The straw dilemma

So this is pretty pitiful, and probably not interesting to many... but I'd like to see what people think about this.

Every time I go to Chick Fil A, which is pretty much the only place I get take-out, they give me straws in the bag to go.  I take it home, and Jason and I don't use straws - we take the lids off and drink from the cup itself.  I hate to be wasteful though, so I put the straws in a drawer in the kitchen.  The other day, while searching for something else in that drawer, I got fed up with the mound of straws.  So I took them out, and I was amazed at the amount.  I've probably been keeping them for at least a year, and I don't even get take out food that much.  I started keeping them just as a thought of, "Hey, I might have some other use for them some day, or might run into a time when I need straws."  (Hahahahaha, right...)

So here's what came out...

I keep my asparagus rubber bands... I rather think the straws now rather fondly resemble asparagus from the store...

These picture actually don't make it look so bad.  But I promise, I was having issues even holding them all at once.  They were OVERFLOWING in my kitchen drawer, where they probably took up 80-90% of the space.

As far as I know, straws aren't recyclable, which is sad, because I'd have many to throw that way.  So does anybody need a bunch of straws?  I just hate throwing things away.  And how do I stop the pile from growing even more?  Do I hand them back every time after fishing them out of the bag while in line at the drive thru before I pull away?  Can I take my asparagus bunch of straws back to Chick Fil A every now and then and tell them I don't need them?  Or maybe just throw them into the straw container at the condiment counter? :-) Should I tell them as I order my food that I don't need straws?  Haha, because those people are so speedy that I don't even have time to do that when I pull up to the window before I get my bag handed out to me.

So what to do with the extra?

My favorite Christmas commercial

Just thought I'd share it... I think most people have probably seen this many times.  It's been around as long as I can remember, and it comes on every year.  I used to play handbells too, so it's fun in that respect.  My favorite part is the little sigh of exhaustion at the end. :-)



(Those of you on FB will need to go to the blog to see the video...)

I gave in to the holidays

So I've been a total blog slacker.  Not without reason though - I am getting married in just a few short weeks, after all.  I hope things will slow down significantly after that, but somehow I have a feeling that they won't anyway.  We shall see.

Well, I know I complained about everybody and their brother bringing out Christmas way too early, even before Halloween for goodness sake!  But last week something got into me and I finally gave in.  I figured it's a week out, it's ok.  So I went upstairs, moved the stuff away from the wall, and opened the little door to the lovely attic crawl space that is such a *great* perk of apartment living (you know what I'm talking about... the little child-size doors that open to a dark space of plywood and insulation up under the roof, which serves as your "storage space").  I tried to hold my breath as much as possible to avoid all the dust as I continued to get aggravated at the lack of storage space, as I always do.  After pulling out numerous boxes, bags, and bins, I finally found a few things worth keeping out.

My first item on the agenda was the lighted garland.  Here is the final result (this is something I usually do each year, so it was an easy choice to pull out)...

(Forgive the cell phone photos... these are of the stair railing.)

The little bow is either from my mom or one of the grandmothers, I can't recall... but I think it's fun.  Cute Santas are always fun.

Thank goodness I'd kept all the garland in a box together, along with the bow.  I even labeled the box before I put it away last year - probably knowing how annoyed I would get trying to find it again if I didn't do so.

I usually have a mid-sized tree I'll put up, but I decided against pulling all that out this year.  At my bridal shower a few weeks ago, they had a little tree, and everyone brought different snowflake ornaments to put on it.  It turned out beautifully, and it's also very special to me now since so many people contributed to it.  So I decided just to put that up in my place instead of the big tree this year.  Here it is...

All the snowflakes are from family and friends.  There are even some famiy heirlooms on there that have been handmade and around for a very long time, so it's a great keepsake.  And I've got a tree up now. :-)

That's all I did last week, but everyone around here was hanging up wreaths on their doors, so I decided to go dig mine out too on Sunday.  The wreath was in its own box.  But I had to do MUCH searching, digging, box shifting, and sneezing before finding the hanger.  Unfortunately, for some reason, it was put up in a big bin labeled "Christmas Stuff" - haha, what was I thinking?  THAT's a title that's going to help me out a lot.  Anyway, here ya go (bow credit to my mom, hehe)...

So, that's it for the Christmas decorations.  There are about 10 more boxes of stuff I could drag out up in that darn little storage area, but I wasn't going through that hassle this year.  I also gave in to some hints by a certain someone who really wanted some sausage balls, so they got baked this weekend as well.  I even find myself stopping on the Christmas radio station every now and then to hear the rest of the song.  Most still get on my nerves, since it's all basically the same set of songs done over and over different ways by different people... but hey, I guess that's just something to deal with.

Honestly, I truly hope everyone is having a good holiday season.  Spend time with the people who are important to you, and make sure they know that.  Remember the true reason that we celebrate Christmas, which is our Lord.  It's easy to get swept up in the holiday craziness all around us, so just make sure you take a few steps back and keep it all in perspective with what (and who) is really important to you. :-)

Grease

Just had to share that I'm sitting here on my couch, working on wedding plans, and watching Grease...  and laughing...  and singing along (haha, should I be embarrassed about that?)...  Greased Lightening just went off.  What makes me laugh even more than the movie itself and all of them dancing and flying around is the fact that I know all the words.