Best of 2010 Playlist

photo © 2003 Shiv Shankar Menon Palat | more info (via: Wylio)
Music was ABSYMAL overall this year, but here are my favorites:

1. Bad Romance, Lady GaGa
2. Crystalised, The XX
3. Cousins, Vampire Weekend
4. F*** You, Cee Lo Green
5. Dog Days Are Over, Florence + The Machine
6. Ready To Start, Arcade Fire
7. Rill Rill, Sleigh Bells
8. 10 Mile Stereo , Beach House
9. Empire State of Mind (f. Alicia Keys), Jay-Z
10. Uprising, Muse
11. Dance Yrself Clean, LCD Soundsystem
12. Grenade, Bruno Mars
13. Monster, Kanye West, Jay-Z, Rick Ross, Nicki Minaj & Bon Iver  

Disagree? Agree? Have better choices? Think it's bad news that I ended the list on 13? Sad I left out Party in the USA by Miley Cyrus? (It's so damn catchy!) Leave it in the comments.

Bah Humbug- Holiday Pet Peeves

Here are my ultimate 10 Holiday Pet Peeves, because I am sooo over the Holidays!

1. Save Now, Hurry, Act Fast- all of the annoying emails from stores. Please, I don't need 3 emails from you every day, telling me not to "miss out". It makes me NOT want to buy from you!

2. Specialty toy stores hocking toys that you can buy from Toys R Us, and marking up the price.

3. People that buy tons of hot ticket toys to sell on Ebay. Yes, I am speaking of my son's beloved Ixl, which I went into a mad frenzy to buy the day before Thanksgiving.

4. The lack of entertainment during the Holidays. No new TV shows, no new blog posts... it's like people are busy or something! What's up with that??

5. Scrooges. Come on, now... that's no fun. At least try to find some happiness during these hectic days.

6. Long shopping lines. I took that picture standing in line to buy GROCERIES. Not gifts, just food. That's obnoxious.

7. Rude people. Hey we are all in this together, we don't need to shove and shout!

8. Bad holiday music... which to me is basically any Holiday music that was made after 1960.

9. People bragging about being all done with everything... oh wait I am one of them. Still, I am annoyed with myself.

10. Trying to find places to put Boodle, our elf on the shelf, every night. Our house is not big enough! I was glad to see him go, even though my youngest son, Jacob, cried when I told him he was gone for the year.

What about you? What are some of your Holiday Pet peeves?

Happy Christmas!

From the Bees to you,

 Have a Christmas full of Merry

and a New Year of Happy too!

photo © 2010 Squeek Photo | more info (via: Wylio)

Day 17- A piece of Artwork

photo © 1935 The U.S. National Archives | more info (via: Wylio)

I've always love Ansel Adams' photographs. They were what made me want to take up photography. It makes me miss the simplicity of a great black and white photo, and miss the days of slaving away in an orange lit darkroom. I miss those simple days when taking pictures was black and white, and a photographer's hands were stained with fixer (ok, maybe that was just me).

In case you haven't been following along, I'm taking part in a 30 day blog journal that has stretched into the 6 month blog journal. Thank you to Sass over at Secret Life of Sass and Lex for the great idea. From one Mrs. Bee to another (yep, they are Bee's over there as well), thanks!

Here are the days:
Day 1 - your favorite song
Day 2 - your favorite movie
Day 3 - your favorite television program
Day 4 - your favorite book
Day 5 - your favorite quote
Day 6 - 20 of my favorite things
Day 7 - a photo that makes you happy
Day 8 - a photo that makes you angry/sad
Day 9 - a photo you took
Day 10 - a photo taken over 10 years ago of you
Day 11 - a photo of you recently
Day 12 - something you are OCD about
Day 13 - a fictional book
Day 14 - a non-fictional book
Day 15 - your dream house
Day 16 - a song that makes you cry (or nearly)
Day 17 - an art piece (drawing, sculpture, painting, etc)
Day 18 - my wedding/future wedding/past wedding
Day 19 - a talent of yours
Day 20 - a hobby of yours
Day 21 - a recipe
Day 22 - a website
Day 23 - a youtube video
Day 24 - where I live
Day 25 - your day, in great detail
Day 26 - your week, in great detail
Day 27 - my worst habit
Day 28 - whats in my handbag/purse
Day 29 - hopes,dreams and plans for the next 365 days
Day 30 - a dream for the future

Happy....

For My Husband....

Happy because I love you.
Happy because you love me.
Happy that I get to wake up each morning next to my best friend.
Happy that I got so lucky.

Happy because it's your birthday.
Happy I have spent 11 birthdays with you.
Happy because I get to spend many more birthdays with you.

Happy that you were born Day.
Happy Birthday, Mr. B.

PS. Happy that I am younger than you... I kid, I kid!

Motivation: Donation

It's official: I am free!

I have been growing out my hair to donate, and it was finally long enough, at least most of the pieces are.
Now I have a cute new haircut and my hair cannot get caught around my scarf, seatbeat, or phone anymore! Phew!

<-------------------Me now. What do you guys think?

The Tales of the Lost Glove

photo © 2010 Boaz Sachs | more info (via: Wylio) We have lost 4 Gloves at the Bee house already*.  Yes. 4. It's only DECEMBER!

I can't even begin to tell you how annoyed I was that Drew lost a glove the first week of wearing them. I promptly bought another pair, and told him to HOLD ON to that pair, and to look for the lost one. He was so excited when he came home from school the next day to tell us he had found his glove, unfortunately, he had lost one of his OTHER gloves,the replacement glove. I looked in the lost and found at his school for his replacement glove, and found a glove that looked like his spiderman gloves. Surely he couldn't have lost THAT glove, he wasn't wearing them at school, I thought. So I left it there.

I guess you know where this story is going.... it WAS his glove! needless to say, I was a little irate.*

We found a life (and money saver) though, Mitten Keepers Clip - Best One-piece Mitten Clip (Blue)**. These things should be issued to all parents of Elementary schoolers, they are awesome. He doesn't enjoy keeping his mittens on a string, but I enjoy knowing where his mittens are at all times. They are better than mitten clips, they go through the whole coat. Happy times are here again. (Yep, I know I need a life.) Now I just need to worry about his hat, scarves and boots....***




* Not all of our gloves that we lost were of Drew's doing. I lost my glove in the parking lot of the movie theater the FIRST night I wore them. So I really have no room to talk. Still, searching in the morning for gloves can make you become a hypocrite.

**Amazon affiliate link.

***In no way was I compensated for this, I just bought a great product and wanted to share!

Christmas Card Calamities

There are no words for the experience of trying to take my annual Christmas Picture by the Christmas tree, or should I say the three experiences... because the first two times I had no success. The third time I had a little success, enough for me to call it a day!




This collage is my life in a nutshell. We live for chaos er, Christmas.

New Design

I have a new layout. Yeah, I know it's minimal, but I needed a change, and I definitely needed to update the pictures of the kids. Some of it's still under construction, but let me know what you think!

Days 15 and 16

Day 15- Your Dream House:

My dream house is just the right size- not too big, not too small (after all someone has to clean it- although I guess my dream house would come with a maid).We'll say 3000 square feet (over twice the size of my house now, but still maintainable). It needs to have 4 bedrooms (Master, Drew, Jacob, Guest) a den/office room, a sun room, living room, dining room and playroom. An open floor plan is ideal, with lots of light and windows for nice breezes. I've always liked the cape-cod style houses, so the outside could be that style, with window boxes containing self watering flowers on the outside of each window. A deck should wrap all long it, with a porch swing for the front and the back yard and the backyard view should  be this:
photo © 2005 Jean-Sébastien Roy | more info (via: Wylio)

See- I'm not picky at all.

Day 16- A song that makes me cry: See here.

It only took 5 months for me to get through 16 days! Chugging along, I am.