Catching Up

The Saturday before Christmas I went to my sister's house for the day. Typically we (as in my sister, our friend, Tammy, and I) spend the day scrapbooking. However, Beth needed to do some shopping so out we went. Not that we complained at all. ;-) We hit a few stores & then went to Longhorn's for lunch. Can I just say, "Yummy!" I indulged in a steak. Oh so good.

I really was all done shopping but I found myself picking up more things. After all I had a great coupon for Michael's & another for A.C. Moore so of course I had to use them. One of the last stops we made before lunch was at Eastern Mountain Sports. I bought two Camelback water bottles. My MIL has one & I've wanted one for a while so I bought one for me & one for hubby. Perfect. Then I put them in my truck along with my purse. There - no more impulse buying for me!

Once we were all done, we headed back to my sisters for a quick supper. Then we let her son stay up to watch us open the gifts we had for each other. Each year we exchange gifts & always have a lot of fun with it. Usually we don't scrap or have a whole day together in December so this is generally done at a restaurant during dinner. This was a nice change.

My sister opened gifts from me first. We kept laughing at her son. The camera he is holding is his mom's old one. It had stopped working for a while & she ended up buying a new one. As it typically happens it started working again out the blue so he's been using it. We called him the "paparazzi" as he was RIGHT there taking photos of his mom the whole time. ;-)

Hmmm, an 'r' & a 'd'....is this suppose to spell something?

Yup..."friend." I made one set for each of them - in their favorite colors.

Tammy is holding the little Willow Tree box Beth bought for her. The funny thing - she & Beth both bought one for me as well. I now have two & they even did different ones. I love Willow Tree stuff & these are actually my first ones.

Another funny story...I bought each of them these neat little bookmarks. I found them at the Christian book store while we were shopping on Black Friday. Tammy is laughing because SHE bought me one as well so we all have them. I love using mine. It's perfect.

Tammy with her "friend" blocks. They were so easy to make. Most of the gifts I did this year were homemade. I also gave them some of my goodies.

I always have a great time with Tammy & Beth. I look forward to our get togethers every month. It's my "girl time." It's when I recharge. I get the day off from my boys & I'm a better mom for it. This year I'm really hoping to get a lot more scrapbooking done. I'm also planning to jump in to more digital scrapbooking if I can sneak the laptop away with me from time to time.

Thanks girls - you guys are awesome!