* I have been a very bad blogger, etsy shop owner, email returner, etc. It's not because I want to be! I have been so busy with everything that I haven't been able to do anything!
* I have been summoned for jury duty next week (13-17). The week before Christmas! Hopefully, I won't have to serve. Do you know what a pain in the rear it is to figure out potential child care for a week when you are a stay at home mom? My mom may have to come down (an hour her and back) 3 days and one of my sitters took 2 days. Figuring out how to get AJ to and from school and skipping his last gymnastics and swimming classes for awhile... Grrrrr.
* We have tickets to the Rose Bowl! We fly out of Minneapolis a couple of days before and come back a couple of days later. I hope it doesn't snow buckets when we have to drive 3 hours to the airport and back. December/January in Wisconsin/Minnesota can be fierce like that. I was once in Florida over the New Year and couldn't get back to Minneapolis for 3 days after my flight was supposed to come back!
* Speaking of winter weather... we got SOCKED yesterday. At least a foot is on the ground and then add some high winds and you get 2-3 foot drifts. We were supposed to go to a holiday cocktail party a block and a half away. We would have gone last night (probably would have snowshoed there considering there were 300 people invited to a house that has very little parking and snowplows probably would have schmucked the cars that were in the street...) except for the fact that we had to pick up and drop off our babysitter in near whiteout conditions. Oh well. We took our family Christmas picture yesterday in the blizzard and it turned out really cute! (I will post it after the holidays) After, I baked 3 more cookies to add to the 4 kinds I made last weekend! I will definitely post the 'winner' recipes! Yummy!!
* And about the Rose Bowl... why does the travel industry find it ok to hike up rates so drastically? Flights out of Madison or Central Wisconsin to LA? Close to $1500!?!?! That's ludicrous. Before the Badgers were for sure going flights were one price, after it was announced they almost doubled. We have friends flying into San Diego, San Francisco and Las Vegas and out of Chicago and Minneapolis just to get a somewhat more reasonable rate. Insane. Hotel rooms on NYE are astronomical! Thank goodness it averages out to a better rate because of the other nights. Tickets to the game are a whole other beast. Whoever pays that much for a ticket to a football game is nuts. Ours are face value. :)
* And since i am on the subject of New Year's Eve... I hate it. I feel like it is forced fun. I don't like going out on that night. Period. I'd rather be in bed. Maybe it is because I have never had a truly awesome NYE. I don't know. But LA's midnight is our 2 a.m. Can you tell I am a morning person?
* I just figured out what I am going to do for my Christmas card design. Ordered the extra supplies I will need which probably won't get here until later this week. As well as the pictures. Again my cards won't go out until December 23rd... Why do I do this to myself?
* I am a P90X grad!! :) Steve and I officially finished P90X on Friday. I am toned and 6 or 8 pounds lighter. I can't remember my start weight. I really didn't have a lot to lose in the first place though. I wanted to get toned. Probably gained a little weight in muscle. I feel great and I am really proud of myself that I stuck with such an intense program for 3 months. We don't know what to do now so we'll probably just keep going! We are planning on running Crazy Legs (5K up and down hills) in April in Madison and I will do the Susan G. Komen run here in October. So yesterday instead of taking the day off I decided to see if I could run the 3.1 miles on the elliptical machine. I did it although I thought it was 3.2 miles but my heart was going. P90X is so different that I'd have to train by running to get ready for it. After I finished 3.5 miles (cool down) and doing 350 sit-ups (Yes 350! That's how many you do in Ab Ripper X...) I put a jacket over my sweaty t-shirt and a hat on my wet head and went outside and took our Christmas card picture! Oh, I put some powder and lipstick on but it was the best post work out picture I have ever taken! ;)
