Top Ten Worst Christmas Songs Ever

So, my friend Katie inspired me to write this post. Yesterday she listed some of the worst Christmas songs ever written. I thought it was such a funny post because Alan and I have been making a similar mental list for years now. So, this post might be somewhat of a rip-off of Katie's post (sorry, Katie), but we will add some more insights as well.

10. "Santa, Buddy," as sung by Michael Buble--I really like Michael Buble's Christmas album, but this song is just trying too hard to be witty.

9. "The 12 Days of Christmas"--As my brother says, this song is only sung because someone needs to fill up the last 20 minutes of a Christmas album.

8. "Christmas Time is Here" (the opening song on Charlie Brown's Christmas)--Is this song supposed to make me feel happy inside? It actually has the opposite effect.

7. "The Friendly Beasts"--The only recording I have actually ever heard of this song is on the Brian Stokes Mitchell/Tabernacle Choir Christmas album from a few years ago, but I guess I don't appreciate the animal impersonations. Watch the video here.

6. "The Little Drummer Boy/Peace on Earth," as sung by the Dynamic Duo Bing Crosby and David Bowie--If you have heard this, you will know what I mean. Also, a lyric flaw: what do newborns like better than to have a loud, annoying drum banging in their ears?

5. "Hey, Santa"--We hate this song mostly because they leave out the "t" in Santa. "Hey, Sanna! Hey, Sanna!"

4. "Simply Having a Wonderful Christmas Time"--Love ya, John Lennon, but this song just has a totally lame sound to it.

3. "Grown-up Christmas List"--While I appreciate the good intentions this song has, it is sooooooo cheesy.

2. "Last Christmas I Gave You my Heart"--Nothing captures the Christmas spirit quite like a self-pitying break-up song.

And the #1 Worst Christmas Song Ever is....

"Christmas Shoes"--Why isn't the little kid in this song home with his/her dying mother instead of at the store buying new shoes for her that she will never wear? This is a terrible song--such cheesy sentimental nonsense.

Honorable mentions:

• "My Favorite Things"--I don't actually hate this song (I rather like it), but who decided that it was a Christmas song?
• The Charlie Brown theme, "Linus and Lucy"--ditto
• "Do You Hear What I Hear?"--There is a major flaw with a few of the lyrics in this song. "A Child, a Child, shivers in the cold," and what should we do to remedy this unfortunate situation? I know, "Let us bring Him silver and gold!" Yeah, that ought to do the trick! Forget about the blankets!
• "Little Saint Nick," a song by the Beach Boys, contains the lyrics, "Christmas comes this time each year" over and over again. Very insightful, Beach Boys.
• Alan's personal favorite stupid lyrics come from the song "A Marshmallow World" (although we like the song in general). At one point the song says, "And the sun is red like a pumpkin head." As far as we can tell, there are three major flaws with this sentence: 1) No, the sun is NOT red. 2) Pumpkins aren't red, either. Not usually, anyway. 3) What on earth is a pumpkin head?

Feel free to add any others we have missed to our comments. :)

Preschool Christmas Program

Cute preschool nativity

Getting Santa hats on

The three wise men

I love being able to go to Jared's preschool programs. I just about burst my buttons over how dang cute he is! Seriously. I love him so much!

This post has a bajillion videos that probably not very many of my readers will be interested in, but I know Jared will want to watch them over and over again!

Festival of Trees

The movie Up! seemed to be popular this year. Here's a tree...


...and a gingerbread house

Alan and I have loved going to the Festival of Trees with other members of my family every year, but this year Alan wasn't able to come because of a deadline he had at work. I took some pictures of my favorite trees and gingerbread houses for Alan and brought him home one of their delicious cinnamon-sugar scones as a consolation prize.

Peanuts tree

A very classy Mickey and Minnie tree, complete with Minnie bedroom furniture

Heat Miser and Snow Miser from The Year Without a Santa Claus--a holiday classic I grew up with

Cool log cabin

This was supposed to be the Weasley's house

Tangled gingerbread house, complete with Rapunzel and Flint dangling from her hair

December Fun

I took the kids to the Aquarium on the free day they had there. We got there right when it opened, but it was still crazy busy! We enjoyed it, though, and we had fun with our friends the Griffins.

Jared and his friend Bronte. They are the same size as adult penguins!

Jared loved the pool where you could touch the rays.

Playing in the caves

Maggie came to the aquarium, too. She spent most of the time telling me she wanted to get out of the stroller, and I spent most of the time trying to sneak her some snacks so that she'd be happy to stay in it.

We have sort of started a tradition of buying a gingerbread house kit and making it (this was our 2nd year). Jared wanted to do the gingerbread village this year.

And here is our finished product:

Just kidding. I took a picture of this village at the Festival of Trees this year. I wish ours could look this good! Here is our real end product:

Rather than trying to get it to look beautiful, we let Jared be in charge of the decorating after Alan did the assembling. It made Jared's day!

Thanksgiving

Mike is doing this face on purpose, of course. Sorry to those who didn't make it in the picture!

Better late than never, right?

This year we had a great Thanksgiving at my brother and sister-in-law's house. Shell did such an awesome job decorating, complete with cornucopias made from ice cream cones and stuffed with candy. All the food was delicious! It was so fun to be with my family, especially my dad, who had been so sick the week of Thanksgiving that he wasn't sure if he was going to be able to come. We are glad everyone made it.

I love this picture of two of my favorite people.

Jared quote

A few days ago, Jared came up to me with a serious face and said, "Mommy, what does alcohol taste like?" I said, "Well, Jared, I don't know what it tastes like because I've never had it. Remember that we aren't supposed to drink alcohol because of the Word of Wisdom?"

Then, Jared got this sly look on his face and said, "It tastes like liquiiiiiid gooooold!!"

We can thank the movie Fantastic Mr. Fox for that one.

Jared's Halloween Program

This year Maggie and I went to Jared's little Halloween parade and program that he did with his preschool. I have recorded a few of the songs he sang below. (He is such a CUTE kid!) I think the best part is that he knows all the words, but he seems to be a little slow to do all the actions. It's hilarious.

Curtis Halloween

We had a totally awesome time at our annual Curtis Halloween party. This party has probably been going on for seven or eight years. This year we had time to play games, eat delicious food, carve our pumpkins, and (my favorite) sing pumpkin carols. Our family has a repertoire of about ten or eleven Halloween songs that we sing every year together. (How many of you can boast such a thing?!!) The list includes the famous "I'm a Mean Old Witch with a Hat," which was written by my dad's sister (not kidding), as well as several songs made up by my maternal grandmother (but not famous outside our family). We also sing songs like "Have You Seen the Ghost of John?" and "There is a Haunted House in Town." See the first video below for a sampling of our singing talents...

Jared and his pumpkin made from stickers

My nephew was an Angry Bird--so funny! Sorry the picture is blurry.

My cute mom and oldest brother

Our pumpkin is the top right. It was a skeleton wearing a top hat with a cat next to him.

Stout Halloween

This year we had our third annual Stout Halloween Party. A lot of work goes into this party. There are neat decorations, delicious food, and well-thought-out costumes, not to mention an awesome Spook Alley put on by Alan's youngest siblings and cousins (who aren't so young anymore, I might add.)

(I must apologize to Mandy for this picture)

We didn't get pictures of everyone (I put Alan in charge of the picture taking...), but here are a few of the brilliant costumes.

I get to take all the credit for the idea of going as polygamists. We have to thank three of Alan's sisters for making our idea more complete. It just wouldn't have been the same without my three sister wives.

Brad Pitt, Angelina Jolie, and their Black baby

Mrs. White from Clue

Runner and Mechanic

Mason went as the guy from "Better Off Dead"

Maggie the frog

We anxiously await next year's party!!!

First Wife

Happy Halloween from my family to yours.

Family Pictures Preview

So, I have lots of Halloween pictures to post, but I haven't loaded them on my computer yet. Instead, you get a taste of what our family pictures will look like this year. I had my amazing friend Cindy take them for me. She was sooooooo patient despite the meltdowns that Maggie was having every 10 minutes. Cindy is so sweet. She won't let me pay her since she's not very experienced (not like I can tell--they look wonderful to me!), but I will babysit for her for HOURS to make up for it.

I'll start with some of my favorites (although I haven't cropped or enhanced them at all yet) and then maybe post a few outtakes. Unfortunately, I deleted some of the most hilarious outtakes (they were wretched!) , but you can still get the idea. We did not get a single good picture of just Jared and Maggie together.

Unfortunately, this very well might be the best family picture we got. I guess it's semi-decent.

I'm trying soooooooo hard to learn to not crinkle my nose in pictures...

OUTTAKES:

Not sure what Jared's scowling at...