Weekend Top Five

The weekend was quite uneventful, other than trying to finish figuring out Christmas shopping. I know it seems strange me being so centered around Christmas shopping now, but I need to get it done so I can caught up on our mortgage and other bills. I like to get the sale prices as they come, and I like to be done early. Then I can actually ENJOY the holiday preparations without the worries of shopping.


Especially with our anniversary four days before Christmas, as well as the big music performance in which my bells are playing six pieces.


So yeah, some of the top five is centered around this obsession.

5. Friday- Bakugan Mania

Since I was sick on Thursday, I ended up teaching a few lessons on Friday. It was strange to come home and still have it be dinner time. We ended up doing movie night with the boys with the Pirates Movie again and then I did head back out to the mall with Deb.

Since I am wanting to finally establish the "three presents" rule with the boys for Christmas (which is getting considerably stretched...I'll explain in a different post), I want to be sure that the three are what they want and not just "some present". It is making me work a lot harder to make sure that they are three things that count.

Noah wants everything.

But before he even knew what they were called, his first thing on his list was: "the thing that is a little ball and opens into a creature."

HUH?

So when he started looking through the catalogs when they came, he found what he was talking about and showed it to me. I am quite picky about what the kids watch and play with, and have even outlawed Pokemon just because I don't understand them. We don't have cartoon network and I can't imagine he has even seen the show or knows there is a game centering around this whole thing.

When he showed me these Bakugan things, I figured, okay those little balls to play with, no big deal, right?

Wrong!

Apparently, they are the thing this year for little boys. I still don't intend to let him get all wrapped up in it, but if it's just little balls rolling around at each other, I guess I can live with that.





Meijer, WalMart and Target are officially sold out of them, so when I found a starter package for $10, I scooped it up. I didn't want to spend the money on the $30 "arena" so I saw in the Walmart Exclusive catalog they had a "flip open" one for $15.

Perfect...the price is right and it will thrill him on Christmas morning (even though I still don;t understand how the game is played). I am excited that I can make his dreams come true...

until Deb and I get to WalMart on Friday night.

I asked at the service desk, who called a super WalMart about the ad. Apparently, WalMart can't even keep the things in stock and told me to order it online and they wouldn't charge shipping to the store.

Online, they are all out.

Shouldn't they have figured on this before they put it in the Big Toy Book and had every kid on earth asking for it?

I know Noah will still be thrilled with the little balls (I found a set at Target while there were still three left), and it is weird being part of a "trend" I thought I had a few years, and I thought it was strange since I had never even heard of these things. I probably should still try to figure this whole "arena" thing out though.

Is anyone else facing this on their little boys Christmas lists? If so, start looking now!

4. Lost and Found MP3 Player

Again because of this whole "three presents" thing, I locked myself into the bedroom for a short time on Saturday to go through and make sure I really was done with shopping for the boys. I really have no hiding places in the house so I brought up a separate bin to put each boys' stuff in while I sort and wait.

Last March, my nephew Patrick got an Ipod for his birthday.

Noah wanted one desperately.

Well, there was no way that was in the budget, but about six months ago, I found a user friendly MP3 in metallic blue on sale for $20. It was back ordered for at least another month or two, so when it finally came, I was thrilled to have the one thing he really seemed to want all summer long.

When I went to go sort through the stuff, I couldn't find it ANYWHERE.

Slight panic, fight with Steve, and a broken dresser later, I resigned to give up for awhile and stressed over trying to find the money to get him another one and wondered if I would ever find that kind of deal.

Later Saturday night, I had an epiphany...

Sure enough, I walked straight up to one of the bags that had a different toy hiding within and pulled it right out.

Huge relief and NOW I can say, that I am done and can start saving for the mortgage.




3. Leaves

We had absolutely NO plans for Saturday, so we were pretty much sitting around the house all day. About 2:30, I looked outside and noticed that the six bags from two weeks ago that the boys and I raked were no longer sitting in our front yard.

When I asked Steve about them, he said that while Noah and I were at the library that morning, a guy drove up and offered to take them away for his compost pile. And then Steve said that he offered to take anymore if we wanted to finish the yard.

BAM!

No more words needed.

"Boys, let's get outside and get the yard done.

This time, we actually let the boys PLAY in the leaves before bagging them up, and a good time was had by all.

Steve and I were amazed that we finally have boys who are at the age that the help they have to offer is wonderful and we got the yard done in less than half the time than any other year, thanks to giving the boys jobs, and rewarding them with "teamwork treats" when it was over.





2. Noah's Watch and Children's Time at Church

This was quite an adventure all weekend as well.

I am he lunch mom on Fridays at Noah's school. This Friday when I left, Noah kind of flipped out a little about wanting to come home then instead of waiting. So I took off my watch and gave it to him and said I will be back in three hours. He was thrilled to have the watch all day and when I picked him up, he begged for a watch just like mine. Not one with characters or digital, but with a real face like mine.

While Deb and I were at WalMart, she was also looking for one for Abby so when we found these perfect watches for $6 we were both quite happy.

She is saving Abby's for Christmas, but Noah has now had THREE PERFECT WEEKS at school so I decided Saturday morning to present his to him as a reward for such great work at school.

He was SOOOOOO happy. All day long, he was reading time, showing everyone he saw all day, and kind of making me wish I had saved it as his only present for Christmas, he was so happy.

So I let him wear it to church Sunday morning, which turned out to be a BIG mistake.

During children' message, something apparently burst inside of him, and when our youth director told the kids about the food parade that they will be doing next week to collect food for local food pantries, Noah launched into a HUGE soliloquy in front of the entire congregation about "we're going to be in the Christmas parade at school and I'm going to wear a Christmas hat and mommy's going to wear antlers, and I can tell you when we'll line up because I have a new watch...etc" at the top of his lungs.

I haven't been that embarrassed in church in ages. No less than six people came up to me after church, "Noah sure isn't shy" and comments like that.

I know he was excited, but I am quite ashamed and he will not be going up for children's message for quite a long time.

1. Bells

No big story for this one, but it was fun having my sister and niece come to bell practice after church today. They are filling in for a service in December and it was fun having them there.



For a boring weekend, it actually came away with some silly stories. This week looks pretty boring other than STILL trying to find the money to pay the mortgage.

But if anyone sees a Bakugan flip open travel arena anywhere in the blosogphere, please throw an email my way.

Otherwise, have a great week.