Christmas 2008

Merry Christmas from the Faulk family! We hope your holiday is blessed and memorable...

We're back in Oklahoma, after a whirlwind trip down to Texas at the end of last week. We left after church on Wednesday night, and I kid you not -- there was a special fog that descended between Duncan and Alvarado JUST for our driving pleasure. It was probably the only stretch of land on the planet that was engulfed in fog during that three hour drive. We got to my parents' house late that night and woke up earlier than we wanted to, thanks to Reese. (Oh, did I mention that Reese and BC came along? And that Reese spent the last hour of the trip with her front paws on the steering wheel, further obstructing my view in the fog?)

While the girls (and dogs!) enjoyed a little vacation with Gram and Gramps, Wes and I got away for a while to celebrate our anniversary. Yes, I finally got a barf-free anniversary. (Well, BC threw up the day before. But that was the day before and not technically on our anniversary. So it doesn't count. Barf-free!) We had a great time visiting some of our favorite spots from our dating/newlywed days and reminiscing on the past few years. Even though he was gifted with a motorcycle on this anniversary, Wes still claims that 2004 was the best December 18th he's ever had because he married me. I'll choose to believe him, even though he spent half the ride back home on Sunday talking about being reunited with the bike.

We headed back to my parents' house on Saturday, where we had our Christmas with them and my sister's family. My niece received a Princess Belle dress, complete with all the accessories, and we've all since learned that little girls can't run outside in princess shoes without some disastrous results. Emma received a complete set of Yo Gabba Gabba plush characters, which she spent the remainder of the evening hugging close to herself while snarling at anyone who attempted to take them away. Ana was most excited about a Backyardigans book which she read from the moment we left the house that evening until we returned home three hours later. (That's some good reading!) I was gifted some warm dress clothes -- hallelujah! I prefer wearing dresses to church instead of pants, and unfortunately, that gets really cold when the temperature drops into the teens. I have no time (nor patience with two little ones) to shop for clothing for myself, so it was a real help that my mother had gone and gotten me a few WARM options for Sunday mornings that work with shoes and other wardrobe pieces that I already own. Yay! I was freezing to death at church, but no more!

We returned home last night in time to get the girls bathed and to get the car unpacked. This morning, we had our "Happy Birthday, Jesus" party for the children in the church. We took the kids around to the adult Sunday school classes, where they sang "happy birthday" and wished each classroom a merry Christmas. Senior adults + adorable singing children = happy church family. Pastor Wes came by the party and read the Christmas story from Luke, and we all had cake and made ornament crafts. The nursery babies even joined in on the fun, so Em got to cram a ton o'cake in her mouth at 9:00 in the morning. Good times!

The girls wore little Santa dresses to church the weekend before Christmas last year, but since they're such big girls this year (or at least bigger than they were!), they wore special Christmas dresses. And looked fabulous doing it!

For the second Sunday in a row, Ana sat through the entire service. She did have to be escorted out a bit early this week, since she started moaning and groaning during the third point of Papa's sermon, but she was easily corrected just outside the sanctuary and stood calmly with me at the back until the service was over a few minutes later. She has a handkerchief doll (which doesn't make any noise -- thanks, Gram and Gramps!) on the front pew that helps calm her down if she gets antsy, but that's all she's had with her, which has kept her focused enough to know what's going on in the service. I'm really passionate about having children learn how to worship alongside their parents and am trying, with all that is in me, to figure out how to go through this process with Ana. I'm continually praying that our church will have patience and understanding with us during this time, as Ana claps offbeat to every song we sing, chants, "bye-bull, bye-bull, bye-bull!" as I bring out mine, and -- yes -- moans and groans when Papa talks longer than she thinks he should. We're learning, y'all. ALL of us. And then, we're going to do it all over again with Em! (Which may be decidedly more difficult as Em's one attempt to sit through the service was spent with her fighting me to stand backwards on the pew, where she spent the whole time making eyes at and giggling at a group of elementary aged boys. Oh my.)

Well, it's about time to start dinner for the girls and then head on up to the church. Merry Christmas from all of us here! Hope your Christmas season is blessed!

Motorcycle!

Seems Santa came to Duncan a little early and just happened to leave something for the young parson...



It wasn't a surprise... but he still looks happy, doesn't he?

It's a little blurry because they were moving, but Ana and Emma walked all over the church today, holding hands just like this...



Sweet girls!

We went back to the dentist yesterday, where I received the most fabulous of all surprises. See, the dentist had identified four cavities in my mouth (I know!), but while filling the first two, she took another look at the last two, said that they didn't need to be filled (yet), and saved me both a world of pain and a sizable chunk of change. Yay! I do realize that in six months she'll probably choose to fill those last two, but that's six months away, so I'm not going to think about it now. My parents came into town to watch the girls for us, since we learned earlier in the week that a tiny waiting room isn't the most ideal place for a one year old and a two year old to spend a couple of hours with only one parent at a time watching them. This made the morning much, much easier, if you can believe that. Afterwards, Wes and I were able to go and eat lunch and hold hands while we walked around the mall. Life is so different without strollers and chicken nuggets. We hardly know how to function without them!

When we got home, we got a phone call letting us know that my rings were back at the jewelry store, resized. Woo-hoo! We packed the girls up after their nap and headed to yet another mall to pick the rings up. They fit MUCH better now, but I kept them about half a size too large. You know, in the very likely event that as I age I'll gain a pound or twenty. Ha! I walked around the rest of the evening looking down at my hand and telling Wes that he's awesome. I was especially glad to get them back before next week, when we will celebrate our fourth anniversary. Aww...



This is probably the worst time of the year to have an anniversary, but we sure did love having a Christmas wedding. We have big plans to celebrate this year, and we're keeping our fingers crossed that no one will get sick and ruin the plans. (Our first anniversary I spent throwing up with morning sickness courtesy of Ana, our second anniversary I spent throwing up with morning sickness courtesty of Emma, and our third anniversary was spent cleaning up Ana and Emma's vomit as they struggled through their first American illnesses. We're hoping for a barf-free anniversary this year. Is that too much to hope for?)

Emma has learned something new. For about the past six months now, whenever Em has started to cry for whatever reason, Ana gets hysterical and starts yelling, "No, no, no!" while shaking her finger at Emma. We're not sure why. Anyway, this morning, as the girls were enjoying some Krispy Kreme donuts that Papa picked up for them yesterday, Emma bit her lip or something and started crying at the table. Ana started in with the finger shaking, took in a breath to start yelling, and was cut short when EMMA shot her a look, raised her own little finger, and started screaming, "NO, NO, NO!!!" Oh, my. I'm not sure who was more surprised -- us or Ana, who looked totally bewildered by a taste of her own medicine. And while we're glad that Emma is developing a little sister backbone and standing up for herself, we're not so glad that the Faulk house cattiness is amping up a level. Fun days ahead, y'all!

I'm working on some things for the church today and just generally taking it easy. Yay for lazy Saturdays...

"Mik"

Productive week here at the Faulk house! I've managed, somehow, to get FIVE weeks worth of curriculum done this week. We're good to go up until February now, so I can actually enjoy the holiday season without this weighing on my mind the whole time. Yay!

I finished our Christmas letters and pictures and put them in the mail yesterday. Wes is taking the ones for church members with him to work today, which means that I'm done with that. All the gifts are wrapped and under the tree. I'll probably be sad in a couple of weeks that I have no gifts to wrap while listening to Christmas music and enjoying the actual week of Christmas... but right now, I'm glad for the early finish.

Hyundai issued a warranty recall on our year and model's passenger airbag (which is kind of important), so Wes took it up to the dealership yesterday to get it fixed. Since it would take more than a few days to fix and we're a one vehicle family, they gave him a loaner car. Last night, he pulled up in a Santa Fe. We drive a Sonata. I don't know how much you know about Hyundai cars, but the Santa Fe is their super nice SUV, while the Sonata is a mid-size sedan. We were riding in style on our way to church last night, talking about how wonderful it would be to have a Santa Fe. But then, we fell under conviction, realizing that our Sonata is more than enough car/room/safety for our family... in fact, it's way better than what we thought we'd be able to buy when we came back to the US. Why do we always want something bigger and better when what we have is more than enough? It's a mystery. It's really easy to see this tendency in myself when it comes to something like cars (which I couldn't care either way about most days) but not so easy when it comes to things like... um... jewelry. (I get blinded by bling!) I'm challenged to remember, as I spend these next few days riding around in a car that's much bigger and nicer than I need, that we have more than enough as it is. And I'll be content with that and work on being content in all things.

We haven't gotten any snow yet, but it's cold enough for it. I bundled the girls up in their winter coats last night for church, and they were super cute, so that made the cold a little more enjoyable. We had to run to Wal Mart afterwards to pick up some groceries, and Ana expressed her undying love for milk. Or, as she calls it, "mik."

Ha!

On today's agenda -- straighten up/clean up the house and attempt to organize the toys before the Christmas loot takes over every inch of space in our home. That should be enough to keep me busy all day.

Hope you're having a great day where you are!

Things I've Learned Recently...

Things I've learned recently (in no particular order)...

1. Preheating the oven helps to cook your food evenly. Seriously, how did I just figure this out, after several years of living on my own and cooking for myself? I don't know, but I give all the credit to Wes, who explained the "preheat" phenomenon to me this week. Amazing! (I, in turn, explained to him that there is a "medium" heat level on the stovetop and that all things don't need to be cooked on "high." Between the two of us, we're going to make one amazing cook eventually!)

2. Once-in-a-lifetime retail sales happen every few months. We get a lot of jewelry catalogs around here, and I love browsing through them and checking out the deals. And what deals they are! Prices so low you won't believe it! Limited time, though! It'll never be that low again! Buy now, buy now, buy now! And while this ingenious sales tactic has worked on me and my beloved a few times, I've noticed that for the most part, ALL retail stores run the same fantastic, limited time sales... over and over and over again. So, if your beloved fails to bring home that spiffy new can't-beat-the-price whatsit you've been admiring from afar, just wait another couple of months. It'll be on sale again, and you can buy it yourself with the money you were saving to buy him something cool. Win, win!

3. Brownies made to go with ice cream need to be made at the same time as the ice cream. Now that we're able to make ourselves some homemade ice cream, we decided on our last grocery store run that it would be just wonderful to have some ice cream over warm, ooey, gooey brownies. Mmm... I started making the brownies the other day and realized halfway through that the ice cream freezer still needed to freeze for a while before I could make the ice cream. No problem, I thought. We'll just eat a couple of brownies and save the rest to heat up later when the ice cream is ready. Well, tonight I'm making the ice cream. And the brownies? Are all gone. I can't blame Wes entirely, although that would be a lot easier than blaming myself... which would be more accurate.

4. Twisted Peppermint really is twisted. Last year, I bought a small bottle of "Twisted Peppermint" lotion at Bath and Body Works. I'm not sure if they even carry it anymore, but it was part of their Christmas line and smelled oh-so-festive. It somehow got lost in a purse before I could use it, and I only recently discovered it and thought that it would be nice to use it now, since the holiday season is upon us. I lathered it on the other night, put on pjs, and felt something cool. Just a little cool. Then, it started spreading, and I felt like I was standing in a freezer. Brrrr!!! Wes was watching me, asked what was wrong, and I told him, ever so calmly, "I think I need to shower," as I sprinted to the bathroom. It took thirty minutes of scrubbing that stuff off of me before the cooling sensation ended. Wow! (I'm not throwing it away. I plan on using it next summer when it's blistery hot outside. It'll be a little Christmas in August.)

5. Dental insurance is a good thing. Wes and I recently went to the dentist. We hadn't been in three years. Yikes! As predicted, we both had some cavities. Wes had one, and I had... well, more than one. (Before he could get all smug about this, I reminded him that I carried his children for a total of eighteen months in my womb, causing my body to forsake all other normal functions -- including dental health and maintenance -- in its exhausting effort to maintain and support life. How noble of me, right?) We went to make our appointments for the fillings and were shown exactly how much our insurance was paying and what we would be paying out of pocket. Wow. We've always had medical insurance, but we've only had dental insurance this past year. I remember in seminary when Wes had quite a few cavities, and we were given the grand total on having them filled without insurance. We were about to give the dentist more than we made in a month, which was all that we had accumulated in our savings to put towards our future deductible for maternity care (we were trying to get pregnant), when Wes's grandparents sent us a check for the exact amount the dentist had quoted us. (I'm sure it wasn't the most thrilling gift they ever gave. Merry Christmas, kiddos. Go get your nasty, rotting teeth filled. But, y'all, it was the best gift we ever received as dirt-poor seminary students!) All that to say, we've experienced the shock and stress of a dental bill that seems beyond impossible to pay, so we were all the more thankful today when we were handed a quote that we could easily afford. Yay for insurance!

6. Ana loves Ana. I was asking Ana tonight about who she loves. She was in a sassy mood, and her answers reflected this. Does she love Papa? Noooo. Does she love Mommy? Noooo. Does she love Emma? Nooo. I finally asked her, flat out, "Ana, who do you love?" She looked at me thoughtfully and said, "Ana loves Ana." Were truer words ever spoken? I think that declaration is going in the baby book...

7. Emma dips everything in dipping sauce. Until the food runs out. Then her fingers work just as well. I was washing dishes while the girls ate dinner tonight, and when I finished and went to check their progress, Em's plate was empty... and her hands were covered in blood! On closer inspection, however, it was clear that there was no blood, only ketchup. Em was dipping her fingers in her dipping sauce and licking them. Bleh. She looked at me with a face full of the vile stuff, smiled, and tilted her head back for a kiss. I refrained... until after I gave those lips a good wipe down!

8. If you want the puppy house-trained, refrain from offering an all-day buffet and beverage service. With the weather turning chilly, Reese has been spending more and more time inside. She won't stop eating and drinking while inside, though, which means that she has to keep going outside, etc, etc. BC eats at specific points in the day and is a very healthy dachshund, so I'm assuming that I won't starve Reese if I only leave the food out at specific times. I've been trying this, and Reese? Has been an absolute joy! She doesn't overeat and overdrink, doesn't have accidents, and actually curls up with us on the couch. Aww! Why did it take me so long to figure this out?

Anyway, there's my wisdom for the day. And check out what we're watching! We finally found a Yo Gabba Gabba DVD! Our girls can enjoy DJ Lance and his friends in Gabbaland anytime they want to now! All day long! Every day! Oh, wait... maybe this isn't something to be so happy about...

Saturday Night Fever turned into Sunday Morning Barfing here at the Faulk house. Bleh. The girls have been struggling through colds/viruses all week, and it just all came undone this weekend. The good news is that the fever is going away, lunch stayed down, and Elmo is bringing smiles. God bless his furry little red soul.

We had a whirlwind end to the week, with a trip to Oklahoma City to do some hospital visitation and a trip down to Texas to have Christmas with my extended family (extended as in grandmother, aunts, uncles, cousins, etc). In OKC, we were finally able to try out the Mexican restaurant that everyone's recommended to us as the best Mexican food in the state... and we were impressed. Wes spent the meal holding a crying Ana (she wasn't feeling well even then, poor baby), and even he said it was the best dining experience we've had so far here. On the way back home, we stopped over in Chickasha to see their "Festival of Lights," a city park decorated with literally thousands of Christmas lights. I've seen a couple of similar set-ups in other places, but this was by far the most thorough and extensive. Beautiful! If you find yourself in Chickasha, Oklahoma this month for some reason, make sure and see it. (And give me a call, as you are undoubtedly woefully lost and need directions. )

We went down to Fort Worth yesterday morning to eat BBQ with the rest of the family and then onto one of my cousin's houses for our gift exchange. We buy for all of the kids, but since there are so many adults, we've opted out of buying individual gifts for one another and instead do a gift exchange. Each adult brings a wrapped gift within a specified price range, we draw numbers, and each person either picks a gift to unwrap or steals a gift that someone else has already unwrapped. Fun! Wes and I both ended up with cash gifts this year, which never happens. (Wes brought a Papa John's gift card, and I brought forty candy bars. Yes, forty. They were a hit!) We're putting the cash in the motorcycle fund, which experienced a bit of a setback last month when Wes used some of the money in it to buy my birthday present. (Did I tell you about this amazing gift? Oh, I did? Because I can post another picture of it if I didn't! ) It was very unselfish and thoughtful of him to do so, and now, I'm cutting corners and saving all that I can so that he can still buy the motorcycle early next year. It's times like this that I wish I had a job and could actually contribute something financially to our funds. Wes is a great provider... but I sure would love to secretly and extravagantly surprise him once in a while with a gift that he didn't save up for himself. Ever feel that way, fellow homemakers?

The girls and I have had a slow day at home. We had every intention of going to church, and I was dressed and ready to go up until Ana got sick at the breakfast table. (We then checked Em's temp, and it was over a hundred degrees. Bless their little hearts!) I'm very thankful for the other teachers in our children's department who are able to go on and get the job done when unexpected things like this come up. It would definitely be one of my strongest arguments for group teaching, centralized curriculum, and an opening/closing assembly for Sunday school. Just in case you were wanting to know my deepest thoughts and opinions on the subject. Ha!

Well, it's time for dinner. Oh, and we did end up making ice cream with the stand mixer (and ice cream maker attachment) last week. It was wonderful! And super, super easy! I was amazed.
We're not eating ice cream tonight, however. I'm going to see how these girls handle chicken nuggets and french fries...

Well, we did end up getting that mall Santa picture taken on Monday. Ana saw Santa coming back from his break and was immediately very interested in him, to the point of hanging sideways out of her stroller to wave and shout at him. The thrill officially ended, however, when we took her up to sit on his lap. Emma was cautiously calm when we sat her on his other knee, but once Ana started screaming and flailing limbs abounded, poor Em's bottom lip started to quiver. Long story short, we have a beautiful picture of Santa, Ana, Emma... and Mommy. Had I known that I was going to be forced to sit in the picture holding Ana, I might have fixed myself up a little bit or at least made sure I wasn't wearing a sweatshirt and mom jeans (sigh), but alas -- I didn't. What a great memory, forever preserved on film! (The girls did look beautiful in their festive red shirts, even though their faces were all contorted up with grief. Merry Christmas indeed.)

A couple of weeks ago, we treated the girls to an early Christmas present. Actually the gift benefits the two of us more than it benefits the girls. It's one of those two screen DVD systems for the car. We used it on the trip down for Thanksgiving, and Ana's screen kept freezing up after a couple of hours on the road. (Setting off a round of frantic, "Hep! Hep!"s from the backseat.) We did an exchange this week for a new system, and I'm keeping my fingers crossed that it works. We're not big advocates of letting the girls watch hours and hours of TV here at home... but I'm thankful for hours and hours of Nick Jr. and Elmo DVDs on these long drives through Texas. I know how we managed without it in Okinawa, and we didn't manage well. Ha!

I took my rings to be resized and feel very anxious with nothing on my finger. Was it too much to hope that they would just resize them all while I sat there patiently in the store? Probably so.

I used my new stand mixer for the first time today. Wow! We made dough for homemade pizza crusts, and it was super, super easy. So easy in fact that I miscalculated the time it would take, and we ended up having lunch an hour and a half before we normally do! (Will have to remember this for future reference. The stand mixer does things a lot faster than my tired, scrawny arms.)

Wes is taking some of his vacation days this week. We got to the end of the year and realized that he had taken all of a couple of days of vacation throughout the year. Hmm. I guess when your kids are too little to go anywhere for a long vacation and you love your work so much that it's how you would choose to spend your time anyway, you don't notice that you haven't taken vacation in a year. Regardless, we're glad to have him around for a couple of days. After work last night, he watched the girls for me so that I could go grocery shopping ALONE. That's right -- BY MYSELF. I didn't hardly know what to do. While I was in the checkout line, a very tired looking mommy pulled up in the next line with an infant in a car seat. The baby was crying, and it was all I could do to keep myself from walking over there and offering to hold the baby for her for an hour or two. I know! What's wrong with me?! I get to a point where I think I'll pull all of my hair out if I don't get some time away from mommy duty, and then, as soon as I do, I feel purpose-less unless I'm taking care of a baby! (Anyone's baby! Doesn't even have to be one of mine!) Maybe it was just because I was remembering what it's like to have a newborn that tiny and wanted to give this woman a couple of hours to nap right there on the cold tile floor of the Wal Mart. Because she's probably tired enough that she could manage to do it.

That's about it from here. Ana has strewn building blocks all over the floor, and Emma, who could trip over a stray dog hair, will likely break her neck if I don't straighten up. Hope your week is going well!

December! How is it already December?! We've been in the US for a full year now. It feels like we've only been here a few months. We were watching a Little Einsteins cartoon with Ana this morning, and Wes mentioned how when we first heard about this show, Ana was so tiny that we couldn't imagine the day when she'd be old enough to enjoy watching it. And now she does! (And Emma likes Elmo now. How is she even old enough to watch Elmo, much less cheer for him and respond to his questions!?! She's still a newborn, right?!)

Wow. Time goes by too quickly.

Wondering why Wes was watching Little Einsteins with Ana on a work day? That would be because Wes doesn't go to work at 6am in the morning, which was when Miss Ana woke up for no apparent reason! I asked her if she was feeling bad, to which she happily responded, "Yep!" Then, I asked her if she had a nightmare, to which she giggled and shouted, "Yep!" Hmm... methinks someone was not understanding the questions. She napped on the couch with Wes for about thirty minutes and is now unapologetically up for the day. Maybe she was having a tummyache of some sort. We had pizza after church yesterday (as we do most Sundays -- it's easy to pick up and eat in the short time we have between services), and Ana kept asking, "Crazy bread and dipping sauce, Mommy?" Too much of that will make a grown adult ill, so there's no telling what it did to her little stomach. (She and Emma have recently gotten into "dipping sauce" with everything. So much so that last night, Ana stared down at her dry fish sticks, shook her head, and said, "No, Mommy. Dipping sauce!," while pointing to the fridge. When I brought out the ketchup, Em started grunting and managing a "Pleeeee?," so they ended up eating fish sticks with their excessive amounts of ketchup. Ugh... hope this phase doesn't last long. I just have no tolerance for ketchup in my old age. Bleh!)

Speaking of sick to my stomach, BC was sick to hers last night, which made all of us a little queasy. Bless her heart, I think Emma must have fed her a few bites of pizza or something because she threw up four times (!!!) before I could get her outside. After her stomach had been settled for about three hours, I took her to bed and spent the whole night waking up every time she woke up, trying to make sure she wasn't getting sick again. I know, I know -- she's a dog. But we take her ailments a bit more seriously since losing Blue. She's fine this morning and was right back to her old self, doing her best to annoy Ana. Ha! :)

If I can get the girls to take a morning nap, I plan on running a whole lot of errands this afternoon when they're awake and refreshed. I don't have anymore Christmas shopping to do, but I'd still like to check out the stores and see what's left. I need to get Ana and Emma's picture made with the mall Santa, which should be every bit as exciting as it was last year when Ana screamed from the moment she saw him until we were back in the car. (I'm just amazed by these photographers who think that they should keep trying to get a better picture of your hysterical tot, when all of their attempts only make the situation worse and painfully longer. I appreciate their heartfelt desire to get a smile, but at this age, we would just settle for a snapshot of that minute of hysteria on Santa's knee because it just won't get better no matter how much time and how many toys you use. Am I horrible for putting my children through this? I feel compelled to -- the grandmothers are very into mall Santa pictures, as evidenced by the collection of screaming mall Santa baby pictures they have of us growing up. And since we're not doing the whole Santa thing at our house, I have to give them something, right? ) I plan on getting my new ring sized, along with my engagement ring. Wes had that re-sized while I was pregnant with Ana... a good sixty pounds ago. I had been hesitant to re-size it since I knew we'd be having more children (and I would likely get just as huge, which I did!), but after a year of it slipping and sliding all over my finger, I would like to have a wedding ring that fits. Hopefully the girls will let me get that done today.

I better go and get Miss Emma up so that she's on schedule with her sister. I'm hoping Ana doesn't have anymore early wake up calls this week. I'm already exhausted!

Happy Monday!