the holidays...sing,b-days, charity, and cheetahs!

Happy late birthday mom! She turned the ripe old age of 51 on friday and we celebrated with a small dinner at Chris and Tim Payne's house. I made a lasagna and bread, Chris Payne made a great salad and Bob and Mona made a great peach and blackberry cobbler for dessert. We ended the night with Chris cutting my mom's hair (as it is expected to fall out this week). Her before shot...and the final look-I was quite surprised and thrilled with what a great job Chris did!

Now to back up a day, on Thursday, Lainie and Tristan had their holiday sing at school...this is always a very big deal-the show starts at 7 and people start taking their seats at 6:15-to get the best seats-we arrived at 6:30 and were halfway back in the gym..so pics aren't that great.. and hopefully I can learn how to post video soon so I can post a clip of each of their songs-they are so cute! I did take a couple pics at home before the show. The night was great and all of the kids sounded fabulous.

Saturday morning, Lainie and I attended the Big Bear Brunch at the Ritz Carlton. My good friend Christy was on the board for the event that is sponsored by WINGS a charity that supports children with cancer and their families-it was a beautiful event and lots of fun. Christy invited us and we were so glad we were able to attend. Mandy Murphy from Fox 2 news was the MC and she and her step mother and her 2 daughters sat at our table with us. There were all kinds of characters Snow White, Belle, Cinderella, Fredbird, Captain Jack Sparrow, Mr. Incredible, Batman and Superman were all there for the kids to meet. Then we had a fabulous breakfast that was very fancy. There were lots of craft tables for the kids to make tote bags, candy wands, cinnamon bears and then there were ballon artists that made amazing balloon creations. The whole event was great-thanks Christy for inviting us! We had such a wonderful time!

Can you find Lainie in this picture? Isn't this a riot? After she got dressed today and put on her coat (zebra) I realized how much she would blend in with our shower curtain-this is kinda like a Where's Waldo pic!

Our friend Ted invited us to go to the Cheetah Girls concert today (sunday) with he and his daughter Emme. Ted is actually a co-worker of Chris' and he actually asked Chris if he would like to take Lainie to the concert with he and Emme (Chris failed to mention to me that he was invited first)-he just asked if lainie and I would like to go and I said sure and Ted had an extra ticket, so Lainie invited Ella to go with us. Lainie was very concerned that she was wearing zebra print and not cheetah print-I told her she looked cute anyway. Ella, Lainie, and EmmeSo we had pretty great seats and THe Clique Girlz opened up for the Cheetah girlz (I have no idea who they are, but they are played on radio disney alot and now Laine, Ella, and Emme have added their cd to theor xmas list-they loved them!) The Cheetah Girls put on a pretty good performance-nothing compared to hannah montana and the jonas brothers last fall!-but the girls had a great time and we had to buy a few momentos on the way out...then this story will crack you up..Ted ran into a friend of his-who is also a police officer who was on duty at the Scotttrade Center-as we were leaving. He tells us how lucky we were to see their concert tonight as it is their last...i was thinking last on their leg of the tour and further inquired about his statement....he corrected me and said "No, they have like 2 more shows, but then they are breaking up-so this will be their last performance in St. Louis ever!"....You should have seen the girls faces-Lainie shrieked and said "WHAT? THEY"RE BREAKING UP?" Ted went on to congratulate his friend on his statement and told them that the 3 girls now were crying! It was pretty funny and now I guess we'll find out in months to come if that statement is a rumor or true......

a little bit greedy

So I am really having a problem with how greedy I have become in my hunt for the cheapest gas. Let me start out by saying how excited I was when gas prices started to fall....I would constantly call Chris and give him a heads up as to where the cheapest prices were (when you drive a big Yukon you're constantly bargain hunting). So you can only imagine how thrilled I was when gas went below $3 and then below $2 and hit the bottom of the barrel last weekend at $1.33 right by our house and held there for the weekend! I filled up Chris' volvo for him before he went to Kentucky and it only cost $27.00-I can;t remember the last time that happened...the only problem was I didn't get smart and fill up my Yukon. So guess what, prices are back up-and I shouldn't be mad but I am. Yesterday, being the smarty pants I am, while out doin g my errands, watched my gas light come on to remind me that my tank was low...well I just didn;t find the best bargain on gas(it was up to $1.59) so I thought I'd wait till this morning-after all I only drive like 2-3 miles a day (brentwood just isn't that big)...so this morning I have Bradley go start the car-it was frigid outside-to let it warm up. As I was loading the troops in, y car died. Surely there was something wrong with the engine-and then it hit me-I had run out of gas for the first time in my life. I grabbed the gas can from the side of the house in attempt to get to the gas station-but no such luck-not even enough to start the car. Bradley (being the mature young man that he is) volunteered to walk Lainie and Tristan to school and then walk himself to school as I was trying to get into Chris' truck (our 3rd car...its always nice to have a spare in an emergency)..but came to realize it was filled with his hunting stuff and the back seat was out-this wasn't getting us anywhere fast. I let Bradley walk the kids to school and ran in to call my friends to see if they would casually drive by and offer Bradley a ride to the middle school-cindy's husband craig came to the rescue! i knew lainie and tristan had made it safely to school and bradley was well on his way in a warm friendly car. I called Chris to let him know what was going on and he calmly said he would be home to take care of it...prolly 30-40 minutes later he came in the door and let me know my car was up and running and I would need to go put gas in it. Did I?...I ran and got a workout in and then ran some errands and that light came on again...as I approached the first gas station the sign said $1.59-no way-i knew the station by my house was $1.55 so on I drove to pay $1.55 (I know I shouldn't complain) but guess what-not 3 hours later when I left to pick the kids up from school it had come down to $1.51! I know, can you even believe I am complaining, much less blogging about it-when I told Chris I couldn't believe that gas had gone up so much he just started laughing and put it all into perspective for me!

the stockings were hung.....

I completely forgot my camera on Turkey Day, so I have no pics of the celebration. Let me begin by giving you an update on my mom (thanks you for all the prayers)...Nichole and I escorted her to her first chemo treatment on Wednesday-we thought this was a wise choice since she was eager to get started and we were told she should feel fine the day after treatment. It took about 3 1/2 hours for the whole treatment...they start by giving her fluids (she gets everything by i.v.) then the next bag is her antimedics (antinausea, and steriods) then the next bag is her first chemo medicine and then the last bag is her 2nd chemo meds. She was surrounded by wonderful nurses and we struck up a few conversations with other women who were doing their treatments-giving my mom some hints as to what she could expect. She felt a little woozy after the treatment but went home and had a great night sleep. Thanksgiving she felt okay-not a huge appetite and a little tired. Friday she was a little tired and having a hard time eating salty foods-they are not tasting good to her at all. Saturday it hit her hard and she felt miserable-no appetite, very naseated, very sleepy and she is getting sores in her mouth(one of the side affects). Today she reported more of the same as yesterday, but she did try to eat a little today and didn;t sleep as much as yesterday. She is hoping to wake up tomorrow feeling better and hoping to be able to go to work..her next treatment is on December 17th-so hopefully she will feel good by christmas.

Turkey day was great!...we woke up and Chris made a big breakfast of biscuits and gravy, eggs and bacon-the kids loved it-they love when Chris makes them his famous biscuits and gravy! Then we got to cooking-Chris made his families specialty-squash casserole-until Chris and I were married I'm pretty sure the Beckers hadn't had a cheesy casserole at too many get togethers-Chris introduced a little casserole cookin' and he's had the job every Thanksgiving since-even though he promises that no one in my family eats it and he's not sure why he is requested to bring it year after year-let me tell you the dish was completely empty this year! I made a few new recipes this year-I made a rosemary roasted vegetable dish-which was not only beautiful, but delicious!...and I made a new recipe for blackberry cobbler-chris' favorite and a super easy-super delicious recipe! As usual there was way too much food and we all ate way too much-now that Lainie has decided to become a vegetarian (and she takes it very seriously!no animal eating!) all she ate on Thanksgiving was pumpkin pie-at the end of the night she had had 3 pieces and so needless to say she is sick of pumpkin pie! Since Molly was hosting a wonderful Thanksgiving in Chatanooga and was not here to shop with me on Friday at 5 a.m., I had to find some other suckers to get up with me....I set my plan in motion and packed up my family to spend the night at Chris Payne's house Thanksgiving night, knowing that if I was there ,surely I was going to be able to get Taylor up to go with me! To my surprise, Sally and Sarah were also spending the night and after a little convincing, I talked them into it to. We set up girl camp in the living room and thought we were going to sleep at about 10.-I left Tim and my Chris out by the bonfire and snuggled into bed...at about midnight sassy (the payne's dog) came in and climbed right into bed with me chomping on a water bottle-i was mad, grabbed it and threw it-it hit taylor, who took it and hid it and led sassy out of the room...we had a little discussion about how we were getting up in a few hours and needed to sleep-about an hour later-tim let coco(our little schnauzer) out of her kennel and she came bounding in licking and jumping and whining-this upset sassy and all of the sudden there was about to be a scuffle on taylor-i grabbed coco-stomping back in the back room and kenneled her as taylor took sassy into chris and tims room and we settled back in for sleep-about and hour and a half later tristan woke up and turned the tv on LOUD and woke us all up-he wanted to watch cartoons...my alarm went off at 4 a.m. and we all got up-i'm not so sure we needed an alarm-we were on quite a role of being awakened!....we headed out to chesterfield mall and scored some great deals-we got a free mp3 player from old navy(yes molly i got it this year-i didn't oversleep), i got a buy one get one FREE deal on holiday sweaters at the gap-so once again i got the kids their christmas sweaters and macy's had some great sales too....oh and my highlight of the morning was the eggnog latte (my fave) from starbucks to kick off the big morning. we headed of the mall as the sun was coming up and went to meet the rest of the becker girls down at soulard, we hit a cute store down there called -the porch-super cute gift store! next, it was on to viviano's-i was quite surprised to find out that they have opened other locations around st. louis so there were very few people in the store! we hit the missouri bakery for a few sweets and then onto lunch at Favazza's- it did not disappoint. Lainie and I headed out early and headed home...Chris's grandfather was rushed to the hospital on thanksgiving night because he was having trouble swallowing his turkey-and they live in a tiny town in kentucky-long story short the surgeon finished his thanksgivning meal with his family before coming in to perform surgery on chris's grandfather and after surgery, he seemed fine, but kathy and keaton and grandma jones got a call in the middle of the night to hurry back to the hospital b/c he was not doing so well. they ended up transferring him to a hospital in Paducah, and after tests-they found that he had a slight heartattack and he has pneumonia..so chris went to kentucky to be with him. we're all praying for him, but he is quite a fighter...he has diabetes, parkinson's disease, emphesyma, and double lung cancer (has had it for 2 years)!

So Chris surprised me and he and the boys put our tree up and put the lights on it while Lainie and I were shopping and lunching. When I got home, Chris headed off to Kentucky and I was left with the kids and the fun job of getting out our 4 crates full of Hallmark ornaments to decorate the tree. Those familiar with Hallmark ornaments know that there is a system to our tree and I had to remind my children of the rules that go along with decorating the tree. Now I love our tree-it makes tons of noise (because of all of the moving ornaments) and it is beautiful and full of character and the kids love to tell the stories of the ornaments and they love picking out a new hallmark ornament every year...but oh would i love to have my own "themed" tree that i could decorate as i like-one of these years i will have it! Now when Chris and I got married we were very lucky b/c all of his life his mom had been collecting ornaments for him, so from the very beginning we always had a ton of ornaments on our tree. The hallmark ornaments though all come in their own box, wrapped in there own plastic and this makes for a very long and tedious task of decorating the tree-b/c you have to open the boxes, unwrap the ornament, hang the ornament, re-stuff the box with the plastic and then close the box back up-do this over and over like 150 times!..now i see why chris is so sneaky and acts like putting up the tree and doing the lights is a huge deal-i think he's pulling my leg and acting like its a big deal so i won't want to trade jobs with him....well 3 1/2 hours later the tree was decorated (i still have one more crate downstairs that i have not put on the tree yet)

I am contemplating putting up the rest of the ornaments-there is still a little bit of room on the tree! But I am most excited because I ordered new stockings this year and I think that they are so cute!

I think we're about ready for good old St. Nick to come on down that chimney! Hope you all had a great Turkey Day!

Rewind...

First and foremost thank you to my friends and family for your support and prayers and words of encouragement...i/we cherish every one them! please continue to pray for my mom-for both strength and peace-i will post her final results on monday after she meets with the surgeon to make her decisions as to what surgery she will need to have and then her surgery will be on thursday. i will be with her thursday and spend the night in the hospital with her and nichole is going to drive to st. louis on thursday evening (when she returns from her business trip) and she is going to try to stay through Thanksgiving weekend.

now, it is time for me to catch up my blog a bit. halloween has come and gone but i never posted pics. since it was the youth hunt weekend chris took bradley hunting, so this year bradley didn't dress up. Lainie was a pink lady-from grease-now her favorite movie(good girl)...and tristan was indiana jones. the weekend before halloween we had trunk or treat at church...it was so much fun and one of the winning trunks did a leave it to beaver theme-it was hilarious! a few friends from school joined us this year and a group of girls dressed up as cat burgalers.....-their costumes were great! it was pretty cold-so it made the trick or treating from trunk to trunk move along a little faster.

fast forward to the bridgeport halloween blockparty-such a fun night, all of the kids dressed up in their costumes-murray was cotton candy-so cute!-.....we had a costume parade and then they had a pumpkin decorating contest and they had a few games planned for the kids to play...the adults enjoyed good conversation around the fire pits and the magees set up a big screen in their front yard and the kids all set up their sleeping bags and watched the great pumpkin charlie brown. check out this wagon-it is my friend terri's - she has triplets (who are now 7) and jacob (who is 6)-this was how she toted her brood around when they were younger!..now the kids love to pull eachother around in it. the next night was halloween-the weather was perfect-in the 70's in fact i think we worked up a sweat trick or treating around the neighborhood. we had dinner with our neighbors outside to kick off the evening and at dark set out to trick or treat-we picked up quite a few friends along the way-i think we had a group of about 15 people by the end of the night. the kids got way too much candy! sunday was chris's birthday-they came back early from hunting and we had a small family dinner with chris parents, matt, jamie and alayna, amanda and matt, nathaniel, grandma dolan and my mom. i made a few soups, cornbread and chris's favorite dessert-blackberry cobbler. since chris is going to a mountaineering school and ice climb in colorado, in december, and climbing mt. rainier in the spring, everyone got him either gift cards to rei or something off of his climbing registry there. he has a few more things to get to be totally ready for his trip and i think he is getting pretty excited and i am excited for him.

the next weekend i took tristan and bradley and bradley's friend wesley to the st. louis blues hockey game. this was tristan and my first time ever to attend a hockey game..hockey is pretty fun to watch! we went with the cub scouts-so tristan was really excited about getting a badge from the blues. and what excited the boys even more was that cam janssen was signed to the blues from the new jersey devils at the end of last season and cam was a good friend of my brother sam's. during the funeral and the memorial bbq's that we have for sam, the boys got to hang out with cam and play washers with him and nervously they asked him for his autograph-he was very sweet to the boys. the boys are especially proud to know cam because he is the fighter-and we missed his first big fight of the year by one night...although he did not let us down because he tried to start about 5 fights the night that we were there-and the boys would jump up and yell and cheer him on as he was about to bash some other players face in!...and they bragged to all of the cub scouts around us-so by the end of the night all of these little 6 year old boys were saying "where's #55, we wanna see him fight"-gee was i so proud!

lainie had her last soccer game of the season last weekend-we were up at 7 a.m. and it was a cool 35 degrees at 7:40 a.m. as they did their coin toss on the field to see which team would start. we were all bundled up in coats, hats and gloves and had our coffees in hand to keep us warm-the girls were troopers and played a great final game...it may have had something to do with the fact that we bribed them with lamars donuts after the game! oh and i can't forget 2 weekends ago lainie had ella spend the night and they put on quite a show for me-after a visit to the local libby lu store (in the clearence section) we ended up with $7.00 dresses-that matched- and pop star dress up kits...i thought that rachel would kill me because the girls wanted to wear the ensemble the next morning to church-i complied but would not let them wear the hair!-they danced around all night singing hannah montana and the cheetah girls songs and then on monday night called eachother to plan out their outfits for school on tuesday-guess what they wore.....and how about the rock star one-handed glove ella has (think madonna)-lainie's popstar dressup didn't come with a glove so she wore a fingerless winter glove to church and school-just to make sure they matched!

one more pic to leave you with...the kids have a halloween parade at heir school every year followed by the halloween parties-and the teachers get in the spirit too...this is coach w-the p.e. teacher at lainie and tristan's school-is this a great costume or what? everyone was cracking up!

as i promised.....

Chris pointed out to me that in my last blog i stated that i would be uploading ohotos from the wedding ( the very next day)ooops...a few days later, but i hope you enjoy...no commentary...just pics!