We're not getting a Puppy, and B isn't old enough

Oh....hey...yeah...I kind of bailed huh? Well I had to choose something that had to go for my own sanity, and apparently this was the way I went. That said, it always seems wrong because my posts on here are almost therapeutic. Whatever, let's just start like I didn't disappear for half a year.

Hey! Welcome back to my blog!

So one of the few vlogs I did last year was done the day after we had to put down our baby girl, Alice. After her passing, I said we wouldn't get another dog until Brock was older and able to understand how to properly treat one. And for years, I swore up and down, no puppies...So last Sunday we went and got our new puppy, Eevee.

So what changed? Well when we got Alice, we were a couple, making sure a dog was a good fit for us (and oh wow was she) was much harder when you factor in kids. While I wasn't actively looking, I was looking at shelter pages. 

Between that, and talking with 3 different people either with puppies or dogs, I looked online, thinking I would find nothing...and sitting front and center, I found a 12 week old, whip smart, friendly, partially house trained puppy, who needed to be rehomed quickly. 

This week has seen it's ups and downs. Jake has learned to "be a tree" when she gets jumpy or nippy. I expected a quick bond with me, there was with Alice too. What I didn't expect, was of all people, she would want to be with Brock. Brock is fearless, that's why I expect it's become a thing, but this morning she will not sit with anyone else. 

So pictured above is my "Not old enough" son, with my " Never gonna happen" pup

-Mama Bear Out

Planning a Matheson Family Christmas Post 14

Full disclosure, I don’t think I was mentally prepared for how much I was taking on with this series this year, having JUST gone back to work and having not one but two kids now. I don’t think I expected it to be as much as it has been. I’m happy to be back working, but the reality is, by the time I get home, and get my little monsters into bed, I want to relax. The thought of filming and editing a video exhausts me. So going forward, I will not be setting a scheduled vlog. Instead, if one springs up, awesome. I may not even stick to the schedule, instead give you raw, this is what we’re doing posts. 

So Halloween, it was a big hit, and we had a very happy little first time trick-or-treater. He’s a tad unhappy with me right now because the Halloween and fall décor is packed away (it makes me with I was this good at packing away Christmas too, but there is a LOT more of it). 

We also FINALLY got out to our back yard and packed up Summer. We still had our pool, BBQ and fir pit out and it was time. We also got into the shed, and if I’m being honest, we have never just completely emptied the shed since we moved in. And we still haven’t. However, we did dig a little deeper in this year, and discovered 3 HUGE bags of deicing salt, so jackpot. We still have a cooler on the deck and a couple of other things, but nothing that should take more than 30 min. 

I have also started Christmas shopping. Santa is covered for both boys. One little tip I will add in here, from previous experience, check the items when you get them, especially if assembly is required. The reason I stress this, Jake’s second Christmas, he got an easel (which he’s really only just started using). When we built it Christmas eve AFTER he went to bed, we discovered that part was damaged. Luckily not to the point of not being able to use it, and he was young enough to not even notice. His gift this year has a LOT of parts, and I spent a good 20 min last night checking that all the parts where accounted for and in good condition. I did the same with Brocks, and it was a bit of a breath of fresh air when I saw how much easier it was going to be to assemble. I also almost have my nephew done, because I do a Christmas Eve box for him, and I need his PJ’s and treat at this point. I ordered a gift for my in-laws, who promptly told me not to go crazy (I was good I promise). And I have a gift for Cale. 

I also picked up our Christmas lights. I was so anti LED lights for so long, we have always had C9’s on our house. I did so much legwork this year and found LED lights that look like the C9’s. I made the plunge, because I would like to reduce my power bill, and not have to replace our lights EVERY SINGLE YEAR.

My hope is if the weather allows, our lights will go up this weekend (up not on). 

On the note of up not on, with Covid last year, I struggled to find a poppy for Remembrance Day. I am excited to share I already found them a couple of places, now I just need to go somewhere and get cash…

Anyway, this is what I have been working on 

Mama Bear out! 

-Nancy 

Planning a Matheson Family Christmas Post 13

I know, I know, I have dropped the ball on the vlogs. Honestly, I have filmed them, but when I see the finished product, I hate them. Here’s hoping I can fix that in the coming weeks, simply because it will be getting a lot more focused in less than 2. 

Anyway, what have I been up to? Gifts, décor, and more. So let’s start with gifts. I have had to rein myself in. For the sake of my budget and future sanity. I had to tell myself to chill out when it came to the kids. I feel like when it comes to the kids, we can all go overboard, and this was me with my own, and my nephew too. I reeled it in, because I know how my brother and sister in-law like to keep it a little more minimal with him, and truth be told, I prefer to keep it simple. So, I have the narrowed down plan for the gifts for the kids. I have something for hubs, and plans for everyone else.

Décor. I get an itch this time of year, to dive right in to my decorations. Truth be told, I love my Fall stuff too, so I’m torn. To satisfy the itch, I plan. I sometimes go in and do an inventory of my décor, but I did that as I packed away last year. I planned out some stuff though. My tree goes where it goes, but I planned out what goes where on my bookshelves, and my TV stand, and THIS year our TV stand has a fireplace, so that was a fun one to play with. I’m also making a shopping list. We’re taking the plunge and finally going for the LED lights. Also I made my 3ft wreath over the summer, so that used up some of my garland. I am watching for that to go on sale. It’s typically lights and garlands I need. I don’t really look at other stuff too much because I do have a pretty good sized collection, and being a Christmas lover, you can’t tell me that my kids won’t get or make me stuff over the years, it’s gonna get bigger. 

The topic I was ACTUALLY planning to talk about was toiletries. I feel like this has become a little more prevalent because of the toilet paper hoarding we have seen during the pandemic, but this is the time I like to grab an extra pack of paper towel, toilet paper, hand soap, things like that. These are the items that you NEED, and tend to be forgotten. So I have my Christmas toilet paper stash, deal with it! 

That’s what I have been up to

-Mama Bear Out!

Planning a Matheson Family Christmas Post 12

 I do like to do crafts all year, but right now is when I really shine. This is the time I figure out crafts I want to complete for myself, and stuff that I might want to do with Jake. I think I actually have one planned for with the elf. I know it’s mid- October, but the Christmas stuff is hitting the stores (we saw it on the weekend) so planning out the crafts is something that you might want to take into consideration. OR you may not craft at all, which is fine, to each their own.

I’m also planning out the baking. I am not much of a baker. Because I can read and follow a recipe, I can bake, but that’s where my skills end. That said, I have my little man who enjoys it. Scratch that, he likes it for about 15 min, then he wants to go do something else, while I wait out the timer. If I’m being honest, we buy some of the drop and bake cookies for times we might not have anything set. But we have figured out 3 types of cookies we want to do this year. Sugar cookies, gingerbread, and chocolate chip, the classics. Baking has a deadline in my house, but not necessarily a specific day. We tend to spread it out, and then freeze a bunch. There is typically two tins that go in the freezer. There are the ones we can break out later when we empty the cookie jar, and the Do not touch until Christmas eve tin. Otherwise we can go to town. So at this point I’m checking what ingredients I need to pick up, watching for them on sale and ballparking when we will be baking.

-Mama Bear Out!

Planning a Matheson Family Christmas Post 11

Covid has seriously thrown a wrench in the works for the social aspect of the holidays, I don’t know if we’ll see holiday parties return, but this is the time to consider them, and all the other events that are coming, and do a wardrobe check. 

When I do a wardrobe check it almost always starts with the boys. I actually start back at Thanksgiving, do I need to grab anything to dress them up? What about if we take them to see Santa, do I need to grab new clothes? Christmas eve? PJ’s? And as for us, what if there is a work party? Do we need to grab anything new? All the holiday clothing items aren’t out just yet, but they’re slowly arriving, and being prepared and knowing what you need will be half the battle.

The answer to these questions by the way, Thanksgiving, both boys are good, so is Cale, I on the other hand am lacking in the wardrobe department (y’know, having two kids changes your body). Going to see Santa. If it happens this year, I’ll probably pick up a Christmas sweater for Jake, but I expect Brock will fit into ones that Jake only wore a couple times. PJ’s, while they’re undoubtedly going to see them in their Christmas Eve box, odds are the Elf will bring them a set they can wear leading up to Christmas too. Work Party? Again, Cale is probably fine, I might need to grab him a little something, I will need to probably keep this in mind when I get shopping. Then there is New Years Eve, and in previous years it has been a themed party we attend. Last year it didn’t happen, but it could be back this year. 

So that’s the wardrobing I’m looking at right now

-Mama Bear Out!

Planning a Matheson Family Christmas Post 10

I know this is a day late, and written, but we had a pretty major hiccup last week. Jake had a covid test, and we isolated. Where I wasn’t working you may think that I had more time to do these posts, this is not the case. When I work, I have times I can take to make sure that I get the time to record and edit. A Vlog takes a minimum of 3 hours for me, while I can fire out a blog in about 20 min if I know what I want to say. Thankfully, when we finally got the test results back (super backlogged) it was negative, I just had some snotty kids with a cold. Things are still a little screwy with us getting back into the swing of things, my goal is to have a vlog later this week, but no promises.  

One thing that we did while we were isolating to entertain Jake was make his Christmas list. I mentioned in a previous post that I had been brainstorming all year for him, but this was his list he made. It’s the first time he made the list himself. I gave a little help when he would get stumped but for the most part this was all him. Brock will have no sweet clue what is happening, so I’ll be referring to the brain storms I did for him. 

Just a quick rundown of how I shop for the kids, because I don’t want to go too overboard. I talk about my two all the time, but another important kid on my list is my nephew too, so I will talk about my plan for him too. For my two, They will each have their one gift from Santa, one big gift each, on small gift each and their stockings. Of the cousins in our family, Jake is the oldest, and my Brother and Sister in-law adore him, and will admit they loved to spoil him when he was little. They have always done his Christmas eve box and did one for Brock last year too. I took on the role of doing one for my nephew, so this has been an assignment I have been working on. He will also get a bigger gift from me, and a smaller one. 

I also thought I would share how I put together a Christmas Eve box, because on a Christmas group I’m on, a frequent question is “what do you put in the box/stockings?” (I’ll cover stockings at some point too). 

The Christmas Eve box, you keep it simple, and honestly kind of practical. 

PJ’s are typically the base of one of these boxes

A book. Some people like a movie, but I find Christmas eve can be hectic, so a little quite time with a book VS a movie is a good idea

A treat, I got my nephew puffs last year, I need to figure out what I will do this year. I think I may have put in Hot Chocolate packets for everyone too.

An ornament. I just like doing this one, I’m sure my nephew will learn over the years how much his crazy Auntie loves Christmas, so an ornament from me feels like a special gift to give him. Not to mention last year was his first Christmas, and it was really cool he and Brock have the same baby’s first Christmas ornament. 

So I think this is enough of my gushing with excitement for one post!

-Mama Bear Out!

Planning a Matheson Family Christmas Post 9

I was going to do this one as a vlog, and realized it’s kind of dangerous to do, because little ears tend to hear what the shouldn’t. Instead I decided to write this out because I am actually a rookie for this one still, I’m talking about The Elf.

I am a mom who will find every single solitary way to have fun at Christmas with my kids, and as such we embarked down the path of, Elf on the Shelf. I see a lot of online hate for the Elf because of the effort that is required from the parents. I totally get that after last year, more on that in a few. BUT it really was a blast to watch Jake light up each morning when he found his elf. It’s lesser scale Christmas morning excitement. 

Last year was the very first year with our beloved Pickles, and being a rookie, I made a rookie mistake. I got too excited for the elf, and he came as soon as our tree was up, this is early to mid-November in our house. I went in headfirst with little to no preparation, and this is where the issue was. I did not prepare for this little elf of ours, and so I sat there totally lost more than once. 

I do not intend to make this mistake twice. As such, the other day when Jake mentioned he missed Pickles, he reminded me, start getting ready. 

As such, I have compiled a list of the 24 places that Pickles will be found and started my shopping list. I am here to share some of my tentative plans for Pickles, PS unless specified, these are not in order.

1. First day, arrives with advent calendars

2. Dressed in his super hero costume (thank you Uncle Bill for grabbing that)

3. In a cast, because they didn’t clean up their toys

4. In a Jar so he can go with us to look at Christmas lights

5. With a book, so we can read together

6. In underwear, because what’s funnier than underwear?!

7. The final day is a good bye gift, last year it was Candyland, this year another board game

I have 24 plans, and like I said I’m compiling my shopping list. My plan is to have everything ready to roll before December 1st, so it will be simply execution at that point. 

What are things you do with your elf?

-Mama Bear Out!