Weekend Fun

No Blue Christmas around here. December has been a very good month to just enjoy Christmas, lots of music, concerts, spending time with family and friends, and ... 

enjoying my Christmas present. Listening to some very old Christmas albums on my new Victrola!!! It has been at least 20 years since I have played these albums. I can also play my old cassette tapes and even record off the cassettes and albums onto a CD!

Kate spent the weekend with us and she is such a joy! We did have a bit of a dilemma involving a mythical character for one of the rites of passage in life, i.e. losing baby teeth. Here is the Facebook rant post from her mother last week. 

"The tooth fairy has forgotten to come 2 nights in a row and we don't have an Elf on the Shelf. #Momfail. Why? Why did anyone ever come up with so many additional imaginary things to make parenting even more difficult. It's hard enough as it is without having to remember to keep up with made up stuff. And then, THEN, I feel guilty about it. What!?! Merica. Rant over."

Sooooo, in the spirit of trying to help Mom out, I asked whether the Tooth Fairy ever visits the grandparents' house. We decided yes, he/she can and since Kate would be with us this weekend, the Tooth Fairy could come for a long, overdue visit. Well, after telling Kate the next morning that maybe she should check under her pillow to see, she informed me that she had NOT brought the tooth with her and if the tooth box was not under her pillow, the tooth fairy would not come. She was very adamant about that and, later, I found this on the floor. This young lady plays by the rules. And I get to keep the $5.

She just isn't buying into that and I guess she

realized we tried to fool her.

Such a sweet boy!

Let's just take Grandpa down in this pic!

On Sunday evening, just before we were to leave for another Christmas concert, the doorbell rang and what to my wondering eyes should appear! My old and dear friend, Bettye, stopped by for a minute to say Merry Christmas and, more importantly, to show off her oldest granddaughter, Shana. Oh, I loved it! I hadn't seen this beautiful girl for so many years and a couple of Christmas memories came to mind that were funny. When she was four years old, she made this precious little Christmas card holder and Bettye brought her to visit. 

She was all dressed up in her Christmas duds carrying my gift. I had a gift for her, too ... a Veggietales video ... and when I presented it to her, she said, "Oh, I hope it's not another video!" Out of the mouths of babes comes brutal honesty sometimes.

She will be off to college next fall.

Some friends from church invited us to attend the Plano Symphony at the St. Andrews United Methodist Church. What a magnificent facility they have and the concert by the orchestra and the Frisco Chorale was excellent. The huge pipe organ!! Oh my goodness! I'm used to a band at church with keyboard, guitars and drums.

Kate and Jack are with their Nana for a couple of days.

It's always a happy and special time for them with her.

Years ago, a co-worker made a styrofoam snowman for everybody in the office. I have held on to it for probably twenty years and set it out with other small decorations every year. It looked something like this, only hers was much better.

Now Jack liked that little snowman so much that he wanted to take it home. We just barely got off our street before the snowman had fallen apart in his little hands. No big loss to me, however, it was to him. So, while he is with his Nana, he decided he wanted to re-create it. Here it is!

This pic just makes me smile really big!

Nana told me he asked for two toothpicks, but when he saw the box full, he got a little carried away with toothpicks in his snowman!

This is Hunter with the doll house we sent to her. 

She was so excited over this and the video they sent of her opening it was adorable. 

She's so pretty - (wish she didn't have that binkie in her mouth though!!)

And, finally, here is a pic of my sweet friend, Liz, who was paralyzed by a stroke almost 11 years ago at the age of 22. She is a darling girl who has the sweetest spirit and attitude. Mickey, Minnie, and others visited our church last week for a hot chocolate party. Love the big smile on her face.