All work and no play, makes Dawn a bad blogger...

(Yes, I just recently watched The Shining!) lol

SO...how have all of you been since I wrote to you last year? Ya know, I have absolutely NO excuse for not blogging lately. Ok, wait, ABSOLUTELY is a little bit of a stretch. Everytime I log onto my computer, I honestly have good intentions on blogging. But it just hasn't been happening.

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Somewhat in my own defense, Mister M. has been on vacation since the 15th of December. And I must say, it has been really nice having him at home all day. He goes back to work on Monday :-(. And then Jayla has been home since the 22nd of December. She goes back to school on Tuesday. So we've all been trying to spend some much needed time together.
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Anyway, I'm just behind in everything that I normally do. And since Mister M. has been home for the past couple of weeks, I've been trying to make it look like I actually do housework when he's at work, LOL. Believe me, I'm no actress, so that's been a little difficult :-). Along with all the "acting" I've been doing, I didn't even get around to sending out Christmas Cards. So for those of you who usually receive cards from us...it's nothing personal...NOBODY received one! However, I may try and do an "after the thought" letter here pretty soon.
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Oh, guess what I did? As I mentioned, I've been a little less than crazy lately. And in my craziness, I actually forgot to give Jayla some of her Christmas gifts :-). I did so well wrapping up everything and hiding it so she wouldn't find it. Little did I know that I was really hiding stuff from myself :-). This past Tuesday, I was looking for something in my craft closet and there it was...big as day...a(nother) bag from Best Buy! I'd totally forgotten that we'd bought the girl some learning software for her computer and a Dora The Explorer digital camera. All I could do was laugh. But Jayla was excited...it was like an extended version of Christmas for her.
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Once again, we received the cutest Christmas list from Jayla. I forgot to scan it, (it's still around here somewhere...in my wallet, I think) otherwise, I'd just let you see it. But she had stuff on there like, (another) toy kitchen, kitchen "supplies", a camera, a blender, a microwave, a couch to sit and watch TV on, garden tools, a baby diaper bag, a bathtub to bathe her dolls in, a doctors kit and a washing machine. Seriously? Whose kid IS this? lol. She's STILL so domesticated. Too funny! We had the hardest time finding a "kitchen" for her. The ones they have are obviously for kids younger than Jayla. I guess they figure that kids over the age of 6 have grown out of the "pretend play" stage. Well, not MY daughter! We're still looking for a suitable kitchen. Hmmm, maybe we should just rent her an apartment, LOL.
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Speaking of Christmas, here are a couple of pix of Jayla opening some of the gifts that made it under the tree :-).



I don't think we've ever gotten through a Christmas morning faster than this one. Boy, things change when you only have one child at home :-). Jayla knocked on our bedroom door at 7:30am on Christmas morning. And by the time we made it downstairs, found a seat and gave Jayla her "go for it" orders, we were done in about 15 minutes :-). So, back to bed we went, lol.
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Oh well, I think that's about it for me for now. We're going to some friends house tomorrow to watch football and celebrate a birthday. So that should be fun. Then, next week, we'll be back to our regularly scheduled lives.
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Thanks for your time! And I'll talk to you soon.
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Oh wait, before I let you guys go, I'd like to make a special request...can you all keep my nephew, Markell in your thoughts and prayers? He and my sister are experiencing some tough times right now. He's not sick or anything. Just being EXTREMELY rebellious and making life hard on himself and my sister. So any encourgement would be greatly appreciated.
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Toodles!!