Merry Christmas!!!

Last night Ryan, Libby, and I went to Ryan's parent's house for Christmas. We had dinner together and then opened presents! :-) It was a fun night and we headed home a little after 9:15pm. We got home and Libby and I baked some cookies for Santa and then Libby took her shower. After her shower we each were each able to open one present. :-) Libby wanted us to open the gifts that were from her. Ryan went first and she had decided that he needed a new pair of batting gloves so he opened that and was pleased with what she picked out for him. Libby is always very thoughtful when it comes to picking out gifts! Next it was my turn and I opened my gift from Libby and it was a stuffed snowman. She had Ryan take her shopping and she was very insistent that she use her own money for buying my gift. It's a very sweet thought but I'm going to have to slip some money back into her wallet to refund her because she shouldn't be spending her money on me! She also made me a card and it was precious. She is so thoughtful and loving!!!! Then she opened a gift that her Aunt Arlene sent back home with us. It was a makeup kit in a pink sparkly train case. This was her first real set of makeup...I always get her sheer colored lip glosses and small bottles of fingernail polish, etc, but this one actually had real eye shadow, eye liner, lip gloss, fingernail polish, and a complete set of brushes! She felt so grown up!!!! :-) It was time for Libby to go to bed and "Santa" got to work delivering her main desire for this year - a Barbie dreamhouse!!!!! It took a while to get everything settled under the tree and about 1:00am Ryan was standing outside her door with some sleigh bells. :-) I lightly woke her up and asked if she heard the bells. She got the biggest smile on her face and said, "I think he's here!!!" and I told her to go back to sleep so that Santa could stop at our house. :-) Last year she was up at 3:00am to open her presents and I had to make her go back to sleep until 6:00am before she could open presents. :-) This year, though, I woke up at 8:00am and Libby was sleeping soundly! What? I went downstairs to wait and about 8:20am she finally came bounding down the stairs to discover that the jolly old elf had made her dreams come true and had left her a Dreamhouse! The rest of the day she spent playing with her new treasures while I kept trying to clean up (but no matter how much I picked up stuff it still looked like a tornado went through!!). I made our Christmas lunch...a turkey, stuffing, roasted red potatos, and baked cream corn souffle. We finally ate around 3:00pm and after lunch Libby kept playing. She went to her dad's at 5:00pm for her winter break visit with him. Sending her off for her extended visits with her dad never gets easier on me!! I'm now counting down the nights until she gets back home. It will be 10 long nights without her and she comes home on January 4th - the day before her 7th birthday!! I'm volunteering in her class on her birthday so I'll get to spend the entire day with her! :-)

It was a great Christmas for us and I hope that each of you had an equally wonderful Christmas!!!!

Our trip to Tennessee

Our trip to Clarksville to visit with my brother, his wife, and my two nieces went wonderfully!! We left Gainesville at about 6:45am Friday, December 19th. I had planned for us to leave an hour earlier than that but it just didn't happen. Mostly it didn't happen because I didn't get to bed until about 1:00am Thursday night/Friday morning. I had a full day of work, then I picked up Libby and we had a few errands to take care of and then Ryan had a championship softball game. The game was over around 10:00pm (the team came in 2nd place!) and then I still had to pack. So, we finally left Gainesville and what usually is an 8.5 hour trip for me ended up being a 10 hour trip because Libby had to stop every hour to go to the bathroom! :-) We finally got to Clarksville around 4:00pm Central Time. We chatted for a bit and at 5:30pm we headed out to go to the Riverwalk in Clarksville. They put up tons and tons of lights along the Cumberland River and it's always packed there at night with everyone going to see the lights. That night is was 41 degrees so it was pretty freaking cold - especially for us Floridians! :-)

Saturday morning my nieces were both performing in a play so we got the pleasure of going to watch them both perform. It was a two hour play of children performing Shakespere...so, it was almost intolerable but we made it through it. :-) My nieces have been performing for about four years so they are pretty good at it but there were also teens who just started doing this and you can definitely tell the difference between the "veterans" and the beginners. :-) After the play Libby went back home with my brother, my sister-in-law Arlene, and my younger niece Della. Meanwhile my older niece Elizabeth and I headed out for some one-on-one time time and for Elizabeth to help me pick out a Christmas present for Della. We spent about four hours out together and then met everyone for dinner.

Sunday we all went to Nashville (about 45 minutes away from Clarksville) to see the Trans-Siberian Orchestra. My sister-in-law decided to treat us all to the Orchestra. Both of my nieces are interested in music...Elizabeth is very focused on drama and vocals...she is in 10th grade this year and looking for universities with great drama programs. Della is very focused on playing percussion in band and she wants a career in that so she was the one who originally asked her mom about going to the Trans-Siberian Orchestra. We were all psyched about going but it didn't quite turn out the way we expected - but that TOTALLY needs a blog entry all by itself! When we left the Orchestra it was 14 degrees. ARE YOU KIDDING ME????? After the Orchestra we went to the OpryMills Mall and my sister-in-law finished up some shopping and we got some dinner and then we went over to Opryland Hotel to see their lights. They put up millions of lights and it's absolutely beautiful to walk around the hotel (it's literally large enough to actually get lost in). It was great to see the lights INSIDE since it was so cold outside. After seeing the lights it was time to head back to Clarksville around 11:00pm. When we left the mall to go home it was 8 degrees outside...as in a single digit. Seriously, that is brutally cold - especially when Florida has been having 80 degree weather lately. I thought I was going to get frost bite just walking to my car.

Monday after breakfast Della and I headed out for our one-on-one time - and for Della to help me pick out a Christmas gift for Elizabeth and for my sister-in-law. It took a while but we finally found something for both Elizabeth and Arlene that I was happy with. When we got home they said that they wanted to go out for Chinese food so we all went to dinner and when we got home we watched National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation and drank hot chocolate, ate cookies, and opened presents. It was another late night...I went to bed around 1:00am again and I was back up at 6:00am and got us ready to leave and we were on our way back to Gainesville. It was another 10 hour drive but we finally got back home and I spent the rest of the night getting unpacked and putting away everything that we brought back with us from Tennessee. It was a wonderful trip and it was great to get to see our family again...it had been a year and a half since we last saw them so the trip was very necessary. We can't wait to see them all again!!

She really should have told us at the beginning of the year!!

I picked up Libby yesterday from her daycare and she usually has at least one "big" piece of news that she can't wait to tell me. We get in the car and she's talking really fast (I don't know WHERE she got that from!!) and she says, "Mrs. Whitehead (her teacher) always tell us the truth so you have to believe this! She is an elf!! Did you hear me? She's an elf!!! But she grew too big and so that is why she decided to become a teacher." I'm smiling as big as I can and I was playing it up like, "Oh my gosh! Are you serious? I can't believe that she's an elf!" and she sits back in her seat, puts her hand on her head and says, "She really should have told us at the beginning of the year so I could have been good all year." It was hiliarious!

Letter to Santa

Libby wrote her letter to Santa a few days ago but I wanted to take her to the post office to drop it off so that she could put it in the North Pole mailbox rather than just putting it in our usual mailbox. Right after I picked her up from school we went straight to the post office and she dropped off her letter to Santa and she wanted her picture taken. :-) You may notice that yes, she is wearing pj's in this picture. At her school they had a Spare Change Challenge recently and her class brought in the most change for the entire school! Whoa! So, as their reward they had a pajama party all day today. They also had hot cocoa this afternoon and the principal came in and read them a book. We always park across the street from school in the mornings and walk over. This morning we were waiting at the crosswalk with several other students and their parents and I got a few weird looks because Libby was in her pj's. :-)

Today while I was in her classroom volunteering all of the children were sitting on the carpet in front of the teacher and Libby raised her hand and said that something was in her shoe. The teacher told her that she could go behind everyone where she'd have more room and take her shoe off to get whatever it was that was bothering her out of her shoe. She walks behind everyone and I was watching her as she took off her Eskimo boot and pulled out a folded up piece of paper and six erasers!! She had all of that jammed in to her boots!! No freaking wonder it was bothering her! :-) I asked her later why she had all of that in her boot (oh, and right now I need to add that we had some really nasty weather this morning. It was dark as night outside with the wind whipping around and rain pouring down) and she told me that it was in case there was a tornado she wouldn't lose that stuff because she really liked those erasers. My silly litle girl! :-)

Christmas lights

Last night we went to see the Christmas lights at North Florida Regional Medical Center. That is a very special place for us because that is where my little Libby Regan was born (almost SEVEN years ago!! Man, time flies! But that's another story). There is a duck pond at the hospital and they put up thousands of lights so not only is it a special place for us but it's also a beautiful place!! So, we went there last night and it was nice and chilly so we were able to put on jackets and take hot chocolate and walk around and look at the lights and listen to the Christmas music. It was quite festive! :-) In the picture above let's pretend that Ryan is looking at the camera and smiling and this would be a perfect picture! :-)

SEC CHAMPS!!!!!!!!!!!

31 - 20...that was the final score of the SEC Championship game when the Gators took on #1 Alabama and OF COURSE the Gators won! :-) I was nervous, but I knew it would happen. We are the SEC Champs!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! And, barring some computer glitch or something retarded we are on our way to the NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP game in Miami on January 8, 2009!!!!!!!!!!! Gooooooooooooo Gators!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! My hands are stinging from so much clapping and my throat is sore from so much screaming (and yes, I watched it at home alone with Libby but we were still going crazy!!) but it was all worth it! We are the SEC Champs!! :-)

Little Match Girl ballet

Each year I take Libby to the ballet at Christmas time. Every year we have always gone to see Cinderella. It's a very pretty ballet but the performance is long. A ;little too long for Libby so we usually end up leaving half way through because Libby isn't one for sitting still long and being quiet. But really, Cinderella is a very pretty ballet. But the performances of Cinderella are next weekend - and Libby is with her dad next weekend. This weekend there were performances of the Little Match Girl. We haven't seen that one before but we decided to check it out so that we could continue our tradition of going to the ballet each December. I knew from the beginning that we'd only be there for an hour because the performance started at 2:30 and the Gator game started at 4:00pm. It's the SEC Championship between #2 Florida and an (so far) undefeated #1 Alabama. Can't miss something like that - ESPECIALLY when if Florida wins then that means a shot at the National Championship!! Sooooo, we go to the ballet and we LOVED it! Like I said before, Cinderella is very nice and very pretty but we both just loved the Little Match Girl. It was just so cute. I actually didn't want to leave at 3:30 but we had to because I can't miss a Gator game for anything. It was also a much shorter performance. We left after an hour and there was probably only about 45 more minutes left of it so it is about half the length of Cinderella. We had a great time! Now we can't wait to see it again next year!!

A visit with Santa

Today we finally made it to see Santa! I seem to be doing everything late recently. I can't believe that Christmas is just three weeks from today! I haven't even decorated at work yet - and I usually have that done before I leave for Thanksgiving! At least I'm decorated at home, though! So, we finally made it to see Santa after I picked up Libby from school today. Ever since she was born the Santa in our mall has been the same man every single year and I think that has always helped with the continuity for her to believe that he actually was Santa. I bragged about that fact this year and it came back to bite me because we walk up today and it was a different Santa! Either Libby didn't notice (but she's a very perceptive little girl!) or she just didn't say anything and I didn't want to probe too much because I want to keep her believing for a long as possible. Today at work Ryan was talking with a girl that he works with and she said that her son just figured out that Santa wasn't real (the son is like 10 years old) and Ryan said to her, "Don't say that to Leslie because I think she still actually believes!" :-) It's true, though. I still totally believe in all of the magic of Christmas - and that includes believing in Santa!!! But, that's about me and I was talking about Libby. So, we get there and Libby was a little shy (as always) but Santa was a wonderful Santa. He started talking to her and had her go sit in his lap and he talked to her for a bit and then they took a picture and then he asked her what she wanted for Christmas, etc. She left there jacked up because she finally officially requested her Barbie dreamhouse from Santa. And Libby knows that whatever she asks Santa for she gets. I think that's very important in making her believe in Santa so far so I'll do whatever it takes to keep that up. Luckily for me she has always asked for stuff that I've been able to actually get. Even if it was the knock-off version (the American Girl doll that she wanted last year that you may remember I found a pretty good look-alike in Target for like 1/5 of the price of that nearly $100 doll). There was also that year in 2006 when I took her to see Santa two days before Christmas and she surprised me and asked him for a Bratz pony. What?!?! That was the first that she had ever mentioned that! So, I had to freaking order one online and *overnight* it to my house. I'm sure you know that the shipping cost more than the darn pony! :-) But, anyway, I've always been able to come through with the thing that she asks Santa for so she knows that if she asks Santa for it that it will appear under the tree Christmas morning. So, now that Santa knows her request she is very anxious for Christmas! :-)

Here is a picture from just before we saw Santa. You'll have to wait to see the Santa picture in your Christmas card in a few days! :-)