Christmas Gifts

Boy am I on one tonight. I cannot sleep, I MUST rant. My current disgust has to do with the exchange of Christmas presents. I up until this year have been guilty of what I am going to protest.
Why do we insist on having a set dollar amount when exchanging gifts? Doesn't this take away from the true meaning of Christmas? Not that there really was a Little Drummer Boy, But was his gift any less valuable to the savior because it wasn't costly? No! He played his drums for him. Which to me is even more meaningful. Do Gold, Frankincense and Mir all cost the same? I don't even know what the last two are but I bet they vary in price.
Every single person is in a different place in their lives, how can we be expected to spend the same amount?
I don't remember this, but I don't doubt it validity. A couple years ago my sister made homemade gifts for everybody. Apparently we complained and got upset at her because it wasn't fair that she didn't spend the $75 we had decided on. Why should it be fair? She is a single mother of 2.
When we give neighbor gifts, Do we go around the neighborhood asking what everybody is going to spend on us? Do we say to our children, I am spending $100 on you, I hope you have been saving your allowance? Our unconditional love for them is why we do it. Their happiness from the gifts is their gift to us. Why don't we continue this policy with everybody in our lives?

This Christmas I genuinely do not care if I have nothing to open. I want Christmas to be about Christ and the spirit of Giving. I wish I had felt this way years earlier. This year I am not putting a price tag on Christmas.

Car Seat

When Aiden was much too young, and the car rides were unbearable, I bought a front facing car seat at the DI. It was only $10 and I wanted to see if that made a difference before I spent more money than necessary at the time. It worked and for several months now we have been using the $10 DI car seat. Well the time has come. I found the most amazing car seat (well a friend, Geri, found it). It goes from 20lbs to 100 lbs. You cannot find that anywhere! The headrest slides up and down. The harness can be removed when the child is old enough and the back rest comes off and it becomes just a booster seat. It has awesome a armrests with a cup holder in one. The sides/headrest area is great for when Aiden falls asleep. He won't tip over or kink his neck. I was going to get him one of those $300 Britax car seats because for a while they were the only one I could find that went as high as 65lbs. But comparing them side by side I like this Graco Nautilus, much better. It was on sale at Target for $149. Half the price as Britax.
I bought it because we are visiting a friend next week and I am embarrassed by our DI car seat, but now I am not bringing it because it is too nice and I don't want to ruin it. I also don't want the little monster to ride in it until I get a car seat cover.
Here come the neto pictures.

We are sold! I give it 43 thumbs up! and 73 Stars!

Thursday Oct. 2nd

Tonight we went to dinner at "Raphael's". This is a Mexican restaurant in Sandy. Reasonably priced, good service and excellent food. Their salsa is amazing as well as their deep fried tacos. But who can go wrong with anything deep fried. I wasn't a big fan of the enchiladas, but I am not a fan of enchiladas in general. Josh said that he hasn't heard me have anything good to say about a restaurant in a long time. Definitely try it. It has been around for a long time, just changed location to be near the new Wal-Mart and Lowe's.
I saw "Iron Man" at the dollar theater. I would have paid full price to see this. I don't even remember it coming out but I really liked it. It had a lot of action, good humor and a great story line. It wasn't your typical super hero movie, which I appreciated. I don't understand why good movies like this don't make it huge at the box office. Maybe it will in the rental market.