Aaak! Friday Again!

How can it be that the time has flown past again so quickly and it's Friday once again? Well, since I can't answer that complicated physics question, I shall blather on......just had a nice little blurb composed and the Cyberspace Gremlins took it away......sh__! I am not a happy camper today - too many computer glitches that are extremely frustrating........

I was very sad to have been thwarted in my attempt on Sunday night to drive to Evanston to see Kate's last CCC concert. The wind and the snow conspired against me, and Kate called me as I was wending my way through South Elgin and said to turn back because the weather appeared to be getting worse in where she was. Oh, well, I definitely have many beautiful memories of the CCC concerts I saw Kate perform in, and am keeping fingers crossed for local auditions so that she can still sing in a good choir, just one that is closer to home. :) (Brent, too!)

Tuesday night was Tom's Band concert - very good stuff played, especially by the top group, the Wind Symphony. They had an especially cool piece that featured a good reader with an amazing speaking voice, narrating The Night Before Christmas, accompanied by a Christmas medley. Fab! Wish you all could have been there.

Wednesday night Tom had Religious Ed and I had my knitting group Christmas party at the home of one of the members. It was the most magnificently decorated home I've ever personally been in - wish I could have taken pictures so that you could all have enjoyed the vision as well. Simply amazing. I would not be surprised if the person admitted to me that she had at least $50,000 worth of Christmas decorations in her house. Just a sampling: every window that I could see in the front and side of the house (four car side-load garage with windows above) was festooned with a beribboned wreath.

There were many twinkling white lights on the outside as well, and some lit snowmen grouped near where the brick walkway joined the driveway. As you approached the front door (which was a beautiful, HUGE, creation of dark wood and lots of clear glass so that you could clearly see the enormous, beautifully decorated tree in the entry hall), you were greeted by the sound of Christmas music playing (I spied some small speakers near the front door), and two four foot tall wrought iron angels holding lit candles (real candles) on either side of the front door.

Once you stepped into the house, it was as though you'd entered a magazine spread - everywhere you looked, there were pieces of greenery, lit candles (truly there must have been at least fifty of them - thirty alone on the fireplace mantel in the family room), pinecones, and cranberries.

I have no idea how many actual Christmas trees were in that house, but I am going to say at least ten, between the entry hall, diningroom, kitchen, and family room. The largest was in the entry hall, second largest was in the family room, but then there were smaller ones - two in the diningroom on either side of the sideboard, a medium-sized one in the eating area of the kitchen (which adjoined the family room), and several other small ones on tabletops.

The family has three dogs, and the dogs were all rather small, so they had three dog houses lined up in the eating area of the kitchen - they resembled bird cages in that they had 'slats' that formed the sides and roofs of the cages. Each dog house had a red glittery star with the dog's name inscribed on it. I asked Laura (the person who owned the house) if the stars were on the dog's houses all year long, and she said no, that was only for Christmas. The rest of the year, they had little dog-bone shaped name tags!!!!! OMG!!!!!

Needless to say, I would guess that this house was over a million dollars when built several years back (it's in the new section of the Tanglewood subdivision in Batavia), and I would estimate that the square footage was in the six or seven thousand squre foot range (not counting the immense basement). Amazing!

So last night was the concert for Kelly's 4th and 5th graders. Kel said that the kids sounded pretty decent, but there were a few incidents that made the night less than happy for her. After the concert, one of the moms came up to her and said, "The concert was good, BUT I could see every child in the orchestra except for mine, and I am really angry about that right now. You need to keep that in mind for next time!!" Can you believe this? What kind of stupid person blames the orchestra director for not being able to see her child? Maybe if her kid were any good, he'd have been in the first row....maybe if he practiced he'd be better.....maybe if she had a BRAIN she might have gotten off her lazy ass and moved so she COULD see her kid.......or all of the above.

There were times through the years that I couldn't see one or the other of my children who were performing at a particular event, and it was upsetting, but never in a million years would I have dreamed to go up to the director of the event and bitch about it. How ridiculous. Okay, enough ire!

I spoke with Julie earlier this week and she told me that Hunter had taken a bad tumble, split his lip, and ended up with a bruise to show for it all.......it will be a relief when he's a bit older and more steady on his feet so that she doesn't have to worry quite so much about these things.......

I'm not sure of the date, but I know that very soon, Payton will be boarding the plane to Boston to spend time with Julie, Scott, and Hunter. What a fun experience for him! That child has logged more miles in seven and a half years than I have logged in fifty seven years! haha

Oh, well, I need to get wrapping on Alene, Kiersten, Jean, and Mike's gifts, since I believe that today is the last day I have the girls until after the new year. :) And maybe tonight will be the night we finally put up the Christmas tree.....defintely doesn't look much like Christmas at the BlingMansion yet!