The children were nestled all snug in their beds

While visions of sugar plums (and apparently Taco Bell) danced in their heads.

Merry Christmas!

I have two extra Christmas cards set aside for my blog followers, if you are so inclined to receiving mail from strange people on the internet.  To be eligible, please paste the word Fahrvergügen in your comment.

The Christmas Tree of Sorrow and Despair.

I got a new follower.  So this is the pattern.  Don't blog for a month, come back, find a new follower.  It's been working out pretty well so far.  Hello, Randine.  I seeeeeee you.


Okay, so we got this stupid tree and then the stupid thing wouldn't stay upright.  The fury.  THE FURY.

And as you can see, I fiddled with it so much that half the ornaments are now facing the wall.  And then my dad came over and said, "You know what I'd do?  Got any string?"  And immediately I was on the same page because I'm my father's daughter and I was like OH HECK YES I'VE GOT SOME STRING.  So later on when Jesse was at the store by himself because I may have already been in my jammies, I climbed behind the tree with a cup hook and some yarn to tie the tree up to the wall so it wouldn't be so depressing anymore.  And because, hello!  What's more classy than a Christmas tree tied to the wall?  Then I found out the walls are too soft for screws to support any weight, and I left the yarn back there, climbed back over the couch, and did some angry knitting until Jesse came home.  Hi, husband!  I'm your festive wife, here in my jammies and mad at you because the stupid tree stupid sucks.

I shoved a Pringles can into the tree stand and life overall has been much better.  Not perfect, but better.

Also, a few weeks ago I said to Jesse, "Hey, this last half of 2010 has been pretty exciting for us, but there's been a lull the past few weeks.  Why don't we go to the doctor and have him diagnose you with type 2 diabetes?"

So, that's what we've been up to. Katie's agenda:  learn how to cook for a diabetic diet.  Wait, scratch that.  Learn how to cook.

Here's a shot of Cinnamon taking advantage of the heater behind the couch, warming up his cute pink nosie.

The end.

Oh wait, just kidding.  I remembered there was a passage from a book I wanted to include, and seeing as my blog track record the past few months has been scattered, I should post it now instead of waiting.

When Jesse and I first got married, he was what you call a Scrooge about Christmas.  A Bah-Humbug.  A Grinch.  I'm very fortunate to have a great family who's kept up on traditions, especially through the holidays.  So I am what you call filled with Christmas Spirit.  I love the thing.  Yeah yeah, stores have made it this crazy thing to get you to spend a lot of money, but that's what stores do.  You think they weren't taking advantage of people protecting themselves during Y2K, even if they thought it was bunk?  Sorry I just mentioned Y2K.

I'm saying that yeah, Christmas may have become this crazy spending spree, but I still very much believe in the magic of the season.  The first Christmas Jesse and I had together, he did not want to get a Christmas tree.  I finally dragged him along a couple weeks before Christmas and made him get a tree with me.  We had friends over afterward, I made cookies, we decorated the tree, and watched Christmas movies.  That night Jesse said to me a simple, "How dare you.  How dare you make me like Christmas."  And that dude has not been the same ever since.  I mean, that morning he didn't like Christmas.  The next day he wanted to throw a big ugly sweater Christmas party.

Last month I found an old book my mom had bought me by an author I liked, and I read a part that reminded me of Jesse and I may have cried a little bit (nobody saw, it doesn't count).  Yes I was reading it in the bathroom.  Because we keep it real here at twelvedaysold.

This passage is from Engaging Father Christmas, a novella by Robin Jones Gunn (author of the Christy Miller series, beloved of my heart).

"I thought of all the times over the years when I had heard people say Christmas was too commercial and materialistic.  They were right, of course.  I couldn't disagree.  But if any one of those bah-humbug, Christmas Scrooges had lived my life, if they had come from where I came from, with motel soaps and shampoos and never a Christmas tree to fill a room with cheer and wonder, I think they would have softened their railings.  If they could feel what I felt at this moment, gazing at the Christmas tree with wide-eyed Julia, they would say that tradition, decorations, and gifts were a beautiful way to celebrate Christ's birth."

And that's it, my fabulous followers!  Hopefully I'll have the annual Bray Creepy Christmas Photo up sometime this weekend.  (And Nessa, I owe you pictures of the cowl I knit and the package you sent me, but I wanted to get this post up before it was too late to talk about Christmas.)

Hot or Not? Dot com.

Let me preface this story with saying yes, I think I am better than you if you don't have a more impressive wisdom tooth extraction story.  I can't help it.  It is a major flaw in the human race.  But I'm not the only one.  Here, let me insert a video, and if you don't want the video, I have included the dialogue in text form for your viewing pleasure.  If you don't care for either (why are you here), then skip down until you hear think *tink*, then you may turn the page.

"I made the mistake of trying to tell a story about having only two wisdom teeth pulled.  And I learned a lesson. Don't ever try to tell a two-wisdom-tooth story, because you ain't goin' nowhere. The four-wisdom teeth people are gonna parachute in and cut you off at the pass. "Halt! Halt with your two wisdom tooth tale!" You will never complete one - trust me. I was trying to tell my story ...

"You know, I had some wisdom teeth pulled ... I had two--"
"I had four pulled."

Oh, ok.

...No, five. No, nine! I had nine wisdom teeth pulled! All of mine were impacted, they were all coming in upside down, the roots wrapped around my tongue, coming out my nose ... there were tusks! I was a warthog! No anesthesia, they pulled them out with pliers, I was eating corn-on-the-cob that afternoon.

Pin the blue ribbon upon his chest. That knocks the socks off of my wisdom tooth tale."

Anyway.

 *tink*  You may now turn the page.

My face swelled up when I had my FOUR wisdom teeth pulled.  And because of that flaw I mentioned in the human race, yes, I got dry socket in two of my teeth because I kept throw-throw-throwing up after taking Vicodin, thereby pushing out two of my bloodclots.  I know you're thrilled to read this.

Speaking of that dry socket, the night that was the worst I took a bunch of pain meds and stayed up until the wee hours of the morning watching infomercials, and crying.  Imagine me, perched on the side of my bed, tears streaming down my face for what had been hours at that point, watching an infomercial on mineral makeup, reveling in how amazing the results were.  I needed that mineral makeup.  Sob.  Needed.  Needless to say I didn't get the makeup and I had to take a suppository to stop being nauseous.

Anyway, there are two pictures from my wisdom teeth extraction, one I call the "girl" picture:

And one I call the "boy" picture:

Now I want to state, for the record, I was not allowed to put photos of myself online while I was in high school.  And for the most part, I complied.  Until this photo was taken.

There is a website called hotornot.com where you upload a photo of yourself and people rate how hot you are.  And I just checked to make sure it still exists, and it appears that yes, people are still wanting low self esteem by putting pictures of themselves online for people to rate how hot they are.  It's redonk.

So anyway, I decided to go against my mother's wishes, and I put the boy photo of myself online as a dude.

Aaaaallll that to say:

The ladies think I'm a 7.

Hi, I'm twelvedaysold, not in prison.

Last night I had a talk with Jesse about something kind of important.

"Honey?"  I said, sweetly, but sternly.  "I feel like you're putting your homework on the back burner."

And then I literally slapped my knee and got kind of that giddy-in-your-chest-too-funny-of-a-joke-to-laugh-properly thing.

But on to more important things.

Honey?

I'm going to be honest and say it's gonna be kind of irregular at the twelvedaysold for a little while.  Life is getting cray-zay and the holidays aren't going to help.  Well, they are, because Christmas is awesome, but you understand.  It's about being bizzay, dawg.  Bledat.

Anyway, craft project!

It looks a little dull in this photo, so here's an angled shot so you can see how sparkly the letters actually were.

Jasmine is my cutie pie niece, and here's a picture of her absolutely in love with her new bedroom door sign.

Actually, I typed all this before her party, so I'm really going out on a limb.

Let's move forward.  Cinnabanana, doing his new laying down-squinty-eye thingy:

And, a while ago Jesse and I were arguing about something stupid (which is how it always is, am I right or am I right?) and Cinnamon was sitting on my legs.  He jumped off me and in the middle of Jesse and I arguing I was like GET THE CAMERA.  And here's the cuteness that ensued and what put whatever we were arguing about to rest.

See?  Pets are good for a marriage!

And I have a new follower, Giddy Fingers!  It's a comic blog, and right up my alley.  Giddy, I'm not sure why you started following me when I hadn't blogged for like 2 weeks, but I appreciate the pity follow.

Oh, and in case you were wondering, yes, Jesse had already moved all the flammable papers from the stove and I had to reenact the photo.

Wordless Wednesday 2.0. Toddler and sixth grade. What happened to my eyebrows?