Well, That Was Fun

We awoke later than planned, shopped longer than planned, spent more money than planned, and then stayed up much later than planned.  But we had so much fun!

We slept late this morning, mostly because of the sleep issues I'm battling, but also because we were up late last night, so even though we wanted to get an early start on finishing our Christmas shopping, our extra sleep was necessary.  Once we got going, though, we had a very busy day.  I'm not much of a shopper.  Frankly, I hate it.  But I do love Christmas shopping.  I find it to be a blast trying to find that perfect gift.  And we found a lot of perfect gifts today!  We hit Hobby Lobby, where we found a boatload of those metal signs reproduced from the 50s.  We found picture frames for my daughter's school pictures, which is an annual favorite gift, particularly for the grandparents.  We also stopped at the "cheap" store for gifts, Big Lots!  The home of $5 watches and $10 jewelry provides plenty of stocking stuffers, as well as affordable gifts my daughter can buy for the entire family.  We cleaned house!

Aside from the ridiculous amount of traffic in the area around the shopping center, it was a fun trip.  The weather, with temps well into the upper 60s, allowed us to spend time with the top down on our little car today, as well.  Even though we drove the wrong vehicle today, which meant stuffing the car with more stuff than it was meant to hold, it was worth it for a taste of the warm weather.

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After church, where we received a wonderful message by Pastor Mark about the roles all of the "characters" played on the night of our Savior's birth, we grabbed a Ledo's pizza, then we went home to begin our little Christmas Caper....

For many years, longer than I've known them, my in-law's family has exchanged a gag gift that has made the rounds to just about every family member at one time or another.  It was lost for a few years, then popped up again.  It landed in my lap last year.  It's a pair of boxer shorts.

I'm pretty sure everyone has forgotten that I got them.  It was a gift I received from my mother-in-law (and I can't believe she ended up with them prior to me getting them).  So upon digging them up the other day and my daughter asking questions about them, I let her in on my plan.

I figured it was time for Uncle Jerry to get the shorts.  But we were going to make it noticeable and memorable.  We got a very large box, one of those that was about 3x3x3, and filled it with crumbled newspaper.  Then we hid the boxers in an empty box of Fruity Pebbles and buried them in the newspapers.  Then we wrapped the big box and applied stickers saying, "Fragile", "Made in Italy", "Do not open until 12/22 at 7 p.m.", "No peeking", and "Santa's watching!"  We also addressed it to Jerry, and placed a huge red bow on it.  Once we got it prepared, we took a little trip over to Uncle Jerry's house.  It isn't hard to find.  Jerry does a fine impression of Clark Griswold.  I'd hate to see his electric bill this time of year...

Our plan was to take the box and leave it on their front porch, where they'll likely find it tomorrow morning.  We parked across the street, and waited a few minutes to make sure no one came to the window.  The house seemed quiet, aside from all of the bling outside.  I got out and opened the back of our Jeep, pulled out the box, and ran it up their driveway toward the front porch.  They had a spotlight shining on the front of their house, and as I crossed in front of it, my shadow became a 20-foot giant across the front of their house!  I was sure I'd be caught, but I completed my task and place the box, then hot-footed it back to our Jeep, jumped in, and we took off!  My daughter had taken pictures of me the whole time, and she began laughing hysterically as we pulled out onto the main road.  Mission accomplished!

We headed home, laughing the whole way, excited that we were successful.  And we're looking forward to our big Christmas party for tomorrow evening.  We can hardly wait to see if we've successfully surprised Uncle Jerry.  It ought to be a lot of fun.

Time for bed... Have a great weekend, everyone!