The Christmas Gift from ... a not nice place

Every year our extended family has a gift exchange, which this year we lowered to a $35 limit-- swell. I picked my Grandma's name. Now being fairly certain she won't be online to read this, I feel it is ok to discuss what a huge ordeal this gift has been.

When shopping 2 weeks before Thanksgiving, I came upon this really neat tree from Things Remembered- faced with the dilemma of what to get a Grandma who really doesn't need a thing for Christmas, I thought- 'that would be kind a neat to have a picture or everyone in one place'. The tree was about $34.99 I think, plus engraving- but who needs that?? Perfect. HA HA HA HA HA!!!.......

I forgot that being of a 'digital' family now, I don't have 20 hard copy pictures of the family-- no problem. I'll just order them-- while I'm at it, I'll go for the really good quality metallic paper they have out now, doubling the cost- but hey- Grandma's worth it right! So, I spend 2 hours ordering all of the pictures- with shipping an additional $23. No big deal, that's what gift accounts are for.....

I decided against spending the $20 extra to have it engraved- thought a nice 'hand-made' sign would be neat. HA HA HA HA-- spent 2 hours trying to get my little paper oval to fit perfectly in the hole, and it's still not right.... - it's the thought that counts, right?

Time for assembly..... AGHHH!!! Wouldn't have been a problem, except that each oval was a different shape- with no rhyme or reason- but variety certainly adds to the thing- except when you've ALREADY cut out your pictures not knowing they were all slightly different! At this point I'm thinking I should have just left the insta-family portraits that came in the tree to begin with. They all looked really nice- I could have assigned names to them and everything!

And here is my desk-- you know me and messes..... but it's for a good cause!

Each little frame is held together with tiny little screws-- that might I add were an absolute PAIN to get put back in properly! And did you know that there are INVISIBLE cracks along your window sill that PERFECTLY SWALLOW up such screws?? And I thought it was the kids I had to worry about losing them. Thanks Mark for finding another one! He was able to do so because he wasn't out chasing the squirrels tonight :) Now guess what--- 4 of my pictures were too big to fit in the little holes. Again-- no problem. I'll just run off to Walmart (did I ever tell you how much I LOVE that store at Christmas???) and have them re-sized down to appropriate sizes in their neat little in-store instant machines for 39 cents a copy, never minding the wasted money I already spent. That was a swell idea, and it worked great-- now it's time to check out. The re-sized pictures had to be done it wallet sizes, which print 9 to a sheet-- a full SHEET is $4.97!!!! I had 3 of them--- you do the math! Sorry kids, no pretzel treats today!

And about $71 later, we FINALLY have a finished family tree. I apologize in advance to Charlene, Holly, and Stu for not being able to see your full faces- please refer to paragraph 5 of this blog. I really hope Grandma likes her gift-- I told Mark that at the very least I was getting blog material out of this one! It's always the thoughts behind the gifts right-- well, the good 'initial' thoughts I should say :)

Happy gifting!! :)