Christmas at Longwood Gardens

Last weekend the whole family took a trip to Longwood Gardens. Longwood Gardens is a wonderful place to visit. I've linked to their website if you want to see more pictures or read about the history of it. It's a well known place in this area. When we tell people the town we've moved to, they often don't recognize it but when we say, "It's right near Longwood Gardens," they know exactly where we are.

I took LOTS of pictures. Lots. Of. Pictures. The pictures don't do it justice as it was absoulutely beautiful. I was unable to get pictures of the outside lights because besides being totally frigid last weekend, it's just not really possible for my little digital camera to capture the beauty. The website has additional pictures though of the outside and you can check them out if you wish. Also, some of my photos aren't as clear or as bright as I'd like them to be. It's kind of dark in some of the areas and my flash isn't all that powerful. I still wanted to share them though because some of the decorating ideas are really unique and definitely "doable" at home.

I'll share some of my photos with you and try to keep my commentary to a minimum which many of you know, will be difficult for me.

There were lots of beautiful trees and various decorations:






There were lots of beautiful flowers and wreaths:





But the most beautiful thing of all at Longwood Gardens last weekend was...






The sweet little girl is The Niece by the way. You sure can see the family resemblance, don't you think? I hope you enjoyed my pictures. We'll be going to Longwood again next weekend. It's a great place to take visiting family.

Last but not least, I should mention that this is my 198th post! I am planning on another new post for Kimba's Christmas Open House on Tuesday which will be #199 and then... on Wednesday... I am having a giveaway for my 200th post! It will be a small giveaway of something I've handcrafted, but it will be a giveaway nonetheless. I hope you'll come back to enter.

See you Tuesday! Have a great weekend!

Why did the chickens cross the road?

To make The Husband late for work!


The Husband took this picture with his iphone on his way to work yesterday... told you we were in the country now! Lately he's been seeing one or two as he drives on this road. The road, incidentally is called Guernsey Road which in and of itself is "country." On Tuesday he saw this whole flock, gaggle, group (?) of chickens and had to snap this picture. This was definitely not something we saw in The City very often. Or ever, although there was that one time we saw a Chicken at the vet... her owner was feeding her Tastykakes, butterscotch krimpets if I remember correctly. Weird stuff.

Anyway, one last riddle for you, The Son loves this one:

Why did the chicken cross the playground?

To get to the other slide!

Have a great day everyone and stay tuned for some holiday posts...I just have a lot to do today so I thought I'd just give you a little quickie, that's OK once in a while, right?

Baby, it's cold outside!

So Momma, could you please let me in!

Here's the reason my side light windows are never clean any more. Ziggy. We let him go out to "do his business" and this is how he tells us he wants to get back in. The wet nose is ALWAYS pressed right up against the glass. As irritating as washing those windows multiple times a day can be, it cracks me up every time.

A few days ago, we were talking about how it would probably be a good idea to give Ziggy a bath soon. It would take two people because I'm not anticipating a lot of cooperation on Ziggy's part.

Who me?
The next day, we got this sample for Degree Deodorant for Men in the mail and look who it's addressed to.

I laughed for a long time about that one. If only Zig would use his deodorant, he might not have to worry about a bath so much! I have no idea how this came addressed to him. I thought I had registered him to get a coupon for a free bag of "Snausages" in the mail but then I got the coupon and it was under my name so it can't be that. How ever it happened, it's hilarious to me!

Have a great day everyone and keep warm!

Dishonest Country "Crafters".

I have lots of new things to post on the blog this week but today is a Busy Day so I'll have to start with a short story that doesn't involve any pictures...

My cousin Chrissy (Chrissy 'Cuz) and her friend Cheri from Connecticut came to visit me this weekend. We had a great time, played board games, had cocktails, went shopping, almost died in a snowstorm... good times, good times, but we also came to a rather sad "revelation" at a local school craft shown and I must share it with all of you crafty (and maybe not so crafty) women out there.

We went to the local intermediate school for their holiday fund-raiser/craft show this weekend. The school is big and it was full of crafters. Every hallway, the gym, the "multi-purpose room", each place was full of vendors, the good, the bad and the tacky. We came across table after table of cute "hand-painted" items until we stopped at a woman who was selling little square slates with leather cord hangers. The slates were painted with cute sayings like "Live, love, laugh" "Live for Love" and all that shmaltzy nonsense. Chrissy 'Cuz wanted to get one but they were small and the "crafter" was charging $6.95 which we thought was a bit much when we are already crafty and could make our own. Chrissy 'Cuz told her she thought they were cute and the woman replied, "Thank you." with a smile. We continued on...decided we didn't really need to buy anything and headed on to do some shopping.

Our first stop was the Dansko outlet...do you wear those Dansko "Professional" Clogs by any chance? They're the best. Chrissy 'Cuz and Cheri each bought two pairs. I didn't get any because I already have a few.

We continued on to the "Floral and Craft Warehouse" in Blue Ball, PA. (Yes, Blue Ball, for those of you who don't know, it's right near Intercourse, PA. LMAO! Really...I kid you not) Anyway...as we traversed through aisles and aisles and aisles of All Things Crafty. We came across the "Home Decor/Cute Little Painted Slate Aisle" and what did we see? We saw the same EXACT "Live for Love" sign that Chrissy 'Cuz was admiring at the craft show. The. Same. Exact. Thing. the woman who was trying to pass it off as her own creation didn't even try to make it a little extra special by adding a ribbon or extra details or anything...she simply added $3.95 more and sat there smiling while we stupidly thought it was her handy work. Liar!

I tell you, I am now completely disillusioned. I have no problem with Captitalism, that's what retail is about and she didn't come right out and say that she made it but she sure as heck didn't say she didn't make it either. It now makes me wonder, how many of those other vendors bought the crap they were hawking and tried to pawn it off as their own. It's wrong, wrong I tell you and it makes those of us who are crafty feel bad. I was very disappointed. Very. Disappointed.

Chrissy 'Cuz ended up buying three of the slates at the warehouse and was very pleased that she didn't buy them from the Liar Lady. It was a learning experience for us all and next time I visit any craft shows, I will be specifically asking the vendors if they made the items before I buy them.

By the way, there's also a Bird in Hand, PA which is another one I find hilarious...gotta love it.

Some Christmas Questions...

So, I realize I haven't blogged in a few days. I've been busy People! Busy with decorating, busy with The Son and busy preparing for a visit from my favorite cousin Chrissy. (I only have two cousins and Chrissy being my favorite certainly doesn't belittle my feelings for her sister Jennifer, it's just that Chrissy and I are very close in age...but she's still older) Anyway, we have a busy weekend prepared. It should be great fun. My house is close to being finished and it's looking really pretty. I'll be posting pictures next week.

I'm not really sure what blog etiquette is on the following but I was reading some blogs that I like this morning and came across this Christmas Meme. I haven't been tagged but I wanted to be so I decided to copy it and tag some of my own people. This is from "Sandy" at Shell in Your Pocket. She's got a really fun blog that I'm going to add to my blog roll because I keep forgetting to check her out. Let me say, she's got music on her blog which we all know I dislike BUT I'm going to let that slide because I enjoy her blog THAT much.

So, here's the questions and my answers...

1. Egg Nog or Hot Chocolate? Hot chocolate definitely, Egg nog is gross!

2. Does Santa wrap presents or just leave them under the tree? Santa wraps most of the presents but once in a while might leave a really good one out and set up, like a special train set or an item that can immediately be played with. This year they'll probably all be wrapped though.

3.Colored lights on house/tree or white? I prefer white on the house but I have two trees and one has colored and white and one just has white.

4.Do you hang mistletoe? Yes, every year and then we all act silly as we stand under it begging for kisses. The Son is getting a really big kick out of it this year.

5. When do you put up your decorations up? During the first week in December...it takes me a while to get it all finished.

6. What is your favorite holiday dish? I like it all... unfortunately...

7. Favorite holiday memory as a child? The year The Sister and I got our play kitchen. I was probably around 5 or so and she's three years younger... you do the math. It was such a 70s style, golden yellow metal (I think it was metal) with all the accouterments that go along with a 70s kitchen. We thought that thing was fabulous! Santa had it all set up for us to play with when we came down the stairs in the morning. I don't even remember what else we got that year.

8. When and how did you learn the truth about Santa? I don't remember exactly, I know I believed for a LONG time. I think I started to realize it when I noticed that Mommy's handwriting looked an awful lot like Santa's in those letters he left us each year.

9. Do you open a gift on Christmas Eve? Yes, my husband and I usually exchange our gifts although I'm not sure we'll be exchanging this year... we do have two mortgages after all. I also let The Son open new Christmas Jammies every year. We always did that as kids and it's a tradition I really enjoyed.

10. How do you decorate your Christmas tree? We have two trees, one that's the "cute" tree with colored lights and the more rustic or Hallmarky ornaments and one that's the "fancy" tree with all white lights and glass/crystal, "fancier" ornaments. I have enough ornaments that I could actually fill a third tree and just might do that next year...

11. Snow. Love it or dread it? I'm looking forward to it this year in The Country but it looses it's luster after we get too much of it. That hasn't been a problem as of late since last year we had one snow storm.

12. Can you ice skate? Yes, I'm no Michelle Kwan but I even took lessons for a little while a few years ago. It was fun.

13. Do you remember your favorite gift? Definitely that kitchen set I mentioned above and my "My Friend Mandy" doll. My Mom made her a gorgeous wardrobe of clothes and I LOVED that doll for years and years and years.

14. What is the most important thing about the holidays to you? Spending time with family and watching the joy of the season reflected in The Son's face.

15. What is your favorite holiday dessert? I make a mean apple pie but I do love me some chocolate too!

16. What is your favorite holiday tradition? I don't think I really have a favorite, I love it all. The Son is just now understanding the whole concept of Santa and the holiday so I might have a new favorite in a couple of years.

17. What tops your Christmas Tree? An angel on the fancy tree and a big gold star on the cute tree.

18. Which do you prefer giving or receiving? Giving, especially to The Son.

19. What is your favorite Christmas song? "Oh Holy Night" for serious Christmas songs and "Blue Christmas" for the fun ones.

20. Candy Canes. Yum or Yuck? I love the way they look but I do not like mint! So that's "yuck" for me.

21. What do you want for Christmas? Nothing really, I just want everyone to enjoy themselves.

22. Do you attend an annual Christmas party? Nope.

23. Do you dress up for Christmas Eve or wear PJ's? No dressing up for us on Christmas Eve but we do dress up a little bit for Christmas.

24. Do you own a Santa hat? No, no Santa hat for me.

25. Who do you normally spend Christmas with? In the morning we go for a little brunch get together with my dad's aunt and his side of the family. In the past we had Christmas dinner at my Mom and Dad's house but since my mom passed away last year, we'll be having Christmas dinner at my house this year. I'm looking forward to it.

Here are the rules:

1. Post the rules on your blog.

2. Fill out the questions; Tag 5-7 people at the end of your post; Pass on the tag!

I tag.....
My friend Roshell at Always Smiling
The Sister at It's Just the Little Things (even though she hasn't blogged in a month)
My friend Buffy at Buffy's Bitchin' Blog
My Bloggy friend Darlene at Darlene's Days
My friend Michelle at Heart of a Runner, Body of a Mother (isn't that the best blog title?) and...
My friend Erin at Running to Stand Still

I look forward to seeing all your answers girls! Happy Holidays!

Ho ho holy crap I have a lot of Christmas decorations!

I've started with the Christmas decorating and it's really amazing the amount of things I have. I've always been very into decorating for Christmas because for all the years that we lived in The City, we participated in a "Holiday Open House" for our street and thousands of people would visit each year. It was pretty exciting and I will say that I'm pretty sure my house was one of the best as far as decorations go.

So now I have a much bigger house but still an exorbitant amount of decorations. I also got half of my mom's decorations this weekend. The Sister and I went to The Dad's house and divided them all up. I thought it was going to be difficult but it actually turned out to be kind of fun. We laughed about all the stuff my mom had (now I know where I get it) and we divided it all up and donated some. (Nurse it out Cathy! ...sorry inside joke!) My dad kept very few items, he's never been into all the hoopla of Christmas decorating anyway. I think he was happy to see it being put to good use and he enjoyed being the Official Straw Holder when The Sister and I had to draw straws over a "big ticket item". I ended up with some great old ornaments, a huge beautiful Lennox platter and all the kitschy 50's decorations I wanted although I had to give up the ceramic tree for those. The Sister ended up with most of the things she wanted too. It worked out great. Then I brought it all home. Get a load of those swell 70s boxes. Those ornament chests have been around at least as long as I have...


Here it is after The Husband unloaded it into the garage.


Here's what I had already in my basement.

Here's The Son's reaction to all of it in the dining room.


No, he's not the least bit dramatic...why would you say that?

So, the trees are done...more or less. We have a 9 footer in our foyer and a 6 footer in the family room. I have enough ornaments left that I could probably fill another entire tree but I'm still loading them on the 9 footer as I unpack them. I DO like a lot of ornaments on a tree and they are looking very beautiful. I am having my favorite cousin visit this weekend and I'm hoping to have the decorating pretty much finished. We'll see how it goes, between feeding the child, wrestling shoes out of the mouth of my puppy and uploading all these pictures, not much has gotten done today. I also have to teach swimming in an hour or so but I remain hopeful, it's only Monday right? Happy beginning of the holidays!

Comment Etiquette...

Or, "How to Leave a Comment"

Dear People who read my blog:

I am writing this quick note to let you know how to properly leave a comment on this blog. I see that you're visiting. I think some of you are even my family since I know where you live and I see your locations. (Is that you Delphine and Bev? Joan? Daddy?) I can only guess that you don't realize how to leave a comment. In fact, some of you have told me in so many words that you don't know how to leave a comment.

Here's all you do...see below this post where it says " # nice people said..." You click on that and a box will come up allowing you to type in a comment. You don't even have to join anything since I allow "anonymous" comments. It is nice to put your name after an anonymous comment but you don't technically have to even do that.

Now, you probably ask, "What do I say in my comment?" Well, you don't have to say much of anything, a simple, "Cute idea!", "How true!" or "I just stopped by, your blog is adorable." will suffice. If you're feeling more verbose on a particular day, can type a lot more. I do read my comments faithfully and often respond to them in the same comment section...that is of course, when readers are leaving them.

And lastly, just so you know, I am not begging for comments, that would be juvenile. I write this blog because I like it, comments or no comments. I just thought those of you who aren't commenting might actually want to, so therefore, I've given you the means to do it. It's just good manners to say hello when you stop by and I know none of you would want to be rude now, would you?

So people, have a great day. I hope your Thanksgiving was good. I'm off to read AND COMMENT ON some of my favorite blogs now. See that list over there on the side? Those are my faves, if you stop by those, make sure you leave a comment for them too. I'm just saying...

Love ya!
CityMomma/CountryMomma