atlanta and then on to Dallas. We get to the hotel (the Sheraton) and are waiting in line (the other sponsor and myself) and this gentleman (using that term VERY loosely) comes up to us and says are y'all with the group of 800 that are checking in? I said well actually it is 23 and yes, we are. He then asks us if he can skip us in line, what?! Are you kidding me, we tell him no, politely and tell him there is a second line that may be moving faster. He gets pissed, asked us where we were from, we say Memphis, he responds obviously not from Texas. He then walks behind a post and calls us B***hes. Yep, welcome to Dallas!

All goes well from here, the squad does great, they place 2nd in cheer, 5th in dance, and 3rd in performance. That is until Sunday night...snow and ice are coming through and our flights have been CANCELLED until Thursday morning! I head downstairs to see if we can extend our reservations because we can't get home, not because we want to extend our vacation. I was told no by both the reservation manager and a supervisor. When I tried to explain the situation again to her, she replied "We didn't make you stranded" I asked if she could help me find a hotel then, and would they be able to provide me with transportation since we had none and the only jackets our kids had were their cheer warm-ups (the temp was suppose to be 55-60 the whole time we were there)-her reply "we don't offer that service" ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!?!?! I was livid at this point. I find a hotel that can pick us up and has room for us. The next morning, I speak to the hotel manager and tell him what happened. He was embarrassed and says they could've let us stay one additional night, yes they were booked, and they would have been able to provide transportation. They will be getting a letter to their home office from ME!!! The manager bought us all lunch in a very nice restaurant and had the chef make one of our kids a birthday cake (which happened to be on that day).

We get to the new hotel (The Hotel Lawerence) in Dallas. It was built in 1925, but is in good condition. They were EXTREMELY nice to us and the kids. The kids think they see a ghost that night. The next morning they do research and find out the hotel is on the list of haunted hotels in Texas and was featured on Ghost Lab. They spent the rest of the time talking to EVERY employee they could find to ask about it and trying to find ghost. Oh the stories they will have!

We finally made it home Thursday, in time for the kids to change into cheer uniforms, get to school for the game and for the 8th graders to be recognized for 8th grade night. All in all it was an adventure, not one I care to be on again in the near future, but it was fun.

Oh, we also took them to the mall where they could browse, Gucci, Coach, Tiffany's, and True Religion. They loved it! And we went to The World Aquarium in Dallas-AMAZING!!!

Chef Lyllian

She LOVES her kitchen!!!

Christmas Fun!

We had such a busy Christmas this year! It was fun, but busy! In order to keep from posting a BAZILLION pictures of Christmas, I made a slideshow. I realized after I finished, I was missing Christmas with Tim's mom and Christmas Eve at my parents. I have very good reasons though, we videoed everything with Tim's mom and my mom took all the pictures with her camera at her house. Oh well, you can see what else we were up to this Christmas!

I hope you enjoy the slide show as much as we enjoyed experiencing it all.

This year was a tough year deciding what Santa brought vs what Mommy and Daddy gave Lyllian. She gets three presents from Santa and three presents from Mommy and Daddy (since that was all baby Jesus got and it helps keep the cost down)-anyway we don't want Santa to overshadow Mommy and Daddy you know-so we had to split up the big gifts. Santa delivered the kitchen and Mommy and Daddy gave her the tricycle. Santa delivered a tea set and Mommy & Daddy gave her the dollhouse. Santa delivered dress up clothes and Mommy & Daddy gave her the Fancy Nancy game. The stocking is from Santa and doesn't count with the three presents. Trust me, everyone else did plenty of spoiling with out Santa's help. She got a table and chairs and TWO ride on toys from CiCi & Papaw; along with some more Fancy Nancy stuff. She got a bean bag & Shopping Cart from Grammie & Pops; along with Angelina ballerina and Oliva dolls. Maw Maw gave her HUGE building blocks, an Aqua Doodle and MUCH, MUCH more. I think she is still overwhelmed and doesn't know what to play with first.

Ok, so I have babbled long enough, you really only want to see the pictures of her anyway...

***I had to remove the pictures, I couldn't get the Christmas music to turn off***

Merry Christmas

From our family to yours!

It's Beginning to Look A Lot Like Christmas

At least around our house it is. We start putting up Christmas decorations the weekend after Thanksgiving. I am all about not getting Christmas out until Thanksgiving is over.

Anyway, we have been busy little bees here lately. We made the grandparents their yearly Christmas ornament. Sorry I can't show you, the grandparents read the blog. But I can assure it they are CA-UTE!! Let's just say Lyl did some finger painting on them this year.

When we were finished with the ornaments, she wasn't finished finger painting, so we gave her some paper and let our little VanGogh go to work.
She had a blast! She didn't want to be finished when Mommy said time was up. We now have this beautiful piece of artwork up on our fridge for the world to admire.

Tonight we went to Pops retirement banquet. He has retired from the Air National Guard after 33 years of service. It was a nice banquet and he received a very nice shadow box with all of his ribbons and medals in it.

One of my favorite childhood memories is baking Christmas goodies with my mom. I decided to start the tradition with Lyl this year. She LURVED it! She did a very good job and only got slightly messy. I think we will have to get her an apron like Mommy's since she likes to help in the kitchen.

She helped cut all of the cookies with the mini Christmas cookie cutters Daddy bought us. Her favorite was the Gingerbread Girl.

We tried to watch them baking, but since I am always telling her the stove/oven is hot, she didn't want to get near it. At least she listens!- ha!!

After they cooled, I drizzled them with green cookie icing and let her "sprinkle" on the red sugar. We had to keep moving the cookies around because Lyl liked them to be "really" red. She had fun, but I think the thing she enjoyed the most was getting to stand in a chair, cause that's a no-no ya know!-ha!

What are some Christmas traditions you have started with your little ones, or some you can't wait to start?

Blog Wrap Up

No, I'm not closing down the blog, although maybe I should since I have become a B.A.D. blogger. I simply need to post a WHOLE!!!! bunch of stuff and decided that instead y'all have to scroll through each one, I would put it all together.

Over my fall break, the Lyl and I traveled by ourselves, yes, all alone, on a plane to NH to see one of my very best friends, Rebecca. Now, Lyllian has flown before and she did great, so yes, I was nervous, but I thought, really, I've done it before. Well, yes that statement is true, I have flown with her before, but not by myself. Tim was with us last time and she was smaller. Anyway, it was bad, not throw on the floor kicking and screaming bad, but it was yes, she is my child and yes I realize she is not happy and she is screaming so please stop looking at me bad. I picked the 6 am flight, thinking she would go back to sleep on the plane. She didn't go back to sleep, but the other passengers on the plane DID want to go back to sleep and couldn't thanks to my child. Oh, and I should mention here that these were regional planes, so they were tinytinyplanes.

Long story short, she was much better the second leg of the trip and we were both glad to be on land for awhile.

While we were there we went to a little town called Keene. It evidently has the world's largest carved pumpkin festival. I have never in my life seen so many pumpkins in one place, much less I have seen them ALL carved. The town has rafters, yes, rafters of carved pumpkins everywhere! It was crazy and there were a TON of people there.

We also went to visit Quichie Gorge, it was in a quaint little town and was beautiful. But then we went to Woodstock, it was picture perfect, like right off a movie set. I loved it!

I think I said about 4,218 times how beautiful the scenery was, even on the interstate.

We also went to visit Ben & Jerry's. Lyllian loved her icecream.

Lyllian saw wild turkeys in Rebecca's backyard and watched Maggie chase them.

And we finished it out with a trip to the Vermont Country Store, where I brought make some delicious cheese and seasoning packs. We had so much fun and yes, it really was beautiful. So glad you will get a white Christmas this year, Rebecca! Thank you for having us!

Next up, Halloween! We took Lyllian to Zoo Boo this year. She still has no idea about the whole candy concept, and I'm ok with that, but she did like watching all of the other kids dressed up in their costumes. We also went to our church's Fall Festival. Lyllian did pretty good, she really like the pig race and wanted to take one home (no they weren't real, they were wind-up). She did not, however, like the inflatables AT ALL. She didn't even like the big inflatable slide her CiCi took her own.

We have had our first bout of ear infections. She has a double one, and let me tell you, I felt so bad for her! She didn't want to take her medicine and I know she was miserable. I think she had a diet of water and yogurt for a week. It was all she would eat and the doctor said to let her eat it then. Thank goodness we had 15 months with no ear infections!!!

**Pictures to be added soon!-Anybody know a quicker/better way to add pictures besides typing everything and then having to rearrange for pictures? I really think I am doing something backwards...

FREE Christmas Cards

I love, love, love getting Christmas cards in the mail each year. Now that most of my friends have children, it is awesome to watch them change each year. Also, it is a great way for me to show off my little cutie!!

Last year, I took pictures of Lyllian at home and sent them in to be made into cards. I say "I", but it really took me, Grammie, Auntie Susan, Auntie Becky, and Tim to get the pictures done. And might I say they looked pretty darn cute for a group of people who were/are NOT professionals.

Anyway, we have used Shutterfly in the past and I love their cards. Their service is pretty awesome too! So this year I was browsing through the Shutterfly cards and came upon some super CA-UTE cards, like these:Choice 1-Monogram

Choice 2-Modern/whimsical damask

Choice 3-Elegant damaskChoice 4-Fun holly

Choice 5-Elegance Abounds

Aren't these cards from Shutterfly wonderful! I can't wait to get Lyllian's picture done so I can see what her beautiful little face will look like in each one.

One thing I must have on my Christmas cards is "Merry Christmas", I know for some people it doesn't matter, but to me it does. So, which one do you like best? What are you Christmas card ideas? Do you have any "quirks" about your family's Christmas cards?

So, on to the really reason for your reading this post. You want to know about FREE Christmas Cards. No, really Shutterfly is giving bloggers 50 free cards. Free always makes holiday shopping a little more fun! Wanna find out more?

GO HERE TO CHECK IT OUT

Don't forget to tell me which card you like best.

Oh Happy Day!!