Recovering Shopaholic

OK so totally not trying to recover :-) I used to go to the mall almost every day...seriously, 3-4 times weekly. That's harder to do now with a baby in tow. I hate staying home though. You can only clean and do laundry so many times (OK so I have a housekeeper, takes care of the cleaning part) a day. I compensate now by going to lunch with the girls 3-4 times a week. Usually just the girls because Kaylor is a night owl and prefers to sleep till at least noon. He's homeschooled so that works well for him :-)

Anyway, we found that we were spending 20 min trying to decide where to go or arguing over who had to choose last time. We devised a plan....We wrote the names of the 25 places we eat on slips of paper, folded them and put them in a bag. We choose a restaurant and that's where we have lunch! The first day we put the plan into action, Britt didn't want to go to the chosen restaurant so she vetoed it. We decided then we could each have one veto a day. The next restaurant chosen was good with us all so we go there only to find out they're not open for lunch :-( Was the plan really gong to work? We just went to a place close by and decided to try again the next day. Since then the plan has worked great! We ended only going to each one like once a month and the choice gets made quickly!! Awesome! Today we're having barbeque!!

As for the shopping, I still freakin' love to shop! I'm obsessed with Coach purses and shoes of all kinds. I love love love to shop for the kids and Jerry. Now that it's almost time for Christmas shopping (I can't officially start until the day after Thanksgiving) I'm all in a tizzy about it! I can't wait!!!!!!!!

I give each of the kids a Christmas list to fill out, due back to me by Thanksgiving. Everyone has to have the same number of gifts. I'm OCD like that. I still like to play "Santa". Every year all the kids would stay here Chrismas eve night so Santa could come. Every gift was wrapped and under the tree. Christmas morning everyone would open a gift and then figure out to whom it belonged because I didn't put names on anything! It was awesome!

Christmas was always nuts around here for 2 days because of tradition. Christmas eve was at my grandmother's house with my extended family. Then the kids would exchange gifts here. Christmas morning was Santa at like 4 AM then breakfast here with my mom and grandmother. Then at 10 we go to my mom's to let he do "santa" too. Back to my grandmother's for Christmas dinner then the kids would go to their dads or their significant other's family and everyone would be exhausted by 3 or 4 Christmas day. Tradition will change this year. Hopefully for the better. Christmas eve still at my grandmothers (she'll be 92 in Jan so who knows how much longer we'll get to have that tradition) then here for the kids to exchange gifts with each other. Britt, Keith and Maliyah will stay at their own home this year but the rest of the kids will be here. When Maliyah wakes up (usually around 7:30) we'll all go there to be with her to open her gifts from Santa. We'll cook breakfast there then still go to my mom's around 10. All the kids will come here then for 'santa' about 5 Christmas afternoon. Hopefully everyone won't be exhausted because we won't have to get up at 4 inthe morning to cram everything in. I think instead of cooking a full meal though we'll do finger foods and desserts though.

I HEART CHRISTMAS!!!

OK enough of the past......I think I've just decided all my posts now are going to be about the present and the future. Unless, of course, I think of something I just HAVE to share. :-)