Seven Quick Takes - September 2nd.

It's been a while since I've done a Seven Quick Takes post...I barely know what to write about.

1.  Well, as I mentioned before, David got the volunteer position of Communion Co-Ordinator at our church, which is exciting.  We've also volunteered to help run a new Youth Alpha program starting up in October, so I imagine we will be very busy with church work in the next few months!

2.  The Christmas gift cycle has already started in our house!  Can you belive it?  Believe it - we like to get it revved up early around here.  First we start with the "we'd better order the gift catalogues" statement.  We always get World Vision, MAF and Samaritan's Purse catalogues, but then EVERY. YEAR. we question whether to get something for people, and if so what to get, and whether to get a big gift for each family or multiple smaller gifts, and what qualifies as a big gift, and whether to get my non-Christian family gifts that aren't 'Christian' per se, or whether that matters...and so forth.  This can occupy us for-to-the-ever.  After the gift catalogue debate comes the Christmas cards, because again, every year, I lose the Christmas card address list and have to call up my grandmother, my mother-in-law and multiple other people to get my addresses together.  And then we have the 'whose getting what card' conversation 'cause I keep all of the odds and ends from previous years, and then who gets the snowmen we're still using up from before my conversion in 2004?  What about the Mary and Jesus scene?  Will my parents FLIP OUT if we send that to them?  After Christmas cards I like to panic a little bit about whether to try and knit gifts, because, I don't know, I'm good at panicking I suppose, and it all goes downhill from there.

3.  Re: Christmas Fiasco.  This year will be different.  I know I say that every year but I mean it.  I can't do that whole rigamarole this year.  Here's what's going to happen.

a)  I will make a list of addresses.  I will buy one Christmas card design. I will send out my cards.

Everyone will get the same card.  Everyone's card will be sent on Dec. 1st.  If it isn't sent on Dec. 1st it isn't sent.

b) Every family is getting a 'family gift' this year.  No individual gifts.  This means that we will send out

four family gifts.  Plus 2 gifts for our nephews and one for my grandmother, who don't fall into the 'family' categories.

c)  I will buy Christmas paper at Walmart.  We will not be making our own/knitting our own decorations/painting hand-gathered acorns to tie onto bows or selecting special Christmas stamps for each family.

d)  All Christmas gifts go out on Dec. 1st.  By post.  Not like last year when they all went out via bus...gosh what a nightmare that was.

4.  The great closet purging of 2011 let me drop off a bag of boy's clothes to a local mom of triplets yesterday, which made me feel wonderful!  She's such a nice gal, and could you imagine, triplets?  Sheesh.  What a surprise!  My closet is done now, Samuel's closet is done...we just need to strong-arm David into letting me into his closet and we'll all be much happier.

5.  I realize that this question will forever mark be as incredibly boring but does anyone know a good brand of clothespin?  I've tried the wooden ones, but if they stay out when it rains they get rusty and then the rust gets all over your clothes.  And then I tried the plastic ones but they break like crazy!  I'm on my second brand of plastic ones, but they don't have that little hole that fits around the clothesline and allows you to move the pin down the line as you go so you have to manually move each one, which is tiresome.  Are you asleep yet?  Can you help me?  We've been really lucky with our laundry situation so far in this apartment.  We had a laundromat right around the corner, which closed this Spring, but when it closed our neighbour was more than happy to let us use his washer and dryer, and his clothesline, which was very helpful.  Then once he got busy and soon moved, we had saved up enough to buy our own washing machine (we had bought a washer and dryer last year that both broke) again, and then our neighbour in the apartment next door said we could use his dryer for free.  Hallelujah.  Except that then his dryer broke (not our fault!!) and he hasn't gotten it fixed, leaving us back with the wash-and-hang-to-dry routine.  Except that our neighbour with the big line has moved so we can't use that line.  Not a problem, I'm just doing smaller loads and hanging between my back porch and the small line outside.

6.  The same neighbour who moved a few days ago (leaving us without a clothesline!) pulled me aside the other day and asked if we'd like the contents of his fridge/freezer, since there was no way he could finish all of that food by the time he moved.  I have never turned down free food and I don't intend to start now!  So, I picked up the two boxes and brought them home.  Until I got inside and unpacked them I hadn't realized exactly what he'd given us, since at first glance the boxes seemed to be filled with the usual collection of partially used condiments.  But no, there were club packs of bacon wrapped chicken breasts, ten huge sausages, perogies, about 12 frozen meals, a container of ice cream, two full containers of high-end juice, and on and on.  There was a $20 pack of chicken breasts in there!  I was just speechless.  Our freezer is full to bursting and I love having all sorts of foods to offer David and Samuel.

7.  We had a movie night the other night!  I love movie nights, but we are almost never home at the same time, and if we are movies are so expensive to rent.  But we got The King's Speech and Soul Surfer.  I knew I was going to love The King's Speech, but after watching it, I don't know, I found it more disturbing than Soul Surfer in a lot of ways.  When he tells about how his nanny woudl pinch him till he cried and then refuse to feed him...that really bothered me.  Whereas the arm-eating-shark bit was handled so well that I wasn't disturbed at all.  You never know.

There.  That wasn't so hard.