pastasalad

mine are 9,11, and 13 and well let me tell ya age doesnt matter... when yours are close to my childrens ages you will find everything you possibly can to keep the "magic alive".....for example, somewhere on this site someone posted a free email from santa...well i thought maybe mine wouldnt believe it...HAHA to me...they absolutely believed they got an email from santa...OK OK so they checked my email and the dh's email to make sure we werent tryin to pull the wool over thier eyes LOL....my 9 yr old even tried to hit reply to santa to see if it came to me...well it didnt... my point you are doing a GREAT thing by your children...especially since they cant check emails like mine(LOL) ENJOY this time of year!!! You are making memories that NO ONE can undo!... I still say BRAVO TO YOU! what a GREAT MOM your children have!

I think you rock!!!! how old are your kiddos? and well you have just made magical memories for your children that no one can undo! BRAVO!!!!!!

OKAY Thanks evreyone for replying! I am gonna hafta figure out how to tell G'ma that i feel this doll is OK and if she doesnt feel comfy buyin it then......oh lordy, she is the controlling type! TBC :)

My dd age 9 wants the Bratz dolls this yr...her G'ma asked her what she wanted AND my dd's reply was the Bratz dolls.,..well my SIL who has a 7thgrader and wants bratz dolls also has decided they are inappropriate for her dd and voiced her opinion to my mil....and my MIL told my dd they are horrible dolls and she could make better choices......WELLLLL my 1st instinct is to go out and buy every stinkin bratz doll there is...but of course i wont do that....any adivice from anyone about these dolls? I know the names sounds kinda snotty...HELP.... anyone I dont wanna cause an uprising in the family my goodness this is the 20th century!

OH 3cuties4me you have BEAUTIFUL children they sooooo overtake the decorations! That aside your home looks lovely! I so LOVE the Holidays!

Your Home is really Decked out! It looks awesome! I Love the snowmen. My kitty would tear your house apart! LOL I have a hard enough time keeping him outta the tree-his new favorite spot to hide.... Thanks for sharing!

me either I planned to start wrapping a few and hiding them but 2 snow days killed that plan...guess i will wait till closer to Christmas break-which is what i typically do anyways, But this site was gettin me inspired to wrap a lil earlier this yr-darn snow storm!

I saw some at Academy here in Tulsa, and Khols in Bentonville Ar, but they may still be to big if your lil one is tiny...it may not hurt to check... are you trying to prepare for the parade tomorrow? They called off all our parades due to the weather...I sure hope you find some!

We dont have it "yet" it's on 2 lists, my 9 & 13 yr old LOVE HS Musical, I bought the dvd for one and will get the game for the other-I just couldnt justify buying 2 games and 2 dvd's. They both want posters also... In my opinion If your 10 yr old liked the movie then they would prolly like the game too. My dd 9 LOVES Ashley Tisdale aka Sharpay Not that this was much help since we dont own it yet but it is on the Santa List.

brynn I do the same thing with my children with ornaments.... I thought the story behind it sounded fun so i guess this yr we implement "the great pickle hunt" Christmas morning

While taking my g'ma to her local pharmacy I noticed they had 75% off Olde World Christmas ornaments, the sales clerk told me a brief story(which i had never heard before) about the pickle ornament, she said she had one left so i bought it...anyone else have a pickle hanging from their tree?

omg I read that last sentence and burst out laughing, got coffee all over my keyboard! I SO agree my 3 lil lovelies better not say they dont believe to me either. I am 35 and i still BELIEVE Keep the Magic alive for your 3 yr old and give those cousins of hers a big box of COAL!

This is such a neat site Thanks so much for sharing! wow santa has gone high tech he can even email now! my kids are such techies wonder if they would believe santa emailed them??? probably-it's the last thing they would expect-this site just made made my nite thanks again op

Our local chik-fil-a does a very nice job of lighting up the store in red and white lights they even have a huge awning fully covered in lights for the drive thru....it's very pretty! would love to see the kfc pics

awesome lights! we never seem to make it outside with lights and decorations(BUT we sure do enjoy driving around looking at others) I keep telling myself one year, one year we will do it,maybe when we move and are all settled..... Thanks for sharing your pics they are lovely!!!

this is such a FUN game! we play at my moms every year there are 10 adults, this yr my mom is saying no gift cards because my sister, her dh and ds's all brought gc's last year, thats the easy way out and not much fun...it's more fun if it's all gifts....since this is a family dirty santa our limit is $25-30 as to what I am doing this yr....I am making a kitchen basket with measuring cups and spoons,pot holders,kitchen towels,a wisk,a mixer,wooden spoons,some magnets for the fridge stuff like that... as a filler to hold everything in place I am stuffing the basket with clipped coupons(lets see if they notice) since we have to have 2 dirty santa gifts the dh and I have discussed options for the 2nd gift...things we considered mp3 player,craftsman tools,maid service,salon services and a nights stay in a hotel....not sure what we will do for the second one...but everyone always tries to out-do the other while staying within the budget in our family...my moms house is by far the best time of the holiday season! I LOVE this game!

JanaBanana~your home is lovely! Thanks for sharing.

How very scarey for any mom, my what you have been through, I am happy you have your babies at home and everyone is healing! May God Bless You & Your Family

I Love It's a Wonderful Life-thats a classic for me. But the whole family enjoys A Christmas Story, Polar Express, The Grinch, Elf and The Santa Claus w/ Tim Allen....

I LOVE lotsa lights too...we have a very nice pre-lit tree and I am still trying to add lights to it Up until last year we always had a real tree and I always bought box after box of lights(i can relate to 2800 lights,its NOT to much-its just well-worth it!)I would start deep inside the tree meticulously adding strand after stand then slowly work my way outwards with the lights-the result "breathtaking" it doesnt quite work that way with my pre-lit my family thinks I have lost it!!!! I guess I have given up adding extra lights because our prelit was expensive(we bought it thinking "investment" ) and I dont wanna mess up what we have so maybe I am over-compensating on the ornaments this yr I found some GREAT BF deals- maybe we can post pics of our trees in this thread-or has that already been started?? I so LOVE this time of year.....

I typically dont wrap until the week before the kids get out for Christmas break-because well heck they start shaking and comparing box sizes and counting and begging "just one gift mom" "PLEASE" etc etc...since we have such the extended family(both me and dh are from divorced families and I have 2 children from a previous marriage)so our holidays start around the 21st(the kiddos get out around the 18th for break) I typically wait till that week to wrap everyones gifts including extended family members- yes I am looking at my tree now and yes it looks bare BUT its very pretty in all it's white shiney light glory bare under-belly-an-all

Thats a hard one, for me at least(i am sorta living it now)... I had some Christmas items I bought for my son and a few stocking stuffers for the girls in sacks, I put in our garage on a ping pong table under some old garage sale stuff(i thought the sacks were hid good enough untill i could get em up in the attic)my youngest 9 took some stuff to the garage and found the sacks and SNOOPED!-of course the majority of the stuff was for her brother, so she said i know some stuff mom got you for Christmas and told him everything she saw in the sacks, then preceeded to say "do you wanna see it?" yiyiyiyi he said NO but then told me about it on our way outta town during Thanksgiving Holiday... I was sooooo upset with her and I really had to choose my words carefully at this point. To be honest I still dont know what I am gonna do-I feel like it's partially my fault for not getting it up in the attic sooner,but still she had NO reason to be snooping either...Now my son(11) knows his bigger items and i feel horrible and am not sure how to deal with my younger blabber mouth dd...advice??anyone?? sorry op to hijack your post and not be able to offer any advice!

wow thats a really good deal....i may have to rethink my amazon gift certs...do you have any expierence with this mp3 player? This will be our first purchase and we really are lost-there are so many choices...

My dd wants a mp3 player for Christmas-I will be getting it from amazon(thats where i have all my gc's saved up) Can someone PLEASE give me some advice on a good one in the $100-150 range I have looked until i have crossed eyes and still dont know which is the best deal/player she is interested in the scan disc and creative zen & i-river does anyone have any expierence with any of these? Thanks in advance for your help

how do you make the fluff dip? I remeber having it years ago i thought is was powdered sugar mixed with marshmellow jar stuff??? anyone help me out here, I would appreciate it, i would like to bring a fruit tray to my sisters and this dip will be perfect...tia