My mom is decorating her house for Christmas and I rode over to help her. My mom LOVES Christmas-- or maybe it's that she loves SANTA. She has probably like 700 Santas displayed throughout her house. No, that's not a typo; I really mean 700 Santas!

Her Santa collection deserves its own blog (and we're working on it!) but I took a few pictures of the first bearded ones coming out of their warm weather hibernation and decided to post them here. Above you can see the fireplace mantel and some other Santas on the floor. You never know where one is going to pop up, really.

Grumpy Santa and his strange yarn friend:

Patiently waiting to be uprighted and placed in just the right spot:

In bike news, I had a flat tire when I went to get my bike out for my Sunday ride to breakfast and it really put me in a grouchy mood for most of the morning. I had wanted to get a ride in before the rain/sleet/snow started and of course that went out the window. I bought some "fix a flat" foaming stuff and at first it didn't seem to work correctly, but now my tire seems ok-- knock wood. It's held air for almost eight hours now but tomorrow I'll know for sure if it sealed the hole. If not I have a new tube, but I've never changed a tube before and I don't want to test out my skills tomorrow-- I want to go for a ride!