Minivans Are Hot | Christmas

Friday Links

December 3, 2010 By Kelli 5 Comments

- Shaun Groves wrote this post yesterday that made me laugh out loud. If you’re not reading Shaun you really should be. He’s a great writer – genuine and funny. Plus, who doesn’t love a guy in his thirties with a mohawk, right? Or is it a faux hawk? Anyway, read the post.

- Another blogger I love is C-Jane. Her perspective on faith and God are very different from my own, but I love reading her thoughts, learning more about what she believes and laughing at her posts. She’s an amazing writer and is very engaging. She’s a daily read for me. I particularly enjoyed this post. (A few Cliff’s Notes: She calls her husband Chup or Chupa, her son is the Chief and her daughter’s name is Ever Jane. This will help when you’re reading the post.)

- Nicole has an awesome advent plan for her boys. If I were crafty, I’d be all over this. But I’m not. So I just look on in envy…

- A few years ago I had the privilege to work alongside the awesome Dana Loesch. While doing this I got acquianted with her husband who is a wickedly talented musician and producer. Recently Chris and his team at Shock City Music filmed this music video to go along with a song that he co-wrote. Becky Kelly is the singer. The song is really beautiful as is the video. It’s a great reminder of what the season is about. Enjoy.

Happy Friday everyone. I’m headed into a week of insanity. Taking deep breaths today.

Filed Under: Christmas, Holidays, Random Tagged With: Becky Kelly, Courtney Kendrick, Links, Nicole Diehl, Shaun Groves, Where's the Line to see Jesus?

Christmas/Advent Plans

November 30, 2010 By Kelli 1 Comment

With December just hours away, I find myself thinking more and more about how to make Christmas a special time for the kids. I should probably start thinking about this before November 30, but I’ve never been known to think or plan ahead so why start now, right?

I’ve instituted one major plan with the kids for this holiday season, but other than that I feel like December has snuck up on me. I mentioned the Christmas musical my church is putting on last week – this musical, while great fun and a great ministry, has taken a lot of my mental energy. Starting Saturday I will pretty much live at church until the following Sunday.

So here’s what I need from you, bloggy friends. I need ideas. Christmas tradition ideas. Advent ideas. I want to help the kids focus on the miracle of Christmas and not just the “stuff” of Christmas. We are going to do Elf on a Shelf for fun, but I also want to incorporate some kind of simple, daily exercise that helps them understand why we celebrate.

I need ideas that are simple and won’t take hours to plan ahead of time. Because I simply don’t have that in me. I’m not a crafty gal so if your idea involves extensive use of scissors, glue or glitter, I’ll have to pass. I’m sure it would be beautiful, but it just wouldn’t get done.

What do you all do this time of year to celebrate advent and to help your kids learn, see and experience the glory of the Christmas season. How do you mold their hearts to understand the magnitude of Christ’s birth? What do you do to make the season special and memorable and magical for your family?

I don’t just want to survive Christmas – I want to experience it. I’d love to hear what you all are doing to experience the season. Thanks for sharing!

Filed Under: Christmas, Holidays

I need your advice

November 9, 2010 By Kelli 17 Comments

Post edit: This post is not meant to condemn anyone who has given their child a Nintendo DS or DSi. I do not oppose gaming devices in general, however, at this point in time they are not right for our family. My intent in posting this is not to make anyone feel bad but to get feedback on what the heck to buy my children for Christmas!!!

Carry on…

Hey guys. So Christmas is around the corner. I’m not sure if you were aware of that fact. I mean, you know, if you’ve been hiding under a rock you might not have realized, but for the rest of us who are already being bombarded with decorations and music it’s pretty dang hard to ignore.

Christmas is coming and somewhere someone’s goose is getting fat. Poor Thanksgiving…it is the forgotten holiday.

So here’s my yuletide dilemma. My seven year old is at the age where gift buying is becoming a bit difficult. He still likes toys (praise God), but he’s not as easy to please as he once was. I believe we have one more year before buying gifts to satisfy his maturing tastes will become harder…and more expensive.

This year, he has his sweet little heart set on a Nintendo Dsi. He talks about it incessantly. He wants to check them out every time we enter The Holy Land Target and he tells everyone he sees that he’s getting one for Christmas. Here’s the thing, though.

He’s not.

Lee and I have decided that right now we are not ready to introduce hand held gaming devices into our children’s lives. There are a couple of reasons for this:

1.) I just don’t think it’s necessary at seven to have a Nintendo Dsi. I’m not opposed to them, but I find it to be an awfully expensive gift for such a young child.

2.) I think there are better things to do with one’s time than play video games. We have a Wii and it gets played some, but repeated and extended periods of play are off limits.

3.) I am not ready for the battles that will inevitably come with a NDsi (don’t want to type it all out again). Sloan is actually very responsible when it comes to TV and video games. He does not have much of an addictive personality and he is not one to sit for hours with his eyes glued to the tube. He gets bored and loses interest quickly and can go months without playing the Wii at all. Landon, however, is already showing addictive tendencies in that he wants to watch TV or play the Wii all the flippin’ time. It’s already a daily battle with him resulting in many tears shed. A NDsi would inevitably become a battle zone between Sloan and his siblings and, quite honestly, I can’t handle one more battle.

Are we being unfair? I don’t feel like it, but it really does break my heart not to give Sloan what he wants because he’s such a good kid. I tried to break it to him gently the other day that this year would likely not be the year he received an NDsi. His reponse?

“That’s okay. I’ll ask Santa to bring it to me!”

Crap! Am I going to crush his dreams and destroy Santa all in one year? Hey…welcome to the Stuart home where we take your dreams and roll them inthumb tacks then light them on fire.

Thanks for stopping by!

When I told Lee of Sloan’s reponse he came up with the brilliant solution of telling Sloan that Santa doesn’t bring such expensive gifts – he lets the parents buy those presents. I have tasked Lee with preparing Sloan to not find a NDsi under the tree this Christmas while still preserving the magic of Santa for one more year. I’m counting on my man to come through on this one!

My question is, though, what should we get the poor boy for Christmas? Yes, he will receive clothes, a few books and probably some new art supplies. But what do we get him for that one special toy that’s going to light up his face when he walks around the corner Christmas morning?!

I need your advice! What are you getting your kids for Christmas? I have a few ideas, but nothing seems to take the place of his beloved NDsi, which he will likely receive at some point, but just not now.

I do hereby open the comments up for suggestions. This is my sad attempt to see if I can break the ten comment barrier I seem to have on my posts. Come on, folks, don’t let me down. I am officially begging for your comments! My motherly angst has reduced me to this…a comment whore mooch.

…

Okay, I can’t let the last word of a post be whore mooch so I’m going to share a picture that has nothing to do with this post but I just want to share it. It’s Tia, in her Little Miss Matched tights, which I told you about here and her glasses which make her look way too old.

Merry Christmas.

No! Happy Thanksgiving.

Filed Under: Christmas, Holidays, Kids, Landon, Lee, Motherhood, Sloan, Thanksgiving Tagged With: Age appropriate toys, Little Miss Matched, Motherhood, Nintendo Dsi, When should a child get a Dsi?

Drowning

November 3, 2010 By Kelli 7 Comments

First of all, I am very pleased with the way that elections turned out last night. There were a couple of issues that disappointed me and the fact that Harry Reid is still in office annoys me to no end, but more than anything I’m glad that there is a better balance of power in Washington now. Perhaps we can finally have reasonable discourse and work toward the good of the people. For a great analysis of how I feel about all this, visit Nicole’s blog. She essentially said everything I want to say and said it better than I could have.

I’m going to have to bail on a post today. I’m trying to do a better job of not posting bad, rambling posts on the days when I don’t really have anything good to say. Actually, I’ve got a couple of posts rolling around in my head but I just don’t have the time to write them well right now. You see, I’m smack in the middle of a little editing project. My deadline is 13 days away so I need to hunker down and dig in my heels. Let me just tell you – trying to work from home when you have small kids is hard. I have a newfound respect for working moms. And I have a newfound respect for the 5:00am hour. Me and 5:00 are becoming well acquainted.

I don’t like 5:00. AM or PM, come to think of it.

On top of that it’s Holiday season which means there are class parties, birthday parties, Christmas parties and every other kind of party you can imagine to plan and prepare for. And rehearsals for our church’s Christmas Musical (which is going to be amazing – tickets go on sale this Sunday!) And field trips. And big, fat giveaways on 5 Minutes for Mom coming your way – be on the lookout!

There’s also election night coverage to watch, which I know I don’t have to do but it’s so entertaining to listen to husband pants yell at the TV that I can’t pull myself away. There is food to be cooked, lunches to be made and boo boo’s to be kissed. I am speaking on a panel in a couple of weeks at the St. Louis Women in Media’s Fall Networking Event alongside several other amazing women so I need to prepare myself for that, and I need to find a baby sitter and I need to find a babysitter for a date night next week.

Date night! I love date night.

I’m not complaining. Life is full right now. I love it. I go to bed knowing that my day was packed and productive. But life is also tiring right now and I’m learning to say no. It’s hard to say no. But I am doing it. I said no twice today. It hurt because they were big no’s. But for now, no will do.

Oh, I forgot to add that I need to do laundry. I feel like I mention my laundry woes here quite a bit. It’s probably because I’m always waist deep in laundry. How does that happen?

Speaking of laundry – for those of you who are the mother’s of little girls, you must invest in several pairs of socks from Little Miss Matched. It’s the most brilliant idea ever conceived. Sell socks in packs of three, all of which coordinate but don’t match. This way you never have to worry about trying to match socks. There are leg warmers and underwear and shirts and tights and even dresses like this one:

I am going to sign off now because the whole point of this post was to tell you that I’m not going to post today. See? This is exactly the type of rambling, boring post I’m trying to avoid.

Clearly I need to work a little harder on that goal of mine.

Filed Under: Christmas, Family, Holidays, Kids, Life, Motherhood, Random, Thanksgiving Tagged With: Little Miss Matched, Random blog posts, WAHM, Working Mom

The day we spent $127 on soap

September 30, 2010 By Kelli 7 Comments

Alternately titled: I hope all the women in our lives like to smell good because you’re getting soap for Christmas…

We were in Hallstatt, Austria. It was our second day there and the weather was spectacular. Before heading up the mountain, we decided to walk through town and shop in the local shops. The night before we had walked by a shop filled with the most beautiful soap I had ever seen. It was all different colors and flavors and it smelled amazing.

“Let’s get some soap tomorrow to give our moms for Christmas,” I suggested. I don’t know why I suggested this. Who wants soap for Christmas?

*pause for flashback scene*

When I was in first grade, we had our annual Christmas party. As is tradition in every single elementary school since the very beginning of time itself, we drew names and had a Secret Santa giveaway in which we bought a small, inexpnsive present for someone in the class.

My name was drawn by a boy named Troy. Apparently his mom did not have girls and did not know what to get a little girl…so while everyone else got cute little Hello Kitty trinkets and bracelet, I got a bar of soap. The class played with their toys and I held my…soap.

Second grade, Christmas rolls around again. My name is, yet again, drawn by a boy. I don’t remember his name. What’s another good ’80′s name we could give him? How about Brandon. Let’s go with that.

“Brandon” got me soap. It was shaped like a Hippopotomos and it was pink. I tried not to cry because dangit! I didn’t want soap. My friend Leslie got Poochie stickers. I got soap.

Third grade. Mr. Stephens class. My name drawn yet again by a boy. I think it was David, but I’m not entirely sure. And I’ll give you a second to guess what I got.

I know. It’s almost unbelievable, but my mom will vouch for me. I got soap. SOAP! It was a little red, Christmasy roller thing of soap. Like a bar of deoderant…but soap.

I didn’t even try to hide my disappointment that year. I burst into tears and my mom had to usher me out of the room.

I never received soap again at a class party after that, thankfully. But my faithful parents, being the loving, supportive people they are – they give me soap in my stocking every year. Hardy har har.

So now you know my background with soap and Christmas.

* End flashback. *

Which is why it is odd that I would choose to buy someone soap for Christmas. But these little bars were so pretty and they were made in the most beautiful town on earth so it seemed like a good idea.

When we walked by the store, the overwhelming aroma took over us. It was like drugs. And the prices seemed so…inviting.

“Hey,” Lee said. “This stuff is cheap. Let’s get some for everyone.” At a Euro or two a bar, this felt like a steal so we grabbed a basket and started filling it. Lemon Verbena, Chocolate, Lavendar, Honey Suckle….so many enticing flavors. We grabbed something for everyone and danced to the register, our basket overflowing.

I handed the woman our basket and credit card. I was adding up the soap in my head and figured we had about 35 Euros worth of soap. Still a little much, but I figured it would cover several people for Christmas so no big deal.

She handed back my credit card and the receipt and pointed at my total.

96 Euro.

Let me say that again.

96 Euro.

That equals 127 dollars. On soap. SOAP!

And then it hit me. We weren’t paying a Euro a bar…we were paying by the gram. Sweet Mother of God! We spent 127 dollars on soap. I don’t even like soap. And I certainly don’t like to give it for Christmas.

To the women in our lives…I hope you like soap. It’s the gift that keeps on giving, right?! Don’t take it personally. We don’t think you stink. We just can’t afford to buy you anything else. Because we spent 127 dollars on soap.

Soap!

Merry Christmas…er…

Ahem.

Filed Under: Christmas, funny stuff that happens, Holidays, Lee, Marriage Tagged With: buyers remorse, Christmas gifts, Hallstatt Austria, Hallstatt soap, soap for Christmas

The One Where He Sings Dradle, Dradle, Dradle

December 29, 2009 By Kelli 5 Comments

This year, our church opened up the Christmas Eve services to anyone who wanted to join and help lead the service. Since I am so involved with our music department, I decided to take Sloan and have him stand up front with me. Much to his dismay, I might add.

My sweet six year old will walk up to anyone in the world and strike up a conversation. He entertains us tirelessly at home and he’s got the sweetest singing voice – but when he gets in front of a group of people that he perceives to be “staring” at him, he clams up completely and turns into someone I don’t know. So he was not thrilled when I told him he was going to stand up front and sing in big Church.

Once I assured him that he would not have to sing alone into the microphone, though, he was much relieved, though still not thrilled.

Who’s kid is he anyway?!

So, we headed to practice last Wednesday night. Because there were a lot of people to organize and several songs to go through, the rehearsal was longer than I had expected it to be. This led the six year old to behave like a, well…six year old.

There was the wallowing on the floor, and the third time I dragged him gently lifted him to his feet, I told him that he was going to make it and he needed to stand up, to which he replied, “This is the awfullest day of my whole life! Why did you make me do this?”

And somewhere, a group of crickets began singing a mournful tune. (eyeroll)

Then there was the issue of him having been placed directly in front of the microphone, which, despite his phobia of singing into one proved to be far too great a temptation for his six year old self. He commenced making gun sounds into the microphone, which required him to jump up and down so that his mouth was closer to the mic as it was set up fairly high. On occasion, he jumped up and barked out “Hello!” then grinned from ear to ear when he landed back on the floor.

And finally, the icing on the cake…

Many of the songs were very traditional Christmas carols, which I am ashamed to say he doesn’t know. He can sing Frosty the Snowman, but O Little Town of Bethlehem is an unknown tune. That will change next year. So while we rehearsed and practiced the songs, he really had to just stand there because he didn’t know the words and he can’t read well enough to follow the screens. This resulted in him repeatedly ramming his head backward into my gut, leaving me with bruises.

And I began to seriously question my bringing him along.

Then I heard him singing softly in his sweet little tenor. So I leaned forward to give him encouragement. And this is what I heard…

“Dradle, Dradle, Dradle, I made it out of clay…”

That made me laugh. Only my kid would think to start singing the Dradle song while at church rehearsing for the Christmas Eve service. So I did what any self respecting parent would do. I leaned down and taught him how to mouth the word Watermelon to the beat of the song. He thought this was all the hilarious and embraced it whole heartily.

I am pleased to report that during the actual service he did very well. He sang when he knew the words. He didn’t once make a gun noise into the mic, he stayed on his feet and he mouthed Watermelon with pride. The only hiccup came during a particularly powerful moment in the service when Lee, who was sitting about four rows in front of us, raised his hands in praise as he sang. This caused Sloan a great deal of consternation and he began motioning vigorously to his dad to put his hands down, the whole time stage whispering, “Dad. No! Dad! Get your hands down now, Dad! NOW DAD!”

Hilarious.

Despite it being the “awfullest” night of his whole life, he did very well and even admitted at the end that he had fun.

Score one for Mommy.

Filed Under: Christmas, funny stuff that happens, Holidays, Kids do the darndest things, Sloan

Christmas Is

December 28, 2009 By Kelli 1 Comment

Christmas is the excitment on little faces at a sea of gifts filled with unknown treasure.

Christmas is little boys grinning from ear to ear.

Christmas is Santa Clause coming to town.

Christmas is the thrill of a surprise.

Christmas is family.

Christmas is being together, celebrating the birth of our Savior and relishing the blessings that have been bestowed upon us. Christmas is my favorite time of year.

Filed Under: Christmas, Family, Holidays

It’s a Merry Christmas Day!

December 25, 2009 By Kelli 4 Comments

I hope and pray that you all had a blessed Christmas day. Ours was nice. I, unfortunately, was up all night with a violent case of the stomach flu. Seriously – it was ugly. I ended up just sleeping on the bathroom floor kind of ugly.

But alas, Christmas morning came and the worst of it seemed to be over and we managed to get through gifts without me hurling every which way. It was a bit of a bummer to miss Christmas dinner, because my mom makes a mean Christmas dinner, but she sent us home with loads of leftovers which I hope to dig into as soon as my stomach quits repelling food and liquids.

May you all enjoy the weekend with your loved ones!

He came that we might have life and have it abundantly!

Merry Christmas.

Filed Under: Christmas, Holidays

She Slices, She Dices

December 23, 2009 By Kelli 6 Comments

Lucy and I become better acquainted with one another every day. She’s got all kinds of bells and whistles that I’m busy exploring and wondering when and if I’ll ever use them. Like the rock awesome High Definition camera and microphone that records and takes pictures. Or the HDMI slot that apparently does something super cool because my husband keeps telling me it’s super cool. Or the software that will build websites, make business cards, brochures, and so. much. more.

She stops just short of making me a cup of coffee and walking the dog.

Which, ya know, is understandable. I mean, she’s not a Mac.

(insert awkward transition to a new topic here)

So it’s the Christmas season and all…ahem – Last night Lee and I with my parents went to see White Christmas at the Fox theater. It was great. Initially, my heart sank slightly at the tweaked story line and the extreme liberty taken with some of the music – I don’t like change much. But by the end when they all came out it their red and white outfits and sang White Christmas whilst blowing fake snow throughout the theater, I was all warm and fuzzy inside. There’s something powerful about several thousand people standing up and singing nostalgic Christmas songs together.

(awkward transition to a new topic – take 2)

A couple of days ago, we packed up our pajama clad babes and drove to a local park that was all decked out for Christmas. After we ooed and aahed at the beautiful lights, we headed to Starbucks for hot chocolate.

Have any of you ever taken a 6 year old, 3 year old and 2 year old out for hot chocolate? It’s, um, interesting. Upon receiving their kiddie sized cups of hot cocoa, they promptly began complaining about it being too hot, wanting a stir stick, wanting chocolate milk instead… Fun. You should try it. You can borrow my kids for the full effect if you want.

And, of course, there was the obligatory spill, which prompted tears and the need to share because we weren’t about to buy another cup, not that it mattered because Landon refused to drink his.

(transition again – I think I’m getting better at this)

And speaking of Landon and his refusal to consume, we found out at the doctor on Monday that he hasn’t gained a single ounce in the last six months, which dropped him 20 percentage points on the growth chart. The doctor asked us to proactively try to get him to gain weight and wants to see him in 4 months for a weight check. She wants him to have gained 3/4 of a pound by then.

Right. We’ll get right on that. You know – once he quits throwing up and decides to start eating again. Yep – the flu is creeping it’s way through the house. He spewed yesterday – an act that perplexed him greatly and caused him a great deal of confusion. The plus side is he slept 13 and a half hours last night. The minus is he still refuses to eat, though he did drink about half a cup of Emergen-C this morning.

We’re well on our way to losing 3/4 of a pound, I’d say.

Sheesh.

A few pictures.

Check out those eyes...

Daddy's so glad we decided to stop for hot chocolate.

Merry Christmas Eve Eve, all!

Filed Under: Christmas, Family, Holidays Tagged With: Fox Theater, White Chritmas

Baby Number 4

December 22, 2009 By Kelli 5 Comments

Well, it finally happened. It was inevitable. I really wanted it to happen, although the urge got stronger over this past year. I’m grateful that my husband was willing to do this for me and for our family, too. He’s a good guy.

My family has expanded.

Everyone – meet Lucy.

Isn’t she pretty? Lee gave her to me for Christmas. I had grand plans of him wrapping it up and me opening it on Christmas morning because I think it’s important for the kids to see us opening gifts from one another, but once I got my hands on my precious I couldn’t give her up.

There’s a hidden lesson in that somewhere.

The kids saw us setting it up anyway so I just explained that daddy gave mommy her present early. Yay me!

I seriously am in love. And so I’ll keep this short so I can go explore all that Lucy has to offer. And she has a lot to offer! She’s real perty.

So I’ll leave you with photos from our first Christmas this weekend, which we were blessed to celebrate with Lee’s parents. I’m so sorry to neglect you all like this, but a shiny new laptop tops creative posting. I’ll be back tomorrow! Lucy has promised to make me a better blogger. I trust she’ll not fail me.