09/15/07 Early Check in September 15, 2007 Eastern

[Hixski]

Thanks for all the compliments on my tree. I realize I am a sick sick woman when it comes to Christmas trees. Got to get back to working on my last tree. It is 8ft and takes the longest to put up. DH is always great playing pack mule and lugging things up out of the basement. He is usually the one who pulls all the ornaments out of the boxes too. I think I will keep him.

 

[JLSE50]

.....We are just doing our usual stuff..taking it day by day. Preparing for our first holiday season without my grandma (who passed Aug 1) and without my dad (who passed Nov. 1). With the arrival of my second son, hopefully that will be the thing we need to get through.

Best wishes--never easy, but memories are good things and tears are not bad things.
Jan

 

[JLSE50]

I will help keep us off page 2. We are putting up all our trees and I thought I would post my Disney tree. (Since we are all crazy for Disney)

LO-VER-LY!

 

[JLSE50]

Thanks for all the compliments on my tree. I realize I am a sick sick woman when it comes to Christmas trees. Got to get back to working on my last tree. It is 8ft and takes the longest to put up. DH is always great playing pack mule and lugging things up out of the basement. He is usually the one who pulls all the ornaments out of the boxes too. I think I will keep him.

How many trees do you put up and what rooms do you put them in?

I always thought I could do a Disney tree, a Teddy bear tree, a photos-of-my-sons-on-ornaments tree AND a Nativity tree. But we never did. I only ever did one tree but had BOXES of ornaments that never saw the light of day from one year to the next.

When we moved to our condo in January 2005 I SORTED as I put things away, made a box for each of my kids and gave a bunch of ornaments and decorations to the church for their outreach to women coming from the battered women's shelter to the church's halfway house.

Last Christmas when I put up the tree I had to make a bas-relief tree. I put the pole as close to the window as I could. I did not use any of the largest branches. I started on the lowest level with the second largest branches, but none by the window. I put the lights back there though so that if anyone looks up to our third floor window it will look like a Christmas tree.
That all meant that the tree can hold fewer ornaments so I have weeded out my collection further--much to my amazement.

Safe travels all!
Jan

 

[Hixski]

How many trees do you put up and what rooms do you put them in?

I always thought I could do a Disney tree, a Teddy bear tree, a photos-of-my-sons-on-ornaments tree AND a Nativity tree. But we never did. I only ever did one tree but had BOXES of ornaments that never saw the light of day from one year to the next.

When we moved to our condo in January 2005 I SORTED as I put things away, made a box for each of my kids and gave a bunch of ornaments and decorations to the church for their outreach to women coming from the battered women's shelter to the church's halfway house.

Last Christmas when I put up the tree I had to make a bas-relief tree. I put the pole as close to the window as I could. I did not use any of the largest branches. I started on the lowest level with the second largest branches, but none by the window. I put the lights back there though so that if anyone looks up to our third floor window it will look like a Christmas tree.
That all meant that the tree can hold fewer ornaments so I have weeded out my collection further--much to my amazement.

Safe travels all!
Jan

I just posted these on a Christmas decorations thread on the CB.

This is my 8ft tree. It is in our great room.

This is DH SciFi tree. In one of our bedrooms.

This is my BARBIE tree. It is in the great room.

This is my foyer tree.

This is a 4ft tree.

This is DH St. Louis Cardinals tree.

This is my Disney miniature tree.

I have more stuff but I don't have pictures of everything.

 

[JLSE50]

This is DH St. Louis Cardinals tree.

NICE TREES
DH would like this one!! He is a Cardinals fan too. One of our bathrooms is done in Cardinals stuff. We cannot find a Cardinals waste basket in Indy. We would also like Cardinals floor mats for the van. Maybe someday we will drive over.....
Jan

 

[2canadianfans]

Ya gotta love a Christmas AND Disney fan ...

 

[Hixski]

Ya gotta love a Christmas AND Disney fan ...

Thank you, Thank you very much.....(It is so hard to get that Elvis sound to come through the keyboard)

 

[lg3]

Great tree!! Wow all the Disney decorations..thanks for sharing.Slowly starting the Christmas season..had my first eggnog latte at Starbucks today..sharon

Yes - Another eggnog lover!!! I could drink it anywhere, any-how (Is that a word? ) It's not the Christmas season without it.

 

[Mommaraven]

Yesterday my sisters, my mother, Patrick's mother, his neices and I went shopping for bridesmaid and flower girl dresses. It was a blast. Everyone got along very well and trying on gorgeous dresses is always fun. I ended up changing my colors from royal blue to navy after seeing the colors together with my dress and on my sisters. The littest neice looked adorable in the flower girl dress. I was really happy with the dresses that we ended up getting and my sisters loved them too, so happy all around. Plus, it was nice to see my Mom and future MIL getting along so well. Today, DFi is off playing golf and DS4 and I will be cleaning and going shopping. Oh joy. Hope everyone is having a good weekend!

 

[kimgregg]

Just a bump to get us off the 2nd page.

Hope everyone has a Happy Thanksgiving.

 

[Grandma4ever]

Getting ready to visit the family. We have a ten hour drive tomorrow. Don't know that I'll have the time to keep up with the post while were gone. So I thought a take a minute to:
Wish everyone a Happy Thanksgiving
Lois

 

[captaincrash]

Hello folks!

I've been fighting a nagging cough and generally rotten response to high pollen and dust in our area. Plus it's just been busy in a crazy (and sad) way. We've had two more family members develope bad heath considerations. We're waiting for the various tests to be competed but in one case it may be stage 4 lung cancer or we hope the lesser of two eviuls would be lymphoma (misspelled?) or multiple cancers as opposed to metastatic lung cancer. And in another family member we are are finalizing the diagnoisi on an atuo-immune disorder - we suspect.

Frankly - it shakes me to my core to see folks our age fall chronicly il for the 1st time in my life this year. We've seen about half a dozen to a dozen friends, relatives, and best friends who themselves have folks our age (40s) or of their parents age who have developed varying chronic ailements.

So we've been sort of quiet lately. I spent some time mindlessly posting to the community game board for a while too. Oh well... maybe I'm losing my mind too?

ANYWAYS.... below are my BLACK FRIDAY comsideration (boldfaced) with comparable deals in regular print for your consideration and amusement:

Well... here are many of my picks: (any thoughts?)

Hitachi 51" Widescreen HDTV at Best Buy for $699. No... I don't want this but it is interesting how it compares against the 60" 3x4 Philips rear CRT projection HDTV I bought from Costco about 3 years ago (and returned due to major defects).... I paid $1800 back then!

Panasonic 52" LCD Projection HDTV at Circuit City for $999 with a HD tuner. Again... an impressive bargain considering I paid nearly $2000 for my 57" Epson LCD rear projection HDTV. 720p. But I remain satisfied with my Epson for many many other reasons. But HALF the price for only 5" smaller sounds pretty impressive too.

Polaroid 20" TV w/ Built-in DVD Player for $84.99 at Circuit City. DO I really need one of these??? MAYBE I'll get one...

Polaroid 8.5" Portable DVD Player for $100 at Circuit City. Problem: No DC charger or battery apparently.

7" portable DVD player at Kohls for - get this - $19.99? No name - probably no battery or accessories but then again it's just twenty bucks.

MAG 17" LCD monitor...Best Buy... $79.99 ???? I could use one of these - but 19" would be nicer!

Panasonic TH-42PX60U 42" Plasma HDTV from Best Buy for $999. Not that I want one (I don't) but it is amazing how much these have come down in price for a HDTV Plasma WITH HD tuner in 720p!

And Office Depot has a Haier 42-inch Plasma HDTV for only $799! But - who on Earth is "Haier"?

Pioneer 700 Watt 7.1 Channel Receiver at Circuit City for $119. Not bad looking with 7.1 sound processing and 700W.

Samsung 19" Widescreen LCD Flat Panel Monitor for $129 from Best Buy (This one I am thinking about).

Samsung 19" Wide-Screen LCD Monitor for $129 at Staples. Resolution appears to be 1280x1024 with a 700:1 contrasat ratio, 8ms response and 75hz. ARE these specs good enough? I may bet this one.

19" Proview Widescreen LCD Monitor for $129 from CIRCUIT CITY after rebate (Yuck - I hate rebates). This one states it has an SXGA resolution with a 500:1 contrast ratio.

Sandisk 1GB Ultra II Compact Flash Card only $15 at Circuit City

SanDisk 2GB Ultra II CompactFlash Memory Card at Staples for $40

Toshiba DLP Projector $399 at BEST BUY... the DMD DLP HD projector - it's XGA res w/2000 Lumens and can handle 720p inputs. It is a business class 3 pound machine so my expectations are low - but interest is moderate. $399? Wow!

Toshiba L35-s2151 Laptop for only $249 from Best Buy w/o need for a REBATE. Too bad I don't NEED a notebook cuz I'm looking at this thinking why not get a spare? If it really is $249 without requiring I subscribe to AOL or buy a cell phone in conjunction I just might get one of these. It comes with a 15.4" WXGA 1280x800 screen; Intel® Celeron® M processor 420 with 533MHz frontside bus, 1MB L2 cache and 1.6GHz processor speed; 512MB PC4200 DDR2 SDRAM for multitasking power, expandable to 2GB; DVD-ROM/CD-RW combo drive; 60GB Serial ATA hard drive (5400 rpm); ATI Mobility RADEON X200M graphics with 64-128MB dynamically allocated shared video memory; Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition OS; and it Weighs only 5.1 lbs. and measures just 1.5" thin for easy portability; lithium-ion battery . I may have to go wait in line at 1AM to get this one though... and I am uncertain whether I really want to do that.

Toshiba Satellite Notebook L35-S2171 W/Celeron M Processor 420 (same as at Best Buy) for $299. Maybe I'll stay home and sleep and pay $50 more then Best Buy... if the line is shorter here! Only problem is we have Best Buy gift certificates we would like to get rid of on black friday purchases!

Compaq Presario Notebook w/ Celeron M 420, 512MB, 60GB, 15.4" LCD for $299 from Circuit City after REBATE (I dislike rebates).

Free 3.2 MP Polaroid Camera with Any $249+ Purchase I'll get this from CIRCUIT CITY IF I buy the notebook there.

JVC 3-Pack of 60-Minute DV Camcorder Tapes for FREE from Circuit City. I wonder if I'll find any of these???

Western Digital MyBook 250GB External Hard Drive for $69.99 a BEST BUY. This is exactly what I just got - and for the same price I paid!

I/O Magic 250GB External 3.5" Hard-Drive for $39.99 from Circuit City after (yuck) Rebate.

External 250GB Hard Drive branded as a Comp USA brand by the same company for $49.99. It runs at 7200 with a 2MB Cache.

Simpletech 250GB External HD at Office depot for $49.99

Maxtor OneTouch III 300GB USB 2.0 Hard Drive at Office MAX for $99.99

Western Digital 400GB MyBook External Hard Drive for the same $99 at Staples. It is also USB 2.

Westinghouse 22" LCD Widescreen Monitor at Best Buy for $199. I was wondering ... do I really need 22" versus 19" for $129?

Westinghouse 42" 720p LCD HDTV at Best Buy for $999. No, I don't really want one buy they are amazingly cheap, eh?

Westinghouse 7" Digital Picture Frame at best buy for $79.99. I really would like one of these. But for the money I want the $249 Toshiba notebook more as it makes for a more versetile device with a larger screen for the money!

Power Wheels by Fisher Price Dora Volkswagen Beetle Ride-on for $75 at Walmart. AND my only gripe about this deal is it means transacting with the "Evil Empire" and this minions!

 

[CaptainJack]

Happy Thanksgiving!

 

[kamgen]

Hey everyone....hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving.
Ours was pretty uneventful.....just me, dh, ds, and my mom.......
Strange the first holiday without my dad. Miss him a lot. As you can see by the time of my post, still up. Everyone else is in bed...can't really sleep.
I miss the little things so much....especially watching my dad as "grammpy", interacting with my son. And as the birth of my second son gets closer, it saddens me more each day that he is not here for it. I know I have to be strong and focus on the positive, which I am trying hard to do, but sometimes I cannot help but be sad for all that is gone.
Thanks for letting me share.

As for all the previous posts...the christmas trees are wonderful. My mom and I are going to decorate this weekend, try to get it done before our little guy arrives!
Megan- glad to hear the dress shopping is going well and you are having fun with the wedding plans. Miss you guys a lot!!!

Everyone take care and be safe.....and above all, be thankful for all you have.

 

[lg3]

Hello everyone - HAPPY HAPPY THANKSGIVING (a little late ). We ate my SIL's. Brought the wine and appetizers. Everything was extremely tasty. We have committed to hosting it every other year from now on. (We had it last year). We have so much to be thankful for including wonderful people like you all on the DIS.

kamgan, I am sending a huge hug to you - I am trying to catch up on everything and see that you recently lost your dad. The first holidays after that are the hardest. When I was in my late 20's I unexpectantly lost both my parents within 6 months from one-another due to cancer, and still today 15 yrs later it is sometimes difficult. It is never easy, and I am so glad you and your mother can get together to put up Christmas decorations. That is wonderful.
I am leaving early next week to NYC for a few days, but will get back in touch after that. Take care everyone!

 

[captaincrash]

Kamgen...

I know how that somber feeling can run. But I wanted to offer that our TG feast was also a bit muted. In past years TG was one of the "celebrations" we had with my side of the family while we traveled to my spouses' side for many of the other gatherings. We used to see a wide range of family and friends over this holiday. That made TG a bit more meaningful to me it being my side an' all.

Well... last nite it was just one of my siblings with their immediate family, plus my Dad and step mother, and us. My brothers' having a tough time dealing with the AZ of his spouse and 2 families over was all he wanted to "risk". One of his problems was if anyone said the wrong thing then it would trigger several days of difficulty and unhapiness. He also wanted to try and host something that still "looked" like TG though. So he sort of hand picked two families to attend who he hoped would be perfectly diplomatic and all. So instead of several dozen at TG it was just the 3 families gathered. It was nice but very modest in scale.

THen on returning home we took a call from folks out of town - one of whom was getting the last few stages of analysis today (friday) non their suspected growths. Well, we still have the biopsy as the last thing to analyize but we have pretty strong suspicion as to what we are dealing with. There are several surgeons in the immediate family, one of whom teahes at a renown medical school in the Boston area - so everyone has been speaking in muted tones of what we think we're looking at. So ... it's been a wierd kind of season and year because of this and the things so many others close to us have encountered.

So... having said that much, the turkey was dry last nite but the stuffing was (as usual) the stuff of myth! My younger daughter LOVED the stuffing and rekindled memories of one occasion when I was a child when I piled a stuffing portion HIGH on my plate and drew critical glances from my Mom.... well ... as you can imagine I could not finish it and I had a private warning and chat with my Mom afterwards. I still think back to that at TG whimsically.

And last nite I thought I might try my hand at stitting out for a Black Friday sale to be among the first few in line. Well... I drove by the stores under consideration at 9:30PM last nite so I would know what the "competition" was and dress/pack accordingly. Enroute my spouse was quipping that there probably would be nobody out there as it was pretty chilly... and to our mild surprise there were perhaps 150 people camped out in line at BEST BUY! The at Circuit City they had about 25 people. We were chuckling and thinking "I" was NOT going to wait 7 hours for a sale like these folks were doing.... and I was thinking of going out at maybe 12 or 2AM...

So I was at home and noted that grudgingly I would maybe try for an Office Depot sale ... except the ad said only a few of the computers I wanted were going to be on hand... so at 1AM I drove off half ready to wait in line only to discover there were dozens of people camped at Office depot with far heavier camping gear then my heavy jacket and balnket!!! AND... for chuckles I went past Best Buy and Circuit City. BB had a line running from front to the back of the building. CC had thick a 70-80' line running to the sidewalk!!!

So my spouse woke me at 4AM to inform me she was departing for the sales. So I had the kids this AM. I called her and she's been to Macy's, Sports Authoyity, Sears, Disney Store, Target, the local Mall in general and is now enroute to Costco.

So.... happy TG to everyone! How was your BF shopping?

 

[Hixski]

No BF shopping for me. I am working right now. Worked last night too. I will shop later. We seem to just buy gift cards so we don't need the sales. Crazy I know but it works for us.

PS. If anyone wants to be frosted or ho ho ho'd let me know. I passed on a few but don't know if everyone wants one.

 

[kamgen]

Good morning everyone. Glad to hear all the other stories of TG and shopping. It is so nice to be able to come here to vent and talk.

Mom and I went BF shopping and hit Bath and Body Works like freaks! LOL! I got around $400 worth of merchandise for less than $140!!!! So exciting! We also hit the Disney Store and got some things for Ryan and Liam (and some other secret stuff!) Mom went to Target without me...needed to rest after getting my tired, pregnant butt out of bed at 4am! We also hit KB toys for the buy two get one fisher price sale.
Overall it was a nice day....
Today we plan to start Christmas decorating. We will probably use all mom's stuff since Steve and I have all ours in storage...but we will see.
Enjoy your weekend everyone!

 

[nikkistevej]

Just found this thread, booked about a month ago for the Sept 15,2007 eastern- my first DCL cruise!!!!!! I am so excited and it is sooooo far away.