Tuesday, December 09, 2008

1 Tree, 2 Sick Girls, 3 Winners, 4 Adorable Kidlets

1 Tree
It didn't occur to me to post pictures of our Finnish decorations until commenters mentioned it. So here we are: some close-ups of the straw decorations, including various kinds of stars and snowflakes, pine cones, angels, and even straw garland.

You can see the tree in all its splendor as well as the goats (on the mantel) at the bottom of this post.







I've always been a white light girl myself, but hubby likes multicolored. We tend to trade off from one year to the other to keep us both happy. But this year, I insisted on white. To me, multicolored just wouldn't work with the straw ornaments. Last time we used all white, some of the strands died, so yesterday I went to buy more before we got the tree.

Do you know how stinkin' hard it is to find plain old white lights?!

There were oodles of multicolored ones, but almost the only plain white I could find were icicles. Not what I needed. I ended up buying several boxes of the only other ones there: mini strands with of a paltry 20 lights on each . . . argh! But hey. It worked.

Our tree looks pretty good. At least, it looks good save for the bottom foot or two, which are pretty bare so the cat doesn't destroy my cool ornaments. She's already decided she likes taking flying leaps into the tree and sleeping on one of the boughs.

2 Sick Girls

In the middle of her piano lesson yesterday, #3 came down with a pretty nasty head cold. She was miserable for much of the evening, but with the help of some Advil managed to put a smile on her face enough to go get the tree with the family and take a picture (below). She's staying home from school today.

Then last night I was up for three hours with #4, who woke up in horrible pain with a UTI. She, too, is home from school.

Yeah. I had a ton of things on my to-do list for today. A doctor's visit and lots of cuddling with two little girls is pretty much going to replace most of that. Hope the fam isn't too hung up on having things like clean underwear.

3 Winners

As promised, I'm announcing the Pay It Forward winners today:

Marcia

Redhoodoos

Sher

Congratulations, ladies! Remember to let me know which book you want and where to send it. And be sure to Pay It Forward on your own blogs.

4 Adorable Kidlets

With the tree up, we (finally!) took a picture to use on our Christmas cards. The kids look so grown up to me, it's sort of freaking me out. I swear, they were just babies. Babies, I tell you!

Note the Scandinavian sweater #2 is wearing . . . I wore that very sweater myself at that age.

The picture uploaded really little even though I picked "large" (no idea why . . . dumb Blogger), but you can sorta see the straw goats on the mantel above my son's head (one big goat, two little ones).


Merry Christmas!

15 comments:

Heidi said...

Look at all that red hair! And I love your straw, goats and all. I had to pick up some white lights, too--found them at the grocery store. Who knew? I'm sorry you have to deal with sick kids. There were 8 in my family and we always (ALWAYS) got sick at Christmas. I remember one Christmas morning sitting at the top of the stairs waiting for my dad to record the loot Santa brought while my older sister was acting as bookie, taking bets on who would throw up next. My poor mother. Ooh,ooh! Love this one: flangut. I mean, that's a real thing if you live in Flan land.

LisAway said...

Those ornaments are so beautiful! And I agree: they need white lights. I'm so happy to see pictures of your cute smiling children! I hope they get well soon!
My WV word: trialo- what adorns the head of the trinity. (?)

Kristina P. said...

I don't like colored lights. I can do all one color, but I prefer white.

Congrats to the winners!

Jan said...

Lovely tree. Just beautiful. Think wedding sections for white lights. They come on sale too.

You kids are adorable.

Anonymous said...

We have similar ornaments. But I bet yours are "authentic" (ours came from IKEA). :)

CUTE kids!

Cheryl said...

Oh, Annette! Those ornaments are simply gorgeous. I love them! Our tree is a hodge-podge of everything and anything we've found over the last 10 years. Blah. But at least it has that "we have small children!" charm.

Your kids are adorable. And I can see now why you love the red hair (not that I doubted!).

Redhoodoos said...

Okay this is funny. My cats loved our fake tree so much that they would climb to the top and go to sleep - until they broke it one day. Now we buy real trees. Cats are such funny critters.

I'm a white light girl, too.

Thank you again for this great giveaway. This was such a treat!

Kimberly Vanderhorst said...

Beautiful! Both the tree and the children. Sorry about the attack of illness though - yeurgh!

Melanie Jacobson said...

Oh, pretty tree! And pretty kids! I hope your girls fell better soon!

Lyon Pride said...

The kids are all so cute. We miss see your family!

in time out said...

this was SUCH a fun post. thanks. hope you all are feeling better...cute tree.

Heffalump said...

Your tree looks great. So far we keep most of our ornaments disposable or homemade because some of my boys can be kind of rough on ornaments. Those Finnish decorations are beautiful.
It's great that your daughter can wear that sweater. My Mom saved some of my old baby clothes, but I really don't want to put Baby B in polyester bell bottoms with a crease down the front...

Jenna said...

I LOVE the straw ornaments! How wonderful that you have those! Darling family picture too! Hope everyone gets better before the big day!

Amanda D said...

I love all the ornaments and your kids are adorable. Great picture!

Luisa Perkins said...

1) We have the same situation: I love white lights and P loves the colored ones.

2) Cats and Christmas trees: don't get me started.

3) You're such a good mom!

4) This is the most trite thing ever, but I can't believe how big your kids are getting!

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