The War on Christmas

I am a Christian.

I have been saved by the blood and sacrifice of Jesus Christ. He died for our sins so that we may have eternal life through the heavenly Father.

As Christians, I believe it’s our duty to bring others to Christ by sharing the gospel and by praising our Lord.

I do not, however, believe that freaking out about a stupid red coffee cup is going to entice our fellow man to come to Christ.

My husband was the first one to tell me about the whole “Starbucks is starting a war on Christmas” thing. He actually landed on the side of boycotting Starbucks for taking Christ out of Christmas. (I think he’s being silly. He tends to let himself get all hyped up over the most ridiculous things. That being said, I’m still quite fond of him.)

Okay, people. Let me start off by saying that I didn’t even realize Starbucks’ “annual holiday cup” is a thing. I like Starbucks as much as the next weary caffeine-addict, but I don’t buy it enough to consider myself a Starbucks connoisseur.

So, after reading about all the hatred that’s being spewed at Starbucks by these “Christians”, I’ve come to my own conclusions.

Conclusion #1 : It’s a freaking cup. A paper cup that’s filled with over-priced, over-sugared coffee. After you enjoy your beloved Pumpkin Spice latte, you’re going to throw the dang thing in the trash anyways.

Conclusion #2 : After doing some research, I discovered that the holiday cups of years past have typically been decorated with snowflakes, reindeer, Christmas trees, and the like. Now, I wasn’t under the impression that Rudolph was a symbol of Christianity, but apparently some folks think he is.

Conclusion #3 : Oh yeah…. IT’S A FREAKING CUP.

The fact that these people are going crazy over Starbucks’ new minimalistic cup design blows my mind. Is this what our society has come to? We’re offended that a coffee cup is plain red instead of decorated with winter-themed items?

I bet these morons never even stopped to think that this kind of crap is exactly why so many people are turning away from the church. This is exactly why my faith and what I believe in is being ridiculed and trampled on, and that pisses me off a lot more than a cup. The “Starbucks Christians” are giving actual Christians a bad name.

Oh, and the #MerryChristmasStarbucks movement is beyond stupid. If I ever see anybody telling their Christmas-hating barista that their name is “Merry Christmas”, I’m going to laugh in their face.

I swear, 2015 is going to be remembered as the year we were offended by EVERYTHING.

Excuse me, I ordered a helping of Autumn.

Ahhhh….hello, November. Lovely to see you again.

It would be even more lovely if you actually *felt* like November. And by that, I mean if you didn’t bring thunderstorms and tornadoes with you. No tornadoes please, I’d rather have the brisk, cold air and the color-changing “leaf magic show” (as Stink calls it). Yesterday, we spent all day under a tornado watch that was actually upgraded to a warning in the afternoon. There was a tornado in Fort Worth that ripped the roof off of a big office building. It was scary, but made for a great viral video. (Seriously, four news channels were showing the same video over and over. You’d think we Texans have never seen a roof flying through the air. Pfft. We’re used to it.)

For once, I’m glad that October is over. Usually I love October and Halloween, but this year I was pretty indifferent about the whole thing. For one thing, my kiddos were with my ex-husband the weekend of Halloween, so I didn’t even get to see them in their costumes. This was also the first year that I didn’t take them trick-or-treating in their ENTIRE LIVES. (They actually didn’t even get to *go* trick-or-treating with my ex-husband. But that’s a story for another time.)

They did, however, look adorable.

Devynne’s angel costume actually belonged to my sister, who wore it when she was about eight. Since I’m thefavoritedaughter the oldest child, I have all of our childhood costumes. I think Stink’s lion costume belonged to my sis too….but nobody knows for sure. Apparantly, it just materialized in the costume box because nobody has any idea where it came from. And Nolan, in typical boy fashion, wanted to be something skeazy and scary.

We had a great time carving pumpkins. Stink requested a Jack Skellington pumpkin, since she’s OBSESSED with The Nightmare Before Christmas. Honestly, I have no idea where that came from. It’s not like *I* am obsessed with that movie or anything. Not like *I* have a giant tattoo of Sally on my left arm. O.O But I digress.

I carved her pumpkin for her, because her and sharp plastic tools did not sound like a good idea. Dev and Nolan each wanted to carve their own pumpkins for the first time, which they did, and they looked fantastic.

Fun Fact of the Day: When Nolan was about two, we discovered he was TERRIFIED of pumpkin guts. And I mean terrified. Like, scream like a banshee, burst into tears, and run like a maniac into his closet to hide. I still give him crap about that.