Holidays

The end of the year came so fast! Christmas was good. We woke up at 7:45 to open gifts. Carter was kind of skiddish about the gifts Santa brought for him. It took him him awhile to realize they were for him. It was so cute. He got a little trike rider that he rode through everyone's gifts. We realized that he was getting too many gifts. So, we had him open two at a time. Jesse's family opens gifts by going one person opens a gift, then another person opens a gift, and so on and so forth. That means for 6 people and a toddler, it can take a good couple of HOURS to get through all of the gifts. Carter was so excited to play with all of his toys that half way through opening gifts, he refused to open any more. I think I kind of like that. If only he could keep that mentality for the rest of his life.

Jesse and I feel bad, because after we were done opening gifts, we put most of Carter's toys away. We didn't want his cousins fighting over them. Plus, he had another toy coming his way. Jesse's sister and her family came down for breakfast, followed by the family gift draw. Yeah, all of the gifts that were opened in the morning were from the parents to the kids & grandchild, from the kids to parents and then from spouse to spouse. The children and grandchildren all do a name draw and then get a gift for that person. That took another hour. Then for the rest of the day it was guitar hero. I was so sick of hearing it. Then, there comes the people, esp. those younger, fighting over who's been on there and they haven't had a turn since an "hour" ago(actual time: 1 or 2 songs). This is why I NEVER want video games in our house. Then there's my little brother-in-law who gets so defensive about how the family absolutely NEEDS to have it. After Christmas, that's all I heard from him....''Do you think you could donate $20 to get it?'' "$10 or $15 is fine too." I was going out of my mind about that.

Then work was another story. We put our store closing signs out the day after Christmas. Yeah that was another brilliant idea by corporate. Not only was it crazy for the day after Christmas sales, but it was crazy, because people see a bigger sale! We haven't had a sane week of work since 2 weeks before Christmas. People are now starting to get ruder, because we can't accomodate them the way they want. We can't order things for them. We can't hold items for them anymore. We can't take any further discounts off, all because we are in liquidation mode. Then people start getting defensive about what's theirs, and how it's not fair that they didn't get there sooner to buy these things. Apparently, we need to call people about when things go on further discount. I'm sorry, I don't wear a sign on my forehead saying "will only accommodate mr. or ms. so and so." I actually had a person with enough gall to ask me how long until after a person pays for an item do they have to pick it up. All because he wanted a mirror that was already sold. He asked if there was anyway we could refund the money to the person so he could have it. The best part was that I bought that mirror he was wanting. There were so many things I could have told him to embarrass him, but I was kind enough not too. Honestly, are we going to sell the same item to 2 different people!?! I just don't understand how people think the world works.

Well, then came New Year's eve. I worked that afternoon. After getting off work, Jesse and I went to a BYU basketball game with his sister and brother-in-law. Not too long after getting there, we get a call saying that our dog was let out and took off. I was so angry and worried. He's never done that before! He's always been a good dog. He was missing for 3 1/2 hours. Thankfully, my mother-in-law and brother-in-law found him. We had basically called off the search about 10 minutes before they found him. I was so stressed out that I didn't eat anything. I hadn't eaten anything since lunch. So, when I woke up Sunday morning, I had all of the flu symptoms, the aches, the pains, nausea and a super high fever with the chills. It was awful. I slept most of the day. Luckily, Jesse let me do that. The thing that woke me up around noon was Carter dumping Piston's water dish on the floor of our room. I was able to get better gradually with me eating the little that I could. That night my body felt like I needed to gorge. I wish I could have with all of the good stuff that was around.

That was pretty much our holiday season. Over all it was pretty good. Happy New Year!