My Life The Past Two Days

• Thurs. Dec. 10 - Gingerbread House Construction
  

I arose early to begin the baking process for Gingerbread Houses. (I mixed all the ingredients on Wed. and it had to sit in refrigerator 24 hours.) Since Abby, Andrea & I were making houses, I made three huge pans of gingerbread. Each cooked for 25 min. then I cut the pattern, followed by taking out all excess gingerbread from around the pattern, followed by each cooking another 25 min. to harden. That's basically 6 pans of baking for 25 min. It adds up. I finished around 10 a.m. and the gals were coming around 11 a.m.

Last pan of gingerbread

Tom helped out by taking the plastic wrap from all the candies we used. That saved us tons of time.

Before we started the assembly, Andrea & Abby called into the den for a surprise. They had the little girls portraits taken and it was all laid out on my sofa -several poses and each one so precious. Here's one:

My little G.G.s

Before Andrea & Abby began, I was finishing mine up ahead of time. True to form, I made a huge mess - I spilled a bowl of little red hots all over my kitchen floor. Again, true to form, I laughed.

Cady thought it was such fun!

Abby, on the other hand, did not. She cleaned up the mess b/c my hands were covered with Royal Icing.

My creation

Andrea's house


Abby's house

That afternoon, I kept Cady while Ab went to the dentist. She was such fun. She loved my Santa hats.

I love her weird expression.


Looks like Cady may become a handbell ringer or a volunteer with The Salvation Army.

• Thursday night - Carriage Ride in Fountain Inn

The Ivester's visiting Santa after the carriage ride.

The Rucker's

No one was sure how the little girls would like Santa. Both surprised us.

Cady sat there like he was an old friend!

Brie did not cry or make a sound; but she immediately put her arms out for anyone to take her.


Mimi & Papa with Cady & Brie. It was COLD last night.

• Friday, December 11 - Sesame Street Live!

Andrea, Brie, Abby, Cady & I headed out this morning to see Elmo and friends.

Again, it was COLD.

We had good seats, including an extra one just for our coats and bags.

Aubrie & Andrea, enjoying the show.

At the very beginning, Cady whimpered; but when Ab gave her the Lovey & "Paci" (reserved for naptime only), she was fine and enjoyed the show, too.

During the 15-min. "halftime", we sat and fed the girls a snack from home. We noticed that Elmo balloons were on sale down front. Honestly, I didn't even have a moment of "Oh, my girls need a balloon." Nope. But there were many parents and grandparents who could not resist the $10 balloon. $10 . . . are you kidding me?

Here's your $10 balloon.

Two ladies in front of us were discussing the disgusting price tag for a balloon. Here's how their conversation went:

Lady #1: Can you believe people pay $10 for a balloon. They may as well just throw their money up in the air.

Lady #2: Well, now you can look around and see where all the idiots are sitting.

SO FUNNY! And so true!

Next, something very odd happened. Very odd. To my left was an empty seat, then an older-looking father with his small daughter. During the intermission, he leaned over to me and said, "I need to go to the men's room......" I thought he was about to ask us to pardon him as he climbed over us to get out. No, no. He continued, ". . . . My daughter is scared to death to go with me to the restroom. Can she sit with you while I'm gone." WHAT???? She's scared to go with you to the restroom, but she'll sit with a complete stranger. AND YOU ARE LETTING HER SIT WITH A COMPLETE STRANGER? Weird, very weird. Perhaps I looked like a sane grandmother; maybe he was desperate. It's still strange, especially in today's world. In my mind (which sometimes can be slightly overactive and very imaginative), I decided that he had a child late in life, divorced his wife, doesn't see this little girl very often, took her to Sesame Street Live to get Daddy Points, and didn't know what to do with a 3-year-old girl when he needed to relieve himself. Reese sat very timidly on my lap and told me how old she was and that she liked Elmo. Daddy did return and thanked me. Is this odd to you or is it just me, Abby & Andrea???

During the end of the show, I'll admit my mind wondered and my eyes roamed. I began to notice that in the auditorium on the right side seemed to be almost exclusively daycare children. The middle section and left section seemed to be mostly parents/grandparents with a child or two. Let me tell you - when the boogy music began to play, I almost fell out of my seat laughing. The "daycare" section was moving and grooving! Those kids have more rhythm in one toe than the other two sections did in all their toes combined! That side of the auditorium was definitely the happy section. The kids were constantly singing along with the on-stage characters and dancing to their hearts content.

Okay, there was at least one exception on that side of the auditorium.

This lady slept throughout the entire show!

She was right across the aisle from our seats and was surrounded by kids, who apparently did not have any supervision today. For her, the show was "Sesame Street Asleep"!!