Christmas list...Year 2

Last year I posted a Christmas wish list, so I figured I'd do it again...without the rant.
Feel free to gift any of these!!!
- The Happiest Days of Our Lives by Wil Wheaton
- Guitar Hero Encore: Rock the 80's for the PS2
- Please Santa! I've been goot!!!1!

Gift Cards

• iTunes has become a big part of my life now that I have an iPod Touch!
  
• Best Buy
  
• Home Depot
  
• Any one of several dining establishments
  

T-Shirts!

• My Rules
  
• Video Games Ruined My Live
  
• Poker Hand Values
  
• Birds and the Bees
  
• At XKCD there are two shirts, one called Useless and the other called Witty (story of my life!) that are schweet!
  

Books

• Thomas Covenant Books!
  
• Android's Dream
  

Don't you wonder about what a Christmas List says about you?
What do you think mine says about me?
What does yours say about you?

Christmas is a time.....

Wow...what a weekend...sad and sweet.
On Friday, we had to attend a funeral for a friend.
One of the elderly ladies in my church passed on last week. This is the sad part. Sad for me, and for her family, not sad for her. Sister Alice was a great Christian woman and she is at peace and home with the Lord. No doubt.
Sister Alices' daughter, one of my favorite people in the world, Connie, told my wife that they where hoping her mom could be home by Christmas.
When Kim related this to my youngest, he thought that 'Home' was heaven. So he was happy that she had passed away last week....cause she would be home in time for the Birthday Party. I wished I had thought that line up!

So Friday we spent at the funeral and dinner. Saturday was finishing up Christmas shopping and stuff and Sunday started Christmas.

We go to my folks house on Christmas Eve and spend the day there.
We watched the Lions lose again. Ate a yummy dinner and opened presents. It's always good to spend the day with my folks. I don't do it as much as I should. That'll go to the top of New Years Lists.

Monday, we got up and had Christmas with the Kids....this is becoming one of my favorite times of the year. We used to spend New Years Eve Night at my In Laws...but once the other siblings started having kids, and my kids got older (drat) this got harder to do. So a few years ago, we started staying home and having Christmas at our house in the morning and then heading to the In Laws.

The kids got the normal toothbrush, toothpaste, candy and cloths. They also got some video games and such. They soon busted out the new DDR game. VV cool, especially when Mitch wiped out!

After that we went to the In Laws for breakfast (only so many ways you can spell yummy!) and presents.
After a while all the siblings showed up and things were right in the world. It's hard to put into words how much I care for this family, but I always feel it so sharply when were NOT all together. The last couple of years, Christmas has been spread out over there. Not everyone is lucky like us and can spend the whole day with the family. I realize that, but that doesn't mean I wish it weren't so.

Anyway, it was a very nice holiday...looking forward to the New Year...new resolutions, new decisions, new family memebers!!!

We are family....

Family takes care of family. I'm not sure where I heard that, or when, but for some reason I've taken it to heart. I believe it. It's part of who I am.
Ever since I was 15, I've had at least two, then three families.
Obviously my folks, sister and brother were and are my first family. Family was big, specially to my mom, when I was growing up. We would make the four hour drive every holiday and at least once during the summer all through my youth.

Eventually, I started dating this real hot chick (that's another post). Didn't take long before I was head over heals for her. She was just right...long legs, long blond hair and big...um...eyes (yeah, eyes). Perfect. Plus she was smart and funny and all that jazz (blah blah blah.....let's get back to the...um....eyes).

Anyway....I digress....one of the things that I loved/love most about her was her family. The way they had get togethers, and loved each other and took care of each other. I always felt a part...felt like her sisters where my sisters...her little brother was my little brother. I still feel that way.

Today we had our annual Christmas Party. Oh what fun. Granma was there, and an aunt and uncle were there...Nana and Pappa were there too.....but only one sister. No brother.
Don't get me wrong...Billie, John and the Girls rock so hard it's not funny, but I did miss the other two and their families. That's one of those funny things were when not everyone is there, it doesn't feel completely right. I'm glad everyone has grown up, and found great people to fall in love with and have gobs and gobs (9.4 to be exact) children, but it sucks that they have lives that don't revolve around the greater family anymore. Not that it was their fault that they couldn't come today...we planned the party a bit later than maybe we should have, but that we came behind the other things that they needed to go to.

Oh well. It was still fun, plus Mitch got to play some Magic with his Uncle John. I swear that kid would move in with them if he had his chance. He'd miss his mom and maybe his older brother, but he's pretty sure they would come and visit! :)

BTW...my third family, my church.

The Wonders of the Web

Whatever did we do before the internet? I'm planning a little poker party at my house next month am using eVite to send the invitations out. It'll manage my invitees as well as their responses....allow them to ask questions and for me to follow up. What a cool tool.

Also, I spent a couple of hours on YouTube on Saturday, just going thru old John Denver clips. I grew up listening to country music (because of my parents) and he was on of the Family Favoites. I saw a special on him on PBS this weekend and waxed nostalgic, so dialed up the old intertubes and found hundreds of clips on JD.

In addition, the wife and I did a bunch of Christmas shopping last night from the comfort of my bed. Bought the kids Nintendo games, some audio equipment for my in-laws and a Guitar Hero II for my sister (so she can give to her boys!!!).

Gotta love the net....I guess I'm just white and nerdy!

Christmas Lists

One of the fun things about Christmas time is the kids making up their Christmas lists. For as long as there has been a Santa Clause there have been kids making their lists, and checking them 400 times. My kids have been making their lists since October. It's cute.
However, what I don't like, is making them myself.
My mother in law insists on getting lists from all the adult kids. It drives me nuts. It feels like begging!
My opinion on adults exchanging gifts is that you get someone something YOU think they would like. You pay attention, think, check around with other people to see what they think and then you make a decision. But NOOOOOoooo. This is too time consuming. To hard to do. Just write up a list and hand it over and they'll do the rest from there. Blah blah blah.
The really frustrating thing about it is that I think that I'm very easy to figure out.
I like: Poker stuff (movies about poker, books about poker, periphenaliea), Golf, Bowling, Reading, Movies, Tools, I play guitar, collect Mustang (model cars) and am a computer/tech nerd. The tricky thing would be finding something that I WOULDN'T want for Christmas (Paisley Ties....yuck).
Oh, well, you know what the old folks say....C'est la vie.
Now, where is my Word file of last years Christmas list......