my favorite reason for winter ...

EGGNOG!!! :) I love eggnog and when I went to the store the other day to get milk, I was happily surprised to find that eggnog was now on the shelves!! (somehow, I forget this every year and am surprised again every year, but what a nice thing) :) Anyway, don't get me wrong, the leaves and chilly weather are nice, even the pumpkins everywhere and the thought of snow, but for me, too much cold weather is not a good thing. I have extra dry skin to begin with and the cold doesn't help. We've already started running humidifiers in the boy's room every night.

Charley has already had his first mini-cold, which consisted of temperature for a day and a runny nose for three days. Not too bad, I'd say! Now Ben has the runny nose, but not temp, and I was fighting off something a couple of days ago, but I think it's just allergies. Anyway, my cuticles have been cracking since September (when there was just a hint of dryness in the air, or I should say, when the humidity was back down to a pleasant level for most people). But not me, I love warm humid air. I feel like my skin drinks it in. And I'll miss feeling the sun on my skin when I wore tank tops and shorts out during the summer. Oh well, hopefully we'll get some good snow this year. Will says it's going to be our last "true" winter for awhile since we won't live this far North next year. (unless we get stationed in Japan!) :) Somehow the snow distracts me from how cold it really is. Some people have said that it insulates the earth and so it actually IS warmer outside. Who knows, just give me eggnog and let me crawl under my electric blanket at night and I'll be fine. :)

Yes, we've already put the electric blanket on the bed. The lows are getting into the 40's at night and the house is in the mid 60's. We have our heater set at 62 but have a heater in the boy's room at night. That way we're just heating two rooms at night instead of the whole house. Of course it's freezing in the morning, but oil is expensive so what are you going to do? :) Anyway, now the boys have a humidifier AND a heater running at night .. probably at opposite purposes, but it works well enough to keep them warm and moist through the long winter. Hopefully it will stave off colds too. Especially once we get the flu mist and Ben gets the second dose of the flu shot. Which I must add, he took very well the first time! All I heard out of him was a little "eah" and that was it. Of course, his brother and I were distracting him with stickers and songs. He never even knew it was coming! I was so proud of him non-the-less.

Oh yeah, and I have real stitches for Halloween, not that we go all out around here for Halloween, we really don't do anything at all except let the boys get dressed up for social hour and candy collecting in our very friendly neighborhood. :) I just think it's funny that some people put on make-up to look like they have stitches and I really have some. I had a bump removed from my leg and I have about an inch and a quarter worth of internal stitches. It's healing nicely now though. The bump wasn't cancerous or anything, just an abnormality that looked odd and I kept nicking when I shaved ouch! It was itchy occasionally too, just a pain. So since the Navy was paying, I went ahead and had it removed. It was considered purely "cosmetic" surgery, which sounded funny to me, but since it wasn't necessary, that's the category it was placed in. I'm actually amazed it's healing so well since the boys have been crawling and walking and bouncing on it almost everyday since I came home. I've tried to protect it and that worked for the first few days, but after that all bets were off. :) I've had it bandaged too so I'm sure that's helped.

Oh yeah, I drove our friends back to MD last weekend (a week ago). It was a looong weekend. I drove 7 hours down with her and the girls and the dog, spent the night in Havre de Grace, then turned around and came back the next day. ugh! :) We had such a fun time talking though. Anyway, since then I've been catching up with chores and enjoying the alone time with Will; hence the lack of blogging.

Anyway, more to blog later. Gotta do more chores while Charley is away at pre-school. :) ta ta!

safe home

just a note . . . Will made it safely home last Thursday from Norfolk and working on our house, that is now for sale instead of for rent. He brought back with him some friends of ours, Amy and her two daughters Anna and Sabrina ("Izzy") and their dog, Bo. Her husband is on an IA (Independent Augmentation) for a year in Iraq right now and she's staying up here with us for a week or two. We've had a good first week and gotten into a good groove with all the kids and schedules etc. It's fun to have a full house for awhile and the kids are really enjoying each other, not to mention, Amy and I are enjoying the company and conversation. Ben loves Izzy and does a little dance every time he sees her in the morning and after naps. It's so cute. We call it the "Izzy dance". Charley is enjoying being the "big boy" in the house and has turned into quite the helper, as well as providing constant entertainment for everyone. We're all having a blast, staying busy and very worn out each day! :)