Letter from Santa
Our friend Shawna penned this beautiful letter for her son.
Posted via Pixelpipe.
Call to duty
Just leaving the Call of Duty Ceremony for Howie’s nephew Tommy and his
regimen. His unit is being deployed to Iraq tomorrow morning.
Monopolizing new years eve
Big times, new year’s eve!
Already on way home. At 11:30. New year’s eve. How sad is that? Nice night of dinner and Monopoly with friends, though! 1st time I’ve played a whole game. I skunked ‘em!
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Christmas dénouement
We had a good Christmas. Christmas Eve, my parents and two of Howie’s brothers came over to my mother-in-law’s (downstairs at our house). We had the usual ham, baked beans, macaroni salad, and desserts. My mom and I visited with Nancy while the guys played euchre.
Christmas day, Howie’s other brother and his wife came to visit in the early afternoon. We had leftovers, all the aforementioned stuff, only cold. Then we went to my folks’ house for Christmas dinner. More ham. I am hammed out. It’s safe to say we’re now retaining enough water, we could probably just roll from room to room. We were at my mom’s from 3-9:30pm and had a really nice visit.
Presents? Yes, there were presents. We got dad a gift certificate for a local buffet. There’s a group of senior citizens who play euchre there a couple Wednesdays a month and he really enjoys that. There’s a 98-year old lady there who told him his beret was sexy. 
We gave my mom some organizers for her scrapbook stuff, a cute little ceramic cup sculpted to look like an owl, a Fiskars fingertip craft knife, a Fiskars mini easy stamp press, some acrylic stamps, and various paper. I also gave her a dragonfly pin adorned with various rhinestones. Bling, don’t ya know.
She and dad gave Howie a micro-SDHC card for his phone and some Christmas ornaments. Mom gave me an ornament, some scrapbooking stuff, and a rubber stamp of an Itialian greyhound or greyhound which strongly resembles our Emma.
Howie’s present to me was one he touted was really for both of us. I could tell from its heft and shape that it was a book. I unwrapped it and saw it was Garrison Keillor’s WLT, A Radio Romance.
“Oooh, ummm, I think I have this one already”, I said.
“Yeah, considering I got it off our bookshelf”, he replied.
Just then I noticed something sticking out from the pages. Tickets! He bought a pair of tickets to the January 20th appearance of Garrison Keillor at the Midland Theater! I was so surprised - he really got me. I’d forgotten all about Keillor coming to our town. This isn’t a Prairie Home Companion broadcast, just a solo performance. I can’t wait!
I got Howie the season 7 DVD set of The Waltons and a neat little palm-sized mini remote control helicopter. He can’t wait to tease the cats with the helicopter.
Scrapbooking with Jenni
We’ve been scrapbooking since about four o’clock this afternoon today. She is a natural at this, so talented. It’s been great spending time with Jenni and getting to know her better!
Posted via Pixelpipe.
My Santa Baby
, posted using the awesome app, Williams Shamir at YouTube
I received a friend request from this YouTube user today. Normally, I don’t add people on social networks as friends unless I know them in real life or have gotten to know them through a common interest online. I do, however, always look at the user’s profile and see what the person’s all about.
Well, Williams, aka Willy, is creative and I enjoy his videos! I commented on this one, saying it reminds me of those videos people post where they depict what it *sounds* like someone’s singing, to a hilarious end…Only he’s actually singing what you think it sounds like. Look at the illustrations. LOL
Anyway, say hi to Willy! Be sure to check out the artwork hanging on his walls in this video, along with the painting videos he’s posted. He’s a talented artist as well as musician.