Happy 2009

Continuing my recent trend of posting every 14-21 days....

It was a whirlwind few weeks, punctuated by doctor and ER visits shortly before Christmas. Emily missed the last 2 days of school with strange symptoms of swollen hands and itching whose cause wasn't diagnosed until a weekend trip to the ER.... a kidney infection. Thankfully, she only needed some IV fluids and some oral antibiotics. Didn't take more than a day or so before she seemed much more like her normal self.

Had a very nice Christmas with the kids. The 3 youngest set alarms for 6am and were rarin' to go. They were all very excited about their new Ipod Nanos. Unfortunately, Halle's has already developed a problem and I will have to call Apple tomorrow so they can send me a mailer to ship it back to them. We could have had it replaced at the Apple Store in Sac yesterday, but that would have meant Halle wouldn't have the engraving that came on the original one (her name and Christmas 2008). If we handle the warranty claim through AppleCare, we can get the engraving again, and she really wanted to keep that.

Brian and I had a pretty low-key Christmas for the two of us, but that was just fine by me. He did give me 2 things I had specifically mentioned. One was a SmartShopper. I ran across it one day at Amazon (while looking for ideas for Brian's Christmas gifts) and thought it looked very cool. Basically it is a gadget that allows you to record your grocery and/or errand lists on the fly, perhaps as you run out of something, and then when you are ready to go shopping, will print everything out, sorted into categories (dairy, produce, frozen foods, etc.). My neighbor says she always has a paper list going, but in my house, my paper lists tend to get misplaced a lot. This stays stuck on the fridge so I can't lose it. I used it earlier this week to go shopping and it was neat.

Emily and Noah both celebrated birthdays on Tuesday; Noah is 13 and Em is 17 now. We extended the celebrating into 2 days.... lunch at Benihana on Tuesday and then we all went to the mall in Sacramento yesterday. Emily brought along 2 friends and we had a late lunch/early dinner at The Cheesecake Factory.

We spent a few hours outside with the neighbors last night to celebrate NYE. We had a couple of firepits in the driveways and had a chili supper. Aside from the fog and chill in the air, it was a really nice time.

Today I'll be paying for the days of inactivity by getting lots of laundry and housework done. I am so lucky my man is a great help in that department!!