On the twelfth day ...

. . . I played Santa and fell asleep!  I'm writing this on Thursday morning, but it is really Wednesday's post.  I was so excited because I got so much done yesterday, and then when I sat down and relaxed, I fell asleep about 9:30 on the couch ... no blog post.

The first thing I realized is that I am getting an incredible amount of stuff done at home ... remember I said I usually have coffee with my friends every morning for a short bit?  Well we saw each other on Monday, and we decided to skip the next few days.  It amazing what that extra time has given me ... I'm still getting up at about 6:30, and I can just crank stuff out ... here's what I did yesterday:

Made a batch of gingerbread bars (this can sound really impressive, but they are super fast ... make them on the stove, dump them in the pan, bake, and cut apart!)
Took the dog to the vet
Walgreen's for a stocking stuffer
Grocery shopping with my mom
CVS for more stocking stuffers
Did paperwork for Christmas purchases (this is a huge undertaking)
Made a batch of caramels

Is there any question why I fell asleep at 9:30?  One of the things that is freeing me up timewise is the icing machine my son is using.  I called the doctor and they said we could leave it on for longer than 20 min. as long as there is something between his skin and the pack.  Of course ... I've had him leave his shirt on all the time that we're icing.  So I fill this contraption with ice in the morning, then add water; we hook him up and he ices as long as he can tolerate it ... sometimes an hour, sometimes two.  Much better.  Speaking of my son, he is really into this game that Albertson's is running.  If you don't shop Alb., they are having a sweepstakes game with a gameboard and every time you shop, you earn these little game pieces.  The more you spend, the more you earn ... at Thanksgiving when he was home, he had a lot of fun opening the pieces and matching them on the board ... he is convinced we're going to win big!  It's hilarious ... well since he's a bit under the weather from this surgery stuff, I was looking forward to giving him the game pieces from my trip to Alb. yesterday.  Since my mom goes too and she isn't playing, she gave me her game pieces.  I was chatting with the cashier the whole time she was ringing me out and when it was time for her to give me the game pieces she gave me a huge stack ... "don't tell anyone" she said.  Well of course I won't!  I figure there is no harm in telling you all because you don't know what Alberrtsons it was and who she was.  The funny thing is she had no idea what joy she would give someone by doing that ... I'll just consider it a RAK (random act of kindness).

He had a lot of fun opening it all, but we did not get one single game piece that we didn't have!  LOL!!  The pile on the left is the trash pile, and the pile on the right is full of coupons (most of them I won't use) and extra points.  While we didn't get any new pieces, we did get about 3,500 in bonus points ... every 5,000 points you get a $5 reward, so that is something!  Ha, ha 

Before I went grocery shopping I checked the blog I like that tells me what the deals are at all the stores I shop ... it cuts out a lot of work for me.  For each item on sale it tells me what it is, the sale price, what amount of coupon there is for it, and what Sunday supplement date it came from, as well as the final price.  I used to do all that work myself ... what a timesaver!  I noticed that I could get Chex cereal for $1.15 a box if I bought 3 at a time and used a coupon.  So I decided to buy for the food bank.  I also saw that they had a promotion where if you buy 10 items out of this certain group, you would save an extra .50 off each item.  I could get Ragu pasta sauce for .99c a jar.  They also had a deal where you bought a 5 lb. bag of potatoes and got another bag free.  Add to that toothpaste and toothbrushes on sale for $1.00 ... with coupons that made them each about .55c.  I am not allowed to stock up on toothbrushes or toothpaste anymore because I have so much (that's my self-imposed rule), but I knew I could donate those too.  So here's what my food pantry box contains
6 boxes Chex cereal
4 jars Ragu pasta sauce
1 5 lb. bag of potatoes
2 Colgate toothbrushes
2 Colgate toothpastes
This all only cost me about $15.  It feels so good to be able to give back.  I am so blessed.  Just call me Santa.

Are you wondering yet why this blog is called Quilting Under the Sun, and most of what I'm talking about is shopping!  Ha, ha ... some day soon I will get back to quilting, but Christmas is the season of giving, and that means shopping too.

On my trip to CVS I came across some marked down Christmas items.  I don't have a lot of collections, but I do love Charlie Brown and all his friends, and I have a small Christmas collection of them ... I don't know where they came from, but they  may have been Happy Meal Toys.

CVS had this Christmas nativity scene play Charlie Brown set ...

Aren't they cute?  Snoopy has a sheep costume on and Woodstock is baby Jesus!  Ha, ha, ha ... I was so excited; I love it!  I haven't taken it out of the box yet ... so here is my collection

Cute, cute, cute!  This is on a table that sits in my family room.  I have to pass it from the kitchen to the living room, so I see it all day long ... it makes me so happy!  Okay, I better go wrap the caramels (the most time consuming part, cutting and wrapping), and then its time to get ready for work.  Have a great day!