That would pretty much describe today.  It’s just one of those days where it’s just way too cold to venture outside.  Then later this afternoon it started raining ice and we got a light dusting of snow, so it was too slippery to go out anyway.

I did have to venture out late this morning to meet Julie at McDonald’s to get more layouts from her to put together and hand off the ones I had already finished.  Silly me left the house without a coat and I was wearing a short sleeved shirt.  It was so nice out yesterday I didn’t even think about it.  I thought I was going to freeze my tush off when I got out of the car.

After I got home I worked on some more layouts for Julie.  I got 1 1/2 done and am hoping to finish the second one up before bed.

Christy and I were supposed to go to the movies.  But she called me up about an hour before and blew me off.  I guess she’s getting tired of me hanging around all the time.    Just teasing.  Actually it was pretty nice just spending the rest of the day inside.

Instead of braving the weather and meeting some friends at Jose Pepper’s I decided to stay in, and we ordered pizza.  Didn’t really feel much like cooking.  I’d have to clean the kitchen first.  Yikes.

Eric’s parents gave us our Christmas present early.  It was a bunch of tickets to The Majestic.  There’s four Free “Admit Two”, four Free “Admit One”, four Free “Buy One Get One”, 8 Free “Admit Four” to the Improv, two Free Popcorns when you buy a drink, and two “Buy One Get One” Popcorns!  That’s quite a few date nights!

That would be my biggest accomplishment today.  When I was over at Christy’s house last night, Eric called me to tell me that while Jackie was watching Erica for about 5 minutes that the two decided to have a Jello Gelatin food fight in the family room.  So frustrating.  Especially since Jackie was the ring leader and is about to turn 12.  So after I got off the phone I asked Christy for suggestions on what I should do because nothing I do with her seems to get through, so I tend to resort to raising my voice with her which just breaks my heart.

She says a new method that she had been using for her kids is making them run.  So I called Eric and filled him in that I wanted to try this with Jackie and to tell her that she had until I got home to clean the mess up or to be prepared to deal with the consequences.  Unfortunately I got home way later than I intended to so she was already in bed and had yet to clean the family room.

So, shortly after I woke up I went into her room, told her to get dressed and get her shoes on.  She came out into the Family Room and I asked her if she remembered me telling her she needed to have the Family Room cleaned by the time I got home?  Yes.  Did she remember Daddy telling her that she needed to have the Jello mess cleaned up by the time I got home?  Yes.  So then I told her that we were going to try a new way to deal with consequences and to come with me outside.

Once we got outside I told her to run 3 driveways down and back, and had her do it 3 times.  Once she was done I had a talk with her that it was unacceptable what she had done the night before and that she really needed to work on obeying me better.  I then told her she had 30 minutes to clean the Family Room and if she wasn’t done, she was going to go back outside to run again.

So I set the alarm on my phone and came back upstairs 30 minutes later and she had not touched the room and was nowhere to be seen.  So I took her back outside and made her run longer.  Brought her back inside and told her we were going to try this again and that if she choose to ignore me again she would run again and longer.

Came back up 30 minutes later and most of it had been cleaned.  But, I had to follow through and sent her running again.  We came back inside and since she had so little left to do gave her a 10 minute limit.  About 5 minutes later she came and told me she was done.  I went upstairs and she had done a beautiful job.  I of course was amazed and praised her.

We had another incident again tonight with her.  Did the running thing twice before she did what she was told.  I think I’m going to like this new way.  I didn’t raise my voice at her once.  Stayed very calm and she got some exercise.

For Jackie this was a huge deal.  She is so strong willed and so stubborn that I have the worst time trying to discipline her.  Of course she said she would rather have the yelling and spanking than having to run, but I definitely am convinced that in the long run, this will be much better for the both of us.

That’s what I was up to today.  Big surprise I know.  I had to get up at an unimaginable hour (8:30am)!  Picked up Christy and went to Molly’s house for a Stampin’ Up Party.  It was pretty fun.  We got to make some neat projects.

Afterwards we ran to Mr Goodcents and I had their Chicken Alfredo for the first time.  Highly recommend that.  Of course you can’t go there without getting one of their awesome Chocolate Chip Cookies.  When we were done with that we ran to Archiver’s to exchange something, Joann’s and then to the Dollar Tree.  Christy had an exchange to make at Zona Rosa and then picked up Brandi from school. 

Once we finally made it back to Christy’s house I put in a solid evening of scrapbooking for Julie.  I think I ended up with three layouts done.  Wish I were faster at it.  But slow and steady wins the race right?  Finally ran out of adhesive and had to call it a night.    Brandi made us THE best chocolate chip cookies though.  It’s been so long since I’ve had warm cookies right out of the oven.  They were to die for.

That’s pretty much it for my day.  Nothing too ground breaking and riveting but I never promised every day would be. 

Oh my goodness.  Do you ever just have one of those days that when it ends you just don’t think you can possibly settle down to sleep?!

Today was definitely one of those for me.  Went over to Christy’s house (shock and surprise I know) to scrapbook.  Then we ended up developing a couple of new projects to keep connected to our friends better, and they are just so awesome!

Until I started scrapping at SD I had never had so many friends in my life.  Not even in high school.  They are just so important to me and I know any one of them would be there for me if I needed them so I am so excited to have a way to stay better connected to them.

I just have felt like everything today just went so right.  And to top it all off I just clicked on my blog just a few minutes ago to make my post and Eric had made it just absolutely gorgeous!  He said he wanted it to reflect how he looked at me.  He is so a keeper!

Oh my goodness!  This is so exciting!  My first entry in my blog!  I’m sure I’m probably doing this all wrong, but until Eric shows me, I’m just happy to finally be blogging!

Today was a great day!  I woke up nice and late.  Christy called me and decided she wanted to crop over at her house, so I called some girls to meet over there.  Of course you can’t crop without getting some shopping in. 

So, I swung past Archiver’s on my way over there to pick up some calendars and things for a friend.  I also picked up some really cool floral rub ons by American Crafts!  I had also picked up some calendar rub ons by the same company and finally finished my stepmoms calendar from her birthday last year and loved them!!  They are the easiest rubons ever! 

I also bumped into Denise while I was there and we had a nice chat!  It’s always a treat to bump into a friend unexpectedly.  I finally arrived at Christy’s house much later than I planned.  Still didn’t see her brand new Tahoe.  To think I’ve been over there quite a bit lately and still haven’t seen it.  I’m beginning to think this BRAND NEW Tahoe is really another one of those rumors.    LOL!

It was so nice though.  Brandi played the “Hostess with the Mostess,” and took everyone’s drink order.  Kerry, Norita Lynita, Pretty Girl and Diane Lyn were all there.  It was so nice getting to catch up with all those girls and getting some scrapbooking for Ditmer done.

Then I finished up my day with finally sitting down and making an attempt at starting my blog!  Hoping this sticks!