Caroling/Maxhell Christmas - MERGE

[VooDooChild]

Sorry, I can't find the quote feature to quote the actual sentence....

Can someone explain to me what the 12 days of Christmas have to do with working out? :shrug:

[FloraDoraDolly]

What most got me was that fugly man-plaid shirt with which Anna 'was gifted' and so proudly pleased wore in later snapshots. I like plaid as much as anyone but was sad to see 20-something Anna strapped into total coverage antisexywear.

Hey, that's how I used to dress back in the early 90s! :P

[anjulibai]

Steve certainly seems to favour Christopher's boy( can't think of his name) . Always lots of pics of those 2 together. It's either that or Sarah favours him since she is the photographer for these occasions.

Firstborn son and grandson - they're special to Steve - oops, I mean God.

[salex]

And to add a festive touch to it, they all took their shoes of. Is it a cultural thing? I really dislike all these family photos (in general) and the entire party have themselves photographed on their socks.....

I don't do it, but I know several families who don't wear shoes in their homes, to save the carpet. This may be even more common in winter.

[FloraKitty35]

Steve certainly seems to favour Christopher's boy( can't think of his name) . Always lots of pics of those 2 together. It's either that or Sarah favours him since she is the photographer for these occasions.

Joshua is the name of Christopher's son.

[Cartmann99]

My garage isn't heated, and I work out there. I'm a warm person and I overheat easily. (I did hot yoga once and it was hell!). I'd think lack of air conditioning would be worse. Then again, I live in the PNW and it doesn't get bitterly cold here often.

I think it would be OOT to build an exercise room if they already have something that works for them.

I'm pretty warm natured myself, but my garage would be too cold for me right now. You do of course warm up as you exert yourself, but I need it to be at least 60F in the room when I start. Also, my knees and ankles give me a hard time if I spend too much time on bare concrete. I guess it's a good thing I'm not a Maxwell! :)

I hear you on the air conditioning. I see people here running outside when it's over 100F and I don't know how they do it.

[SPHASH]

As soon as I come home I can't wait to take off my shoes and my pants.

And my bra and put on a t-shirt.

[salex]

Does anyone know if their garage is heated? Also, if exercise is so important to their family, why not add on an exercise room to their house? If they kept it simple, it wouldn't be that expensive to do. :think:

It looks to me that they are working out in their basement/warehouse which is likely heated and cooled. I suspect that they may have other equipment that is not shown, to keep the frugal fitness image. They may not finish a room in the basement because of either zoning (no escape routes) or because finished basement rooms can add to tax costs.

The 12 Days of Christmas workout is all over the internet... there are many variations of something like this...

[shedemei]

Not wearing shoes in the house was considered unusual and the mark of being a neat freak when I was growing up in Philadelphia, unless you were from a far east Asian family, in which case it was understood as a normal cultural thing.

As an adult, still living on the east coast, I stopped wearing shoes in the house because I thought it was gross. Think of what you step on outside all day. Do you really want to track that onto your carpet?

Here in the Pacific Northwest in the US, taking off your shoes at the door is the default and most of the people I know would be unhappy if you didn't. Some of that may be due to cultural influence from the Asian population, but it's so wet here that it's just common sense to not want to track mud all over your floors.

My fiance and I both ditch our shoes immediately when we enter someone's house back east because it's the polite thing to do for us and it feels weird to me to wear shoes in the house. I think his brother is used to it, but others almost certainly consider it weird.

[uber frau]

I think the shoe thing has been discussed before. IIRC (and I may not so take it with a pinch of salt), it got to about a 5 on the Peanut Butter scale.

Two things:

John and Christina seem to be the only ones who have a genuine smile. The others seem pasted on.

The picture with John and Anna and Joseph and Elissa looks like two married couples. I'm sure John and Anna are pretty close, but the way they pose together always seems odd. They're deprived of real friendships outside of their sib set and it shows. It's like all the emotional investment that would be spread around a group of friends gets channelled into one person. I don't know how to explain it but it seems weird.

[Jana814]

Steve certainly seems to favour Christopher's boy( can't think of his name) . Always lots of pics of those 2 together. It's either that or Sarah favours him since she is the photographer for these occasions.

I have noticed that too! Yet r their pictures of Steve & Drew together.

[danvillebelle]

As soon as I come home I can't wait to take off my shoes and my pants.

Shoes, pants and bra, OFF. The trifecta of comfort.

[usmcmom]

Not sure who else has mentioned it (sorry) but I also give Sarah a pass on the headbands. I know several women around her age that wear them (some are even mothers) and some of them actually wear them down on the forehead - kind of like a flower child in the 70's I think; and that's even worse, in my opinion. Anyway, the Maxwell girls have no frame of reference for what's "in" for different aged women. They surely aren't allowed to read magazines or browse catalogs. They don't look at Pinterest, I'm sure. Those headbands are probably sold by some Christian woman on etsy or something and that makes them acceptable. They probably are thrilled when Steve allows anything extra and "girly."

It seems to me that Elissa wears the same couple of skirts all the time. In all the pre-wedding photos, she seemed to have a pretty extensive and fun wardrobe. I think she has very few items that are approved by Steve and is having to make do with the one or two items that pass inspection. We'll soon see her in much different clothes than she wore as a single girl, I think. I wonder how often she will get to see her family. Steve doesn't seem like he will allow her much contact. It's very sad.

I wish we could have seen some of the kids' presents in this post. That's one of the most fun parts of Christmas - seeing children with their new toys.

[SolomonFundy]

Sarah's headband is probably mandated by Steve. It's a beflowered mental chastity belt.

I see no issue with Anna's plaid, though. I'd wear the hell out of that shirt.

[bionicmlle]

Sarah's just bad at expressing herself.

In their current house they have space to hang a banner. When they first moved in, Steve got one from Joseph. Since then he has gotten a new banner every now and then (every Christmas, maybe? idk) to replace the old one.

Thank you for translating. I find that I don't speak fluent Sarah. Could you translate the bit about the singing? I don't know who, exactly, was singing. Here it is:

On our visit to our friends Christmas day, we sang carols, and they also sang their Merry Christmas rendition, much to everyone’s joy!

[anjulibai]

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I have noticed that too! Yet r their pictures of Steve & Drew together.

You know I haven't actually noticed any.

And then I thought about it and I don't remember many pictures of Steve holding babies. Maybe he doesn't like holding them?

[Paperplate]

Thank you for translating. I find that I don't speak fluent Sarah. Could you translate the bit about the singing? I don't know who, exactly, was singing. Here it is:

:lol: :lol: :lol:

Maybe being a non-native speaker, I'm more used to interpreting the speech/writing of people who are somewhat challenged when it comes to English?

What I think she meant was that the Maxwells sang to "the elderly" "their friends" and then "their friends" sang a song (or songs; I assume they sang "We wish you a Merry Christmas") to the Maxwells.

[Paperplate]

I'm interested to see if we'll see more pics with Sarah in them now that she "was gifted" with that remote. More publicity for her!

[WonderingInWA]

I'm giving them a pass on buying the used Weber bbq and the used smoker. Both are expensive items to purchase new and if the recipients aren't offended at being gifted something used, the gifters should be able to do that. They are both nice gifts and like cars, don't need to be purchased brand new if they are in good used condition.

As for working out in the garage/basement, I recall Steve talking about building a wood-burning furnace down there when they were building the house. I'm guessing the garage/basement probably ends up being warmed by that at least by default, right? I can't stand to sweat, so the colder the workout room the better for me, so I would welcome a cool garage/basement. The skirts are ridiculous, though.

The little kids looked like they all had a good time. It must have been chaotic and exhausting for all, but it's nice they can get their entire family together. At least when they're together in their own home it means they aren't out accosting others!!

[Marian the Librarian]

FJ Proofreading Services^TM to the rescue once again! The comma that originally appeared thusly:

and a lone, present sat waiting to be opened.

has magically disappeared. :lol:

Stevie, would it kill you to acknowledge how often we bound-for-hell heathens have improved the grammar, spelling and punctuation level of Tits2??? Just sayin'...

[latraviata]

And my bra and put on a t-shirt.

So do I but I am not displaying a picture like that on the internet. Nor do I throw a party, family gathering or whatever and force everybody to take their shoes off or don't wear shoes myself.

I couldn't care less about having clean floors. In my neck of the woods, one doesn't ask a visitor/guest to take their shoes off, it is a big no no. In short, we keep our shoes on.

[DutchMommy]

I couldn't care less about having clean floors. In my neck of the woods, one doesn't ask a visitor/guest to take their shoes off, it is a big no no. In short, we keep our shoes on.

Yes, I agree.

The only people I ask to take their shoes off when they come to my house, are my kids and their playdates.

Maybe it's a Dutch thing.

[MamaJunebug]

So do I but I am not displaying a picture like that on the internet....

Don't be forgettin' the ill-fitting dentures. Before she died, my friend would get home from her very demanding job, kick off the shoes, pull off the bra and pull out the dentures. Then and only then could she relax. I miss her but I love the thought of her gettin' comfy.

Back to shoeless-vs.-shoes. I'd love to have a shoe-free home, but at my age many of my friends are in orthopedic shoes and to ask them to remove them would be not only impolite and inconvenient but dangerous and painful to them. Surely the Maxhellions don't expect any of The Elderly to kick off the old New Balance with orthotics!

MtL, great point about the FJ School Of Grammar And Punctuation. Would it be too smug to suggest that we get screen caps of their flubs, to be shown side-by-side with their later, cleaned-up versions?

As to Poor Sarah's writing, especially the sentence(s) about their "friends" (they do have friends!!! They do!) singing their version of Merry Christmas -- here's what I think happened.

Poor Sarah's initial draft was probably accurate and along these lines: "We sang to them and then they responded with their version of 'We With You A Merry Christmas,' which was so nice." But in pre-publication review, Stevo determined that "'We With You A Merry Christmas" is far too unreligious for delicate Maxhellion ears, and that if word got out that the inmates clan actually listened to such worldliness, sales would suffer.

So Stevo changed it to the garble we all saw and didn't quite understand. I'm a native English speaker and monolingual and *I* didn't get it the first time I read it, either! :pink-shock:

[Maggie Mae]

I think the shoe thing has been discussed before. IIRC (and I may not so take it with a pinch of salt), it got to about a 5 on the Peanut Butter scale.

It was on Yuku.

http://www.donotlink.com/d3vi (I used donotlink because the yuku permalink was a bunch of numbers. Let me know if it doesn't work)

I almost gave up looking for it when I realized the Yuku search engine didn't work. (Un)Fortunately I remembered a few phrases and names of the posters who were most engaged in the discussion.

Personally I don't think it needs to be so black or white. We ask people to take off their shoes (as do most people in my region.) If they don't want to take them off, they wear their shoes. Most people don't care that much. I go everywhere with the expectation that I might need/want to remove my shoes/boots. It's a matter of practicality. No one wants mud/dirt/snow/water tracked all over their floors.

[latraviata]

Yes, I agree.

The only people I ask to take their shoes off when they come to my house, are my kids and their playdates.

Maybe it's a Dutch thing.

Not even my children nor their friends.