The girls have been wanting the Bella Ballerina shoes from Sketchers since they heard about them earlier this year. My Mother in Law has been planning ever since to get them for the girls for Christmas. But they have been rediculously hard to find. She went to every store she could think of and I spent countless hours online trying to find the right sizes for decent prices. After so long, I  gave up on decent prices and just started looking for the right size.

I finally hit paydirt at Nordstrom, and felt pretty good about at least getting no shipping and I thought, no tax, ordered the shoes, and sat back to wait for their arrival. Apparently there is now a Nordstrom in TN, so I was charged tax after all, but at least I didn’t have to spend gas money to get them. They arrived as scheduled, and in plenty of time for Christmas. Yay! Or so I thought. I opened the boxes to see what they looked like in person, but I was trying to be sneaky about it because the girls were around and I didn’t want to ruin the surprise. So, I didn’t take anything out of the boxes, just took a peek.

I passed them on to my Mother in law for her to wrap and put under her tree. A couple of days later she calls and says, “Please tell me you have a size 1o.5 Bella Ballerina shoe at your house!?” I was so confused because I knew that I had left everything in it’s original packaging and didn’t even take anything out of the boxes. I said, no, both pairs were in the bigger box. She said, well, we have a problem. Because there was only 1 shoe in one of the boxes. I felt a brief moment of panic. Because do you know what would happen if Reagan opened the box and there was only one shoe? Or maybe even worse, if Hannah were to get a pair and not Reagan? Meltdown of the century is what would have happened. I don’t even want to have that mental picture in my mind!! The nightmares I would have as a result would be terrifing! I’m so thankful my Mom in law looked deeper into the boxes than I did in time for us to fix it!!

So this morning I spent some time on the phone with Brenda, a very nice and helpful customer service agent with Nordstrom, trying to resolve the issue. Of course it couldn’t be as easy as them shipping me another shoe and being done with the whole thing. Of course they are out of that style and size store wide. She couldn’t have been nicer though and agreed to refund the money so I could find another pair somewhere else. I had a feeling this would be the case, so I had done more online searching this morning and found two stores with the right size. Different colors than what Hannah will get, but hopefully that won’t cause too much of a problem! At least it’s the same style!

And here’s where it  turns into a good thing, maybe. (Assuming they are delivered in time for Christmas!) Anytime I shop online I first go through Ebates to get cash back just for shopping through their site. I’ve only found a couple of websites that don’t use them. After Ebates I check two other coupon/promo code sites for more discounts. In this case I used www.retailmenot.com and found a 25% off coupon for the store I was using. So after everything, I ended up with a $50 pair of shoes for $37.50 plus no tax or shipping, and I’ll get 2% cash back through Ebates.  (I know 2% isn’t much, but different stores offer different percentages, some up to 20% cash back,and it all adds up) So maybe this was a blessing in disguise? Nah…I’d rather it have been done right the first time!

Thanks to my amazing husband (and the boys for digging the holes), we finally have a fence for Abby and the girls. For the 8 years we’ve lived in this house it’s always been a goal to put up a fence. We’ve saved for one several times, but something always came up and that money had to go to something else.  Zale has worked all day to get it finished and I’m so grateful. It was so wonderful to see Abby running so freely. I think she ran almost non stop for a solid 2 hours and is now on her bed snoring.

It’s a good day , even if I’m a bit zombified after only getting 3 hours of sleep.

What a night it has been. I haven’t slept well at all this week. I think 5 hours is the most I’ve slept in a given night. But tonight has been the worst. I think I fell asleep about 8:30, which is VERY early for me. I was jarred awake by the noise when Anthony came home from work around 10. I laid there with my eyes closed for about an hour trying in vain to go back to sleep when I finally gave up, turned the TV on and watched a couple of shows on DVR. That wasn’t doing it, so I read for awhile longer until I was sleepy enough to go back to sleep. By now it’s probably 1:30 or 2. Around 3:30 or 4 Reagan wakes up crying with growing pains in her legs. Normally she whimpers a bit, I rub her legs and she goes back to sleep right away. I guess these were worse than usual, because it took about 20 minutes and some Tylenol for her to go back to sleep. I’m dozing off again when I hear Abby get up and start throwing up. Awesome.

As I take her outside I realize that Anthony didn’t park his car where we asked him to. So I go back inside, clean up Abby’s mess, find Anthony’s keys, and go back out to move his car. Did I mention I’m in my PJs and it’s 20 degrees outside? Ok, maybe 30 degrees. I go to move his car, turn it on, and am assaulted by the Bose stereo turned up as loud as it can possibly go.  So yep, between the cold and the busted ear drums, I’m awake now. GRR

I guess I thought so much about blogging about our “fall fun”, that I thought I had already done it. Sadly I had not. So I’ll try to do a little catch up now. This fall we were able to do a couple of great outings that the girls really enjoyed. I’m not the best at planning these little outings or even remembering that there are such great places around us to take the kids.

But this year, part of the reason I made sure we did this was because Hannah had to miss her school field trip. I had made some plans weeks before I knew what day the field trip was going to be, that were going to require me to pick Hannah up from school early. But with the field trip going on, Hannah wouldn’t have been back at school in time. These weren’t plans that I could easily change and they involved other people, so I broke the news to Hannah that instead of her going on her field trip, I was going to keep her home with me. Immediate tears and heart break were the result. So as I scrambled for ideas to take away that hurt and stop feeling like the worst parent ever, I blurted out that I would make it up to her and we would go on two family fun day field trips instead. And I knew it had to be good!

Thankfully, one of the coupon sites I subscribe to sent me a 1/2 off deal for one of the local farms, Honeysickle Hill that has lots of fun for the kiddos along with a pumpkin patch. I can’t pass up a great deal and it seemed to be a good substitute for the field trip Hannah was missing at school.

Having fun at Honeysuckle Hill Farm

It's pumpkin patch time!!

Yes, Reagan is wearing her halloween costume. Her 2nd costume actually. Her first was this…

Reagan's 1st costume

which I thought was adorable. But she decided she’d rather be a mermaid like her sister….

Hannah the mermaid..and of course mermaids wear make up..don't they?

Woops..forgot to correct the red eyes.

The second family fun field trip was to the Zoo. We had been there before, but it’s been awhile. Other than a little complaining over tired feet and arguing over whose turn it was in the stroller, it was a great day. Here’s the girls on the Zoo’s Wild Animal Carousel.

I was finally able to buy a membership, so hopefully we can make it back and enjoy all the Zoo has to offer many times over the next 12 months!

How is it possible that it’s been a whole month since I last posted? I really need to get back in the habit of doing this!

I tried in vain to get a real family Christmas card this year. But two cancelled appointments and a camera malfunction later, I finally gave up. I did end up spending almost 2 hours (because I can be that slow and picky) on Shutterfly.com to do a custom card so I could get all the kids (and Abby) on a card.

Those two hours were worth it for the great deal I got!

Today wasn’t just about Christmas cards though. Every year (for the past several years), my Mother in Law picks a different color theme for Christmas. She has a white tree, so that makes it easy to do. If I can remember the years in order, these are the colors she’s used. Purple, Blue, Black/Silver/White (which was very elegant by the way), last year was Santa Claus theme, and this year is a pink or rose color. After Christmas is over she donates the decorations and ornaments to charity, which I think is an awesome thing to do. She buys the girls Christmas dresses to match the theme and it’s become a tradition to have their pictures made in those dresses. We usually get this done in October, but I was falling a bit behind this year.

I’ve had the appointment on the calender, knew it was coming, but was I really prepared? Of course not. It dawned on me yesterday that they don’t have dress shoes that fit anymore. So here Reagan and I go, before picking Hannah up from school, to shop for new shoes and socks, praying they fit Hannah since I don’t have time before the appointment to go back to the store. Thankfully I found something at the first store, and after Hannah wore them for a few minutes, she decided they fit ok.

Shortly after getting Hannah from school, we finally made it to JC Penny’s for their pictures, and I have to say my girls are little hams. But as soon as the posing is done, they are ready to go. My Mother In Law and I still have to pick out and order the pictures, which can take some time, so I promised the girls if they were good, we’d go see Santa when we were done (I’m not above bribing my kids if needed!).

20 minutes later we get to Santa’s workshop to discover Santa had just left to have dinner and feed his reindeer (at least that’s the story I told the girls), and wouldn’t be back for almost an hour. To pass the time we let the girls ride on Santa’s train, which had been moved to another part of the mall to make room for the hot tubs that have somehow been included in Santa’s workshop display. ‘Cause that makes a lot of sense! We grabbed a snack and got in line to wait our turn for the girls to see Santa. Now, I’ve not really made a big deal about Santa to the girls because I want them to know that the holiday is about celebrating Jesus’ birth, and not about Santa. But it’s hard to not get caught up in their excitement.

And I think going through the hoopla was worth it to see these smiling faces….

And No, they aren’t wearing makeup, just a little bit of gloss to match their dresses. Although if Hannah had her way, she’d be in full makeup. Now if I can just muster up enough energy tomorrow to put up the Christmas tree, we’ll be well on our way to getting in the Christmas Spirit!

Merry Early Christmas!