It's officially winter!!

I scheduled this post to go live at exactly 4:20am when the solstice is supposed to start in Michigan. 

Because, why not?

I'm ready for the days to start getting longer.  

This post is going to look pretty choppy today.  

We took the grandkids to my VFW to see Santa earlier this month.  

They really enjoyed it.  BabyGirl wanted to give him a hug!

Little presents under the tree!

I also walked in the Lapeer Parade of Lights with some of my SAR team.

The K9s are always a big hit.  

These 2 in particular are total people lovers so they have a good time in parades, too. 

This shirt (and a sweatshirt) randomly showed up in the mail one day!

I think it may have come from a place I did a survey for, since how else would they have sent the correct size? 

The Grandkids still for a moment!

I bought them reflective vests in their size since it gets dark so early now.  

The Grandson had been wearing one of mine, but I had to use binder clips to make it fit him.  

This is much better. 

Last weekend, I went with Mom and the Sisters to Ohio.  We stopped in Steubenville at the Nutcracker Village like we did last year. 

YMCA!

Sis2 was disturbed by this Santa!

In her defense, he was pretty creepy. 

I can't resist the Navy Nutcracker!

Mom was the troublemaker. She had a hard time climbing up into the porta-potty trailer and scraped up her shin really badly.  Sis 2 ended up pulling her and a random man walking by pushed her from behind.  Then she got up at 1:30am and (wearing fuzzy socks) slipped & fell in the bathroom in the hotel.  Bonked her forehead pretty good.  Luckily I was awake and heard her fall and Sis2 heard me get up and run over so she was right there, too.  We helped her up and made her sit up in a chair until after 3am with ice on her forehead until we were certain she was OK. 

The trip home was an adventure, since she was pretty sore all over.  She was having a hard time walking, like 2 of us literally had to be right next to her so she could hold on.  Once we finally got back to Michigan, we took her to the ER to get checked out.  Thankfully she's OK.  Sis1 took her home with her for a couple days so she wasn't alone at home.   

Sleigh rides on an excavator!

We had a good laugh putting Chuck the skeleton in the Nativity Scene - hope we don't go to hell for that! 

The Spawn started making a grocery list and the Grandson added to it.  

I'm not exactly sure what he wanted, hope it was granola bars!   

I asked him and he told me he just wanted to leave a little note for me. 

Speaking of the Grandson, he's kind of freaked us out a few times.  

He's occasionally been telling us stories about "when he was grown"!

Like how he used to play tennis (and was good at it)

When he was 14, he drove a work truck (then said a tow truck)

He's read a map before. 

He's seen me, when I was 13 or 18 or 19, kill a bad guy before. 

And there's more. I've been writing them down so we remember them. 

Here I thought I was taking a cute pic of Rusty & Daisy spooning.  

Neither of them look happy! 

I made the mistake of offering to take over as editor of the VFW newsletter.  The guy currently doing it showed me and it looked pretty straightforward how to add the new content into the template.  So I went to the post last night to work on the January/February edition and found out that he uses an Apple computer!!!!  I've never messed around with one of those and is making something that should be somewhat easy into a HUGE hassle!  Insert lots of cussing **here**!  Thankfully, one of the younger guys wandered into the office and was able to transfer the file from the Apple to my laptop so now I just have to fight with it, converting it to something I can edit.   If all else fails (or my patience wears out, which is more likely) I'll just start the whole thing over from scratch.  

Yay me.  And deadlines.  Wooo. 

So anyhooo.  Nothing else is going on in the near future.  Not ready for Christmas at all.  I have ordered/received a few gifts, but they won't be wrapped until the last minute.  I don't want to get too much for the grandkids since they will get a ton of other stuff, and then the grandson's birthday is January 2, so MORE stuff.  However I already have tickets for the Reptarium on his birthday so we can go there and feed/hold some critters.  I know both kids will enjoy that.  And me, too!

Since I haven't done Christmas cards yet, I'm going to cheat and get photo cards from DVS, so I'm off to do that!