I am still wrapping Christmas presents but I am nearing the end of bags to be emptied and the contents wrapped.  If I actually succeed, it will be the first time in at least 32 years that am not frantically wrapping presents right up until the moment the sun peeps out on Christmas morning.  I still have to buy the ingredients for our Christmas dinner but this year I have divided up the dishes to be served among the women of the family.  Jen is even introducing a new dish to our menu.  I, of course, have to make Heaven since the kids all say that none of them can make it like I do.  I am so looking forward to this Christmas since we will be having so many children in the house this year.   I have made sure that each child will actually have something to do Christmas day since not all toys get to be played with especially if they have to be assemblied or have a lot of parts that can be lost.  Those toys are usually saved for playing with at their own homes and under supervision......not where there are toddlers that are into everything and everything goes to the mouth.  I think I still have to get Alex a few more toys since I am having a hard time finding something that someone else has not already gotten for him.  He is such a curious child and ever so smart.  Surprisingly enough, Damien has taken the lead on being the child most easy to purchase toys for.  He is at the right age where there is such an abundance of toys in his age group.  He is not picky about his toys either.  He loves everything.  I need to get back to the wrapping again so this will be a short entry.  Oh, the tree is almost fully decorated too.  There for awhile I thought our tree was only going to have the lights and crystal garland strands as the only decorations.  Heather and Jessie finally finished up the tree except for putting on my new bulbs the girls got me and my glass reindeers and my fake candy canes and, of course, the tinsel.  Those items they left for me to do plus tweaking the tree once it gets completely decorated for balance and special placements of some of my very special ornaments.  It is all coming together........Christmas is coming!

I grew up saying if my Husband ever cheated on me (the ultimate betrayal of Trust), I would divorce him in a heartbeat.  I got married and my husband cheated on me with the most vilest, evilest, loving the cheating game and putting horns on her husband, exwife.  I love my Husband and found that divorce was not an option even remotely interesting to me.  I fought for my marriage, my love, and my family.  He realized that he had made a mistake even if it was a mistake that shattered my Trust in him.  My initial Trust was a gift of Love to him.  Now, while I am giving him a second chance, the Trust has to be earned day by day, then week by week, then month by month and hopefully, soon Trust will not be an issue.  I trusted him so completely that I had never even considered that he might cheat on me.  So, I do believe in second chances except there is always exceptions to the rule:  stealing from me or my family, or causing damage to my family.  I know I should have a forgiving heart but I have also found that some people take it as a sign that you have put the welcome mat for them to trample through your Life or the Lives of your Family.  I have learned to harden my heart to the vultures of this world.  

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Edit:  My Husband traveled through tonight and we had dinner together along with Jen, Jessie and Alex.  He had Jessie come in her car too since he is paying her to wrap my Christmas presents and his plan was for her to sneak them into the house.  I never look for the gifts but usually either they wind up telling me what they have gotten me, giving it to me early, or I accidently come across them.  Jessie has assured me that he has picked really well this year and even got him to give her money for an additional gift she knew I wanted.  He is so cute.....he is worried that I will not like his gifts....like that is going to happen.  Christmas is a freebie for me since I think everything is a plus at Christmas time.  Now.....Valentine's Day.....that is a whole different story!  My whole family knows about the F***ing Cookie fiasco that fateful Valentine's Day when he tried to take the cheap way out!  That is one gift he has never repeated .....even as a joke!  It is funny now but at the time I was just a fuming.  My friends were the ones that finally got me to see the humor since they were having a hard time keeping a straight face until finally they burst out in laughter.  The ribbing they gave my Husband helped cure him of repeating that mistake ever again.  The F***ing Cookie Fiasco is now one of our family stories.  I think my girls now use it as a reference in insuring that their Husbands and Soon-to-Be Husband do right by them on Valentine's Day.

I want to be remembered for the love I have for my Husband, my children, and my family.  When I pass I want them to remember the love and support given to them and mix it with all by mistakes and blunders I have also made.  I want them to miss me as a real person and know that when they hear my voice inside their heads, that I had their best interest at heart and could be trusted.  I want to be part of the family stories passed down so that even my greatgrandchildren will know of me and wish that they could have shared that part of the love I have for my family.  I have told my children that none of them are allowed to die before me but they have told me that I am not allowed to die ever.  I guess we will have to live forever since none of us want to bear the pain of loss of each other.    

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I really, really absolutely hate speaking in public if I have to stand in front of an audience.  Now, if I can speak from my chair even if I have to stand up to speak, it does not bother me.  Standing in front of an audience causes me to lose my train of thought and I drift off the subject.  I have even had blank moments when my brain decides that it needs to take a nap or something along that line.  I feel like a deer caught in the headlights of an oncoming car. 

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I just got done reading an article about "Why Bad Employees Do Not Get Fired".   Life experiences have taught me most of the reasons why though some of them did  surprise me.  I hadn't thought of some of the reasons but they made sense once I came across them.  I loved the conclusion of the article though.  In a nut shell, if whatever another employee is doing is not personally hurting you or causing potential damage to the company.....just do your job and let the the bosses do theirs.  It is the boss' job to ride herd on their employees, not another co-worker.  My take on it is that if you have time to watch everyone else, then you have too much time on your hands and should have your job description revised to reflect and utilize your organization abilities to get a job done. 

I seldom watch TV anymore and do not really keep up with the news on a regular basis.  So,  when my Husband called me Monday to tell me there was a fire out of control in San Diego County, I was concerned but not terribly concerned.  I grew up in San Diego and know that San Diego County is about 100 miles from the city San Diego.  My Mom and my two sisters still live in San Diego, CA so to bring myself up to date, I went online to get the news.  Now.....I am starting to get upset and my Husband calls me again to say his radio just announced that Poway is on fire.  My sister Debbie lives in Poway with her family.  This is now the second time her house has been in the pathway of an out of control fire.  Somehow, she has managed to NOT get her house burned down especially since my Mom says her house was on the side of Poway that got burned.  At least, this time we knew where she was since the last fire in 2004, she and her husband had taken a weekend for themselves and did not tell anyone where they had gone.  Actually, her youngest daughter did but was mad at her brother and told him she didn't know where their Mom was, causing my nephew panic and thus causing concern for all the rest of the family when he called trying to find his Mom.  Bad niece.....bad, bad, bad....this was taking sibling rivalry too far.  There for a while I was really worried for my Mom since she no longer drives and the sister living nearest does not drive either, and at one point my Mom had been told to prepare to get evacuated.  That lasted for about a day before they gave the standdown on evacuting the area notification.  My Mom got packed and now I am curious to exactly what she packed to take with her......and at the same time I wonder what I would have packed if I had been in the same situation.  Since she had no car, she would have been limited to only what she could carry.  Someone mentioned taking pictures of the items that you could not take since there was the real possibility that you might only be coming back to ashes and melted plastic.  This way you would at least have pictures to remember with and cherish.  I do know that I would have packed Alex's first baby shoes since when I first even thought about what I would have taken, his shoes were my first thought.  My photographs came second since I can not go back into time to replace them.  I would have had to take them out of the albums so that I could get more in my suitcase that way.   Someone mentioned putting your clothes in garbage bags to give more room in the suitcase for sentimental and practical things like documents and bills.  Just thinking of how few of my treasures that I would be able to take, versus all the ones that would be lost to me, is such a sorrowing and shattering thought even to imagine.  It makes me thankful that I do not have to make those decisions and my heart goes out to those that were forced to make those kinds of decisions.  While things can be replaced, those things usually represented memories that were cherished so those particular things can not be truly replaced.  Still, if that is the price you have to pay to be alive.....then is is a small price since Life is worth almost any price.  Almost but not any price since if you can not live with the price you have to pay to stay alive, Life is not worth it.  I would not want to be alive if it was at the expense of the life of one of my children.  I am sure there are other less extreme instances that would make me turn from Life and embrace Death if there were only the two to chose from.  Thankfully, all my family is safe in San Diego and no one had to evacuate so I was spared that anxiety.  It is hard not being able to make sure that everyone was safe and cared for since as the oldest daughter, I feel that it is part of who I am.  By the way, my grandson,  Alexander, turned one year old Wednesday.  Where has the time gone?  He is starting to walk unaided.  Such a beautiful child....and so curious and loving and comical, he is a blessing and a reward.   Neko is thriving too and is also such a joy to me.  I just love babies.  Neko was so good at the dentist office that everyone kept saying that they wished they could return to babyhood since he enjoyed his bottle and fell asleep in my arms so relaxed that he was a picture of contentment.  His Dad, my Joshua, on the other hand, was a hurting turkey since we were waiting in the dentist office for him to get his four wisdom teeth removed.  After we got him home from the dentist office, he had to put ice packs on his cheeks to reduce the swelling.  He wore a hoodie to keep the ice packs in place with the hood so tightly closed that he reminded me of Kenny on South Park.  Soon Jessica will be getting her wisdom teeth removed too since all of us do not have enough room in our mouths for wisdom teeth.  Jen is starting to make arrangements now to get hers removed now that they can see for themselves how painful it is when the teeth impact due to no room to grow.  I have been telling them to get them removed but they had to learn the hard way it seems. 

My Mom emailed me and this is what she sent:

In 1971, my first husband asked me to pack his suitcase so that he could attend the Army NCO Academy for NCO training.  I packed his suitcase even though I knew he was NOT going to be attending NCO academy since he had done absolutely no spit and polish or gotten any new uniforms to take with him.  I pack the suitcase for him because I didn't want him to be mad at me.  When he came for his suitcase after work, he gave me a phone number to call after he left.  It was a phone number to a lawyer that he had consulted about getting a divorce.  My biggest regret is that I did not burn his clothes and pack the ashes.

   

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I had a interesting conversation earlier this evening.  Having a large family of children, one of the events that takes place in each of my childrens' lives is the first event of rebellion/justice/revenge against a sibling who is making their life miserable.  I witnessed a few of them and heard about others.  My oldest got his comeuppance when his sister finally had enough of his taking things from her and knocking her down.  He would always tell me that she tripped or lost her balance and since she was not able to talk enough to tell me the truth of what was happening, I would just have to keep a closer eye on them.  I did tell him though that I had a feeling that he had something to do with her crying since there was a note of anger in her cries.  I also told him that one day she would be able to talk and be able to defend herself from him.  He did not seem to concerned.  When the day of reckoning came, I realized that I had misspoke......she did not need to speak since she took matters in her own hand.  While preparing dinner, I heard her cries of anger and on checking it out, my son told me that she had tripped.  When he started speaking, my daughter took off for her bedroom and upon returning, came up behind him holding something behind her back.  As he finished his story, she pulled back her arm and clocked him upside his head with a large metal serving spoon.  With vengence in his eyes, he said "Mom!!!".   I reminded him of my warnings to him about pushing his sister too far and it having consequences.  He didn't like it but he learned a lesson on pushing siblings too far.   If nothing else, he had to change his strategy and be more subtle in his dealing with his sister.  My two youngest daughters double teamed their second to the oldest brother.  He was a big kid and when he was about 10 which would make one sister about 6 and the other sister about 4.  I don't even remember now how it all started.....just the cries for "Help, Mom!"  and coming into the livingroom.  There in all his glory was my son on his back with the youngest sister with both her clenched hands full of his hair anchoring him to the floor while the 6 year old, who was not a light weight, sitting on his hips and pounding him with her fists.  From the girls' story.....they had enough of him and planned it out to teach him a lesson....which they did.  My Husband and I were with another couple this evening and they were telling us about some of the incidents that their children had done to end the sibling hierarchy of power.  What struck me as odd but I am definitely grateful that it worked this way, was that it only took one incidence of rebellion/justice/revenge for the older siblings to change their approach and tactics in my family.  I do not know if it was the result of the way I handled the manner or if my kids are just smart enough to make the adjustments necessary or a combination of both. 

I was browsing around different sites this morning and came upon this picture:

My first instinct was to decide that if I were on the surfboard...that I would give this wave a pass.   Then immediately had second thoughts!  What if the shark didn't ride with the wave and after the wave passed, there I would be facing a rather large shark.  Even if the wave took the shark towards shore, the shark would still be between me and the shore....not a good option either!  At least the guy in the picture is doing the one thing I know for sure that I would have done....pull my legs and feet out of the water.  It does not help in my case that I have a HUGE fear of sharks so much that I could not watch the movie Jaws until I was in my late 40's.  When I was a child living in San Diego, CA around the time I was about 8 or 9 years old, we had sharks coming into 3 feet of water on our shorelines and biting people.  As an adult, I realize they were not biting....well, yes they were but in reality, they were actually trying to eat the people in the water.  It had gotten so bad that the radio stations were broadcasting the do's and don'ts of going into the ocean.  I had put up with the jellyfishes but when they added sharks to the list, I developed a love for swimming pools.