Thursday, December 29, 2011

Demons Be Gone

Christmas has come and gone and I admit that we were all spoiled beyond anything any of us deserved. 'Lavished with gifts' comes to mind, but I suppose it's nice to be pampered from time to time. I feel pampered (and I am grateful to those who did the pampering. Thank you!)

Of course, the kids had their list of wishes, big and small. This year, Alex announced that he needed something practical. His word. Practical. And by practical he didn't mean underwear or socks, he meant...wait for it....holy water. Holy water. Because, according to him, you never know when you're going to need it. Which is hard to argue.

So, Alex got his practical gift.  And instead of sitting on a shelf, he's put it to practical use: ambushing and squirting every.single.person who walks into our home under the pretense that he is checking for demons. (I couldn't make this up if I tried.)

I suddenly feel like I'm living in a Calvin and Hobbes comic strip. For those of you who've stood wet and bewildered in my living room, good news! Alex assures me that he won't be needing to call an exorcist on your behalf. God knows I'll be sleeping better at night.






Saturday, December 24, 2011

Deck the Halls and Ho ho ho

On the eve of Christmas Eve, I'm been pondering the finer points of the holiday that's a mere hours away. Well, I guess mostly wondering why the hell do I do this to myself every year because I'm up to my eyeballs in the aftermath of my procrastination. On the bright side, it's nothing that some Christmas cookies and a little booze can't fix....you know what they say, 'Ho ho ho and a bottle of rum.' (Oh, wait. That's 'Yo, ho, ho and a bottle of rum.' Never mind.) Anyway! We've gotten this far and it's not looking too shabby:
Rangling the Xmas Tree

The finishing touch

Deckin' the Halls

Being friggin' adorable

Happy Face

Sad Face

Missing the bottle of rum

Sunday, December 11, 2011

Herding Cats

In case you are ever wondering what Tim's definition of desperation looks like, I'll give you a little insider's peek: Being the grand poo-pa of The Festival of Lights minus the volunteers needed for everything to run smoothly causes Tim to beg groups of known merry pranksters to fill in for 'real' help. Apparently he weighed the possibilities of what might happen with us versus what might happen without us and we won the coin toss...although I suspect that he went 2 out of 3.

Last Available Option

And the games begin....

 ....I was posted as the official greeter, with my father, Wild Joe, under the strict orders that we could not greet guests by asking to trade someone's wife for 3 goats. This conversation actually happened. Tim spoils all of the fun.                                                                                                                    

.....Meanwhile at the petting zoo....



...My brother, Dan, and Alex were put in charge, which was a serious Hail Mary to begin with. As the gatekeeper to the zoo, Dan made every. single. person. with gloves remove them before entering the zoo because, as he explained simply to hundreds of people, "The goats will eat them." This, my friends, is a complete and total fabrication. In reality, goats like eating gloves as much as they like eating people. We have no idea what led him to believe that this little factoid was true but he told the masses upon masses of people with utter conviction and there wasn't a gloved hand in the joint.

...While Dan was busy misleading the public in his corner, Alex was busy creating a whole series of ninja moves to be used on the goat seen in the photo with him. From what he's shown me, that goat woulda been toast.

          ....And finally, we played 'Where in the World is Crazy Dar' (aka my mother)......



My mother, whom we loving call Crazy Dar has a tendency to wander somewhat aimlessly (sorry mom, you know it's true). While 'taking tickets' she was miraculously spotted all over the festival looking a bit like this. Pay no attention to the fact that I took these photos while on duty as the official greeter. The point is that the most responsible ticket taker for the evening was my 13 year old daughter.

...And so it went..like herding cats. I wonder if Tim would ask us to work again next year or if given the coin toss he'd do 3 out of 5 next time......