Catching up with Christmas, part 1

I got so behind in blogging before and during Christmas, that I'm trying to go back now and post a few short updates with pictures.  In the week leading up to Christmas, Laura & George came over one Sunday afternoon and we finally celebrated a belated St. Nick's Day with them.  One of the gifts Laura got from St. Nick was a "Christmas Ween," pictured below with the other two Murdoch weenies, Julius and Max.

While the guys watched football, mom, Laura, and I spent the day baking in the kitchen.  We made all sorts of Christmas cookies that we ended up eating in mass quantities or giving away to neighbors and co-workers. 

Bradley helped out with the sugar cookies.  I was expecting this to be an entertaining experience for him.  Instead it turned out more of an obligation for a photo op, as he didn't have the want or the patience to cut out the cookies or even to decorate them.  So maybe next year he will have more fun with this.  Also, Bradley was fighting a nasty cold and he didn't feel well, so that explains why he looks so sickly in all of these pictures!

I was quite pleased with my cookie tray that I took in to work: 

A goofy shot of me, George, and Laura in our Santa hats

Dad and Stockwell catching a cat nap.  Somebody should really tell Stockwell that he weighs sixty-something pounds and is not a lap dog!

We got too busy on Christmas day to get another picture of us all in front of the tree, so this serves as our Christmas photo of the year. 

 

And of course we had to get one shot with all of us!

Merry Christmas from the Bradley-Vilendrer-Murdochs!

Purse pouting

I recall back in my early twenties I acquired a growing purse collection.  I would actually change purses daily to match the season and my outfit.  Those days are long gone!  When Bradley came along, gone were the days of buying and carrying new bags.  I kept the same purse for months at a time, and added a diaper bag to tote.  I told myself it wasn't forever- that soon Bradley would be out of diapers, and I wouldn't have to haul an extra bag wherever I went.  But just like that sneaky half-truth they tell you about drinking alcohol when you're pregnant ("it's just for 9 months!"  Well, NO, it's not... not if you plan on nursing for a year!), the elusive promise of ditching the diaper bag is a bunch of crap.  I'm just trying to prepare you future moms, and tell it like it is, because after the days of the diaper bag, you are still hauling in sippy cups, toddler-sized silverware to restaurants (do any restaurants provide this?  I've yet to find any that do), plus toys, books, games, snacks- anything to keep your little one occupied while you shop, eat, run errands, or what have you.  And you can just forget about clutches or any bag without a strap big enough to sling over your shoulder.  When you're carrying a kid, and all their stuff, you need all hands on deck.  And on deck ain't on that stylish clutch purse!

A Repurposed Frame of Mind

This week Brian and I had mediation where we signed all the papers, and settled our divorce.  In a few weeks, it will be final.  As a new year has come I am filled with questions of how this new year will go, and how different it will be.  Right now I'm picking up the pieces of my old life and trying to start a new one.

I have this silver frame that we got as a wedding present.  I really love this frame.  In it used to showcase one of my favorite wedding photos of me and Brian.  Tonight I have symbolically taken out the wedding picture, and in its place I plan to frame one of my 30th birthday cards- one that has a cartoon picture of a beauty queen on it that proclaims "Viva La Diva!"  But as poetic justice would have it, when I took the old wedding photo out of the frame, a large piece of the photo paper has been residually left behind.  So tonight I got out the Goo Gone, and set out to clean the glass so that I could re-use the frame.

How appropriate, I thought ironically as I scrubbed the paper shards off the glass, that I am replacing the old wedding picture with a proclamation of my singledom.  As I scraped the glass with the Goo Gone and a paint scraper I was also reminded of a conversation Brian and I had with our pastor Brother Dennis in what seems like ages ago.  He was talking to us about the importance of the vows of marriage, and how when two people marry, their lives are glued together.  He analogized that when they get divorced, the two pieces of wood are torn apart, but the wood doesn't split neatly.  It splinters.  And some of your life is irrevocably connected to theirs, and little pieces of their life are irrevocably connected to yours.  And the splintering of the wood is painful.

Just like my picture frame; I can take the wedding photo out, and put in a new picture, but pieces of the old photo are stuck on the glass of the frame.  So with a little elbow grease, I will clean the glass, and perhaps in the right light you still might be able to see the outline of the old picture, but that's okay with me.  Or maybe there will be faint scratches on the glass from the paint scraper- evidence of the scars left behind, but it won't take away from the cheerfulness of the Diva birthday card encased in that silver frame now.

It's going to take some hard work and scrubbing, even now the Goo Gone is soaking on the glass, but I believe I can repurpose that frame, and make it house something beautiful once again. So that's what I plan on doing, both with that frame, and with my own life.

Christmas week recap

I have gotten so far behind in blogging that I fear I will never catch up.  The week of Christmas, here was my agenda:

Tuesday- Garth Brooks concert with former Penthouse Pets, Rhonda Lu and Emmy Sue

Wednesday- work a half day and pick Conley up from the airport.  Lunch at Chuy's, the beginning of mutant virus aka hoarseness and a severe sore throat

Thursday- drive up to Clarksville and have lunch with Conley and her parents, and said goodbye to her.

Friday- Christmas Eve- Christmas Eve service at church.  I bribed Bradley with the promise of getting to open a present when we got home in exchange for good behavior at church.  I was so hoarse I literally couldn't get any notes out, forcing me to sit and listen to everyone else sing Christmas carols.  Bradley got to open a present at home- a Jessie doll from Toy Story.  They've been inseperable since.

Christmas Eve night- Heather, Jacob, Angie, and Clarinda came over for dinner.  Laura and mom cooked a fabulous dinner- filet, green bean casserole, potatoes, and salad.  Heather & Jacob were responsible for bringing the communion:  bread and wine!  We also had an amazing dessert spread of homemade cookies and cookie bars.  We ended the evening with a $5 Dirty Santa gift exchange.  The Poolar Bear will go down in Dirty Santa history, thanks to Jacob.

Christmas Day- Bradley was super excited to open his door and see the toys from Santa under the tree.  His favorite toys that he's carried around nonstop since Christmas are the Jessie, Buzz Lightyear, and Woody dolls from Toy Story.  We spent a relaxing day at home, playing with toys, and lounging around.  Christmas breakfast was noteworthy- I made monkey bread, Laura made a spinach and bacon quiche, and mom made a hashbrown casserole.  It was just enough food, and great mix between sweet and savory.  George got a toy helicopter that Oscar enjoyed chasing and barking at, and George enjoyed flying.

The 26th and 27th we went to Indiana, and the 28th and 29th were spent in Florida.

I went back to work on the 30th, and so I opted to stay in for new year's eve last night, and was in bed snuggling with Bradley by 10:30 p.m.  No use in staying up to midnight when you've got a little one who's up at 6 a.m.

So there's the fastest recap ever.  I got a new camera so I now need to upload all the pictures and catch up there.  Happy 2011!

December Snapshot

The lazy girl's guide to a blog post: a collage of pictures from the past few weeks: enjoy!

Two and a half

On Tuesday, December 7th, Bradley was officially halfway through the terrible twos!  I have a 2 1/2 year old now.  This really hit home for me when I realized last night that on his next birthday he will be 3.  A 3 year old??  Where has the time gone?

Well, on Tuesday, my little two-and-a-half year old did something that melted my heart.  As I was giving him his hug at daycare and about to leave to go to work, he said, "I love you mommy."  Of course he has said this to me before, repeating it after me, but he has never said it to me out of the blue like that and on his own accord.  He said it again to me tonight, so it wasn't just a fluke.

When they're babies you wait so long for them to finally be able to say "mama" and then you secretly cannot wait until the day they tell you they love you.  That day has finally come for me, and I am over the moon about it.

St. Nick's Day

To the 2% of the population who know what this holiday is and celebrate it, Hope you've had a wonderful St. Nicholas Day.  I tried explaining what St. Nick's Day was to Bradley on our way to daycare this morning, and he thought we would be going to Nicholas' house!  I think maybe he got the hang of it tonight when we discovered what St. Nick had left in each of our stockings.  This was his face as we brought him his stocking tonight!

 Showing Mommy his new Elmo ornament

 Even the dogs know they get something on their stockings on St. Nick's Day- here they are waiting for their treats to be unwrapped.

 Bradley and I with our stockings

 Bradley with Grandma B & Papa...

ps- the secret to getting him to smile in these pictures? He has candy in his mouth!!!

I am on track to making this a good Christmas for us this year.  I can't spend a ton of money, but I'm making sure the gifts I do buy are thoughtful and not just haphazard purchases.  Bradley can sing most of Jingle Bells and Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer, and he knows who all the characters of the manger scene are.  Even though he's little, I'm trying to make sure he understands that while Santa Claus is fun, it's not what Christmas is all about.  Plus when I have my down days during this holiday season I remember the true meaning of Christmas myself, and realize I have so much to be thankful for.

Bye Bye Obligatory Blogging

In the past 30 days I have blogged every single day (except one).  I've turned 30, seen the 7th Harry Potter movie twice, celebrated Thanksgiving, read Hp7, read the books of Acts, Romans, 1 & 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, and tonight will be Colossians, as part of the Daily Walk challenge.  Bradley had his first trip to Chuckie Cheese, and saw Santa Claus, and fellow Brentwood High alums mourned the passing of the great history teacher, Sarah Bayrd, We've laughed, we've cried, it was better than Cats- but now it's over!  I am looking forward to spending my evenings doing Internet shopping or wrapping Christmas presents instead of blogging every single night.  I am still bothered by the fact that I missed that one Friday evening that Rhonda Lu and I went out, but this has been a great exercise for me in discipline of writing.  Now if only I could blog for a living, I would be set!

The Penultimate Post of NaBloPoMo

One of my favorite words I learned in college was the word penultimate, or, in plain English, second-to-last.  Being a music major, we were always discussing the penultimate measure in a piece of music, usually to try and pinpoint the cadence chord that ended the piece.  But technical speak aside, this is my second-to-last, or penultimate post for the month of November- Hooray!

I have really strived to find a variety of topics about which to blog, but tonight, I'll come back to an old standard of mine:  what's Bradley up to these days???

Physically:  He's a solid 34 pounds, but don't ask me how many inches tall he is- I forget.  The Buddah belly is still very much in place, and he wears a size 6-7 shoe, and a 2T in clothing. 

Mentally- the kid is smart.  Yes, I know, every mom thinks that about her child, well, so do I.  He recalls songs we sang a month ago, or hears a Bible story one time at church, and then is able to summarize it for me albeit very shortly, when we get home.  I get a sheet sent home that has the Bible story on it, so I know if he's on target or not.  He has several books "memorized" and can repeat verbatim phrases of the pages to me, and what he doesn't know word for word, he's pretty darn close.  He knows his numbers and shapes and colors, and recognizes most of his letters.  We have taught him the answers to such questions as, "Who was the first president of the United States?" "How do you pronounce the capital of Kentucky- is it Loo-uh-vul or Loo-ee-ville?" (it's Frankfurt), and my favorite, "Who is the president right now?"  (His answer:  Barack O-Mama!!!!!!)

Verbally- he talks very clearly, has a large vocabulary, and sings songs all the time.  He comes home singing songs he learned at daycare, and just recently he has even started making his own songs up.  This makes Songbird Mama happy.

What he's into: Toy Story 2 right now- especially Buzz Light Year and Jessie.  He still has the attention span of a fruit fly, so he's constantly moving from thing to thing, and is resisting our nightly reading time right now (please, Lord, let this be a phase!). 

Favorite phrases:  "I can't!"  "What's that sound?"  "I want to go to Target to buy some Nerds."   Also recently he has cracked us up telling us he's "ready to rock and roll," and referring to anyone else in the room as "guys."

As we approach 2 1/2 I can see the ebb and flow of the terrible twos.  One week will be awful, the next will be fine.  Right now Bradley is whining and crying over the slightest thing that doesn't go his way (again, please Lord, let this phase pass quickly), but also for the longest time over the past few months his sleeping pattern was erratic, and that has calmed down over the past month, so for that I'm grateful.  I continue to chant the mantra "everything is a phase," and try to hang on and enjoy the ride.

Sittin' Stone-faced with Santa

Yesterday we braved the mall to take Bradley to get his picture taken with Santa.  After this experience I can now say with certainty that of all the wonderful things Bradley is, what he is Not is photogenic!  After a tearful, terrible twos morning, I dressed Bradley in this handsome outfit to have his picture take with Santa.  He looks handsome, and also, less than thrilled!  I swear, it's not that he's a solemn child, he just photographs that way!

Round One:  we make it onto Santa's lap.  (Cool Springs Galleria Santa is creepy, by the way.  He has a pony tail behind his fake Santa hair, and a creepy fake-tooth looking smile.)  He's about the unfriendliest Santa too.  He didn't speak to the child unless spoken to, and all during the photo process had a plastered smile upon his face, immune to whatever the child was doing, or not doing as it was in our case. 

There Bradley sat.  Not scared and screaming the way some kids were, but not smiling and excited either.  He just sat there, stone faced and comatose, while me, mom and dad, and the photographer all took turns making fools of ourselves trying to elicit one single smile from Bradley's face.  Meanwhile sat Santa, with his frozen grin.

Here we are, for posterity's sake in front of the Santa sign.

After trying and failing, with no good pictures, I decided to give up and come back another time, but darned if that kid didn't give me the widest grins imaginable afterwards while we were fishing out fruit snacks to give him!  Daunted by the chore of doing this all over again another time, finding another day and time, getting Bradley dressed up and waiting in another long line, was overwhelming.  Suddenly there was a break in the crowd, and very few kids were now waiting in line to see Santa. 

Round Two.  We get back in line.  Bradley makes friends with a 3 year old boy behind us, and is all smiles... until we get back on Santa's lap.  This time, we get a quasi-grin, and this I'll take to avoid going through this all over again.

 So my adorable child refuses to smile for the camera.  That's okay.  A model he's not.  If you ask him about the whole experience he will tell you quite happily that he got to see Santa Claus.  Oh, and for the record, he asked Santa for candy canes for Christmas.  He should be pretty easy to please come Christmas morning!

Ways to Laugh: Thanksgiving Thoughts

I was a guest blogger on my friend Bethany's blog this week.  She has a site called The Simple Day  that offers daily posts on simplifying different aspects of life.  I get the posts emailed to me every day, and have picked up some great recipes, and helpful hints around the house by reading her blog.

During the month of November, The Simple Day had guest writers offering their own thoughts on Thanksgiving.  You can read mine HERE .  The Huber side of the family will especially appreciate this, and what's even funnier is that all of the things I wrote about in this post were discussed around our own table at Thanksgiving with no prompting from me, since no one else had read this blog yet.

I feel that Thanksgiving is really the middle child of holidays, easily forgotten or squeezed in between Halloween and Christmas, and so I hope that everyone relished in their Thanksgiving, especially eating all the yummy leftovers, even amidst the Christmas decorations already up!

We came. We saw. We left.

We were some of the people who were out at 10 o'clock last night to go to Toys R Us when it opened.  Let me set the stage for you:  it was a dark and stormy (okay, rainy) night.  We had been through the ads, and knew what we were going for.  Dad and I had a plan.  Divide and conquer.  Get in, get out.  We weren't after the pricey gaming systems or electronics, so we were in no hurry to be the first ones in the store.  I just figured we'd go to Toys R Us that night and get a few things for Bradley while they were on sale, and while nothing else was open.  I guess therein lies the problem:  nothing else was open.

When we turned the corner into the Toys R Us parking lot and saw the bedlam, we laughed incredulously.  I didn't even attempt to park in their lot, and opted for the strip mall parking across the way.  I pulled out my umbrella and off we went.  A little after ten, people were still lined up outside the store to get in!  Some greedily clung to their shopping carts, as if they wouldn't get one upon entering the store.  Our jaws dropped as we continued back towards the end of the line, which we never saw, in the dark, in the rain, when we decided this was a ludicrous attempt, and to give up and go home.  Nothing I wanted to buy was worth this.  I have no idea how long it would have taken us to get in the store, much less check out.  It was a wasted trip.  You Thanksgiving shoppers are crazy- just CRAZY!  I do not include myself in the craziness because I didn't technically shop last night.  I wonder what Jesus must think of all this, I said to dad as we pulled out of the parking spot, while another car with its turn signal on waited for ours.

Happy Thanksgiving

Happy Thanksgiving!  Hope you and your family and friends have had a wonderful day!

Making punch with Papa

 An audience while preparing the turkey

 More filthy beggars

 My attempt at getting a smiling picture of Bradley in his Thanksiving t-shirt

 Self portrait

A trio of deserts:  pumpkin pie, pecan pie, & chocolate tart with raspberry sauce

Me and Bradley

Laura & her weenies

Akward family photo

Good family photo

Dad's new Facebook profile picture; at least it should be!

Alright, I'm off to put little man to bed, and head to Toys R Us at 10 o'clock to get some toys!

A few off color deer jokes

You know what you call a deer with no eyes?  No-eyed deer.


Know what you call a deer with no eyes and no legs?  Still no-eyed deer.


What about a deer with no eyes and no legs that's cut in two?  Still half no-eyed deer!

Deer hunting season opened this week.  I was talking to a guy at work who's an avid hunter, and I was telling him about the albino deer who used to live somewhere near our house when we lived in Brentwood.   With all the new houses being built near us, we were overrun with deer, and this one albino deer we saw on more than one occasion and even got a picture of it.

My coworker said that you aren't allowed to shoot albino deer.  Why not?, I asked.  Wouldn't you want to rid the population of the mutated species, so as not to further the mutation in future generations?

He agreed, and stated that if anything, you should be allowed to shoot the white deer simply to spare them since they aren't camouflaged in their surrounding.

Are you kidding? I replied.  A white deer in Brentwood totally blends in!  It's the brown deer who are out of place!

a Trying Tuesday

I am so thankful tomorrow is the last day of my work week.  One of my bosses is out this week, so I assumed incorrectly that I'd have a refreshingly light workload.  On the contrary, they are sending more work from home than I can handle and its worse than normal.  I am downhearted after having gotten myself geared up for an easy couple of days.

If I can be frank, besides being a hormonal woman right now, the upcoming holidays have also made me sad.  This was supposed to have been our year to be at home in Florida for Thanksgiving.  I would have been responsible for cooking everything, and would have stressed out over it, but I would have been proud to do so.  I would have opened up my home to anyone who didn't have a place to go, the way we did for Christmas last year.  This year's a little different.

Pulling out Christmas decorations this weekend, most of mine stay in boxes because my current home is not my own, and I have nowhere to put my things.  It's starting to wear on me.  I have this beautiful tree skirt that's red and pink, that I bought from Pier One years ago, and one day, I will have a home of my own, and a tree of my own, to decorate beautifully.  Till then, I will look for silver linings wherever I can find them.

Sorry, I'm no ray of sunshine today, but tomorrow's silver lining is that it's the last day of the work week, AND I get to wear jeans to work, and that's something to be thankful for. 

Montage Monday

Welcome to Montage Monday!  Tonight's montage is all about the latest sports updates, since there seem to have been a flurry of them today.

If Tennessee's Bruce Pearl can violate pretty much every NCAA  recruiting violation there is, and only get suspended 8 games, then why can't Enes Kanter, Kentucky's star recruit, get suspended 8 games and play instead of being suspended from playing indefinitely?

Titans QB Vince Young is said to be out for a "season ending thumb surgery," so says the ESPN crawler across the bottom of my screen repetitively.  My opinion?  Vince might be having surgery, and he might be out for the rest of the season, but the two are not mutually exclusive.  I'd say it has more to do with VY throwing a hissy fit at the end of the game yesterday, and then walking out on his coach as to why he won't be playing any more this season.

Cincinnati Reds first baseman Joey Votto didn't win the triple crown, but he did just win the coveted National League MVP!  Dad called George tonight to ask him how much he'd sell his rookie Votto jersey for, which you may remember , George used as a fishing rag before he knew who Votto was.

The Vikings fired their coach Brad Childress today.  Last year the Vikings got one game away from the Superbowl, and this year they're sucking it up big time.  I just can't see how one mostly bad season can make a team forget where they were a year ago.  Can we really demand instant success from players and coaches?  Can we also all agree that Brett Favre needs to go back to Mississippi and be done with the NFL finally?

I am currently blogging and watching tonight's UK game versus Oklahoma on dvr.  Nobody tell me the outcome of this game before I can finish it!  It had better be a good one.  Currently UK is ranked #9, and all anyone wants to talk about is the 5 recruits we lost in the first round of the NBA draft last year.  Surely you don't get a top ten ranking based on last year's NBA recruits.  Surely some of this year's players warrant a little more publicity, and I'm not talking about Enes Kanter, who can't play because he's too busy hanging out with NCAA violating pal, Bruce Pearl.

Remembering the Battle of Franklin

Sometimes I forget that I live in the midst of a hotbed of Civil war memorials.  You can easily take the historic markers for granted living in this area, where so many named battles from the Civil War took place.

November 30th marks the 146th anniversary of the Battle of Franklin.  The City of Franklin celebrated its heritage this weekend by hosting Blue & Gray Days, where visitors could tour battlefields and historic homes, see soldier reenactments, and purchase items from period vendors.

Last night, the grounds adjacent to the Confederate cemetery of the Carnton House was lit with 10,000 luminaries to represent the 10,000 casualties of of the 5 hour bloody battle of Franklin.  We live so close to the former battlefield that we heard the cannons going off as part of the ceremony, so we hopped in the car and drove over to witness the spectacle.  The sight of those luminaries brightly lit in the dark night was a breathtakingly sad reminder of what fellow Americans did to one another so long ago.

Too busy to blog

I've tried really hard to stick with my goal of posting every day during the NaBloPoMo November challenge, but sometimes living life makes things too busy to blog about it!

There simply was no time to blog yesterday.  I came home from work and played with Bradley for 30 minutes before dashing out the door again to meet Rhonda. We had a fun girls' night planned, and everything about the evening had our early twenties written all over it!  We met at the Brentwood Waffle House, which is where we girls used to always meet up and carpool to whichever downtown destination we were headed.  Last night a local Nashville singer/songwriter Andy Davis was doing a show of only his old songs at the Curb Cafe on Belmont's campus.  This was perfect for Rhonda and me, since we really only like his old stuff anyways!

I observed the mostly collegiate crowd and reminisced on all the concerts and shows I used to go to in my younger days, but then would look at the time on my phone and was brought back to the present by wondering what Bradley was up to, and judging by the time, wonder if he was in bed yet.

The set list was just what we wanted to hear, and the commentary from Andy about the songs and how they came to be made me appreciate them even more.  Oh- did I mention the show was free??  That made it all the more appealing of an event!  The time before and after the concert was perfect for me and Rhonda Lu to catch up on life, and we went and grabbed sushi at a place called Zumi in Hillsboro Village after Rhonda tweeted to find out where a good sushi place nearby was, and her friends responded.  Isn't technology amazing?

Zumi did not disappoint.  Since I don't eat fish or any seafood, I am always on the lookout for sushi places with chicken options, and the spicy chic" roll that I tried was flavorful and had a nice little kick to it that I was washing down with iced tea long after I'd finished the roll.  Rhonda got one called the Firecracker that had shrimp and crab meat, which I obviously was not tasting, but it looked pretty, and Rhonda said was very good.  We laughed about the random chair, and the bottle of Oil of Olay in the women's bathroom, finished our sushi and iced tea, shivering all the while, and called it a night around 10 o'clock; she, back to her hubby Joe, and me, back to my Kentucky Wildcats.

I got home just in time for the second half of Kentucky's ball game, but after getting ready for bed and snuggling up on the couch to watch the game, there was no time left for blogging, reading Corinthians, or Harry Potter, so I've had a lot of catching up to do today!  I didn't even make it to the end of the basketball game.  I was falling asleep with 6 minutes to go, so I trudged upstairs and called it a night.

Harry Potter & the Deathly Hallows

I will be leaving in a short while to go stand in line for my free tickets to the early premier of Harry Potter & the Deathly Hallows, Part 1 (she says smugly).  So there will be no blog tonight except to say, that's where I'm going tonight, and I couldn't be more excited.

So let me get this straight, dad says to me and me.  You two are going to a kid's movie tonight, and the kid is staying here?

That is correct.

Eye Roller Review

So I caved and bought the Garnier eye roller ball thingie, otherwise known by its official name, Skin Renew Anti Dark Circle Eye Roller, a week and a half ago.  It claims to instantly tighten and brighten the under eye area, and also promises to lighten dark circles over time.  I said I would give a product review, so here it goes.  

I apply my moisturizer in the morning, and then roll the pen under each eye back and forth.  The pen deposits a light liquid concealer.  I pat it in gently, and then apply makeup over top.

The first time I applied the roller ball, I felt a pleasant tingling sensation a few minutes after the concealer had set.  One of the ingredients in the pen is caffeine, which helps constrict the blood vessels around the eye area, firming up the skin.  Disappointingly, I haven't felt the tingly sensation since that first morning.  Also, I haven't been able to tell a difference daily or over time yet that my eyes look any different.  

Oh well.  It was worth a try, and I'll continue to use it until it's gone.  Who knows, maybe after an extended period of time I'll notice a bigger difference.