Category Archives: Family

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Finster Graduates

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It was August of 1999 and we were patiently awaiting the arrival of our niece. Brian’s birthday is the fourteenth and he just knew she would be born on his birthday. However, Sierra Chloe would make her arrival on the eighteenth instead. My sister had went into labor the night before and Andre’ came picked me up to go to the hospital. We stopped at the QT across from Hobby Lobby (it was Schnucks grocery store in 1999) to get coffee. When we came out Karen was pacing around the car during contractions. Sierra was born at 10:34 in the morning weighing in at five pounds and eleven ounces. Karen’s first comment was that she was so little and Dr. McCaffery offered to put her back for a week or two. I stayed until after they gave Sierra her bath in Karen’s room and then Andre’ took me home and went back to the hospital. It has been well said that Sierra looked like a monkey when she was born.

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To live in our family, you have to be tough. We can be quite brutal at times. However Sierra would soon grow out of the ugly newborn into a beautiful young lady.

By the time Sierra was born, we had cable in our house and had stopped watching channel nine and were watching Nickelodeon. One of our favorite shows was The Rugrats. Sierra was well under a year old when she earned her nickname from Brian. He started calling her Finster for Chuckie Finster. Chuckie was a worry wart and a scaredy cat two features which Sierra exhibits to this day. If Kayla wanted to aggravate her she would start talking about tornadoes and pretending to hear the sirens. Sierra would go into a panic and Kayla would just laugh.

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Sierra had reddish hair when she was younger and although she did not wear glasses she seemed to be afraid of everything including being outside. Beverly who lives down the street watched not only my girls but Sierra as well. I will never forget the day I drove by when she was sitting on a blanket crying her head off because she was outside. Beverly said she never stopped crying until they went inside and did this day after day. On Andre’s first fathers day I gave him a picture frame engraved with Daddy’s Girl and a picture of Chuckie Finster in it. After this she was stuck with the name forever.

Last week I went through old pictures looking for ones for this blog. I’m posting a few of my favorites.

It’s hard to believe that almost nineteen years have passed and Sierra has now graduated from high school. Even though Brian aggravates her constantly she still insists on hanging out our house. (After all he is the one touching her face with a fish, in the above picture.) She has been a joy to watch grow up. Her future plans are to attend South East Missouri State and study nursing.

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Mole Moral ~ If you have a nickname from the Moles (no matter how ridiculous it may seem) it means we love you very very much. We love you Sierra and know you will do great things!

 

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A Birth and Furry story

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It was seventeen years ago today that I called Brian at the lake and told him I was in labor. He had decided even though I was going to be induced at midnight on my birthday (May 8) that it was totally safe to go to the Lake of the Ozarks with his best friend Johnny. I mean cause it’s only a three and a half hour trip anyway. So I got up and showered but refused to run to the hospital yet and just be at a big ONE centimeter dilated so when Target opened up my sister and I walked around in there for a good hour. By this time it is ten in the morning and Brian still has not returned from the lake. So she takes me to the hospital and my water had broken and I was FOUR centimeters dilated. Yay for me. It just so happened that one of my burn unit buddies was working that day and was my nurse. Now you are probably wondering how this is possible. Tina was a labor and delivery nurse and one or two deliveries away from being a midwife when she decided to go to CRNA school. To get into that program you must have ICU experience so she worked with us for a while. She also knew that I wanted to try to go natural. Around 11:30 Brian is still not at the hopsital (apparently he and Johnny decided false alarm and went back to sleep for a while. Johnny is not one that rushes for anything and this day was no different.) I was shaking all over and Karen called Tina and said what is wrong with her. The answer was simple I was hyperventilating and shaking all over. Lamaze breathing had been long forgotten but I started working on that. However I was like I need an epidural. So she called for one and then after it was placed checked me and said I knew you were at ten by the way you were acting, but I didn’t check first because your husband would have missed the delivery. He showed up just as the epidural was placed. I then received so much epidural I couldn’t push for two hours so we all sat around joking and laughing until pushing time came. And because my uterus did most of the work, three pushes and she was out. I had a different doctor this time and the experience was so much nicer. Brian got to cut the cord and Teresa captured pictures of this. Because my nurse did midwife first, she placed Allyson on my stomach for a while. It was really cool. When the doctor asked delivery time she looked at me like “well damn, I didn’t look at the clock” so she said 2:20 which in my head I said score that is super easy to remember. So the last mole girl was born without any issues and was discharged home on my birthday. May 6 also happens to be Florence Nightingale’s birthday and nurses day. I was often told she was a beautiful newborn.

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As she grew it became obvious she didn’t care what others thought or did. She certainly hasn’t been one to follow the crowd or even conform. I tried not to have a heart attack her freshman year when she decided to cut all of her hair off. I reminded myself it’s just hair and it will grow back.

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I even let her add color to it because Hollie (who does our hair) is awesome and I trusted Hollie to do this for us. Currently Allyson has grown out of all the color and is back to growing it long again. See it’s just hair and it does indeed grow back.

She is very artistic and creative. In middle school she became interested in Fursuits (not to be confused with Yiffers, as Yiffers have sex in their costumes and the Fursuits do not like them as they give Fursuits a bad reputation.) She created her first character whom she named Prototype. He was so big and bulky she has since dismantled him and is currently reworking him. Her second character was Wolzey and she performed in the middle school talent show and received a standing ovation. I was not allowed to attend but when I told the secretary she made it herself, she almost fell out of her chair. IMG_7789 (1)

As you are looking at the picture the unfinished one is Wilson , the guy in the middle is Wolzey and the end one with the glasses is the now defunct prototype. She finished Wilson and here he is. Please excuse my messy house as I always tell my husband on my deathbed I will not say I wish I kept the house cleaner. I will say I wish I helped more people and made even more things for them.

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After she finished him she put Fursuit to rest for a year or so and then she got a job. She has been working since October and has made quite a bit of money as a bus girl. She has another OC (original character) which she created. His real name is Robbie but he goes by Prince and happens to be Wolzey’s father. (Yes Wolzey is also an Allyson OC.) Here he is in 2D form.

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So since Allyson makes way more money than is needed to run her star wars server she decided to commission The GoldenMaw to make this character for her. This is this girls full-time job and a legitimate business. I would have never known such a thing existed. I believe she sent the girl some drawings and then she received pictures of progress on the head. I was amazed that she did it the exact same way Allyson made hers. I got the duh mom how else did you think it was done. Oh I don’t know with a real pattern and sewing machine. Not duct tape to get the shape and cut the fur out. Anyway the head arrived last week and it is freaking fantastic. It came with instructions on how to care for it, including how to pet it. He has a special brush for his fur. This thing is legit.

 

Of course cheap Mole thinks she spent way too much money. Yet when I have done t-shirt quilts he thinks I should charge more. It’s funny how that works. I say she got what she paid for which is true awesomeness. So it looks like we will be taking another trip to Midwest FurFest this year.

Now back to her birthday, she has requested to go to dinner at the place where she works. They “have the best food ever” and she thinks she can get a free brownie desert because it’s her birthday. So we will celebrate her in just a little and can only imagine what her future holds. I say she needs to work for Pixar and she flat-out refuses and tells me that’s not a job its a hobby and its my dream not hers. I love this kid!

 

Mole Moral ~  What one person thinks is money well spent another person thinks is a total waste. However, when it’s your hard-earned money you can spend it how you choose.

 

 

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Pokemon Go Raid Bus

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For those of you that missed the Pokemon Go game release, I thought I had better start from the beginning. It is a game that came out almost two years ago as an app. It was designed to get people out of the house and out walking in the communities. It started off huge and then died down fairly quickly. However there are always die hard’s that stick with it. I downloaded the game about a week after its release when my daughters boyfriend at the time got pulled over at the Arnold Water tower by the cops and asked what he was doing. He and his friends showed the cop the game and they were let go. I honestly knew nothing about Pokemon. My girls never had much of an interest in it and I never played the game back in the Game Boy days. So when I first started my goal was to only catch one of everything.

About six months later on New Years Day my nephew showed me how to evolve Pokémon but I felt that was cheating if I didn’t catch them so I just continued looking for ones I didn’t have and hatching eggs. There are 2K, 5K and 10K eggs so when you walk that distance one hatches. The eggs remind me of Christmas presents because when one hatches, you never know what you are going to get. I then came down with the massive headache in February of 2017. During this time Emily’s boyfriend at the time was a Pokemon person and knew all about it and he started her playing. Now this made it way more fun because I’m super competitive. When Emily moved home in March for her last clinical we had a lot of fun playing together. Generation 2 was released at the time she started playing so I was now evolving and catching things for candy. I also learned how to walk with a pokemon to get needed candy.

Sometime after Emily moved back, I was at the gas station getting coffee with Pokemon running on the screen. One of the kids (anyone under 30 now qualifies as a kid to me) told me about the Pokemon Go Facebook groups. So I joined and Emily joined. This group was a lot of fun and I learned a lot of stuff about the game that I would have never had a clue about. So a guy named Tony decided to do a fundraiser walk to try to get Porygon. He received non stop grief in the group about not having one and took it like a champ. I got out of my comfort zone and did the walk and had a lot of fun.

This past February Tony decided to do a raid bus in which a group of people jumped on a party bus and drove around looking for raids. Now a raid occurs at a gym that you can only see on your phone. It takes a group of people to take the boss (Pokemon) down. I had never done them because I don’t know what I am doing. Most of these people know which Pokémon is stronger than others and who to fight who with. I am still in the I just want one of everyone. However the only way to get the Legendary’s is through raiding. I finally decided to go on the raid bus in March. The only person I knew was Tony and I told myself sitting next to a stranger would be no more stressful than the bus to Big Stuf. And on Tony’s bus we don’t have to play get to know your bus neighbor game. That game stresses me out every year because I have to talk to so many people I don’t know and try not to just stare at each them. Anyway a kid jumped on board and asked if he could sit with me. I looked at him and said “you have a 12 pack of beer, you better believe you can sit right here.” He offered me one but I said no thanks I would never stop talking. He showed me a trick about how to search for Pokemon by name instead of scrolling through the entire index. I will forever be in debt to him. So imagine thirty-nine adults and one kid driving up and down Manchester stopping at invisible gyms and everyone tapping on their phones.L

I am sure it looks crazy but it is a lot of fun. I caught my first legendary that day.

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Of course the minute seats opened for the April bus I signed up for that as well. Although it’s called a party bus, it’s not like a bachelorette or bachelor party bus. People drink a little but everyone is fun and respectful of each other. Tony was trying to take a picture in front of the bus and getting Mew (a special Pokemon that required a bunch of stuff to do before you could catch him) in the picture. He was spinning around in circles and we were all cracking up. The guy had an android and he handed him the phone and said make this thing go back, I don’t do Androids.  I am not sure if he ever got the Mew in the guys picture for him or not but we sure had fun while he was trying. Here is what it looks like if one looks at a legendary in the real world versus Pokemon virtual world.

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If you look carefully you can spot me. Especially if you know what my favorite color is. This game sounds as ridiculous as trying to explain soap operas if you never watched them. However, I enjoyed soap operas back in the day and I really enjoy this game. It is nice riding around with fellow players who both understand and love the game. The same bus driver has done all three events and she was telling us when she tells other groups about us they are shocked it is not kids but adults. This makes me think of Facebook in which the adults took over. The bus driver had never played the game but now when we would stop for a raid she would remind us to throw out a lucky egg for double XP. She even downloaded the game at the end of the trip. She is a blast.

 

Mole Moral ~ Once again stepping out of my comfort zone has led me to meet a lot of super nice people and have a really great time. And yes I have already signed up for the May raid bus. Don’t knock it till you try it.

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The New Washer

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Change is always hard in the Moehlmann house, although it’s much worse for Brian and Allyson than the rest of us. Anytime an appliance starts acting up, I know I have a battle on my hands.

A few years back my gas stove was to the point that to light the oven, one had to open the broiler drawer  and blow. Brian’s father saw this in action and informed me I was going to blow myself up. Brian kept informing me it was fine. I finally realized he was never going to agree to a new stove so I took his mom out shopping, we picked one out and I had it delivered. He crabbed about it for a while but at least I was no longer in danger of ending up in the burn unit.

Ten years ago our washer stopped working. He was unable to fix it. Keep in mind it was sixteen years old and given to us as a wedding gift from his parents. He was so mad that nothing ever lasts anymore. This was right when front loaders were out so I decided that was what I wanted. I have a confession, I hated it from almost day one. It was way too low to the ground so Brian made a box to elevate it and the dryer on. That made my back happy. However it took forever and I wasn’t sure how clean the clothes were. However this was my brilliant idea so I kept it to myself.

Probably for the last three to five years somewhere around the rinse and spin cycle it would error out F20 which meant there was a water outflow problem. So I would have to stop it, the water would drain out and then run the rinse cycle. This resulted in multiple trips up and down the steps. However I also being cheap I just continued to deal with it. Brian confirmed there was no outflow problem so it was most likely a motherboard issue and to fix it would cost as much as a new washer. So we chugged along.

About a month ago the error started happening 48 minutes in and the clothes weren’t even getting wet. It was now ten years old and I had enough so I got in the car and ordered a new washer. I returned to find Brian had taken the washer apart and told me he could get another six months out of it. I told him too bad I had a new washer coming. He got really annoyed and said he wasn’t taking the old stuff off of the stand. (I went back to a top loader.) I told him not to worry I would ask the delivery guy to take dryer off for me.

So the washer came and I asked the guy if he would take the dryer down. I then added I’ll make it worth your while. I quickly realized what that sounded like and said that sounds bad. Anyhow I gave him and his buddy twenty bucks and told them to have a nice lunch.

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This washer is fantastic. It still takes an hour to wash but the clothes area is so much bigger and the clothes smell great. I feel like they are cleaner. I have no intention of ever owning a front loader again. I would say never but then top loaders would be eradicated and I would be stuck.

 

Mole moral ~ Sometimes the latest and greatest isn’t all that great after all.

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Jesus Christ Superstar

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When I was really young, under the age of five I clearly remember being at the next door neighbors house and singing Jesus Christ superstar who in the hell do you think you are. These particular neighbors were extremely religious so I got sent home and I’m not sure if I was ever allowed back over. I did eventually move away a couple of years later. I knew that song came from a musical of the same name released in the early seventies. I always wanted to see it but never did.

Last week at work Theresa told me her daughters school was putting it on and her two oldest were the stage managers. So I pulled an old lady move and invited myself. She had to work on Saturday night so had me ask Liz. Liz had actually seen it a few years back but was up to going so a date it was. Liz had also left women’s health a couple of weeks ago so it was a great way to catch up.

After the first act, my head was spinning. I was like what in the hell did I just watch. After Liz gave me a heads up, it made more sense. I also figured out it was written from Judah’s perspective which made it interesting. I was able to follow the second act and I was left with a few thoughts.

First of all I had been singing the song wrong my entire life. It actually goes Jesus Christ Superstar, Do you think you’re what they say you are? My google research did say this was a common mistake and many people interpreted the way my four-year old self did.

Secondly, I found it very interesting when Judas asked God why he picked him to betray him. If God is really all-knowing and knows everything that happens before it happens then he knew Judas would be the one. However that doesn’t mean he chose him but he didn’t intervene to change Judas heart either. I’m not sure if any of this makes any sense anyway which brings me to my last thought.

Finally, the seventies were so bizarre. The dancing, the costumes and the whole musical was just so weird. I felt like it would have made way better sense if I dropped acid before it started. Liz told me I need to watch the movie and it is on amazon prime so perhaps I will so I can experience the full effect. The kids did a great job performing it.

 

Mole moral ~ Be careful about inviting yourself to musicals, you just might end up in a psychedelic confused nightmare.

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When it rains, it pours

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Last Saturday started the most ridiculously stupid and frustrating week I think I have ever had. I am sharing in the hopes that it makes at least one person laugh. Looking back I can crack up but in the moment I wanted to kill someone.

Kayla was out and about for Mardi Gras and texted me that she lost her atm card and asked me to call and cancel it. So I called the number on the back of my card. I was told that even though I was on her account, I could not cancel it that she ould have to call. However, I was allowed to place it on hold until she could call.

The next day was the ice storm and for some stupid reason I thought it would be a great idea to walk to get coffee instead of driving. On my way back I stepped onto a patch of ice and my feet went out from underneath me. I first hit my butt and then cracked my head on concrete without breaking my fall. That was probably a good thing because I probably would have broken my arm. I never developed any signs of a head injury except for a big knot on the back of my head so I survived that. Kayla also learned that someone had found her debit card, looked her up on Facebook and called her place of employment and told them they would be returning it to the credit union.

On Monday the credit union called her and said someone had returned it and it would be in the vault. So on Tuesday I head up there only to be told since it was placed on hold, they destroyed it and I would have to get her a new one. I got called into work at the moment so saved that for another day.

On Wednesday I am finishing up work and Brian texts to tell me our new credit card had been denied. I had just signed up for it and received it because they were offering 60000 airline miles if you charged three thousand dollars in three months. Since we are starting home remodeling I knew this would not be a problem. I also use credit cards like cash and pay them off every single month. There is no way I am paying interest or late payment charges. That is a total waste of money. So all of my cards have some kind of cash back offer and they all lose money on me the money nazi. So I come home from work and call the credit card company to find out why the charges were denied. The first thing I am told is that she has to verify my identity which is fine with me. Until she wants to verify my phone number. I just changed my number about five weeks ago and I forgot when I signed up with this card, I actually used Emily’s number because it wouldn’t let me use my new number. So she has me give her another card to verify my identity but when she calls back she tells me the phone number doesn’t match. I say of course it doesn’t because its my old number. I become so frustrated I yell at her that why can’t I give her my social security number or a first-born child. She tells me not to shout at her (I hear God whisper soft at that exact moment) so I apologize. So she then asks me if Emily is near by so she can call her. I say no my kid is in California and briefly explained the entire phone story to her. Finally she decides she can call my husbands number to verify my identity. I am assuming because he is on the account as well. So after thirty minutes all is right with the credit card and we are back in business.

Thursday I went to the credit union and got Kayla a new card. That was super easy for a change. I also mailed Emily her contacts and glasses and put a thousand dollars worth of insurance on them because of the issue I had with her books. On Saturday I would realize I recycled the tracking receipt but luckily they arrived with no issues. I had also put her airline credit card in the package as well. This is how we are flying to Disney in October.

On Friday I get on-line to look at my Costco credit card and I notice I have a charge from amazon for prime movies. I was like what I have prime and I am not paying for some movie subscription. So I get on the phone with amazon and she has to confirm my identity as well. It wasn’t quite as complicated as last time but I had quite a good time telling her my stories. She was cracking up. We finally figure out it is a kindle book that was coded wrong. As I am getting ready to leave work Kayla texts me that she has now lost my credit card that she carries in case of an emergency. This one all the free money goes to college expenses. I have had it the longest of all. So I get home from work and cancel it. Then about two hours later she texts me that she found it but I informed her it was too late, I had already canceled it.

On Saturday I get back on Costco to check my balance (yes I have issues with checking all my credit cards and checking accounts) and a note pops up saying there is potentional fraud on Brian’s card. Sure enough there are double charges so I have to close that card as well. At least i could do that on line without speaking to anyone or having to confirm my idenity.

 

Mole Moral ~ I will not change my phone number ever again. Even it I can have six free iphones, a permanent cook and housekeeper!

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Spoofing

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For the third time since I got my new phone number I got a call from a 277 number. My first three digits are also 277 so I figured it was one of those spoofer numbers to trick me into a telemarketer call. They never left a message until today. Of course I only set my voicemail up a few days ago so it was impossible to leave me a message. Well today this number left a message.
I listened to the message and was shocked to hear a man’s voice say I don’t know who you are Rachel but if you don’t know me stop calling this number. I was like umm what? So I check my call log and I have never dialed that number. So I did what any stalker crazy person would do, took a screen shot of my call log and sent them a text saying they are calling me I have never called them. Within minutes my phone rings again.
I answered to a lady demanding to know who I am and if I was a person or a business. I was nice and told her this was my new cell phone number. She then proceeds to bawl me out for calling her. I tell her again that I have never called her. She told me I better figure out what the issue is and hinted she would file a complaint. So again I did what any crazy stalker person would do, I called my cell phone provider.
Apparently someone has stolen my phone number to use as a spoof number and calling all the 277 numbers. I asked if I could get in trouble. She said nope there is no record of my number calling the other 277 number so nothing I can be in trouble for. She said they only use the number for about two weeks. So I had a choice I could call this lady back and explain spoofing to her or do nothing.
I chose to do nothing. She was beyond rude. When I see a number I do not recognize I don’t answer it. If they don’t leave a message I know it’s no one I want to speak too. I am not one to call back and say this number just called me, who are you and what do you want. I just honestly don’t care enough to waste that amount of time. Apparently other people have nothing else better to do with their time. Had this lady been nice I would have given her my time but since she was not, I hope my number calls her every day for the rest of the month!

Mole moral ~ Leave it to a mole to have their number be a spoofer number when the Moles all know about spoofing and not to answer numbers that are close to theirs.

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One Word

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It was sometime around November 2015 when Emily the Director of Women’s Services asked us to read a book called One Word in preparation for 2016. I always did every single reading assignment in college so of course I read this book. Basically instead of making a bunch of New Years Resolutions that are often forgotten or broken within the first month, you choose one word to focus on for the year. She gave all of women’s services (women’s health, mother/baby, antepartum, labor and birth, perinatal center, birthing center, and education) the task of choosing one word to focus on in 2017. The word we chose was Dedication and each month we had something different to remind us. This involved me and the crafty side for a few of the months and I really enjoyed it. This year women’s services is focusing on Teamwork and I am pretty excited for February’s reminder because it involves the winter Olympics.

Last year I chose a word for myself but three weeks in the headache started and I thought of it off and on but it kind of fell by the way side. I decided this word would be my word for this year and I would blog about it to hold myself accountable. So the word that came to mind was SOFT. There are two parts to this and the first is the more excited, annoyed, nervous I get the louder I become. I can find myself almost shouting at times and most of the time it is not necessary. The second half of my language and my cursing. It is such a bad habit that I need to break. It goes hand in hand with the excitement, annoyed, and nervous and being loud. The more worked up I get the more each of them get out of control.

I have been thinking about writing this blog for two weeks and when I came home from church and logged into Facebook I found a website asking what’s your word so I ordered this

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It came the last week so now it is time to take it out of the package and get busy not yelling and cursing.

 

Mole Moral~When you already exercise by being obsessed with running you have to get creative with New Years Resolutions.

 

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Peter and Andrew

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Today in church Pastor Herc gave a run down on the twelve disciples and their personalities. He was making the point that Jesus didn’t pick his team based on the strongest, best traits and abilities like we humans do. Just think back to school days when teams were picked for gym. The least athletic were always chosen last and I was one of them. This was one of the best talks in a long time so I paid close attention to figure out which guy I was most like and it ended up in a tie.

Peter whose name was originally Simon has a lot of my traits. He tended to shoot of his mouth and say things without really thinking. The biggest was saying he would never deny Jesus and yet he did not only once but three times in the same night. It reminds me of the time I said to a patient, I would rather be dead than him. He had lost all four extremities to meningitis. Luckily, he forgave me for about the most insensitive comment I ever made and has gone on to do great things.

I did not realize Andrew was Simon Peters brother and often referred to that way. So no matter what he did he was always over shadowed by his brothers greatness. How annoying that must have been. I often feel this way about my work. I am the invisible nurse. I do a great job but no one seems to remember and rarely am I ever mentioned by name. I know a big part of this is because I take people right after they have surgery when they are still under anesthesia. I am ok with this most of the time but every once in a while when I see the girls with four and five daisy awards or mentioned over and over in patient rounding I get a little jealous and annoyed. I do try to remember what Jesus said in Matthew 6:1-4

1 “Be careful not to practice your righteousness in front of others to be seen by them. If you do, you will have no reward from your Father in heaven. 2 “So when you give to the needy, do not announce it with trumpets, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and on the streets, to be honored by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward in full. 3 But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, 4 so that your giving may be in secret. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.

 

Mole Moral ~ It’s much better to be Peter and Andrew than Judas of Iscariot!

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Christmas Angel

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It was back in 2004 and I was at church when Pastor Tom spoke about a thing he did called Christmas Angel. For the 12 nights before Christmas you pick someone who may be struggling, had a bad year or just need a lift at Christmas and drop off presents. The first night you leave one of something, and the second night two, and the third night three etc. But there is a catch, you drop the present, ring the doorbell, run, and try not to get caught. Of course if you have your children help, they can do the ringing and running and you drive the getaway car. He had this done to him by a mormon family who never revealed who they were. He said we shouldn’t tell either but if someone did that for me and never said who it was, it would bother me forever. So on day twelve I always left a note revealing who I was. Although he said this was a way to bless others, over the years it has been a big blessing to our family.

The person or people I have chosen were always picked by God. He put their name on my heart at some point during the year. Some years it’s really early like April or May and sometimes its been as late as October. Now God doesn’t talk to me in an audible voice for that would surely make me a crazy person but I just get the feeling this person is the one. Most of the time it is a patient I have cared for, but sometimes its a friend that doesn’t know this secret about me. This year I received a little push back from who I chose, to the point I started questioning myself (and God). But in true God fashion I got the answer loud and clear on day ten of dropping gifts off. I received a note saying this girl had a bad year and every night she had to have painful dressing changes and knowing she would be receiving a gift made the discomfort less. I started crying when I read the note. After all it is the exact reason we have done this every year since 2004.

This is the first Christmas we had without Emily. She is working out in California and ended up spending Christmas with the Lindsay’s. If she had to not be at home, she was at the second best place in the world. After all had Brian and I both kicked the bucket, our kids were willed to them. There were times they threatened to kill us so they could live with them. Emily was very sad that she didn’t get to Christmas angel with us. Allyson said to me she liked houses that were farther away because we had more time to talk. So I started thinking about some of the highlights and I shared some of them with this years girl. I decided to blog them tonight for my girls.

The very first year I worked evenings so I had to drop the gifts off during the day. Since I worked the first three days I dropped them off during the day. Apparently that person worked during the day so finally on day three I made my sister call from her work and say this is your Christmas angel please check your front porch. The next year we did my neighbors I had as a child. She was convinced it was a neighbor down the street and each night would yell thank you and say the lady’s name. She never once thought it was me. One year the family lived in De Soto. We arrive in the dark and not one single mailbox has the address on it. None of the houses do either. I attempt to get on google earth but the houses are blocked by trees. By this time I am freaking out, screaming and cursing when the husband walks out to check the mail. Last year the guy I did was convinced he had a stalker and almost called the cops on us. He also had no numbers on his house so my oldest went rooting through his mailbox (which was attached to the house) to see what address was on the mail. One year we did Allyson’s friends who are twins. The first night she was at their house so I had to deliver by myself. I knocked on the door so loud that the guy across the hall opened his door also. I scared them all so bad they bumped heads on the table they were under. Before I had a smart phone I had to use map quest. I arrive to the street I was supposed to turn on and it had turned into a QT with no way to get through. I had to call Brian who had to get out his street guide to get us to the correct house. One year we pulled up to the house and Kayla says they are in the garage. I say no they are not, deliver the gift. She gets out starts to walk and I hear them in the garage. I say F**k they are in the garage, get back in the car.

This year was no different. The very first night I had worked and went by myself. There were no numbers on this house so I had to walk up to the neighbors to see their numbers. I ring the doorbell, hit the second step and my ankle goes sideways. I almost fell and I said oh hell no, I am not getting caught on day one and made it down the steps. One day just as I was getting out of the car, they came out of the house to go somewhere. I jumped back in the car and hid till they left. Then became paranoid they would forget something and come back and catch me. On the eleventh night just as Allyson was crossing the street a van pulled up into their driveway so she came back to the car. We did a lap around the subdivision and then she delivered. But the thing we will always remember is the stop sign in the middle of a street with houses on each side of the road. No cross-road or anything. The sidewalks are on both sides of the streets as well so we couldn’t figure out the purpose. On the last day I was actually going to ring the bell and wait (I’ve only done this one time in all these years) but they were not home.

So what started out as a way to bless others has turned into a Christmas tradition that we all love and look forward to each year. We’ve had great family talks and great family yelling. We’ve brightened 19 families over the years and hope to do 19 more. Although sooner than I care to admit, it will be me by myself so I better keep on running so I don’t get caught.

 

Mole Moral ~ Ding dong ditch still seems wrong even when leaving fun little presents.