Всем на Украине- С НОВЫМ ГОДОМ!!!

Sirius-ly, guys...

Sirius Black has been successfully saved by Harry and Hermione. Lerah and I are quite relieved. It seems that Hippogriffs come in quite handy in tight spots. I think I need one of those. Birthday mental note- fantasy animals are a plus.

Lerah has just stated that she needs to make a trip to the Country Dollar. For those of you not familiar with the Country Dollar, it is the best store in Tallahassee. All of their amazing jewelry is one dollar. And I'm not talking, like, cheap, nasty jewelry, I'm talking like, at least $7 at Claire's. It's the best. It's off Lafayette Street across from the Governor's Square Mall. ;0)

There is not much breaking news to report over here. Of course, "breaking news" is rather relative in this household. When I mentioned Saddam Hussein being executed yesterday Kenley's reply was, "We caught Saddam Hussein?" He's a little behind on the times. But he can sell a house so he has that going for him.

My last day at Kirkland's is tomorrow. No one has taken advantage of my 20% discount except for Mrs. Linda Stringer. Last call, peoples. All Christmas is 75% off...

Speaking of which, all of our lovely Christmas decorations at Kenley's house are put away for next year. Christmas goes by way too fast. But at least we have our $25 prize to spend at Taco Bell. But I think we're waiting to go until David can eat with us. We might be waiting a while...Hopefully Taco Bell will not have gone under by then. Poor Taco Bell. They still have some loyal customers. Chives or no chives.

Well, Lerah is calling to watch the Goblet of Fire for our Harry Marathon. 5 days until Veronica, Olya, Jake and Taylor come! Ypa!

Чебурашка ненавидит Нирвану.

Me, Jenna and Sarah are having a guitar hero jam session over at my place. We pretty much rock. Cheburashka, who makes his home on top of my television holding his sunflower and Canadian flag (my tribute to Leo) loves it when we play Van Halen and Kansas, but evidently he does not like Nirvana as he fell off the top of my TV and toppled to the floor as soon as it started playing. Maybe he would prefer some Kino and Pyatnitsa.

Merry Christmas, Everyone!

Congratulations! 3rd Place!

First off, I would like to give a big round of applause to those of us who decorated Kenley's house for the neighborhood contest. We won third place!!! (Come drive by if you haven’t seen it- Cumberland Road off Hartsfield.)




For those of you who are not Tallahassee natives, or you do not spend more than 3 days a week with The Group, you may not know about the significance of Kenley's house. Kenley, seemingly, bought his house so that we all could use it. If this is not the reason he bought his house he has fooled us all. The garage code is given out freely, extra keys have been made, breakfast food is always stocked, the refrigerator is for public use (often with other people's food and diet pepsi vanillasburied inside), air matresses are left inflated in the second room and the mantle is reserved for our various art projects, currently a bunch of gingerbread houses. It's all of the benefits with none of the rent. :0) Thanks, Kenley!

That being said, it is already the sixth day of Christmas and I am terribly behind. Jenna said I did this last year.

On the sixth day of Christmas my true love gave to me:

Six geese a-laying



Five GOLDEN RINGS!



Four calling birds


Three French hens



Two turtle doves



And a partrige in a pear tree.



And call mine and Jenna's voicemails for more Christmas cheer.

On the second day of Christmas

My true love gave to me:

2 turtle doves

















and a partridge in a pear tree.



Now, I'm just wondering, if my true love gives me a partridge in a pear tree every single day, that's a lot of pears and a lot of partridges. I don't know if I want him spending that much money on me. I'd rather go on a cruise.

Or, I would take Carli on a cruise because IT'S HER BIRTHDAY! HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

Someone stole two baby Jesus' out of the nativities on display at our store today. It's a sick world we live in. Sick. Who steals baby Jesus out of the manger? What the crap are you gonna do with him? I couldn't live with that kind of guilt. If it was you, and you know who you are, return the baby Jesus'. I mean, that's gotta be one of the seven deadly sins or something.

On the first day of Christmas...

...my true love gave to me:

a Partridge in a Pear Tree.



I don't know if that would really thrill me that much. I'd be happy with some flowers or a nice set of steak knives. I don't even like pears.

Today I:

climbed a tree

ate Mexican and Japanese food.

rocked out to the Power Rangers theme song.

said goodbye to Carli

beat my friends at Rummikub

had Jenna save a table

pondered the significance of the numbers 4, 8, 15, 16, 23 and 42

talked to a CEO

and went pearl diving.

It was a good day.

Extreme Makeover- Gingerbread Edition

So I learned something new tonight. People make gingerbread houses out of gingerbread. This was news to me, as I've always constructed my gingerbread houses out of graham crackers and frosting. I have been informed, however, that gingerbread is the best way to build a gingerbread house. Who would have thought? I will eventually prove this wrong, though.

My first real memory of gingerbread house making was when I was about 5 at my friend Jennifer's house. I don't remember the details of that baking day, but I'm sure my gingerbread/graham cracker house was not anything worth mentioning.
At Sarah Evere...Egger's birthday party one year we had a gingerbread house making contest. Alec's was definitely the most awesome. He made the whitehouse.



Uh...yeah, it looked something like this.

Anyway, to bring in the Christmas cheer this evening we decided to have a gingerbread house party tonight. I'll post our amazing results.




















Us working super hard on our houses






Carli made an amazing mobile home, complete with John Deer green pickup.













Alex quotes of the evening:

"No, you have to do this." -Diane Ashburn
"Wait, but I don't want to do any work." -Alex Cherukara

"We need some 2 X 4's and a drill gun." -Alex

"We're going to have these nice, alternative circular windows. Wait, by alternative I'm not suggesting that this house participates in an alternative lifestyle or anything."

"We don't build houses out of cookies in Norway." - Alex




My house.



Jenna's house.







































Poor David and Alex's house collapsed on top of one of their occupants. Poor Mr. Gingerbread.





David and Alex's house was the only one whose house did not stay standing. This proves that graham crackers make the better building materials. You can see the parade of homes on display at Kenley's house from now until December 23rd. Contact Diane Ashburn for details. Merry Christmas!

Happy Birthday, Taylor!

If I had one steak left, I would share it with you. I love you! Happy Birthday!

Only 20 Days Until Christmas!

Lori is home, everybody. Well, she is in Tallahassee. That is so exciting. I got to drive up to Atlanta with Mr. Tony and Mrs. Cheryl to pick her up at the airport. That is always loads of fun. Me and Mrs. Cheryl dominated the CD player the whole time. Poor Mr. Tony never got to listen to his Creedence. Mrs. Cheryl said, "Calyn, you have such good taste in music." I just said, "No, Mrs. Cheryl, I just have your taste in music." I ate at my first "Huddle House." Not necessarily something I'd repeat for fun, but I can say that I've done it.

I had a huge Dr. Pepper waiting for Lori as soon as she got off the plane. We've had a great time Christmas shopping this week and hanging out and catching up. Of course, I've only been Lori-less for a month, whereas most of you people have been Lori-less for about 11, and I don't know how you make it.

I'm staying with Josh and Melinda Cable this week and we're having a super great time. Mrs. Laura is a very smart woman to leave us no-oven-required meals, although somehow I'm sure I will end up messing those up as well. I didn't even know you could make lasagna in the microwave! Amazing. I'm staying as far away from their refrigerator as possible. (*See May's blog posts for reasons why.) Really anything that uses water I'm trying to stay away from.

Well, I will leave you with my two quotes of the week.

"I knew something was going on with Jan and Howard! I knew they were having an affair!" -My Mom
"You mean both of them?" -Cameron

"We have nuts. And Fig Newtons." -Kenley

I Am Going to Pick Up Lori!