Making Lists and Checking Them Twice

Monday and Tuesday have been busy. On Monday, Mason and I left the house at 9:30 and didn't return til 6:30. We went to the BX three times in one day. That is three times too many. I am determined to be completely done with Christmas shopping and shipping before Thanksgiving. I want to enjoy December and focus on the true meaning of Christmas, instead of buying, buying, buying. Mason and I started off at the post office, mailing Sean packages for the Afghanis. Last time I got caught because you are not supposed to mail humanitarian aid through the mail, or at least not through the Military Postal System (aka the free way to ship things from one APO to another APO). The mailman said, "Uh, just FYI, you can't do this next time", and I said, "OK, no problem, these clothes are all for my husband who is very very cold". The mailman said, "RIght, good thinking". SO, on Monday I shipped the boxes to different people in Sean's unit so it wouldn't look so suspicious. Am I honest in all my dealings? Well, sure!! What is more important? Being completely honest on a customs form or clothing cold poor people? Yeah, I thought so, the latter. So, if any postal employees are reading this: SORRY!! Come and get me with the cuffs!! I'll be waiting with warm chocolate chip cookies to bribe you. Here's Mason on the dolly going to my car to pick up all the packages:


After the post office, I took Mason to Sister Adams house so I could go to German class. Class was hard. We learned how articles change depending on their role in a sentence, subject or object. Only masculine articles change though. Hmmmm....I'm sure I could say something biased about that, but I'll be good. After picking up Mason, I took him out to lunch. Nothing too fancy for this guy!!

Yup, Burger King. Then we went back to the BX for more Christmas shopping. We picked up the kids in the rain:

Look how excited Mason was to pick up Punky Brewster, I mean Ella, from school!
He couldn't wait to hug her.


We went BACK to the BX to see the new movie, MegaMind. Yeah, it was cute. The kids enjoyed it. Here's Ella eating her dinner from Subway. Can you tell what she's eating?


She would make Atkins proud!! Bacon and ham. That's it. No bread, no veggies, just MEAT!
We picked angels from the angel tree so we could count the evening as FHE and add a little moment of selflessness to the evening. I let each kid pick an envelope and we'll buy them each a present and return them to the tree in a few days.


Now, on to Tuesday...
I had packages to finish and needed some time to wrap them up, so I enlisted the help of my favorite four year old: Aedan Turner. He came over to play with Mason and keep him happy while I settled down to work. They played well all day, unfortunately most of the time Mason was in a dress. Even Aedan referred to Mason as "she" at one point. They played superheroes and I tried to explain that Batman is most comfortable in pants, not a dress. Here's Mason and Aedan in Ella's room:

On the way to return Aedan to his rightful owner, I followed a German truck for a while. And guess what? I could translate what it said on the back! Not too exciting, but I was happy. Here's the truck:

I know you're dying of curiosity, so I'll tell you, it was a window and door truck. Exciting, huh? Do YOU know the German words for window and door? No? Go look it up and get back with me...
Oh, here's a picture of Pinkerella this morning getting ready for school. Do you have that book about a little girl who only wears pink? Ella channeled her today in her clothing selection:

On the way home from Aedan's, Mason and I stopped off at Wasgau to purchase some chocolate for our packages. Here's our loot when all was said and done:

And here's Mason trying to scale the kitchen cabinets in order to get a Kinderegg that was denied him since he didn't finish (or really touch) his dinner: