My Second Annual "In-Your-Dreams" Christmas List

I am not a huge fan of posting my real Christmas list.  A lot of people do it and it's fine. And of course there are realistic things that I want for Christmas.  If you want to know what they are, call me.  I don't feel like reliving my wedding registry days and posting my wish list online for all to see :-)

But I am happy to share some stuff that I really want.  Stuff that would be first on the list if I won the lottery.  Stuff that is too expensive for anything but dreams.

Yep, still want that stinkin' thing.  It was on last year's list as well.  I will only accept it in these colors.  And no stripes, please.  I might go for checkerboard mirrors.  Maybe.

A gift card worth $20,000 to IKEA.  I have an ENORMOUS wish list on hand in case I ever get to go there.  With order numbers and everything.  Yep.  I'm serious.  And yes, I have never been there.  I just know I am going to love it and want everything.

An outdoor oasis/swimming pool/maybe hot tub type of area.  We have a huge yard that would be perfect for a pool, but Josh is very against that idea.  He doesn't want to maintain a pool.  I understand that, sure.  But I want one sooo bad!

Okay.  So I don't want to attend St. Francis Xavier University (what is that anyway?).  And I'm not Thomas Roy Ignatius Robles.  But I liked the look of this diploma a lot.  And the basic point I'm trying to make is that I would like my Masters degree to be finished.  If I could buy my diploma without doing the rest of the work, I totally would.  If I had the money.

Yes, a chandelier.  Again.  We have a beautiful space at the top of our stairs which overlooks our foyer.  It's pretty cool because the two floors of our home are open.  Josh can have a conversation with me from the kitchen when I am in the home office.  It's pretty sweet.  But from outside, there is a nice window of that area and at night is is lit up beautifully and I am dying for a hang-y type chandelier like this to go there:

There are two problems with this chandelier thing.  1) All of the ones I love (and I am picky) are too expensive.  2) The current light fixture at the top of the stairs would have to be moved over about 4 feet to put the chandelier in the right place.  Not sure how we would go about doing that.  But, if you have $500-900 you would like to blow, you can buy this for me.

That's it.  I don't need too much stuff.  But there are things I love and want.  Maybe when we win the lottery.  Maybe when we start buying lottery tickets and then win the lottery.

My Grown Up Christmas List

Last year I posted my "In-Your-Dreams" Christmas list.  The kind where I post a bunch of stuff I would love to have but just know that I won't get because it's too expensive...   I was thinking about doing that again (and I just may).  But for today, since it's officially "after Thanksgiving", I want to post my Grown Up Christmas List.  I sang this song in high school and always loved the message it sent.  Plus, everyone can use a little Michael Buble in their life...

Do you remember me

I sat upon your knee
I wrote to you
With childhood fantasies

Well, I'm all grown up now
And still need help somehow
I'm not a child
But my heart still can dream

So here's my lifelong wish
My grown up christmas list
Not for myself
But for a world in need

No more lives torn apart
That wars would never start
and wars would never start
And time would heal all hearts
And everyone would have a friend
And right would always win
And love would never end
This is my grown up christmas list

As children we believed
The grandest sight to see
Was something lovely
Wrapped beneath our tree

Well heaven only knows

That packages and bows

Can never heal

A hurting human soul

No more lives torn apart

That wars would never start

And time would heal all hearts

And everyone would have a friend

And right would always win

And love would never end

This is my grown up christmas list

What is this illusion called the innocence of youth

Maybe only in our blind belief can we ever find the truth

(there'd be)

No more lives torn apart

That wars would never start

And time would heal all hearts

And everyone would have a friend

And right would always win

And love would never end, oh

This is my grown up christmas list

It's a Dogfish Head Christmas!

One of my gifts to Josh this year for Christmas was a Dogfish Head Brewery Tour.  You may know of the Dogfish Head Craft Brewery from the show on Discovery called Brew Masters.  The tour is absolutely free, and so are the tastings :-)  But you have to book it way in advance because it sells out very quickly.  We went yesterday!

The tree house that is often featured in the show.

It took about an hour to trek up DE to Milton, but it was a very pretty drive.  We got to go into the factory and see some of the original brewery equipment from when they started the company.  And we got to see the hugeeeee tanks that they create the beer in now:

Yes, freakin' huge.  The beer travels through those pipes along the walls and below the ceilings.

This is called palo santo wood.  The whole tank is made just of this wood... not nails, glue, or anything.  The beer is aged in here for about 3 months.  Pretty impressive.

After the tour, they of course, offered tastings of various beers.  The kinds they offered while we were there were Raison D'Etre (delicious), Midas Touch (tastes like love in a glass), Palo Santo (not my favorite), and the World Wide Stout (amazing).  The beers ranged from 8%-18% ABV.  Which is insane considering a Coors Lite is about a 3%.

If you ever want to go, give us a call.  We would love to go again and you will have a place to stay!

Oh, The Busy Life

It's been a while, Blog World.

Wednesday after school, I was a timekeeper and scorekeeper for our school's first basketball game.  My school and other schools around us have this after school program called ACE.  I think it's "Active Character Education".  Teachers can recommend students in the 4th and 5th grade who are on the borderline when it comes to behavior and character.  Basically, the bad kids who need some self esteem help and teamwork.  So they form this team of these kids and ever Wednesday after school, their coach (our PE teacher) does some activities with them for a few hours.  They have character education lessons, do activities to build self esteem, and then have basketball practice and apply the character traits they talked about into their basketball team.  Well, they actually play other schools occasionally and Wednesday was their first game.  We lost terribly, but the kids were cute.  Most of them were excited to even have a chance to be on a real sports team, and others were nervous because it was their first game ever.  Then, our PE teacher bought them all pizza and we talked and ate pizza until the bus came and got them.  It was really fun.

My first Holiday program at my new school was scheduled for Thursday evening.  The whole first grade was going to perform four different selections, all about stars. Then the orchestra would do some Holiday songs ,then the band would play.  Believe it or not, we have about 65-70 kids in our 5th grade band.  Pretty impressive, huh?  It's their first year playing and they actually sound really good.  Well, when we woke up Thursday morning, we learned that it was also the first Winter Weather Advisory of the year.  It was supposed to snow about ONE inch.  So they canceled the program and we got a 2-hour-early dismissal.  I was confused, so I went to the principal.  I asked why all this was happening for one inch of snow that might even pass over us.  He replied, "Maria, this isn't West Virginia.  We don't treat the roads here.  When it snows, we all go home and wait until it goes away."  (ME): But why can't we just put chains on the bus tires?  (Principal): HAHAHAHA.  Chains!  You're funny.

And sure enough, it snowed one inch and there was one inch of ice and snow on the roads.  It was crazy.  And don't you know, school was closed on Friday, too!  So we watched Home Alone on Thursday night and laughed our heads off.  It truly is the most hilarious movie ever!

So, Friday, I woke up late, drank coffee and watched Regis & Kelly, made cookies, went shopping, went to the gym, and made chicken noodle soup for dinner.  It was delicious!  And it's sooo easy.  Let me share with you:

In the crock pot, put:

A bunch of chicken broth, sliced carrots and celery, pieces of cooked chicken, and some oregano and parsley.  Let it cook on high for about 4 hours.  Put some egg noodles in and let it cook on high for about another 45 minutes.  Voila.  Delicious.

I made sugar cookies on Friday.  I still don't have a rolling pin so I used a PAM spray bottle and pressed really hard.  I tried making royal icing and "flooding" the cookies.  It's pretty much the only way to make the icing on the cookies look smooth, according to Martha Stewart.  So you make two kinds of royal icing--stiff and wet.  Then you outline the cookie with the stiff icing, like so:

(not my cookies, just a photo from the internet)

Then you add water to the stiff icing to make wet, really thin icing and use a pastry bag to fill the inside.  When it dries, it will be nice and smooth.  My only set-back: I don't have pastry bags or tips.  So I resorted to the old "fill-a-sandwich-bag-and-cut-a-hole-in-the-tip" method.  The outlines are terrible, but they turned out okay for my first time:

I finished all of my Christmas shopping on my day off.  While I was at the gym, Josh finished his Christmas shopping as well and wrapped all of my gifts.  Something you should know about Josh: He is an excellent gift-giver.  He is thoughtful and always buys me things I love.  The problem is: He likes it so much that he usually goes overboard and then cannot contain his excitement.  So the second I got home from the gym, I immediately had to open some of the gifts that he had just wrapped before he exploded.  So, I opened two gifts.  One was a rolling pin.  He saw me using the stinking PAM bottle and immediately got dressed, went out, and bought me a nice rolling pin.  See, I told you he is thoughtful!  The other is our first Christmas tree ornament.  We actually got a beautiful "First Christmas" ornament from a friend as a wedding gift.  It is gold and beautiful (it has always been my dream to have an all-gold Christmas tree).  The problem?  The date says 2006!!!  It's definitely 2010.  So Josh bought me another gold "first Christmas" ornament with the correct date and we have both on the tree.  It's even a Willow Tree ornament (my favorite)!!!

The rolling pin and ornament.

The ornament on the tree!

I don't typically like to decorate with knick-knack-type things, but I do love Willow Tree things.

That night, we watched one of our other favorite Christmas movies, Elf!!!! And drank gin & tonics.  They are our favorite drinks, especially around Xmas time because they taste like our tree!  The movie was soooo funny.  If you haven't seen it yet, go buy it right now!  It's on sale at Target for $9.

Saturday, we decided to make it our Christmas together.  We are going to be at Josh's parents house on Christmas day, and Josh couldn't wait any longer before I opened the rest of my gifts.  Plus, we had our Christmas last year on the Saturday before the real Christmas, so we may as well make it a tradition.  Here is what our tree looked like in the morning:

How fun!

Josh got me a beautiful sweater I have been wanting from Macy's, lots of chocolate, some beautiful champagne flutes I have been wanting to match our set of wine glasses and the. best. gift. ever.  Are you ready for this?

A set of 25 colorful Sharpies!!!!

You better bet I got my best card stock, went straight to the computer, printed off a bunch of coloring pages and got right to work.  And I did that for about 9 hours that day!  I love Sharpies!

Josh also opened his gifts.  I got his two sweaters from Gap that he had been wanting and what I would call an overpriced ugly tie.  Every time we go to Macy's, he stops and looks at these certain ties.  I think they are terrible.  He loves them.  They are super expensive and probably won't match anything, so I always tell him "NO WAY!"  Well, they went on sale right before Christmas and I had a coupon, so I bought it for him, even though I hate it.  He was pleasantly surprised and very excited.  Now he's probably going to wear it every day.  I also booked us two tickets for a DogFish Head Brewery Tour in January.  It's about 45 minutes away in Delaware, but I am super psyched about going and he is too!  The tickets are usually sold out months in advance, so I  really had to be on the ball to get this one.  I got online right at the time they were posted for this particular date and snagged two.  We are excited to try lots of beers!

After gift giving and eating left-over chicken noodle soup, we went to a church down the road from us to watch one of Josh's students in the Christmas piano recital.  We brought her a bag of cookies, and for some reason I had a feeling that I should bring more than one bag, so I did.  And guess what?  One of my students was in the recital, too!  It was adorable.  Josh's student was 9 and mine was 6. They each played 5 pieces, including a duet with their teacher.  Each song was only about 30 seconds long, but it was so cute.  So we gave them both bags of cookies and their moms were really happy to see us there.

We stopped at the Shoe Dept, which is ALWAYS  a mistake because I always buy something.  Which I promptly did.  I bought a beautiful pair of peep-toe nude colored wedge shoes on clearance for $9.99 and I am SO excited to wear them.  

Josh had promised me a long time ago that for Christmas, we could have Chinese food.  We have lived here for about 5 months and still haven't tried a Chinese restaurant.  So we ordered it and it was so-so.  I liked it better than he did.  But I was mainly just happy to have gotten it in the first place!  Then we watched another favorite movie: Planes, Trains, and Automobiles.

Have you ever seen this movie?  If not, you're crazy and you need to go watch it right now.  I laugh non-stop when I see this movie.  It's one of my all-time faves.

While we watched our favorite past-time movie, we enjoyed our favorite past-time drink.  Super cheap champagne mixed with pomegranate juice.  And we enjoyed them in our new champagne glasses!

This morning, we woke up super late and watched yet another movie.  Yes, we were super lazy bums this weekend.  Deep Impact was on TV and I hadn't seen it in a long time.  It's pretty intense and a good way to spend two hours.  It's about an asteroid that is supposed to hit earth and kill everything on the planet.  It's kind of like Armageddon. 

And that's how we spent our weekend.  Pretty exciting, huh?

My program is rescheduled for tomorrow evening (Monday).  I am kind of concerned that most kids won't show up now.  Many of our students couldn't come in the first place because their parents don't have transportation or just plain aren't involved in their child's life or education.  And now I'm afraid that the people who were going to come already have plans tomorrow.  Oh well.  We will have to wait and see.  I will say that the program is going to be super cute.  My 6-year-olds practically created the whole thing themselves.  They made up the lyrics to the songs and made up their own movements, too!   I will take pictures!  Wish us luck!

My "In-Your-Dreams" Christmas Wish List

1.  Mini-Cooper S.  It has to be white.  It has to have a black roof.  It cannot have stripes.  I need awesome wheels, as well.

2.  Apple Mac Book Air.  It's awesome.  And I want it.  And I want to take it on planes and to work and to the coffee shop and to the park and in bed and everything.

3.  Pink Susan G. Komen for the Cure KitchenAid Mixer.  I have wanted one of these forever.  I remember staring at my mom's as a child in wonderment as it whipped up my chocolate chip cookies or fluffy mashed potatoes.  We actually put one on our wedding registry, but obviously that didn't happen.  But someday it will happen!  I will make sure of it.

4.  Any pair of shoes from Anthropologie.  I am a lover of all fabulous shoes.  I don't own too many.  But that's basically because when you are a teacher, you cannot justify hundreds of dollars on shoes.  But I love to look!  Here are some of my favorites:

5.  Fine china.  Lots of it.  Lots of different ones to use on each night.  I especially love some new modern patterns.

L by Lenox

Mikasa Pure Red

Kate Spade Gwinnett Lane

Mikasa Daylight

6.  An awesomely expensive and huge chandelier:

Quoizel La Parra Chandelier

7.  Another trip to Costa Rica.  The last time (and only time) I was there was in the summer of 2004.  I fell in love with that place and even thought that someday I could move there.  Now I would just like to visit every once in a while and climb an ACTIVE volcano again!

This is the volcano that my junior Chemistry class and I hiked up in 2004.

There you have it!  My "I will never get it--In your dreams--He!! no--Are you serious--Christmas list".  

WINTER

Here is a list of my favorite winter-time things:

1. Soup.  I love my crockpot and I love the comfy, warm feeling of a hot, hearty soup.  Recently I have made white cheddar corn soup and white chicken chili!
2. Sweaters.  They are the best.  I bought this beauty at NY&Co. recently:

3. Snow.  I can't wait until the first snow.  I love snow days where I can sit at home, snuggle in a blanket, and watch a movie while the snow piles up outside.
4. Blankets, especially my heated blanket.  The heated blanket is the BEST invention ever.  Using it in the winter to snuggle up makes me soooo happy.
5. Christmas.  Christmas trees and Christmas music.  That's a given.
6. Baking.  I will be the first to admit that I am not the greatest baker, but I do love cookies and apple pies!  So I bake.

If you asked me what my favorite season was, I would say summer.  The beach, weddings, my birthday, being outside, the weather, etc.  But winter definitely comes in at a very close second :-)

The Night Before His First Program

Josh's first school program is tonight.  He is super excited and nervous and I am too!  His whole fourth grade is performing.  Students are reading The Night Before Christmas as narrators and every few stanzas a different class will perform a song.  Most of them were written or adapted by Josh, me, and his students to fit the story. 

One of the classes is even performing a longways set dance as the "reindeer" on the sleigh.  They will be wearing reindeer antlers with bells!  All of the other kids are going to be wearing "Christmas Eve" attire.  A.K.A. Pajamas.  It should be super cute. 

Programs are scary and nerve-wracking.  We, as teachers, get all worked up and try to make everything perfect for a bunch of 6 year olds!  They end up performing a stellar program full of great musicianship (especially for little kids). Meanwhile, all the parents remember is the cute kid in the front who just stood there and waved to his mom.  I will have to remind myself of that in two weeks for my program!

Wish us luck!

Christmas!

It's December!  Yay!  I have never been so excited about Christmas in my life.  Not even as a kid.  I am excited to see my family and spend time.  I am excited to spend time with a new family.  And I am excited to make some memories for our first Christmas :-)

When Josh and I got back from my mom's on Saturday, we got home, brought the stuff inside, and got right back in the car and went shopping.  We got all the decorations for our first tree and a tree stand.  We also picked up a few gifts for some family.

On Sunday, we bought our first tree (it's real!) and set it up.  I also set up my little, tiny, fake tree that my grandma and pap gave to us/made for us last year when we didn't have any room in our apartment for a real tree.  It sits in a window upstairs and looks beautiful!  Then I baked some chocolate chip cookies with Hershey's Special Dark chocolate chips (Thought you would like that, Kathi).  We did all of this while listening to Christmas music, of course!

On Monday I wrapped some of the gifts and put them under the tree and we strung the lights.  We were still kind of waiting for the branches to fall a bit before we put the decorations on.  We also put a wreath on the door, put the stockings up, and added a few of my grandma's ceramic decorations that she made.  And I bought my first Christmas cards to send out... I got good ones, too :-)

And Tuesday we actually put the decorations on our tree!  It looks a little silly without a tree topper or skirt, but it's our first one, so take it easy on us! 

And we are excited for this weekend when my mom, sister, and grandma are coming to visit us!  I will probably bake more cookies and use my crockpot!

It's hump day!  Only two more days to go :-)

A Fun Sunday

Today we finally got to Ocean City.  I am still sick from yesterday with a sinus infection and slight fever.  But since I gave myself a day (yesterday) to relax I figured I had to do something today.

We slept in and watched That 70s Show all morning and Josh make us eggs with salsa.  Around lunch time we headed to Ocean City.  It's pretty awesome that we live exactly thirty miles away from the beach!  We got there and went to my favorite OC restaurant The Shark on the Harbor.

They serve mostly local and organic gourmet food but they have the most amazing lunch specials and local craft beers.  I ordered fried green tomatoes with lump crab meat on top served with this spicy creamy sauce.  I wanted to take a picture of it so bad but I couldn't wait to eat it so this picture is my beautiful lunch with one bite taken out:

Then we walked the board walk a little bit and got some Fisher's caramel popcorn and I had to go to the candy kitchen to get some rock candy (my FAVORITE!)

I tried going to the gym tonight with a fever.  This was a bad idea.  I wasn't there too long.

This week we only work two days and then we are going to Cumberland on Wednesday to be with my family for Thanksgiving.  It's pretty weird being married and having to choose a family to share holidays with.  We want to go to both even though it's not realistic because they are about 2 1/2 hours away.  So this will be interesting in the future on Christmases and such.  I think they should just start visiting us on Christmas (what do you think, families?)

To Grandmother's House We Go!

The MR. and I are headed off to visit family today after I get off work.

We will stop in Cumberland and spend tonight there.  Tomorrow (XMAS Eve) he is headed to York.  We are spending the actual holiday apart, which we have been doing every year.  We thought it would be nice to have our first Christmas together be our first Christmas as husband and wife.  I will miss him, but I am so excited about the following year that I am actually very happy that we have made that choice. 

He will be back on the 26th for my grandmother's XMAS party.  We will leave together to go back to York, probably on the 28th.  This is where we will spend the next few days to celebrate New Year's at our "usual", a family friend of his parents... a very good time :-)

This sounds great on paper.  However, I am a homebody.  Once I move, I make a place my "home".  Even though it is a small, some-what crappy apartment that we live in, I am proud to say that it is officially our home.  And since it is so, leaving for over a week literally scares the living geezes out of me! 

I am leaving my car at "home".  I am trying to remember to unplug everything.  I am trying to remember not to forget anything... ESPECIALLY MY PILLOW (the only thing that could possibly comfort me on our journey).  I will hopefully turn the heat off... it's expensive enough while we are living in it.  I just remembered that I forgot to hold our mail. 

And the kicker... the worst feeling in the world (for me) is coming "home" from a trip to a DIRTY house.  But, unfortunately, I didn't have the time lately to actually clean it.  It is relatively spick and span, but there's something about coming "home", knowing that you finally get to relax on your break, have nothing to do, and walk in and see dirt on the carpet.  Or see ONE dirty cup that you left out the morning you left.

That's okay, though.  I love my family.  I love his family.  I love spending time with them and seeing everyone.  But "home" is where my heart is :-)

food that is not good for me.

I am making buffalo chicken dip tonight for the fiance and friends as a sort of celebration.  They have completed student teaching and have graduated with their degrees!  SO excited for them.  I will probably eat half of the stuff myself.  And I believe we are also celebrating with Jack and Diet coke :)  One of my favorites!

ALSO-super excited about the XMAS gift I bought for the FI yesterday.  An awesome silverish-grey Calvin Klein slim-fit dress shirt.  HAHA.  And a nice tie to go with it.  It was the first time I ever bought I tie.  WOW.  They are expensive.  They are made up of WAY less material than the shirt, yet cost almost just as much!  Silly.  I also bought him a tie rack!  That one is a complete surprise, but he really needs it and I am tired of seeing his ties laying everywhere in my...  achem... our closet.  And the movie 'The Hangover'!  I am so excited to see it.  He asked for it and probably knows he is getting it!

There's just something about this time of year...

Why does XMAS still give me butterflies?!?! 

• I know my gifts already (because I asked for things I need).
• There is no excitement over getting to sleep before Santa gets here.
• I used to love snow and winter.  I now hate snow and I hate cold.
• I used to love buying gifts for people.  I still love giving things, but I wish they were free.
• I do not enjoy sleeping in my mother's house.  I love my family, but I no longer have a bed there.  I sleep on my 10-yr old brother's bunk bed.
• I get depressed seeing how much people spend on Christmas.  A friend told me an interesting fact: America spends $450 BILLION every year on XMAS.  Yes, really.  It would only take $10 billion to provide EVERYONE IN THE WORLD with fresh water... yeah, I am a party pooper.
• I feel guilty when people spend money on me.
• The list goes on...

YET... I still get butterflies around this time of year. 

Maybe it's becuase I am thinking of different things now that I am older.  Maybe because I am thankful for Jesus.  Or my fiance.  Or my job.  Or my happiness.  Or my friends.  Or my family.  Or my new beginning to life and marriage.  Or the fact that I am getting 11 days off work :)

I should be fired...

I am blogging instead of working.  This is technically my plan period, but I am tired of music. 

Well, kind of... I am actually listening to the radio.  But still... just not the beautiful recorder echoes of 8-year-olds.

I had a pretty good day today at school.  During the beginning of the year, I was having some on-days and some off-days.  I can honestly say that even though I have been going home tired lately, I haven't been going home with a headache.  I was getting frustrated when things weren't going my way at school.  Whether it being misbehaving students, forgetting things, listening to my principal yell, lesson plans just not really working out, etc.  Either I am not letting these things get to me because I am not noticing them -OR- it really is getting better!  Students are so much better behaved!  Even close to the holidays!  They might be finally getting used to my rules.  I am writing more things down and forgetting less!  My principal LOVES me!  She bought me a wonderful XMAS gift!  My lessons have (pardon my bragging) been AWESOME!   And the kids are just loving them.

And I am standing up for myself.  Our school counselour today asked me to start coordinating the "Character Ed" Program and to keep HER updated.  I think it's like a program of artsy stuff (singing, instruments, visual art, dancing, etc) that basically somehow relates to good character traits... respect, honesty, cooperation, peace, etc.  So I said, "Oh, I didn't know that it even existed.  When is it?"  Her response, "OH, the last week of school".  My response, "You are definitely going to have to get back to me after the break.  If you ask me to do that now, I will not even think about it over break."
GO ME!  I HAVE GUTS!