What to do in case of fire...works.

First you must huff and bark and be generally annoying to your owners.
Then, maybe your momma will put a Thunder Shirt on you in hopes it calms you down.  Silly momma.
Next, stare at dad intently until he pays attention to you.

Finally, jump up on the couch and crawl into dad's lap.

Hopefully, this will protect you from those mean loud fireworks.

Why I Love My Husband

I feel like I need to take a moment to be thankful for the life I have worked so hard for, waited so long for, and am enjoying as best possible.

I waited and waited for "Mr. Right."  I was 33 when I got married and that was not my original plan.  I had the "Just Add Man Plan" when I was younger. I would be married by about 24-25 years old, have my first kid by 27 (wanted to have a couple of years for myself and my husband to bond as a married couple), and have my last kid by 32 (leaving about 3 years and potty training completed before #2). Sounds perfect right? Well the problem with this plan...the right man.  You don't expect to not find the right one until you are 30 years old. Sure it caused me lots of anxiety.  The older I got and the further I got detoured from the plan the more anxiety I had.

But alas, I did find him, and he is wonderful.  Patience is a virtue, and when I think of who I could have been with for the plan I shudder. I am now able to look back and say everything happens the way it should.  I can't imagine being with anyone else for the rest of my life, and I couldn't imagine having anyone else be the father of my soon to arrive child.

This doesn't explain why I love him so much though.
Steve makes me laugh.  All the time, whether it is with him or at him.  I love to laugh.
Steve cooks for me.  I HATE cooking.  Really, I abhor it.
Steve fills my car with gas on the weekends.  He doesn't have to do this, but he does.
Steve gets up with the animals in the mornings so I can sleep. (And yes, I know this will change with the baby, but I will enjoy it for a couple more months).
Steve cuddles with me before he gets up in the mornings.
Steve offers me the extra gator basketball ticket (offered to us on occasion) even though I will always let him go over me.
Steve supports my dreams.
Steve puts up with: my tech addiction, OCD behavior, my work schedule, my many bed pillows, my home improvement needs, and I could go on here.  And I will note he may put up with it, but he isn't always silent about it. ;-)

So that's why I love him. There are many more reasons, but this a good list thus far.

Why it doesn't feel like Christmas

I see the inordinate amount of holiday sales commercials, I hear the holiday music, and I see the Christmas lights all over the neighborhood.  Yet, it doesn't feel like Christmas yet. Here is why:

1. It's Florida, and it is currently 72 degrees outside. I'm wearing a tank top, capris and flip flops.

2. Our house is for sale, so we can't decorate. No lights and no tree (no room for tree without rearranging the house which would make it look "crowded" and "smaller"). We do have a pretty wreath on the door.  I felt like that was harmless enough.

3. I haven't started wrapping the gifts for which I just bought yesterday (a mere 6 days prior to Christmas).

We won't be home for Christmas, so it isn't terrible that we didn't decorate.  Next year when Elsa is here you better believe I will go all out.  A couple of years of pent up Christmas creativity will throw up all over our house.  And hopefully no animals will get hurt in the process.  Haha.

Birthday Painting

On Saturday night  group of great gals and I got together at Corks and Colors Studio to do some painting.  We had a blast and got some good art out of it.  I choose to alter the painting colors to match Elsa's bedding.  I really love how it came out!

New Traditions

With Elsa coming it has really made me think about traditions.  I have to say there aren't many that are related to my heritage (Swedish) that we have with our family.  So I have decided that Steve and I need to start some new traditions of our own.  Some of the things I want to do include having a signature dish we cook for the holidays and learning about and using traditions from both our heritages.
One thing that we did do in our family was make yummy rosettes. This is a Swedish tradition and I want to start making them this year. My mom has all of our original irons, but a local store sells them as well, so I may purchase a set of my own.

Last night we went to Haile Village Center for their Light the Village festivities.  Andreas' mom Marianne owns a store in the Village called European Essentials.  And of course (since she is Swedish) she carries tons of Scandinavian items.  Including Swedish ornaments.  So we started our collection,  and got these adorable ones:

So let the traditions begin!!