Dear Anonymous Commenter,

Thank you for being selfish; for thinking you are much more clever than you actually are; for hurting my friends-you obviously don't know them; and for putting a damper on my blog reading experience.
I am sorry that you have so much free time; that you have no back bone to just accept responsibility for your opinion- we have often disagreed as a blog community, but honest, open discussion is USUALLY encouraged with love and respect for the people with different viewpoints.
Please accept my apology for publically reprimanding you, but you have purposely remained anonymous and left me no other choice. I will speak for all my friends who have removed a comment option from their blogs because of your callous comments- please come get to know us. Read to your heart's content. We invite you to find us in person as well. We will do our best to be your friend.

To my friends who have removed comments- I am sad. I understand why you did it, but I often enjoy making a trivial comment about the genius, heartfelt writing you do. Just so you know..... I still think as I read, but my comments will remain to myself. I tried the email thing, but I didn't know the email address for the person I was trying to email.

This has been bugging me for a while. I was one of the few who actually read the stupid comments left on Joe's blog which caused him to decide to remove comments. I just think it is sad.

It's a Wonderful Life

I love the movie, it's on our "Must Watch" Christmas movie list. We remember watching it as a young poor married couple curled up together under a blanket because we wouldn't run the heat in our drafty first house. It's a sappy "feel good" movie and I like it.
We watched it last night and was, of course, evaluating my life in comparison. It would be interesting to see the world if I had not existed, but I'm not sure much would be different-aside from my children. What I am sure of however is that if I could see my life clearly I would see the same "supporting" characters. Sunday night there were so many supporting characters making crafts, eating chili, laughing and singing carols. Monday I spent a large chunk of the day at a park with a friend and her four children. Monday night Tommy & Meghann came over and we all exchanged gifts. My family was given more than we gave and we thank givers for being so generous. We enjoyed the fun of exchanging gifts and the company was excellent. Last night we watched It's a Wonderful Life with some of our housemates. It's fun to watch it with a new-be. I've seen it so many times and I have my favorite parts, but a new-be experiences the movie completely different.
Tonight we spent with Doug's family eating Fondue and exchanging gifts.

We are loved. It's a Wonderful Life.

Christmas Fun

I wanted to make sure anyone who reads this knows that tomorrow at 4:00 at Christ Lutheran there is a Christmas Workshop that is kid friendly, but not just for kids. (I wish I could emphasize this more-it's NOT a kid only event. ) There will be chili, mac n cheese and cookies and drinks-hot and cold. Many people are working on crafts to help all attendees make. It should be fun hanging out and listening to Christmas Carols and crafting and eating. Afterward we will share a Christmas Eve service a week early. Fun, Fun, Fun.

We are busy around here finishing up projects to give out for gifts. The girls are making "gifts" non-stop and using all the wrapping paper and bows to wrap their offerings. I find myself getting frustrated with the waste, but at the same time I am very proud of their joy of giving and I want to encourage it, so I keep buying more Scotch tape and helping to wrap up single pieces of construction paper with original artwork on them. Hopefully the recipients of these gifts will believe in the "thought that counts" philosophy.

I Miss Comments..........

(This post is actually a comment I would have left on Tera's blog IF she still had a comment option.)

People act like everyone is easily offended by other people's religious beliefs. I usually think it is blown out of propotion, but this year I had a family refuse to do a homework counting page because the picture items used were Hanukkah symbols like dreidels. The mom told me that they don't celebrate Hannukah and they didn't want their child ....counting.... such items-bizarre.

It is my opinion that if I want to enjoy the freedom to practice my choice of "religious" beliefs I've got to let other's do the same. The more belief systems we have represented, the safer our freedom of religion is- IN MY OPINION.

However, my Kindergarten class made a graph of December holidays that we each celebrate. One kid marked Hanukkah and then I found out that they don't, they only celebrate Christmas. 100% of my class celebrates Christmas- not very diverse.

I Don't Cry at Weddings

I am happily married, have been to dozens of weddings in the last 10 years, and cry at every Chick Flick available. But I don't cry at weddings-typically. I can recall 3 weddings that I have cried at. 1. my own wedding 2. My friend Kristine and her new husband gave Kristine's son a ring and devoted themselves as his parents. Emma was a baby. I cried. 3. Today.
Today Mark Towns, Doug's best friend since 4th grade, got married. I have known Mark as long as I have known Doug, which is more of my life than I have not known them-if that makes sense. Mark hated me in high school, but we worked together at the daycare and he came around to me and we became friends. Mark sang at our wedding, came to our house the day we brought Emma home from the hospital, lived with us for a short period of time when he didn't have anywhere else to go, and has confided some very personal information to us. We love him.
Today he got married. About a year or so ago, he told me he would never get married. He had embraced that. There just wasn't anybody out there for him. (He is extremely picky- to a fault- I mean PICKY.) He has had several unhappy years as he has watched most of his friends get married and start families, while he remained a bachelor. Joe did a fabulous job as the marrier, he always does. I sat in my seat and watched Mark and Mary joke with each other, whisper private comments in front of us-the audience, look into each other's eyes and forgetting that the rest of us were in the room. My eyes were welling up throughout the service. But then, Mark surprised Mary by singing "I'll be There". He got choked up and couldn't finish. He started crying and most of the rest of us did too. Here he was- happy. It was a happy ending to his misery. I can't say that their marriage will be a success, but I hope for Mark that it will. I have never seen him as happy as he's been since he met her.
Joe said that everybody who knew Mark had been waiting for her to show up. I realized that was true. I used to joke with him that if I ever met one of his girlfriends that that would be the girl he would marry because he never really dated anyone long enough for me to meet her. I met Mary. She seems great. She seems perfect for him. I am happy for them. I like when weddings remind me how great marriage is, and remind me how handsome my husband is in a tux.

So What's With Bumper Stickers?

For the sake of this post consider window decals, personalized license plate & their borders and regular old bumper stickers as bumper stickers.
I have been noticing bumper stickers more lately. Doug & I have had a couple of conversations about them. WHAT IS WITH THEM? Do we really need one more way to exercise our "Freedom of Speech"? Is that what they are really? Do I need to know that you are a member of the NRA? That you voted for Gore in 2000? That you are proud that your idiot child is a bully?

What is going on? Do we really need to be able to insult people as we drive around? I find a lot of it very offensive and even if I agree with whatever it is, it just gives me another way to judge you by your car. Back to my point.....insulting...... okay, if you have a cartoon character peeing on my brand of car, what are you saying? How am I supposed to respond? I'M NOT!!! because I'm in my car and you're in yours- it's actually passive agressive. Doug told me he saw a rapture bumper sticker that went like this: In case of rapture, car is yours. Think about that. I guess that's a good way to "witness" to people, try to scare them. How arrogant! How many times have you heard about someone getting cut off or flipped off by someone with a fish on their car? It just gives people ammunition to judge you, that's why I just drive around with my van caked with dirt, filled with trash and car seats, a plain old Nevada license plate with NO border, and only Wal-Mart stickers on the tail lights because the kids put them there. No, I'm not TRYING to make a statement. I don't have to try. People will judge me by what they see. They don't need to know what I do for a living, what kind of food I eat, what type of car my other car is, or what sports' teams I like. I don't need to give them anything else to dislike me for. My driving might just do it.
Now, what's with people lining their back windshields with stuffed animals?

In other news, my hair is growing back in and it looks hideous. I can't pull the sides back because of all the new growth- which by the way, was my hairstyle of choice on busy mornings (pretty much every morning). Maybe I should go for a crew cut. Maybe I should get a clever bumper sticker about how my kids made my hair fall out. Any ideas?