In this house (full as it is) DIY projects are gauged by three very important factors: 1. My husband's analytical mind: I'd mention something about this or that getting done and then he would agree with me, using graphs and/or spread sheets and then submitting a final paper in nothing less than 1,000 words. 2. My patience level: I have none. That is to say, with stuff that doesn't work right, after the 17th time and my aversion to reading directions doesn't help any...either. 3. Calculating the time it takes to get the job done: before my husband gets home.... Read more →

Lucy the Elephant, she's from Jersey! Going to Grandma's house on Christmas Eve has been a Thompson tradition ever since we began adding grand kids to their family tree and every year we would trade-off visiting with my parents, as well: dinner here, dessert over there, etc... My kids are very lucky to have both sets of grandparents in their lives, they know it, we know it and, now that my kids are older (aren't we all?) I'm beginning to truly understand why our folks look forward to having their grandchildren around them, especially during the holidaze. My father would... Read more →

Pinterest has been my time-suck of choice since it first launched in 2010, it really is the perfect social media channel for folks with really, really short attention spans...like me. [source] In fact, a large part of my day job now involves spending hours and hours flipping through people's Pinterest boards and...well...let me just tell you, it's like throwing open the cabinet doors, clearing a path to the garbage can and telling Doofus-Dawg to "HAVE IT, MY FRIEND"! Pinterest is my...SQUIRREL!!!! Yesterday, I mentioned something on Facebook about my thinking it was cute how I keep pinning all these holiday... Read more →

Dedicated to everyone and anyone who found their email/inbox bombed by newsletters that you don't remember ever having subscribed to in the first place: Cyber Monday, so disappointing to me, Cyber Monday, it was worse than I thought Black Friday to be. By Monday morning, Monday morning would pretty much guarantee, That Monday evening I would have 3,982 emails waiting for me. Cyber Monday, I get it, sometimes it just works out that way, Cyber Monday, Black Friday starting on Thursday was bad enough you see. Monday morning, I had little to no warning of what was to be, Oh... Read more →

Not for nothing, but we used to do holidays BIG here at This Full House of crunchy floors and stinky socks, sometimes decorating months in advance. Actually, I may or may not have forgotten to take down last year's [insert upcoming holiday, here] decorations and, well, a few months more and I'd have to dig them out again anyway, right? Then life happened and holidays just sort of started going all #FUBAR, for one reason or twenty. Halloween 2007: I carved the pumpkin way too early and, well, it was gross and swarming with gnats by the end of the... Read more →

She's quoting her favorite Dr. Seuss: do you like my hat? Although it seemed like a good idea at the time, the trouble with having so many kids born 2-3 years apart, I never really did sit down and do the math to figure out that perhaps one day we would be celebrating...a couple of major milestones...THAT SAME FREAKING DAY! Watch out middle school, here she comes! So, I thought to myself...SELF!...why not throw one GIANT graduation party the following weekend or something and just be done with it? Self: Okay, ummm, but what about Hope's birthday? Me: Ummm, what... Read more →

Growing up, our family consisted of me, my twin brother, my parents, my maternal grandmother and my Aunt Theresa (the rest of our extended family lived overseas) so, yes, celebrating holidays, like Easter was a very big deal. We would wait for my father to come home from working at the garden center (Easter flowers were pretty big in the stone ages too, believe it or not) only then would we carve into the Easter ham or (in my brother's case) dive into some Hungarian smoked sausage and crack open a couple of Easter eggs dyed by boiling them in... Read more →