{"id":1634,"date":"2012-12-31T17:30:54","date_gmt":"2012-12-31T22:30:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/?p=1634"},"modified":"2013-01-03T11:16:30","modified_gmt":"2013-01-03T16:16:30","slug":"happy-holidays-from-major-mom","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/2012\/12\/happy-holidays-from-major-mom.html","title":{"rendered":"Happy Holidays from Major Mom!"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Happy<\/a>

Happy Holidays from Major Mom and Family!<\/p><\/div>\n

Okay, okay, so I’m a bit behind here.<\/p>\n

“But at least you’re kept your head above water with all the holiday obligations, right? You seemed to have had a billion Christmas parties for Dave’s unit, scouts, the spouses’ club, and the boys’ piano lessons.”<\/p>\n

I guess so — the house was decorated, trees trimmed, gifts were purchased and wrapped, cards made and sent out, and we made it to everywhere we were expected to be this season — with White Elephant gift exchange gifts as needed.<\/p>\n

I was pretty tired by the time the kids started their holiday break on the 18th. It was non-stop from the week after Thanksgiving.<\/p>\n

Why is it like that? It seems to get more and more exhausting and busy, perhaps because the kids are getting more involved? I try not to let it get me down, but it’s hard not to.<\/p>\n

Things got to calm down once the kids were out of school, and we were able to host a lovely holiday open house on the 21st. This is something Dave and I have been able to do almost every year since we moved to North Carolina in 2005 — when he was a grad student at NC State, Dave had the idea to invite fellow students over for some home-cooking finger foods and desserts. He had a lot of younger guys in his lab who rarely cooked for themselves. By the time we left North Carolina, it had grown into a full-fledged “invite all of our friends” shindig and we now feature cheese and chocolate fondue.<\/p>\n

This year was probably the most popular one we’d ever had, and it was bittersweet because it will be our last one on the Florida Panhandle. (We still don’t have official word on our next location).<\/p>\n

\"\"

We enjoy having an “open house” every December. Sort of like a Christmas gift to our friends….<\/p><\/div>\n

A couple days later, we packed ALL the family Christmas gifts into the truck and headed down to Dave’s brother’s place in Tampa. It was a nice drive down, and we enjoyed a couple days with Dave’s family.<\/p>\n

We bought a bike for Jacob — the plan was to pick up the bike in Tampa somewhere, present it at Christmas, then drive it home.<\/p>\n

Of course, when you try to buy a bike on CHRISTMAS EVE, this is what you’re presented with:<\/p>\n

\"This<\/a>

This was what we were faced with at the Macdill AFB BX. The bikes on the bottom were 26″ adult-sized bikes, and the ones on top, well…sigh…<\/p><\/div>\n

We were able to get the last 24″ mountain bike at the Target right up the road off Dale Mabry Highway. Here’s the bike!<\/p>\n

\"Poor<\/a>

Poor Jacob is in between sizes of bikes, a 20″ is almost too small, this bike is barely fitting him. But give him 6 months and it’ll be perfect!<\/p><\/div>\n

As for Timmy, he was happy with his assortment of toys, board games, stuffed animals and video games.<\/p>\n

\"Timmy's<\/a>

Timmy’s stuffed Sunflower from Plants vs. Zombies was ordered from Thailand!<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Grandma<\/a>

Grandma and Grandpa got Timmy a bunch of brainy games, such as this one, Qwirkle, which he plays at school.<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Dave<\/a>

Dave is loving his new X Box, which he got not only as a Christmas gift, but also a reward for being just about finished with Air War College this month! \u00a0He had been denying himself video games and most pleasure-reading books for the past TWO YEARS!<\/p><\/div>\n

\"As<\/a>

As for me, I was pleasantly surprised by a beautiful Pandora bracelet with the kids’ birthstone charms, and this Coach iPad case.<\/p><\/div>\n

I hope you had a nice holiday also! Stay tuned for our pictures from Legoland!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Okay, okay, so I’m a bit behind here. “But at least you’re kept your head above water with all the holiday obligations, right? You seemed to have had a billion Christmas parties for Dave’s unit, scouts, the spouses’ club, and the boys’ piano lessons.” I guess so — the house was decorated, trees trimmed, gifts […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true},"categories":[1],"tags":[75,30,54],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p5ycQ0-qm","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":698,"url":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/2011\/12\/happy-boxing-day-i-know-youre-wondering.html","url_meta":{"origin":1634,"position":0},"title":"Happy Boxing Day! I KNOW You’re Wondering….","date":"26 December 11","format":false,"excerpt":"Fox hunting is now illegal in the UK, but Boxing Day is still the country's biggest hunting day, with the hounds searching for a \"dragged scent\" instead of a real animal.Happy Boxing Day! \u00a0I know for Americans, this is the day we get in lines to return gifts, and hit\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"holiday\"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"http:\/\/upload.wikimedia.org\/wikipedia\/commons\/7\/7c\/Keswick_Boxing_Day_hunt_1962.jpg","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":681,"url":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/2011\/11\/getting-in-the-holiday-spirit.html","url_meta":{"origin":1634,"position":1},"title":"Getting in the Holiday Spirit…","date":"22 November 11","format":false,"excerpt":"It's been hard this year. \u00a0The media has been inundating us with holiday-related retail commercials and the radio stations are already playing Christmas music. \u00a0I guess it started the same week as Halloween, which seemed pretty crazy to me. \u00a0Has it always been this early?Don't get me wrong...my family and\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"baking\"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/1.bp.blogspot.com\/-E55v4QguCU0\/TssM9ld8OuI\/AAAAAAABbts\/MNbh7gfyQa4\/s640\/IMG_0079.JPG?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":1783,"url":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/2013\/02\/happy-valentines-day-2.html","url_meta":{"origin":1634,"position":2},"title":"Happy Valentine’s Day","date":"14 February 13","format":false,"excerpt":"We had a fun day today. I got to spend time with each of the boys at their schools. Then we went out to dinner at one of the very few restaurants that the four of us can agree on. Unfortunately, when you order sushi while everyone else ordered off\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"holiday\"","img":{"alt_text":"Flowers from Dave, balloons from me. The balloons didn't look quite that big in the large Party City store...funny how that works.","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/02\/IMG_5673-768x1024.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":519,"url":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/2011\/02\/happy-valentines-day.html","url_meta":{"origin":1634,"position":3},"title":"Happy Valentine’s Day!","date":"14 February 11","format":false,"excerpt":"Happy Valentine's Day friends!We enjoyed a special Valentine's Day-themed Build and Grow project at Lowe's last Saturday!My boys awakened this morning and were greeted with these little gifts for Valentine's Day:They had asked for them for Christmas, but I'm glad we waited till now, I think that Valentine Puppy sure\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"crafts\"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/lh5.googleusercontent.com\/_yz59FVsseJY\/TVljKAUvARI\/AAAAAAABRFs\/g1pIDLRfZx4\/s640\/IMG_6139.JPG?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":693,"url":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/2011\/12\/squadron-christmas-party-its-fun-to-play-dress-up.html","url_meta":{"origin":1634,"position":4},"title":"Squadron Christmas Party — It’s Fun to Play Dress Up","date":"10 December 11","format":false,"excerpt":"It had been a very long time since Dave and I were able to dress up and go out without the kids. \u00a0A couple years, I guess. \u00a0Don't get me wrong, we go out occasionally, like to dinner or a movie, but of course we don't always dress up for\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"christmas\"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/2.bp.blogspot.com\/-_ZSkORi4JkA\/TuOV0G0pEUI\/AAAAAAABb6Q\/60DsM7opB_w\/s400\/IMG_0161.JPG?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":267,"url":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/2008\/11\/the-wall.html","url_meta":{"origin":1634,"position":5},"title":"The Wall!","date":"13 November 08","format":false,"excerpt":"Okay, now that I've gotten all my political blogging out of the way (see yesterday's), I can go back to my usual housewife\/Mom\/Air Force wife-type posts, tee hee.Today I made a trip to Target to get something for my sister's birthday (I know you're reading this, Margaret!) I hadn't been\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"christmas\"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1634"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1634"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1634\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1655,"href":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1634\/revisions\/1655"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1634"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1634"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1634"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}