Get Carried Away

Santa's email address according to the Muppets. Gotta love the Muppets!
Welcome to our LONG Christmas 2008 update. It was a month long wild adventure full of fun, gingerbread, and presents for the A-girl's first Christmas Extraveganza. Yours to enjoy the pictorial feature below...

We tried to send the A-girl through the mail to the North Pole, but she didn't quite fit.

A-girl with Santa, who I think is secretly Henry Winkler!

She was so pooped out with seeing Santa, that she fell asleep in the car on the way home clutching a water bottle.

My gingerbread house, which collapsed and became condemned.

Our village, including Hollis' impressive ski chalet.

With my siblings at GJ's ceebrating early

A-girl's first Christmas PJ's. We open PJ's Christmas Eve and attempt to stay in them all day on Christmas. This year was a success!

A-girl's hat from Grandma Braun. She's not sure about it, but we thought it was great.

In all, it was a fantabulous Christmas. With so many family members so close to us, we were barely home for two days straight. We did manage to sneak back to open our family presents and stockings. Santa left me a dozen 100 calorie packs and lip gloss in my stocking. What a guy! And Nick gave me a beautiful silver "A" necklace, which I love.
Hope you and yours had a fantastic Christmas. Here's to a Happy New Year!

Dear Santa,

I've been a good mom all year. I've fed, cleaned and cuddled my children on demand, visited the doctor's office more than my doctor, sold sixty-two cases of candy bars to raise money to plant a shade tree on the school playground. I was hoping you could spread my list out over several Christmases, since I had to write this letter with my son's red crayon, on the back of a receipt in the laundry room between cycles, and who knows when I'll find any more free time in the next 18 years.

Here are my Christmas wishes:

I'd like a pair of legs that don't ache (in any color, except purple, which I already have) and arms that don't hurt or flap in the breeze; but are strong enough to pull my screaming child out of the candy aisle in the grocery store.

I'd also like a waist, since I lost mine somewhere in the seventh month of my last pregnancy.

If you're hauling big ticket items this year, I'd like fingerprint resistant windows and a radio that only plays adult music; a television that doesn't broadcast any programs containing talking animals; and a refrigerator with a secret compartment behind the crisper where I can hide to talk on the phone.

On the practical side, I could use a talking doll that says, "Yes, Mommy" to boost my parental confidence, along with two kids who don't fight and three pairs of jeans that will zip all the way up without the use of power tools.

I could also use a recording of Tibetan monks chanting "Don't eat in the living room" and "Take your hands off your brother," because my voice seems to be just out of my children's hearing range and can only be heard by the dog.

If it's too late to find any of these products, I'd settle for enough time to brush my teeth and comb my hair in the same morning, or the luxury of eating food warmer than room temperature without it being served in a Styrofoam container.

If you don't mind, I could also use a few Christmas miracles to brighten the holiday season. Would it be too much trouble to declare ketchup a vegetable? It will clear my conscience immensely. It would be helpful if you could coerce my children to help around the house without demanding payment as if they were the bosses of an organized crime family.

Well, Santa, the buzzer on the dryer is ringing and my son saw my feet under the laundry room door. I think he wants his crayon back. Have a safe trip and remember to leave your wet boots by the door and come in and dry off so you don't catch cold. Help yourself to cookies on the table but don't eat too many or leave crumbs on the carpet.

Yours Always, MOM

P.S. One more thing...you can cancel all my requests if you can keep my children young enough to believe in Santa

Christmas!
I know, breathe people.
We've been busy doing a lot of Christmas related things. Of course, none of these things are shopping or wrapping gifts, so I'm totally unprepared in that respect. Below are pictures of some of our antics, including choosing a Christmas tree for my parents house and going to Disneyland with the fam. Good times.
I think I'm having a moment this holiday season like the Grinch after Christmas when his heart grew three sizes. Maybe the hormones are still a-raging, or perhaps it's the combo of the Jon & Kate Plus Eight episode and the St. Jude's commercial, but I find myself being overcome. Not just with sadness for the sick children, but with gratitude that my little lady is a happy, healthy, thriving baby- who is growing up way too quickly in my opinion.
I think this whole episode is a result of the crazy Thanksgiving we had- so crazy that we came home and I went back to work and thought, "I never spent time being thankful!" Pretty pathetic. So my gift to myself and to little baby Jesus this year is to be grateful for the incredible life I have the privilege of living.
Too bad I can't get that for everyone on my list.
Here are the pics of our festivities...enjoy!
Choosing a tree with the aunties
Family Disney picture

... and now have a Facebook. Find me!

I've been weighing a lot... weighing myself, weighing how I feel about this blog, and weighing how the two relate.
I'm so proud of the fact that I decided to talk about my weight loss journey on this blog, and proud of the success that I've had thus far, even if it's been small. I've been struggling with how to balance having a blog about my family, featuring the ever-growing A-girl, and my weight loss journey.
And, to be honest, when I'm not being as "on point" with my weight loss as I'd like to be, it makes me not want to update at all.
So I've decided to split my blog in two.
Braun-a-licious will be just that- about the Brauns and how..."licious" we are :) Mostly, it'll be my opportunity to do what we bloggers do best- share, laugh, observe, and dialogue about life.
My new creation will be focused solely on my weight loss journey. It's my pleasure to introduce you to http://mydietribe.blogspot.com/ I hope you'll join me occasionally to cheer me on as I whittle myself back down to where I'd like to be.
So now, in addition to being a multitasking mom, I'm also a multitasking blogger!

Happy Post-Thanksgiving from the Brauns!
Poor Thanksgiving- it gets crapped on and stepped over by Christmas.
Thankfully, our families are all about any excuse possible to get together, so we celebrated Thanksgiving in style.
Feasting began at my moms, where we cooked enough food for a small country before caravaning over to Nana's. The whole fam arrived, laughed, played and ate.
We left late Thanksgiving night to drive up to Yosemite to meet Nick's ENTIRE family in Wawona for the weekend. I'm talking like 60 people. It's crazy and fun and A-girl got a chance to meet a few of her cousins and aunts and uncles for the first time. It's so weird when there's people that you know and love who haven't met your child yet (Crazy Pants K- I'm thinking of YOU) It's also incredible to see people you know and love automatically love your duaghter just because she's related to them.
So, after graham cracker house decorating and a hike or two, we headed home on Sunday. Quick turn around, but totally worth it.
I have to mention my adorable and loving husband, who took care of me all weekend and drove almost the entire way home so I could rest and hold hands with the baby. I do have to say that I didn't spend as much time this Thanksgiving thinking of what I was thankful for- which is ironic because I have more to be thankful for this year than ever. So, I'm telling myself that Christmas will be full of counting my blessings.
On to Christmas- anyone else BEYOND not ready for this?!?