Family Fun Night, Christmas Style

The suburb we live in isn't technically a suburb of Columbus because it's not a city yet. Groveport is still classified as a village. We live in the heart of the village just down the street from the Police Station and about 3 blocks from the Town Hall. Most of the village is comprised of historic buildings and homes like ours so it has that small town charm.

Adding to the small town charm is their Christmas spirit. At every intersection down main street they have planters that are changed to reflect the season we are in. Currently each planter has a small real Christmas tree that is completely decorated. We also have the old fashion oil lamp looking street lights that currently have Christmas wreaths on them. The cherry on the cake though is the enormous, time square sized evergreen tree that sits across the street from Town Hall.

Every year at Christmas time the village decorates the tree with massive sized ornaments and lights. The first Friday in December they have a tree lighting ceremony. So we of course bundled ourselves and the kids up and headed down.



While we were waiting for the guest of honor to arrive they entertained us with some carols sung by some of the Elementary students. After what seemed like an hour because of the cold (only 15v minutes) we heard the sirens coming. This year Santa arrived via Fire Truck.





Emma being the smarty pants she is asked us if the fireman went and picked up Santa and Mrs. Claus at the north pole. Dave told her that Santa drove his sleigh to the fire station and then got on the fire truck.

After a few more songs it was time for the countdown. 5....4....3....2....1....



Once the tree was lite it was across the street to the Town Hall where we waited in line for almost an hour just for Emma to sit on Santa's lap again.



She told us that she was unable to tell Santa everything she wanted at the zoo a few weeks ago so she just had to see him again. This time around Ian said from the start he that he did not want to sit on Santa's lap so we didn't force him but Emma did great as always.



Our next stop was upstairs to get some cookies and cocco and then on our way out we stopped downstairs to look at the Lego Mania display. Ian was completly fasinated with this. The picture here is of the lego version of our Town Hall.



It was a great family night for us and the best part for Dave and I was that it was all free!

Friday Foto Finish Fiesta

Wow has this week just flown by which is a really good thing because it has been one mess of a week. Of course since it's finally Friday that means it's time for Friday's Foto Finish Fiesta.



If you read my last post then you already know that the kids and I put our tree up Tuesday. I decided this year to start early to get a good picture of my two babies together in front of the tree. So far this is the best one. I know how sad is that.

Now it's your turn to head on over to Candid Carries and share a picture with us.

O Christmas Tree

First off I need to apologize for my absence this week. Things have been nuts since last Friday for me and it seems that by the time I am able to sit down every night I am way to tired to get on the computer. Really everything started going down hill last Friday and things just keep heading that way.

Last Friday when I got home from work I opened a bottle of wine and started putting our Christmas Tree up. Growing up my mom always procrastinated on getting the tree up so we usually ended up with only a few weeks with it. The first Christmas that Dave and I lived together we put the tree up the day after Thanksgiving and it has been that way ever since.

So I get the tree all put together and looking perfect then I plug the cord in and nothing happens. I start to panic a little and frantically go through the whole tree to make sure I got all the different strands plugged in together. We have one of those pre-lit trees so all your supposed to do is plug them into each other and then into the wall. All of my plugs were together but nothing was lighting up. I decided to call Dave and see if he had any ideas of what might be wrong and he suggested I go through and replace some of the fuses. I went through and replaced every single fuse on the tree and still nothing. I new it couldn't be because of a burnt out light because these lights are the ones where if one burns out it's the only one that doesn't come on. I called Dave back in complete meltdown phase because I knew we didn't have the money to buy a new tree, or at least not one I would really like, but in my crazy state I couldn't figure out what we were going to do with no light's on our tree.

(I should explain that it was 7:00pm and I had been up since 4:30am and worked a full 8 hours, so my mind was all functioning at that point)

Now Dave being the logical one says to me "well I guess we are just going to have to pull all of them off and put regular strands of lights on". So I took the tree apart and I started with the top section. Again my mind not being at full capacity I sat there and twisted every hook holding the strands of lights on to get them off which not only took FOREVER but killed my fingers. An hour and half later when Dave got home from work he picks up the middle section and just starts pulling and the stupid clips are popping off left and right. I worked for about another 30 minutes before I called it quits for the night and went to bed. Of course I got up the next morning and spent another couple of hours getting the rest of the lights off and the tree back up. This is where everything stopped.

Having a pre-lit tree meant we did not own any regular strands of lights so we needed to go and get some but that wasn't possible since payroll screwed. See Dave was supposed to get his check on Friday but the ladies in his payroll department didn't get it turned in on time before the Holiday so no one got there checks until Monday. This meant for the first year in 8 years my tree was not up and complete over Thanksgiving weekend.

We were able to go to Target Monday night to get the lights and then finally Tuesday night after dinner the kids and I put all the lights and decorations on it. I am very proud of myself this year because I let the kids put up most of the ornaments and I haven't gone through and moved very many of them. I am a major perfectionist when it comes to things like this and usually have to have all the ornaments spread out evenly. The only ornaments I have moved have been breakable ones that they put at the very bottom.

So what do you think? Was it worth all the hassel this year?

Country, Rap, and Surfin Bird

Thanksgiving day after we had all eaten and the football game had been played all of us cousins (younger folks) were in my Grandma's living room talking about some of our nights out. This conversation led to my sister talking about how her roommate Courtney has been wanting to go Karaoke with Dave again. It just so happen that her, my sister, my SIL, and Dave and I were all going to be free Saturday night so we made the plans.

Steph & Me

Courtney & Alicia

Dave & Uncle Bob

When ever Dave goes to Karaoke he always calls his Uncle Bob to join us because his uncle is the one that got him into it. Now we all know I don't get to go out like this very often and when I do it's usually with just Dave so it was a real treat for me to have some girls to hang out with and even more of a treat that one of them was my sissy! I think the last time I was out with her was about two years ago and I was the DD.

I've never been out drinking with my SIL before but Steph has told me many stories of their nights out together which always seem to be fun. Up until this past Saturday my SIL Alicia's claim to fame was the night out a month ago where the Surfin Bird song came on at a local bar and she jumped up and did the Peter Griffin dance for the whole song. If you haven't seen this episode of Family Guy you really should.

Alicia, Dave, & Steph

So the night started with Dave doing Johnny Cash's Folsom Prison Blues, then Steph, Alicia, and Courtney singing Journey's Don't Stop Believing. The girls were a little nervous to sing at first because the bar we were at is a Biker Bar but really you wouldn't know if you didn't see the "No Biker Colors" sign posted on the door. Anyway they got a great response from the crowd so they were feeling pretty confident. Next round Dave sang David Allen Coe's If that Ain't Country. When it came time for the girls next song Dave joined them in one of the funniest things I have ever seen. Him and the girls sang the Trashman's Surfin Bird and my SIL and Courtney kind of did the Peter Dance to it while my sister just kept singing the same lines over and over. Dave of course nailed it and was their saving grace! The crowd must have been bog Family Guy people because everyone loved and were laughing the whole time. I was laughing so hard I almost peed my pants and as soon as they were done I headed off to the bathroom. The final song of the night went to Dave and he closed it out with Eminem's Without Me which brought some Thirty something Ho's to the dance floor. One of which was wearing what looked to be a brand new white sweater belly shirt which my SIL thought was the funniest thing she had ever seen in her life.

(Look toward the bottom of this pick and you will notice the white swaeter belly shirt from the back)

Now for those of you not from Central Ohio you may not get this but if you close a bar around here to have to follow it up with a trip to the closest Tee Jay's restaurant. It's kind of like a cheap Bob Evans and they are famous for their Barnyard Buster which is eggs, hasbrown, and biscuits covered in country gravy. I personal find this beyond disgusting but most people love it. My sisters roommate is from Michigan and my sister had yet to take her to Tee Jays so had to go. It started out being pretty nice but quickly went south when these two guys were seated next to us. Somehow they new Dave's uncle and they were just talking to him but then they started to become obnoxious and make rude and stupid comments to everyone around. I'm pretty sure they thought they were being funny but they weren't they were just pissing everyone off. My SIL ordered a Grilled Cheese which came with two sides and for one she choose a salad. Of course the waitress brought her salad out before the rest of the food and she was eating it. The annoying guys decided that they needed to comment on this and started saying things to her about how rude she was to be eating her salad before the rest of us had our food. My SIL said something back to them that I can't exactly remember do to the large number of shots I had but I do remember them saying something about her being so angry and she responded with a "well I wouldn't be so angry if drunk ass's at other tables weren't trying to talk to me". I'm pretty sure that these guys could sense the anger building in Dave and they finally left us alone to eat our greasy food in peace.

By the time I got home Saturday night it was after 4 am. It has been years since I have stayed up that late and years since I drank that much. Of course I paid for it all day Sunday and a little bit today. I guess I am getting to old to pull that off but it sure was nice to feel young for a night!

The Wilson's Turkey Day

I wanted to write this post on Friday or even Saturday and I knew I wanted to share some of the pictures I took but I seem to have temporarily (so I hope) misplaced the cord to upload the pictures. So since I still haven't found it I decided I had better write this now before it is way to late!

Every year for Thanksgiving Dave and I alternate which family to spend it with. This year was with my family at my Grandma's house. We loaded up the kids around 11 and headed an hour and fifteen minutes west. Of course we had to go over the river and through the woods but we finally arrived just in time for lunch. The whole family was there except for one of my cousins who lives in Florida and wasn't able to get the time off work to come home and his Dad, my Uncle, that passed away this summer. We could all tell that it was really affecting my Grandma and my Aunt Nan but we all did our best to keep their spirits up.

The food was GREAT as always, and there was way to much to choose from but that just meant we all had some kind of leftovers to take with us. The best part of the whole day for me was when my 13 year old brother KJ took my kids and my cousins sons outside to play some football. It wasn't long before some of the adults took notice of the game being played in the front yard and had to join in. Of course I have some really cute pictures of the game that I wanted to share but you will have to do without for now. The game itself was a pretty sad one, Emma had the best play of the whole game by running for a touchdown.

Around 5pm Dave and I loaded the kids back into the car for the trip to his moms house. Both Dave and I had to work Friday but the Babysitter somehow gets it off and my MIL is the only person I know that also doesn't have to work. So she got to keep the kids the entire holiday weekend. Which meant that Dave and I were able to go out and have some fun this past weekend but that is for another post.

By the time Dave and I arrived home it was after 9 and we were both exhausted so it was straight to bed for us.