Sending you elsewhere...

1. I'm over at The DC Moms with a suggestion for getting through a cold or allergy season.

2. I adore this article from the New York Times. Truly. And considering the fact that Lucas likes to tell everyone about his great great great great great great grandfather (# of greats varies every time, and also, it's more like some sort of distant uncle) who fought in the Civil War, I think we're doing a decent job of this already!

3. If you only click on one of these links, THIS is the one. So beautiful.

 


Original post by Smiling Mama. Thanks for reading!

Family Game Night -- A Review and Giveaway!

I come from a big family and some of my very earliest memories of family gatherings include games. I learned to play challenging card games at a very young age and remember joining in very competitive spirited Trivial Pursuit games when I was way too young to have a prayer of ever getting an answer right!

We have several old favorites but are always on the look out for great family games!

So when I saw that North Star Games had set up shop in the hallway at Blogalicious I was very curious to see what they were all about.

I played a few rounds of Say Anything (and enjoyed it!) but the game that really caught my attention was Wits and Wagers. If I could pick any two words to describe the perfect game for my extended family they would be "trivia" and "gambling." And those are the two words that describe Wits and Wagers!

I took the game home over Thanksgiving and played it with six other adults. It was proclaimed a hit! The only grumbles came from my sister (also our biggest Trivial Pursuit hater!) but the funny thing is that she came in a VERY close second place. Even though she didn't love it, she was really good at it. Silly girl.

A few highlights:

1. It's fast-paced. We finished a game in less than 30 minutes.
2. You don't have to know the answers to win! Family members who don't have much to offer during those intense games of Trivial Pursuit have just as good (sometimes even better!) chances to win at this because of the wagering. My sister often had crazy guesses (way off!) but consistently bet on the right answers. My aunt often had the correct answer (or closest to the correct answer!) but never bet on herself so didn't really leverage her correct answers.
3. A large number of people can play, up to seven as individuals but you can even play in teams. That's great for a big family.
4. We liked the dry erase answer boards.

Suggestions for improvement:

Only one: include eraser tips on the dry eraser marker caps! Really, that's all we could come up with as room for improvement!


I received a complimentary review copy of Wits & Wagers from North Star Games but all opinions are my own. You can buy Wits & Wagers at Target or Toys-R-Us or, if you're local, head over to Labyrinth on Capitol Hill or Child's Play in Chevy Chase and patronize a great small business!

GIVEAWAY!
Win your own copy of Wits and Wagers for your next family gathering! Leave a comment on this post by Friday, December 16, at midnight eastern time with the word or words that best describe the perfect game for your family (or group of friends). Make sure to include your e-mail address! I'll notify the winner on Saturday and you must get back to me with your mailing address by Monday, December 19, so we can ship the game right away (hopefully to arrive in time for Christmas, but definitely for your New Year gatherings!). Good luck!


Original post by Smiling Mama. Thanks for reading!

Dia de los Muertos

We got invited to a very fun Dia de los Muertos party on Saturday. It was the perfect addition to our otherwise very low key weekend (just what we needed after a very, very busy October!).

The day before I decided we'd paint our faces like the calavaras and I thought the flowers in my hair were a nice touch! Our painted faces were a hit and several other guests joined in the fun (I brought the face paint and brushes with us!).

Another nice aspect was that everyone was asked to bring a photo of a loved one and many people spoke about the person or animal they were remembering. It was lovely--how often do you get to share a story or memory like that? Not often enough, I say!

We brought the wedding photo of Abel's maternal grandparents (on the left with blue background) and Abel told the group how they had 15 children and were incredibly poor (think one-room house and no indoor plumbing with all those kids!) but that there was so much love their poverty didn't matter. In fact just this summer I asked Abel's mom and aunt if they knew how poor they were and they both answered that they had no idea. Their memories are filled with laughter and love. How wonderful.

Original post by Smiling Mama. Thanks for reading!

The Summer of our Lives

Fab graphic available as a free postcard download at Frolic

A few weeks ago, on the Saturday night before the first day of school, after our yard emptied of the dozens of friends who had come over for an end-of-summer hot dog and s'mores roast, Lucas emphatically declared it had been the best day of his life.

Then he reconsidered as he started listing all the other best days of his life that summer.

We ended up agreeing that it had been the best summer of his life.

Ah, how that made my heart sing.

The summer, well, late winter and early spring, actually, had started out as possibly the worst time of our lives for Abel and me when his small organization closed down and he was laid off. The first few weeks were horrible. Scary. Filled with anxiety. Dread.

Not only was Abel laid off, I had been a stay-at-home mom since Nathaniel was born 19 mos ago so our weekly income suddenly = $0.

Luckily we had some savings. Luckily Abel qualified for unemployment. Luckily we also qualified for food stamps. Luckily a free lance gig came up for me.

But more than luck, we buckled down. We counted every penny. Literally every penny. It became a personal challenge--and triumph--for me to calculate our grocery bill down to the dollar. To go for days and days and days without spending a dime. We started line drying when our dryer broke. (In February. Brrrrr.) We gratefully accepted gas cards from my parents and when they visited they brought lunch or paid for dinner.

And after I was able to fall asleep instead of laying in bed fretting for hours on end. And after we were able to go a day without questioning, worrying, wondering. After we settled into our poverty. After that?

It did become the best summer ever.

We had a house. A car. Two actually. We had the most amazing, wonderful, happy children on the face of the planet. We were together. And in love.

If there is one thing I am most proud of about our little family of four, it is the abundance of love. Of hugs. Of kisses. Of never-held-back I love yous.

Summer 2011 featured no camps, no beach vacation, no amusement parks.

But it did feature lots and lots of adventures -- parks, museums, s'mores (a very cheap way to entertain friends!), the zoo (free in DC!), back yard camping, cardboard robot making -- adventures of all shapes and sizes but with one common factor: free or very, very inexpensive.

Our yard never looked better! The floor of our laundry room was visible on more than one occasion!

Because there was time. Time together. Time around the house. Time for adventures.

And nearly every day (after I stopped freaking out) I thought to myself, "This, this is the time of our lives." We were poorer than I ever hope to be again. But we were happy. Because we were together. And as hard as it was, especially at first, I think I will always look back at the summer of 2011 as the best summer of my life.

{I'm back at work (er, outside the home!) full-time and Abel's home with the kids but still looking for a job. We are doing okay on what I make + unemployment. Thank goodness for unemployment. But we are hopeful that something will come along for Abel soon. And in the meantime, he's trying to savor his time at home, especially all the time he has with Nathaniel.}



Though I didn't initially write this post with this in mind, I've decided to link up to Elena and her Be Enough 4 Cancer Campaign. Because I think this post really is about our family, our love, our togetherness just being enough.


Original post by Smiling Mama. Thanks for reading!

Drum roll, please

In my last post I left a big teaser about life changes. Well, here it is: after 5 years as a part-time work- outside-the-home mama and then 18mos as a full-time stay-at-home mama, I've gone back to work...in an office...full time!

I just finished my second week--and received my first paycheck, woo hoo! (Though it only reflected four days of work so was tiny.)

This is a huge change for our entire family. Right now, Abel is home with the boys full-time. (More on that later...apparently I can't tell an entire story in one post!) They are doing great. I leave at about 8am every day and take the Metro downtown (SOOO fun to be downtown in lots of action!) and get to the office by 9am. So far I've been leaving at 5pm and home by 6pm, but as work picks up, my day may lengthen a bit.

There are great things about going back to work--a paycheck, a sense of professional fulfillment, fun lunch spots (though that isn't really in the budget!), running into friends on the Metro, new colleagues who may become friends.... And there are really hard things--only seeing Nathaniel for usually less than two hours on weekdays, having Lucas ask me to stay home, missing all three of my boys, having less time for my volunteer activities....

But as with any big change, I know it will just take some time and then we'll all be used to it and in a good routine. I'm so grateful to have found a job quickly when we really needed the income. And I can tell you one thing, you can be assured that you won't ever find me in the middle of a "mommy war" debate--I've now been on ALL sides of the stay-at-home v. work-outside-the-home mom debate and I can assure you, they are ALL tough!

Original post by Smiling Mama. Thanks for reading!

Three Kinds of Families

My aunt, a long-time and very skilled family therapist, says there are three kinds of families:

• Families who gather around food
• Families who gather around alcohol
• Families who gather around activities

Makes sense, right? We all know families whose gatherings are all about activities--they get together to ski or mountain bike or hike. Their vacations are centered around being active. Then, there are families who get together to drink. Their gatherings have copious amounts of alcohol. Then, there are families whose #1 question when planning to get together is: what will we eat? What should I bring?

My extended family (both sides) definitely falls into the food category. There's always a big meal. Dinner is often planned during (or just after) breakfast. We're a food family. Sure, there may also be alcohol or activities, but food is the centerpiece of our gatherings.

I've been around alcohol or activity families before and, let me tell you, it has been a disconcerting experience. I'll never forget a time I was vising a friend during college and her family planned a beach picnic. Except we got there and there was hardly any food! The activity of driving onto the beach, visiting the beach, walking along the beach, was clearly the focus (I later realized!), NOT the food part of a picnic. In fact, if I recall correctly, I don't even think there were enough sandwiches for everyone to have their own!

I literally could not wrap my head around what happened that day!

I started giving all this a lot of thought recently when my brother and his new girlfriend were vising for (I would later learn!) my surprise party weekend. On Friday night we were talking about her meeting my parents for the first time the next day. She said something along the lines of, "I feel comfortable around any family that eats."

I couldn't agree more! (And she'll do just fine with ours!)


Original post by Smiling Mama. Thanks for reading!

Uncle Eric

This morning a classmate of Lucas's brought a very tiny dead snake in a zip lock bag to school. She was proudly showing it off to everyone so when we got there she immediately brought it over to Lucas. He was fairly unimpressed and told her, "my Uncle Eric has a bigger snake at his house. It's a corn snake and I pet it."

One of the teachers turned to me and said, "I've just GOT to meet this Uncle Eric. Lucas talks about him all the time." Then the other teacher jumped in, "yeah, Uncle Eric said Lucas can have a beer when he's 21."

I do believe the actual quote was, "I'll buy you your first beer when you turn 21."

Rest assured, Uncle Eric, you loom large in the mind of Lucas and apparently his teachers and classmates as well!



Original post by Smiling Mama. Thanks for reading!

Surviving in Style: Free Lymphedema Sleeves Thanks to Susan Niebur

I've found that when someone is a giver it is very hard for them to accept--let alone ASK--for anything from someone else. My friend, Susan (that's her on the right), is a giver. And, I'm sure that even as she has battled cancer, and the effects of cancer, time and time again, it has been very difficult for her to accept the kindness of others.

The thing is, that when you allow someone to give to you, you really are giving to them. You are giving them the joy, the satisfaction, the happy heart that comes from giving to others.

And so, even as her body was being ravaged by the effects of chemo, Susan was thinking of others. Even as she was feeling the pain of her lymphedema (very painful arm swelling that happens to many breast cancer survivors--or warriors, I like that term better, don't you?--because they had lymph nodes removed and therefore don't have lymph nodes filtering our the yucky stuff) she was thinking of others who were battling lymphedema.

You see, Susan, like my mom, purchased her oh-so-stylish lymphedema sleeves from LympheDIVAS. Luckily, they were both able to afford them, despite the little or no coverage their insurance provided. These sleeves help keep the lymphedema under control and their cool designs tend to elicit compliments instead of rude stares. For many breast cancer warriors, a sleeve and/or gauntlet is a medical necessity, but too often insurance doesn't cover their steep cost (around $100 for just one sleeve!)

And so, Susan (being the giver that she is!), with the help of another giver (and friend!), Sue (that's her on the left), has arranged an amazing partnership. LympheDIVAS is now working with Crickett's Answer to Cancer to provide lymphedema sleeves and gauntlets FREE to those who need, but can't afford, them.

Most people assume that once the hair grows back (there's my sister, mom and me--wasn't she a beautiful bald warrior?--during her chemo) and a few scans come back clear, breast cancer is over. But, for many, the long-term effects are real and painful. Thanks to Susan and this partnership, many more warriors will survive in style and with with less pain.



And one of the best parts is that every time someone posts or Facebooks or tweets or just picks up the phone and calls a friend to tell them about this amazing act of giving, Susan is feeling the joy, the glow, the happy heart that comes with giving to others. And for that, I am especially grateful.

Here are the specifics:

Read about this project directly from Susan, leave her some comment love and then share her post with everyone you know (the share options are at the bottom of her post). Read more about it from Sue. Check out the awesome designs at LympheDivas and read about the co-founder and inspiration behind the company's continued mission, Robin Troxell.

Then, click over to Crickett's Answer for Cancer and be inspired by Crickett then download the enrollment materials here and write in "lymphedema sleeve and gauntlet" on page 2. Or, forward, e-mail, snail mail or fax the forms to someone you know who needs one. Better yet, just tell everyone you know about this, because who knows who might know a warrior who continues to suffer because they can't afford a lymphedma sleeve.

And then enjoy the joy, satisfaction, and happy heart of giving!

Original post by Smiling Mama. Thanks for reading!

The Twins

Exhibit A:



Exhibit B:

Which is Nathaniel and which is Lucas? Everyone says that Nathaniel looks like me and Lucas looked (and still looks!) like his dad, but I think these two boys look so much alike!

In a last-minute decision, we sent both boys to my parents' house this weekend--both boys gone for three nights and two days! It was great, we got a lot of campaign work done, I made some dents in our mountain of laundry and ironing and we even went out on a classic DC date night (dinner followed by a moon-lit tour of a monument!).

I was nervous about being away from Nathaniel for so long because I'm still breastfeeding. And, it did pose some challenges. Pumping was fine for about 24 hours then my body fully rebelled about the fact that there was no baby involved. Luckily in just the first few hours of Nathaniel being back things seem to have, um, regulated.

Answer key: Exhibit A is Nathaniel, B is Lucas. Did you guess correctly?

Original post by Smiling Mama. Thanks for reading!

The Letter Project

Friends, I am so excited about Sue from Laundry for Six's new project. She's calling it Letter Project and the idea is to write one letter a week for an entire year--52 weeks totaling 52 letters. She'll be writing about her own letters and offering readers a prompt each week for their own letters.

And I'm totally in!

I have stacks and stacks of letters from friends and family, the large majority of which arrived when I was in college. I was a prolific letter sender during those years as well. I only knew one person with e-mail during our freshman year and honestly, I didn't understand it at all! I eventually got e-mail maybe during my sophomore or junior year but still rarely used it. Instead, I wrote letters! I have long letters from my then teenage sister and short chicken scratch letters from my dad (he was the best care package sender ever!) and my grandparents. During summer break, my college girlfriends and I wrote to each other with actual letters as well. What wonderful prized possessions those letters are!

And of course, this project will be the perfect excuse to fuel my love of stationary--especially my love of finding cute stationary on sale! (Though, truth be told, I have boxes of cute note cards this very moment!)

I am not starting this project from scratch, actually, I imagine that I still write--and actually mail!--more written notes than the average person. I know what a joyous thrill it is to receive a real live letter or even a note that isn't a pre-printed card in the mail and so make an effort to send notes on a regular basis.

In honor or Memorial Day, Sue's first prompt is to write to someone in the military or someone who is deployed or living overseas. And I actually participated without even realizing it because I sent a care package and note to my sister whose husband is in Afghanistan for a year. (Sarah--check your mail!!)

I'm looking forward to next week's prompt! Won't you join me?


Original post by Smiling Mama. Thanks for reading!

Wonderfully busy Easter

We had three Easter egg hunts. (With a boy who really doesn't care much for candy!)



We dressed in our Easter Sunday best. (The tie didn't last through Mass!)



We made and cracked Cascarones. (Don't you just love an untucked dress shirt on a little boy?!)

We went to the "beach" in the mountains.

And hunted for minnows and tadpoles with Uncle Eric.

Add to that about a million trips to the park and a zillion bike rides around the cul-de-sac and lots of time with Aunt Sarah and it has been a pretty great Easter in Pennsylvania!

Original post by Smiling Mama. Thanks for reading!

Cascarones

We're making our cascarones today! This is my absolute favorite Mexican tradition from Abel's family. They are fun to make and even more fun to crack over the heads of your loves ones on Easter Sunday! Here's a tutorial from a few years ago, although if you haven't already saved empty egg shells you'll need to quickly make a few quiches to get enough!

Original post by Smiling Mama. Thanks for reading!

Great Weekend

I'm so totally lucky to have lots of awesome cousins and one of them had a wedding reception this weekend giving us the kick in the behind that we needed to spend a very fun weekend in Philadelphia with my brother. Philly is so close! And, it is a great city, with or without kids. If you haven't ever been there or haven't been there recently, GO!

We got to my brother's apartment mid-afternoon and trekked all our stuff up to his 3rd floor apartment before heading right over to the oldest zoo in the nation. It was chilly but very sunny and there were only maybe a few dozen other people there--it kind of felt like we had the place to ourselves which was very fun. Plus, the animals were all out and about and pretty active.

Saturday we spent most of the day at the Please Touch Museum. That place is totally worth the trip to Philly if you have a preschooler. It was awesome! Lucas had a blast and we all enjoyed watching him play and playing with him.

After the museum, we went back to Eric's apartment and quickly got ready before Lucas's babysitter--a friend of Eric's--came over. Kids weren't invited to the reception (only a reception because the couple had eloped a few months earlier) but I requested and received a special dispensation to bring Nathaniel. (Of course he was a hit, but he was also very good. Grandma held him for much of the evening and he slept in his car seat for another good chunk of time!)

Sunday afternoon my parents, aunt, uncle and cousin came over to Eric's for lunch and then we headed back home. Both boys slept for most of the drive and it took almost exactly 2 hours to get home.

A few observations:

1) Little Nathaniel pretty much doubled the amount of STUFF we had to take with us!
2) I'm getting soft as an official 4 year suburbanite. My brother's neighborhood is somewhat sketchy and I was totally worried about our mini van!
3) Maybe everyone should have their wedding and reception on different days. My cousin got to wear her (stunning!) dress twice and had a totally relaxing day before the big par-tay.
4) If you take a baby to a wedding reception, arrange to have a grandmother there to hold him most of night so you can mix and mingle and dance the night away!


Original post by Smiling Mama. Thanks for reading!

500 Winner

Because practically everyone who commented on my 500 post for the $50 gift card to Barnes and Noble is either a close friend or family member, I made sure to not look at the comments before drawing the number via random.org. I just glanced at the number of comments and put it right into the random number generator. And so you shouldn't be the least bit suspicious about the fact that my sister won! I truly, truly wanted each of my readers to win and wish I had a gift for each of you. But, I also have to admit that if anyone deserves a little treat right now, it is Sarah.

Congrats, Sis! I'll hand you the gift card at Easter right after my great big hug!

And thanks again to everyone--even those of you who didn't comment--for reading Smiling Mama. Here's to 500 more!

Original post by Smiling Mama. Thanks for reading!

Thoughts Elsewhere

I'm over at DC Metro Moms with a fun little post about my future at the park. You can read it here.

However, my thoughts today and yesterday and tomorrow are really out in California with my little sister who had to kiss her hubby goodbye last night as he heads to Afghanistan for a year. Let me repeat: a year. I can't even imagine. They've weathered two 7 month deployments already (both of those to Iraq) and came out stronger as individuals and a couple.

At Mass on Sunday, in the Prayers of the Faithful, one of the prayers referenced "as we mark seven years since the start of the Iraq war." I thought, can that be possible? Seven years. Indeed, it has been that long and even longer that we've been in Afghanistan.

No matter what your feelings are on war and peace or these two wars in particular, it is so so important that we all keep our troops and their families in the forefront of our minds, our hearts and our prayers. And if you want to put particular names to your prayers, please make it Sarah and Mike.

I can't wait to give Sarah a big hug when she comes to visit over Easter. Hopefully some newphew therapy (and meeting Nathaniel for the first time!) will help just a bit.

Original post by Smiling Mama. Thanks for reading!

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas!

Santa was very good to us this year. The biggest and best reactions from Lucas came from the orange in his stocking, his new electric toothbrush and the touch 'n brush. How fun to witness the wonder of a child on Christmas morning! He also loved his new big boy bike complete with a helmet, bell, bike "basket" and light.

I'm reveling in the fact that we're "home" to enjoy my family's many long-standing Christmas traditions, most of which revolve around foods which I'm not preparing!

Warmest wishes to you and your family!

Original post by Smiling Mama. Thanks for reading!

O Christmas Tree

I realized last night that this is becoming an annual tradition for me...I fully intend for us to get a tree and decorate right after Thanksgiving. Then, on or about the second week of December, when we haven't gotten down a single box or purchased a tree, I begin lamenting that Christmas is ALMOST HERE and there's NO POINT in decorating now since we'll just have to PUT IT ALL AWAY again in a few short weeks.

Oh well, I think to myself, there's always next year.

And then Abel magically appears with a tree and we get the decorations down and it all happens. And I savor each and every nativity scene (I have A LOT) and Santa and ornament and our home looks so lovely and for two or three weeks I thoroughly enjoy it.

Our very first Christmas together as an engaged couple was a challenging one. We had gotten engaged that previous summer (on my birthday!) and Abel found out around Thanksgiving that he was being laid off. Needless to say, we were broke. I had a very, very cozy (read: tiny) apartment to myself and Abel lived in a fairly gross house with 2-3 other guys (it varied) so we spent most of our time at my apartment. Did I mention we were broke? Each weekend we walked over to Eastern Market and as the holidays approached, we admired the beautiful evergreens for sale. Since we would both be traveling to our respective families for Christmas and we were broke (did I mention that?) we only admired them from afar.

Then, one evening I came home from work to find Abel at my apartment with a wonderful surprise. He had literally emptied both his and my change jars, counted out the coins and purchased a diminutive (but quite lovely) Christmas tree with about 75 cents to spare! Decorations were sparse that year but it probably was the most special tree we'll ever have.

Yesterday afternoon I came home to find a Christmas tree on our side porch. We're going to decorate it with Lucas tonight!



Original post by Smiling Mama. Thanks for reading!

Amazing Teachers

I come from a pretty large family and although we don't have a single doctor or lawyer among us, we have many, many teachers. Aunts, an uncle, numerous cousins, my mom and my sister are all teachers. My brother even spent a year teaching at a very challenging inner-city New York school.

I've never sat in on any of their classes, but I'm pretty confident that they are all excellent teachers. The kind of teachers who truly have changed the lives of their students. I know for sure that my sister is that kind of teacher. With only three short years of teaching under her belt, she's received notes from students that many teachers only dream about receiving: "you changed my life" kind of notes.

I didn't go into teaching myself but my sister often tells me I'd make a good one. The thing is, it just seems like too difficult of a job. Yeah, the school day ends around 3pm and there are weeks off at Christmas and for Spring Break. Having the summer off would be pretty great. But, my friends and relatives who are teachers are pretty much the only people I know who don't have a moment to return a quick e-mail during the work day. They're also the only people I know who literally still have 50% of their work to do after the dismissal bell.

The fact that I truly don't think I could do it is a big reason why I have so much respect for those amazing teachers out there. People like my sister and many of my relatives. I know I've been lucky enough to have a handful of teachers like them in my life--but certainly it was just a handful. I hope that Lucas and his little brother are lucky enough to be taught and influenced by some amazing teachers during their educational careers as well.

You know, come to think of it, if we pulled a few of my relatives out of retirement and relocated everyone, I think we could almost fully staff a pretty amazing school. One that I'd love to send my kids to!


This post was inspired by Close Encounters of the Third Grade Kind by Phillip Done which I received a free review copy of from the publisher. You can read more posts inspired by this book here.

Original post by Smiling Mama. Thanks for reading!

Here and There

Sorry I've been MIA over here. Hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving and is enjoying the holiday weekend.

We're visiting the in-laws and at this very moment Lucas and Abel are getting haircuts from the guy who cut Abel's hair growing up. I'm thankful that we've already taken (and ordered--woohoo!) our Christmas card photos because 1) I've generally found that small-town barbers leave something to be desired and 2) if this man cut Abel's hair as a child that means that he's been cutting hair for at a minimum 25+ years. Now, there is a possibility that he's remained current and has even improved with age and experience. Or, Lucas and Abel are both going to come back with boy/man haircuts from the 70s or 80s. Luckily, Abel isn't shy about telling the person cutting his hair exactly what he wants so hopefully everything will turn out just fine. We'll see.

It has also been a Thanksgiving/Birthday/Christmas extravaganza for Lucas. Since we won't see this side of the family again until they visit after the new baby is born, they had birthday and Christmas presents ready. He's pretty much opened 1-2 gifts each day since we arrived. I am thinking this may dash the excitement over my idea of actually putting together a little advent calendar this year with mini gifts (like stickers) each day. But, it sure has been fun for him. Plus, he's actually playing with and enjoying his new gifts instead of them getting lost in the big pile of Santa/parent/other grandparent/other aunts, uncles, etc. gifts.

Also, I've got a post up over at DC Metro Moms if you're just dying to read something new. Click here.


Original post by Smiling Mama. Thanks for reading!

More Good Things

1. Our little old Plymouth Neon just crossed the 100,000 mile mark. We got this car used for a great deal right after we got married. I truly can't believe it's lasted so long without any major repairs. Not to mention that it was stolen and then found when we lived on Capitol Hill (a funny story for another day!). Let's hope it keeps on chugging for another year or more! (Furiously knocking on wood right now!!)

2. We got new windows! Yes, in addition to the closet project craziness, we had new windows installed on Tuesday. They look fantastic and I'm very much looking forward to a winter where I can't feel a breeze from the closed windows as I lay in bed.

3. Today is my little sister's 28th birthday. Hop over and wish her a great year! (And doesn't she look absolutely BEAUTIFUL in this picture?)



Original post by Smiling Mama. Thanks for reading!