Merry Christmas

Pre-Christmas Chaos

I'm not there yet, 
but I'm heading that way!

Grown-Up Christmas List

 

My Grown-up Christmas List

Cancer to stop growing in the people I love

Relationships to be healed

My children to be healthy and find happiness

  There would be enough money to heal the sick

and feed the poor

And I do want my husband to build me a proper chicken coop.

I'm tired of chasing dogs and chickens all day!

What is on your grown-up 

Christmas list?

I love Amy Grant, but I especially like her Christmas music. Here is one of my favorite Christmas songs:
 

Baby Love

This is our little Joseph, who we all fight over at church. We snatch him from his family each Sunday and pour our love on him. Today it was just Emilia and I, she had another baby in her arms and I had Joseph. It was heaven. Joseph is a toddler now, so he got bored and ran off.

 

A little later Mario arrived and once Joseph saw him he came running down the aisle towards him! It was the cutest thing. Mario has a little game that he plays with him each week. He takes the end of his tie and rubs it gently on Joseph's face until he become relaxed and sleepy. Today as Joseph jumped in Mario's lap he grabbed Mario's tie under his vest and began rubbing it. He knew the game and was ready to play. We laughed so hard!

Civil War

We are a house divided.

Two sons attend(ed) Oregon State.

Two sons and a daughter who root for U of O.

A mom who spent some time at U of O.

A dad who is BYU all the way (see-he has his shirt on).

Civil war day isn't that big of a deal to me and Mario, but there is a little party going on here today. I'm catching up on my blog instead of catching up on my sleep. Look for some more posts soon!

Christmas Tree Hunting

In spite of being tired from not sleeping last night, we had a fun time searching for a Christmas tree. It is a beautiful sunny and cold day here in Portland. The perfect day to drive out to the country. We were looking for the place we went to last year, but instead found the country house of my dreams! We happened upon another tree farm with nothing but nobles. $15 for any tree and they cut it, shake it, wrap it and bring it to your car. Awesome!

Emilia started our pretty grouchy this morning, but Mario was able to work his magic (and was willing to stop for donuts and Starbucks) and things turned around quickly. By the time we found our tree we were all laughing and having a fun time.

 I am getting so good at self portraits...I got this shot on the first try!

 Look at that blue sky!

 Me with the popeye face! 

 Trying to get one without the popeye face.

 Being weird on purpose this time!

Sleep Study

I had my sleep study last night. I had an appointment for 6 weeks from now, but I asked to be put on a wait list to get in earlier because I am off call right now. I didn't expect to get a call just a few hours after I made the appointment! I had to say no to that one, but then got called two days later. With not much time to prepare I didn't get the sleeping pill that was recommended. I did have a killer headache and postponed taking my medication for that until bedtime because it usually makes me very sleepy.

Well, I was incredibly tired, but DID NOT sleep. The sleep study is useless if you don't sleep. I am frustrated that I didn't take the time to get the sleeping pill, and for feeling like I probably wasted my entire sleepless night and won't get an accurate account of my sleeping issues.

I wish I didn't have this sleep anxiety that makes it difficult to sleep in unusual situations. I spent the night telling myself to GO TO SLEEP which made it even more difficult to get the task done. OK, and look at that picture of me. It was very uncomfortable to have wires attached to my entire body (even my legs had attachments), belts across my chest and stomach, and the worst of all.....things in my nose! I already have issues with my nose itching all the time. I thought those were going to drive me insane!

So today I feel the same as I do when I've been up all night at a birth! But with a lot more frustration. And wondering if I will have to repeat this test or just not get the results I was hoping to.

I will say one thing for sure, if I need to repeat the sleep study I will be taking major drugs.

Turkey Day

Our Beautiful Bird

Since I've worked to change our food buying practices this last year I didn't feel right settling for the "free" grocery store turkey this year. It went against everything I've been doing. I bit the bullet and paid the price. 

And it was worth it.

When the farm we purchased it from (Family2Family Farm) posted on facebook that it was turkey day I was excited that one of those turkeys was going to be sitting on my table Thanksgiving day. It felt right driving to the farm and meeting the family that just the day before had butchered my turkey. 

I was nervous that I would end up with a dry turkey and wondered if I should do something special to my turkey. I have never worried about this with grocery store turkeys as they have added salt and fluids. You can never touch a baster to them and have a moist bird. (In reality I just typed birth instead of bird and had to change it. I find this very humorous!) But in the end I just mixed the fresh herbs the farm included, along with some from my own garden with some butter and smothered that bird. I put it in a baking bag and went shopping. When I arrived home the bird was done and the meat was falling off the bones, moist and tender.

Like I said before....

It was worth it.

And, I feel good about my choices.  

 I had to add this picture of Amos trying to get to the turkey. When we brought it home G and Amos followed us from the door to the kitchen and both were trying to get to it. By the time I got to my camera G was gone.