Catching up

I took a little leave of absence from blogging. I'm not sure why--perhaps nothing seemed bloggable. Also, I've been to busy to upload pics from the camera, and what fun is a blog post without a picture? I still haven't done the pictures, but here I am anyway.

Christmas break was great. I love it when the kids are home. There is something magic about having teenagers and little kids in the same house--especially when they adore each other. I'm not saying that they all get along all the time, especially some certain combinations; however, the little kids adore the big kids, and the little kids love to play with the big siblings.

We bought an air hockey table and also table tennis for Christmas this year. We decided that since the pool table was ultra-delayed last Christmas, we would plan to have the 2 new games delivered a week before Christmas. That way, if they were late, they would be on time, and if the weather got crazy like it did last year, we had a little buffer. Everything went perfectly, though and the games arrived on December 19th. I guess it spoiled the Christmas surprise, but it sure was fun to see the kids faces when they came home from school and heard an air hockey table in the basement. Truly, I love the sound of air hockey. I had not played table tennis since proba I've still got a few moves leftover from my glory days. I can use a little more practice, and luckily with 9 people in our house, I can usually talk somebody into playing with me.

Christmas day was so fun--and relaxing. There weren't a ton of presents to wrap (the 2 basement games were the big family presents). The 2 oldest boys got shotguns. Which leads me to my next story.

You know how usually I have horrible luck with buying things. Generally they come broken, missing parts, or are otherwise defective. This year, we did 99% of our shopping without going to a store, and got free shipping on nearly everything. Every single thing I ordered online arrived complete, on time, and in perfect condition. It was a Christmas miracle. The only issue we had was with these dang guns we bought from BiMart. It ended up costing me not one trip to the store--but 3.

Mark took the guys to buy the guns on Black Friday. The store, in particular the gun counter, was very busy. As luck would have it, someone who didn't really work in the guns was helping Mark and the boys. They decided which shotgun model they were buying, and were told they had one on the floor, and one more somewhere up in the stock room. An hour later they were home. Two days later as Mark was giving me receipts to file, he noticed he had been overcharged by $70 for one of the guns (which were supposed to be identical). Although the store has a NO REFUNDS OR ECHANGES ON GUNS--NO EXCEPTIONS policy, I spent 2 hours of my time waiting for the manager to figure out what had happened, and he discovered that someone had grabbed the wrong box for one of the guns, and he found the right box, and gave me back $70. I thought we were finished.

On Christmas afternoon as the boys were assembling their shotguns, we discovered that Jacob's gun was indeed a black 12-gage Beneli gun like Abram's, but it was a short barrel, and a completely different kind of gun. Mark braved the NO REFUNDS policy at the store, and the manger totally remembered that I had been there and had been so nice and patient. He exchanged the gun without any hassle.

The moral of the story is: shop online.

I got a new mixer for Christmas. I decided to take my chances with KitchenAid again, because truly I make waaaaaaaaaaay more cookies than bread. I think I'll get a Bosch for Mother's Day. Grandma Bradley was one smart lady, and she had both machines. I always say I want to be just like her. In this way, I will be. I'm just waiting for the extended warranty card to come in the mail. To quote Homer Simpson, "Extended Warranty....How can I go wrong?"

More Christmas to come...as soon as I get to the camera.