Wonderful Christmas

I had a wonderful Christmas this year. Surrounded by family, watching The Present open presents ALL DAY LONG (Christmas in the morning and birthday at night) and being delighted that he wanted to try and read every book that he got (he probably got about 15 books - the kid loves to read) and then sitting down on his own to try to read a book we got for Dimples when everyone else was busy.

Dimples was a force to be reckoned with, and no matter how many girly toys I got her (a baby doll and a pink boat) she just wanted to play with The Present's new cars. That one might be a tomboy, we'll see. She did give the baby a kiss, I think, but maybe she was just trying to put the baby's head in her mouth - she's been doing a lot of that since she started getting teeth.

For the first time in a long time, Curly Girl and I surprised our parents with their big gift. An electric smoker. Dad had been talking about it with her back in October, and she filed that info away and we did some research. Plus we got to benefit the next day when he smoked some ribs. Fantastic, his first try. YUM! In a world where we want to be sure that we get the right thing, our family has gotten in the habit of talking through what we want, and there aren't many surprises on Christmas morning. It was fun.

All in all, it was a wonderful holiday, filled with family and happiness. Hope that yours was amazing too.

Holiday Blogging

Well, I have to say I've missed a lot of my favorite bloggers over the last week or two. All of us seem to be busy, busy, busy. So I think I'll just make a post to give you all something to read, and maybe you'll take pity on me a post a blog about something for me.

I told a good friend about my blog the other day (he actually knew about it, but just never had signed on before) and he said it was interesting how all my blogging friends seemed to know each other. I thought how funny that was, because there are people that only know each other through the blog, like Elastigirl and Jennie, and while they are both important to me, they have never met IRL.

And so I explained to him that blogging is just like that, we find out about others thoughts and lives and learn from each of the blogs we read. I love clicking through the blogs that are interesting to my blogging friends and learn something new or laugh or look at things differently with each click.

So Merry Christmas to all who read this blog. And thanks to all of you who have enlightened me in one way or another during the last year.

Never Go to the Grocery Store Hungry!

One of my key rules to weight loss, but I broke it tonight. I am often weak once the food makes it into my apartment, so I just do not bring it home. Makes the decision what to eat much easier. Not sure why I broke the rule tonight, except I didn't really think I was hungry.

I went to one of my favorite new grocery stores here in the desert, called Fresh & Easy. They are a grocery store that operates on a smaller scale than most of their competitors, so it is eashy to run in and get out usually. The best part about them is that they have amazing store brands. Not only do they cost less most of the time, but they also use only natural ingredients. No artificial flavors or colors, no hormones in their meats, nothing with 16 syllables on the ingredient list. No high fructose corn syrup in their ketchup. Really good products. And they taste great too. The first part of tonight's breakdown. And when they want to get rid of stuff (if it going to expire soon, or if they are overstocked on it) the sell it at HALF price. AWESOME (and part two of tonight's breakdown).

So I went in to look for one thing - I wanted some blue cheese for salad - and came out with a ton of half price stuff that I did not intend to buy. Corn bread, frozen empenadas, green beans and much more. And almost none of it is on the Weight Watchers Core program. So at 35 points a week, it will take a while to consume. My only ray of sunshine is that this week Weight Watchers is unveiling a new program (called Momentum) so maybe I'll be able to have some of it sooner. Yum.