Wednesday Hodgepodge

1. Are you doing anything special to mark this season of Advent? If so please share.

Nothing special at our house. I found so many fun Advent ideas on Pinterest, but that is the closest I got to doing anything for it. Maybe next year.

 2. Dasher, Dancer, Prancer, Vixen, Comet, Cupid, Donner, Blitzen...and of course you recall, the most famous reindeer of all...so, which reindeer name best describes you this week?

Dasher, seems I'm constantly dashing somewhere. I keep hoping things will slow down a little, but seems there's always something that needs attention somewhere.

 3. What's worse-too quiet or too loud? Which have you had more of lately?

I don't like noise, so I'm going with too loud. Too quiet can be a bad thing too, especially involving a toddler. Recently when I realized things were too quiet and went to investigate Buddy had created a cloud of baby powder. It covered every single surface in the living room and he looked like a combination between some kind of tiny old person and a sad snowman. The mess he created was far from fun to clean up.

 4. This question comes to you from Zoanna over at A Penchant for Pens-thanks Zo!

 When you are administratively gifted, how often do you find yourself not trusting less gifted people to do what they've committed to do?  If you are not so gifted that way, but are reliable, how do you feel when the stronger person (in that area) goes ahead and covers it before giving you a chance to come through?

I would rather do the things assigned to me than take charge, and if a somewhat "controlling" person thinks they have to have their fingers in everything it doesn't bother me too much to let them take over even if I would have been perfectly capable of doing an equally good or some cases better job at it.

5. What is your most dreaded task relating to the holidays? Your most looked forward to holiday task?
Most dreaded task is getting Christmas cards out in time. I used to write a handwritten letter for each of them, each one different, but as our list of friends has grown I simply can't keep up with that tradition. A little note scribbled inside cards is about as far as I get except for my parents.

My most looked forward to tradition is a tie between putting up our tree and shopping for Christmas breakfast.

 6. Facebook has released its list of the 'most talked about' topics of 2013. Pope Francis took the number one spot.  Does that surprise you? He was followed by election, royal baby, typhoon, and Harlem Shake. Your thoughts? What was your most talked about topic in 2013? (Facebook, around the kitchen table, or wherever it is you talk)

Each of those topics hardly got any attention from us. The most talked about topic in our house is probably school.

 7. What's something you consider a necessity that others might view as a luxury?

Paper towels.  I was sixteen before I was introduced to that luxury, but it has become a necessity for our family.

 8.  Insert your own random thought here.

This year instead of focusing on gifts we are having a more food related Christmas, similar to what we had while growing up Amish where food and fellowship was always more important than gifts. Rosebud and I consulted Pinterest and added quite a few treats to our list of things we hoped to create.

So far we have made:

• Eight batches of rice krispie treats
• Chocolate truffles
• Party mix
• Butterfingers
• Bounty Bars
• Oreo Krispie treats
• Raisin clusters
• Pomegranate clusters
• Pretzel s'mores
• Chocolate coated pretzels
• Fruitcakes
• Frozen chocolate coated banana slices (so good)
• Kiwi candy
• Rolo pretzel bites
• Ritzy chocolate caramel bites

We are a little over half way done. Next up is homemade Three Musketeers and popcorn balls and some more salty snacks. I'm thinking we'll get our entire list complete. So much fun!