I'm beat, but I'm going to be rich.

Today has me dead beat tired. I went to bed kind of late last night and Jason was up before daylight wanting to change his pajamas 5 times before 7:30 AM. When I finally got myself out of bed, I found Rachel in her crib with 77 books (I counted) that her brother kindly put in there, the Christmas tree was plugged in downstairs, and a piece of the nightstand from the kid's room was on the kitchen floor. I'm not sure if that all happened before or after the sun came up. I don't know what I'm going to do with this kid. I've been given a recommendation to bribe him with hot chocolate in the morning if he goes to bed, but I don't think it's possible to reason with this kid. I know he understands things, but he's really good at giving blank stares and pretending he doesn't understand.

This lack of sleep has not affected my ability to think though. I've come up with a great new product for parents that can be sold at Babies 'R Us. So what do you think of baby crib barbed wire? I don't believe it's on the market yet because I Googled it and nothing came up. I think it would sell really well. I'm thinking $10.99 per package. I'm a little busy now, so I think I'll start on a prototype in 2009. When it finally gets accepted for retail, the product could come with a free trial sized Mederma. The premium version will be electrified and that will sell for $19.99. I love my idea. Which one would you buy?

I'm going to get rich. You watch!

Now meet our bear family:

My sister likes to give us bears for Christmas in the years that we have babies which has been every year of our marriage except for 2003 and 2007. We have a Mama, a Papa and 5 babies. I'm expecting another one this year. 4 of the baby bears have the year we received them written on their paw. The kids love to get them out every year and find the year that they were born. Bradley is disappointed that his 2002 bear is a girl. And Sarah's disappointed that her bear doesn't have a year and is wearing pants. Picky! Picky! But I think I might have to complain too about Mama bear having a stain on her cheek, probably the result of infant spit up in Christmas past.

I thought I might introduce you to my Christmas decorations in the upcoming days. I love looking at them and thought you might too. I love Christmas!