Holiday Movies on Netflix

Reason number 286 why I love Netflix: I can get my Christmas movie fix with Netflix! Once Thanksgiving rolls around, I start watching Christmas movies. I can't get enough of them! And Netflix has a TON of them!

I love all the Rankin and Bass stop-motion Christmas movies because I remember watching them as a kid. (My own kids are less-than-impressed with them.) I love all the classics like It's a Wonderful Life, A Christmas Carol, White Christmas, and Holiday Inn. I love funny movies like Elf and National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation and can quote them in their entirety, line for line. (I know, I know, if only I could make a living with my impressive ability to remember useless movie lines.) I even love movies that aren't necessarily considered Christmas movies, but have Christmassy elements in them like While You Were Sleeping. While You Were Sleeping is one of my all-time favorite movies! It's a romantic comedy and although it isn't a Christmas movie per se, it takes place over Christmas. It also takes place in Chicago which is, in my totally unbiased opinion, the awesomest city ever.

My favorite scene in this movie is the one that takes place around the dinner table when everyone is talking about a different subject. It's so hilarious (and so like my own dinner table!

I went to Cuba.
Ricky Ricardo was Cuban.
You know, Peter should have been an actor. He´s tall.
Alan Ladd wasn´t tall.
Marshal Dillon was six-foot-five.
These mashed potatoes are so creamy.
l could never make a good pot roast.
You need good beef.
Argentina has great beef. Beef and Nazis.
John Wayne was tall.
Dustin Hoffman was five-six.
Would you want to see Dustin Hoffman save the Alamo?
These mashed potatoes are so creamy.
Spain has good beef.
Cesar Romero was tall.
Cesar Romero was not Spanish.
l didn´t say Cesar Romero was Spanish.

You can't help but fall in love with the whole family in this movie! And how can you resist a movie that has a first kiss spontaneously take place under the mistletoe?

Check out While You Were Sleeping on Netflix to kick off your holiday season with a feel-good, funny movie the whole family will enjoy!


 

"Are They All Yours?" and Other Things I'm Asked as a Mom of Six

Today, a teacher overheard me talking to my friend about my kids’ grades. “Three of them made honor roll, two are in college and I’m not sure what their grades are yet, and one … well, we just won’t talk about him right now.”

“You have six kids?” she asked, incredulously.

I shrugged and gave her my standard response: “It seemed like a good idea at the time.”

CONTINUE READING HERE!

My Kids’ Idea of Self-Expression Looks a Lot Like a Mistake to Me

“Look at that guy,” my son whispered to me as we passed a heavily tattooed man with enormous gauges in his ears, piercings on his lips, nose, and eyebrows, and a blue Mohawk. Part of me wanted to respond with, “Wow! What a freak show!” But the mechanism in my brain that keeps me from blurting out things or swearing at bad drivers in front of my kids responded nonchalantly, “Yep, that sure is some blue hair, huh?”

CONTINUE READING HERE!

You Just Might Have a Teenager If . . .

Four of my six kids are teenagers. Do you understand the magnitude of that statement? I have FOUR TEENS in my house right now! FOUR! I think I deserve a medal for that. Or a nap. Yes, a nap would be nice. Don’t get me wrong, I love my kids. I absolutely love the goofiness of them, but it’s almost like parenting toddlers all over again. Maybe they no longer melt down if I do something as evil as putting ketchup on their hotdogs, or making them wear shoes when we go to the store, but they certainly have unexplained moodiness and attitudes that occasionally make me wonder if they had lobotomies when I wasn’t looking.

CONTINUE READING HERE!

Who Promised Us We Could "Have It All?"

I read a piece written by Babble’s Suzanne Jannese, Jennifer Garner Nails What’s Wrong with the Work-Family Balance in America. In it, she makes the point that society still expects the woman to do all the juggling and compromising needed to raise a family while dad can go about his business of bringing home the bacon with little worry about childcare and running a household. I understand what she’s saying. Families have changed over the years, but attitudes about roles within the family haven’t kept up. I get it. She makes some valid points in her article. What I don’t get is this – who ever said that having a family would be easy? Where do we get the idea that we are all inherently entitled to balance? Why is juggling and compromise seen as a bad thing? Why do people believe they deserve to “have it all?”

CONTINUE READING HERE!