2007 in Review

Well, I was so inspired by Grace's recap post that I decided to do one of my own!

In January I had lots to be grateful for, including an amzing husband, which led me to write this post, which was one of the sweetest experiences I've ever had with this blog. I also got the hardest spanking I've ever had. Honestly, when I look back on every punishment I've ever had, this is the one that sticks out in my mind. But as awful as it was while it was happening, it was exactly what I needed, and it's one of my most meaningful memories.

In February I lost a dear online friend, much to my sorrow. I also did a rather overwhelming inventory of our spanking implements. And I got to experience them all in one night too!

March was a lot of fun - Nick and I got to go to a marriage retreat with our church, and it was an amazing time! It was so nice to get a chance to focus on us, and a night alone in a nice hotel room didn't hurt either! I celebated my two year blogaversary (a bit late), and my precious angel was baptized!

In April I nearly burned our house down! For which little snafu Nick quite effectively set my butt on fire. I got to take some time off work, during which we celebrated the birthday of my two favorite people!

May was pretty low key for us. A few spankings, a bit of dissatisfaction at work, and some sad news about some of my close friends. Our precious baby also graduated frim kindergarten, leaving me both proud and teary-eyed.

In June Nick and I took a vacation to the lake to celebrate our ninth wedding anniversary. I also had a job interview that didn't pan out, and I had to deal with a small but painful recurring medical problem.

July saw Nick and I in a family wedding, and my dad had a pretty serious accident. Nick almost cut his finger off, and we got a new puppy. I also made some major changes on my blog and was very pleased and touched by the number of people who stood by me.

In August school started, and Nick and I went to an awesome concert - a real live date! Nick helped out with a car accident we came upon, and I got a pretty hard spanking for some overspending.

In September I spent a weekend pretty much all by myself, and the Laundry Monster reared it's ugly head yet again. The rest of the month was pretty quiet.

In October, I turned.....30! How did that happen?!?! I also met some wonderful new friends on Love Our Lurkers Day! I also got to take some more time off from work, and we took a trip to the pumpkin patch with Morgan. And I got a tattoo! Can you believe it?

In November I got my second traffic ticket, and a hard spanking to go with it. We took a fun camping trip and had a crazy girl get high and hit Nick's truck in our yard! We had a lovely Thanksgiving and worked to adjust to Nick's new schedule.

This month has been filled with all the normal stress of the holidays, but Christmas was wonderful, truly beautiful, and now we're off to a friend's for New Year's Eve.

Happy New Year!

'Tis the season for spanko deals!

God bless Wal-Mart's Christmas clearance sale! Looky what I got for $4.00! Very nice for clutching during a spanking, and also not a bad way to announce what kind of night you're interested in having!

And now to decompress...

Whew! A moment to breathe! I know I've been scarce around here lately, but hopefully I'll have a bit more time to play online now that Christmas is past.

Speaking of Christmas, ours was wonderful, truly special. Someone did something for us that just humbled and overwhelmed us. Things have been really, really tight for us the past few months, especially since Nick's schedule change at work. The new system they have them on has them all bringing home about $300 less a paycheck. Add to that the fact that Nick's now making the 52 mile round trip to work and back an extra 10 times a month and no longer has time off to do side work, and it's been a real strain on our budget.

A couple of months ago we started talking to Morgan about how Christmas was going to be considerably smaller this year. Not that she's spoiled, but we didn't want her to be disappointed when the day rolled around and we had very little under the tree. My parents usually buy her way too much, but this has been an especially hard time for them too lately, and we knew they would be cutting way back too.

Nick has a good friend whose mother is a foster mom. She's been fostering kids for about 15 years, and Nick's friend got his own foster license as soon as he was old enough. These are super nice people, and wonderful foster parents. The lady (we'll call her Mrs. N) has been keeping 3 foster children, a little boy and two girls, all about Morgan's age. Two she's had for a while, but the last little girl she only got a few months ago. This last little girl is pretty wild, stealing, fighting, etc. Mrs. N does not put up with this sort of thing. She's not hard on the kids at all, but she's very firm. Unfortunately the little wild girl decided she didn't like having boundaries, so about a month ago she called child services and told them Mrs. N had been abusing her.

Now understandably Child Services has to take action in the face of an accusation, no matter how unfounded (and this one is most definitely unfounded), and they pulled Mrs N's foster license and took the kids away pending an investigation. I can only imagine how awful this must be for her, and for the two children she's had for a long time. Anyway, she'd been buying Christmas gifts for them all year long, and suddenly she had no one to give them to.

A few days before Christmas Nick's friend told him that he knew things had been tight for us, and he and his mom wanted to give some of the gifts to Morgan. We were enormously touched, but of course we told him that there must be someone in a more difficult position than us who could use the toys. He insisted that this is what they wanted to do and asked us to please let them do this for us. So he loaded up Nick's truck with maybe a dozen toys that could have been bought with Morgan in mind so perfect were they. On top of that two of Nick's other friends each bought her a gift.

She ended up having more than we could have dreamed, and she declared it the best Christmas she's ever had.

Nick and I agreed not to spend very much at all on each other, but we still ended up with a lovely Christmas. He bought me some iced tea glasses I'd been wanting, a Tinkerbell hat/scarf set, some pretty pens with a matching notebook and pencil bag, and....this:

Very, very, VERY nice!

For him I had very little. I got him a coffee pot for work that cost all of $3.88 at the Wal-Mart Day After Thanksgiving sale, a coffee cup to go with it, and a few songs he wanted off of iTunes. Then, on Christmas Eve, on my way home from work I happened to stop by Steve & Barry's. There's one near my job, and since I had to work Christmas Eve, I thought I'd stop since I was down there anyway. Much to my surprise and delight, everything in the store was on sale for $8.89, and even better, they had wool pea coats in Nick's size in two different colors! Nick has wanted a pea coat for years, but it's hard to find them for less than $50 or $60, and we've never had the money when they were available in stores. But how could I pass up $8.89? I got him one of each, navy and charcoal gray and got out of there for under $20. He was tickled to death with them both, and they ended up being his favorite gift from anyone.

Last night we spent some time with my little cyberskin treasure and he did some very impressive um, stocking stuffing. A lovely way to blow off some of that constantly-on-the-go-gift-wrapping-candy-making-Christmas-craziness stress!

I hope you all had a wonderful, wonderful holiday!

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Remember the Reason for the Season!

'Tis the season to be busy...

Hey, guys. I promise I haven't dropped off the face of the earth. We're right in the middle of the yearly whirl of Christmas commitments and obligations. I hope you guys are having a wonderful holiday season, and hopefully I'll have something spanky to post sometime soon. In the meantime, some holiday humor for you...

Merry Christmas!

Happy Birthday, PK!

Still around...

Hey, guys. Sorry it's been so quiet on here lately. Life has been really busy the past couple of weeks, and there's not been much in the spanking category to report. BUT, don't let it be said the holidays have blinded me to spanko stuff. Here's a couple of gems I ran across in the archives of The Collar Purple. Merry Christmas!

(via Colorado Spankers, where I also found the next one).

I also found this one from Brian Tarsis in my files.

Don't miss it!

John of Leather Thorn Paddles is having another great Name This Paddle Contest and, as always, the prize is fantastic!

I can personally vouch for the extremely high quality of John's work and the outstanding personal customer service he offers. We have two of John's pieces, a Buster Paddle with AngelBrat embossed on it, and a Brat Paddle with a customized handle that was such a hit with everyone that it became part of the new design. I LOVE both of them, and they're definitely two of our more frequently used toys.

I've got my entries in, and you should all submit yours too - you never know what Santa might bring you this year!

Christmas Meme

This one has been making the rounds, and it looks like fun, so I thought I'd give it a whirl.

1. Wrapping paper or gift bags? Bags if I can help it. I hate to wrap! Nick however, doesn't mind it, so he usually wraps.

2. Real tree or artificial? artificial, just because we usually can't afford a real one. Next year we hope to get a blue spruce we can plant after Christmas.

3. When do you put up the tree? Usually Thanksgiving or the day after, but I had to work both days this year, so we didn't get it up until last night.

4. When do you take the tree down? Usually New Year’s Day

5. Do you like eggnog? I get a craving for it every year, but after about four ounces I'm sick of it.

6. Favorite gift received as a child? One year I got a set of accessories that went with Barbie size dolls. There were about 105 pieces, and I still have a lot of them (somewhere in Morgan's room).

7. Do you have a nativity scene? A small ceramic one-piece one, but I'd really love to have a Willow Tree version.

8. Hardest person to buy for? My Dad

9. Easiest person to buy for? Morgan

10. Worst Christmas gift you ever received? I can't recall, although Nick once got 6 blank VCR tapes - from his grandmother! And no, no one got him a VCR that year. She actually bought them to use herself, and for some reason they wouldn't work in hers.

11. Mail or email Christmas cards? Every year I say I'll get cards out, but something always comes up. But I have managed to email a few already.

12. Favorite Christmas movie? Lampoon's Christmas Vacation

13. When do you start shopping for Christmas? Christmas eve? Usually September or so, although it's really just picking things up as I see them rather than purposely looking. That usually doesn't get done till after Thanksgiving.

14. Have you ever recycled a Christmas present? Yes, but only gift cards when we didn't have enough money to buy for everyone we needed to.

15. Favorite thing to eat at Christmas? These little olive hor' devours Nick's aunt makes.

16. Clear lights or colored on the tree? White on the tree and the banister, colored outside.

17. Favorite Christmas song? O Holy Night

18. Travel for Christmas or stay home? We never leave the county although we do go to several family members' homes over the holidays

19. Can you name all of Santa's reindeer? If I looked it up I could.

20. Angel on the treetop or a star? Actually we have a little fishing hat. Our tree is done in lodge/fishing ornaments. But I'd like to get a nice rustic angel.

21. Open the presents Christmas Eve or morning? My family is spread out over about a week (for instance this year we go to my papaw's on the 21st). Nick's grandparents' is on Christmas Eve, and our house and Nick's parents' house is Christmas morning.

22. Most annoying thing about this time of year? Money stresses

23. What I love most about Christmas. Everything except the money stresses!