Candy Cane Hunt

The next day was Monday and CB's family decided to do a "candy cane hunt" on their family's property. This involved a snow trail (fake snow) with candy canes hidden in the path and in the branches of the bushes nearby. The trail led up to a big banner of Frosty with Snowballs for a treat.

Assembling all the kids for a photo and pep talk is a tricky thing!

Harper (the youngest- until ours arrives)

love that single leftover tear. So sweet

The hunt begins- Jasper, Ollie and Levi (face hidden under the hat) carry their stockings to fill with the candy canes

Stella mid hunt

Stella and Mason spying Frosty at the end of the trail

Frosty and his snowball treats

CB eating a snowball

The Milk and Honey Maternity Frock GROSGRAIN GIVEAWAY!!!!

The Milk and Honey Maternity Frock GROSGRAIN GIVEAWAY!!!!

Rather Uncomfortable...

Do you think I could remove my bottom ribs? I'm starting to get incredibly uncomfortable. I'm just now almost 6 months pregnant and getting really claustrophobic thinking about the next 3 1/2 months and how much worse they are probably going to feel. I'll be sitting at my desk at work and will just start feeling like all my insides are being pushed into my lower ribs. I don't really want my ribs to expand (they haven't yet, but I hear they do)... but it is really suffocating to feel like there isn't enough room in there for both the baby and my vital organs. And I'm sure that this isn't really that bad yet-- ultimately the thing that freaks me out the most. If anyone wants to comment that the last three months actually get better/easier/more comfortable,etc- that's fine. I need to hear the lies.

Also started having the Braxton Hicks contractions (well, was just recently told that that's what was happening anyway)-- I think it freaked Caleb out a little bit when I told him over Ichat about it. But I assured him that they don't hurt and are just a clenching-ish type feeling and then my stomach feels super hard and are totally normal, etc etc... Poor guy, he's already worried about not being here with me, but now I tell him something that automatically makes him think - uh oh!

The number of people who have felt her kicks (besides CB and I of course) is now up to 5. I'm sure the number would be higher- if it wasn't a little weird to me still to have people press their hand to my stomach for up to 15 seconds at a time without moving it haha- because she really kicks so much. She's back to being the hulk baby.

And for the good news- One week from right now, Caleb will be back in the good ol' US and we'll be together. Hooray! This has been a LONG one. Today is 3 weeks since I've seen him. Add in the intense time zone differences, the spotty internet service, and the $1 a minute phone rates, and this has been the least we've communicated in the past 11 1/2 years... I'm doing pretty good though, considering everything. I haven't had a major cryfest breakdown, which I usually have at least one during his tours. I did have a few tears fall yesterday, but they weren't too bad. And considering the pregnancy hormones that make me cry during the Biggest Loser (ok, I admit- I cry during that anyway), I'm pretty proud of how good I've been :) I check weather.com everyday to make sure that St Louis and Chicago will have good enough weather and no flight delays to keep us apart. My Mom and Aunt Marcia are in town to visit me until Tuesday afternoon, so we have a busy weekend planned and they're going to help me get ready to fly home in less than a week. I am sure the time will fly by.

PS- He's in Scotland right now. That's so rad.

Holiday decorating

I think the saying goes...

When life gives you dead oranges, make a Christmas Tree!

Or at least that's what it should be when dead orange tree is too heavy for you to lift out of the window and your mom is coming to visit...

Free shirt and kitty poo

Who likes free stuff?

If you want to try for a free shirt I'm giving away on the hiphandmaids blog,

click here and leave a comment.

Thought it'd be funny to post a pic of me in the protective gear my mom sent me to protect the babe while cleaning the litter box. I feel like I'm on Dexter working a crime scene haha!

Here are some pics of the band and CB at their Thanksgiving show in the Netherlands. I got the pics off the internet, so I'm not sure who to credit the photos to.

Custom band shirts... I finished them the night before he left. :)

Random Musings...

I've had lots of little thoughts lately, that aren't enough to post about, but just might make a enough of a post strung together. Here they are:

Caleb's in Germany today. I'm wishing I was there. I was an exchange student in Germany 10 years ago and haven't been back since. Next time I have to go.

Time Zones. Wow, it is really harder with such different time zones. Usually the biggest difference is east coast- west coast and he'll be finishing a show and going to bed right when I am, and it's perfect. But 9 HOURS different is crazy. He's going to bed and it's like 4 or 5pm here.

Sewing shirts. I've been sewing shirts like mad, preparing for the markets I'm selling in next week. I pulled out all my fabric the other night and was inspired and started cutting out sleeves from this fabric I had in my bin and I get about 3 shirts worth cut and realize... I cut into the fabric for our BEDROOM CURTAINS. oops. I dropped the scissors, ran into the bedroom with the tape measure and after measuring 3 times, realized phew, there is still plenty of fabric left for the curtains.

Housework. I'm totally not into it. I got really spoiled while Caleb was home for two months straight and with me being pregnant- Not having to clean the catbox or take out the trash. None of the dirty work. Luckily I have a face mask and gloves to protect me from the litter, but I will be way glad to hand those jobs back to him when he gets home.

Netflix watch it now. It's awesome. I've had the same movies sitting on top of my tv waiting to be mailed back for the last 3 weeks (something about taking them to a mailbox makes it so much harder to get done) but now that we can watch instantly online, I at least feel like I'm getting some of our money's worth.

TV seasons. What I am watching now is tv seasons. This is good, cause you can give them half attention- say like while sewing- and still be able to follow the story line. Also if you have a lot of alone time as I currently do, you can watch a marathon of them. I've almost finished watching Dexter Season 1.

Working Overtime. How much is our free time worth? I think about that often. Like ok, during my regular job, I make X amount of dollars per hour. And in an hour of work I think, ok, I just paid for a dinner out or I just made enough to buy a shirt or whatever. But then free time, hmmm... It makes sense that you should be paid time and a half (or more!) for cutting into your free time. It does seem more valuable. But why? Maybe because you've allotted yourself the 40 hours/week or the 8 hours/day to be at the office. I've been on call this weekend, and I had to work 7 hours yesterday and was really frustrated that I didn't get a lot of other stuff done because of it. But then afterward, I thought about what 7 hours of overtime would equal to and it didn't seem as big of a deal... Either way, I'll be glad when this weekend is over and I'm not on call anymore- Crazy to say that, I've never wanted a weekend to be over before. :)

TGIW !?!

Yay for a 4 day weekend!

I am so excited to not go into the office tomorrow or Friday (Technically I'm on call and will have to work on Saturday and Sunday for a few hours, but at least it's not all day long). I have sooo much sewing and housework to do, it'll be nice to have a couple days at home to get stuff done! I may even brave the stores this weekend to try to get some names crossed off my list (anyone want to join me?)

In the past, I've posted a few times about my crazy travel stories... well Caleb and the band have officially topped most all of them in the last two days. This is what he told me last night: They were supposed to fly from the Chicago airport yesterday around noon to Atlanta where they would transfer to the flight to Amsterdam. They get to the airport with plenty of time and found that their flight was delayed about 30 minutes. Worried about the delay causing them to miss their connection, the airport lady switched them onto a direct flight on another airline. Nice, right? Well, no. Her supervisor came over and wouldn't allow it, because their luggage could no longer be removed from the original flight. So they were switched back to their original flight. Which has now started to board. They discover 2 things- 1. The delay was caused by a funny gas smell in the cabin which after being investigated, was found to be nothing problematic, except really smelly. and 2. They had been bumped to the end of the boarding line and by the time they got on, there was no overhead bin space available and so the 3rd guy, jon's saxophone had to be taken to the back of the plane. So at this point, they were delayed 30 minutes and would have roughly 40 minutes to board their next flight. But no.... at that moment Atlanta airport was blocking all departures and arrivals due to a computer glitch. So now, they are sitting on a plane in Chicago that smells like gas for an hour and a half, knowing that they will absolutely for sure miss their connection.

So they finally land, Ashton rushes off immediately to get in line to get a new flight for them, while CB and Jon wait for the plane to empty so they can get the saxophone from the back. Ashton gets them a flight through Copenhagen, he heads over there (a shuttle to a different terminal) and arrives right at the end of boarding. He lets them know that two more are on their way but they close the door anyway about 1 minute before CB and Jon arrive. Is that strike 3 then? So they get in the REALLY long line (if you can imagine that there is only 1 desk with 2 people serving everyone involved) and wait to get to the front. They are told (probably at least 1-2 hours after landing) that there is a possibility of flying standby through London in a couple hours. So they wait at the airport and when the flight time nears they go back to the desk. At some point in the last couple hours, the 10 spots that had been available have now been shrunken down to 2. The lady at the desk actually tried to make two of them fly the standby to London and leave the 3rd to wait until the next afternoon. How horrible is that? They explained that they are a band and can not travel separately (who would seriously ask someone to stay behind an entire day with a 9 hour flight involved?!) and right in front of them she called the next people and said- you lost your chance. Strike 4 then? And that was the last cross Atlantic possibility for the night, so they are given Delta airline t-shirts and toiletry kits (to make up for no luggage), some food, beverage, headphone, hotel and internet vouchers and sent away. How exhausting. Here's hoping the rest of the tour goes WAY better. It can only go up from there, right? Today's travels went off without a hitch and he should be landing in Amsterdam in about 2 hours.