The Beach in December = Boots

12/28/10

Today is my Dad's birthday.

Happy birthday, Papa Tommy.

Here is Papa Tommy wearing Olive's pilot cap:

He has a seriously small head.

What a nut.

Earlier, we went to Zoomars, as always.

The girls love Zoomars:

Here's Ruby in her element:

May found some hungry rabbits and guinea pigs to feed:

Olive was unsure:

Mama and Olive:

(still unsure)

But Grandma Caren helped soothe her uneasiness of small animals:

Friday Photos: Christmas!

Since the girls and I are traveling tomorrow, we celebrated Christmas this morning.

'Twas wonderful.

Here are some highlights:

Bedheads shlepping down the stairs

Stockings and Santa gifts

Daddy helping Olive go through her stocking

Hmmm...what are these?

Oooooh. Clips. For my blossoming hairs.

May, very excited about bubble gum

Then we had breakfast:

Gingerbread waffles with strawberries and whipped cream

(Gluten free gingerbread waffles for Rubes of course)

Turkey sausage

Low acidity orange juice for my acid reflux-ridden peeps

Ruby, surveying the merchandise before we start in

Olive, playing with every one else's stocking items besides her own

This years Christmas travel includes:

1.5 hr drive to Baltimore where Go will drop the girls and I off at a hotel

and then go back to PA all by him lonesome.

Sniff.

An overnight stay in Baltimore for the girls.

An earrrrrrly shuttle ride to the airport from the hotel.

A crack of dawn flight to Vegas - which will last an eternity and a half

due to the 21 month old lap child who is the size of a very large 2 year old,

who isn't interested in anything but running

and climbing into the laps of strangers

to snuggle, play with their buttons, and steal their food.

Our so-called "layover": less than 30 minutes to get to our next flight to LAX:

a feat I fear will be impossible to accomplish.

Short flight to LA.

1.5 hour drive from LAX to Irvine.

"I've already put on my

"This is an adventure!" game face.

I'd say "wish me luck" but I'm going to need a whole lot more than that

to get through the next 2 days.

A Merry Christmas to all!

12 Days of Christmas

I did 12 little illustrations of the 12 Days of Christmas for my buddy Mandy of Gourmet Mom on the Go.

Guess what? She made these images are FREE to download. What a classy broad. See her post with instructions and free download here! She made them into cookies with an edible image printer. So cute! (if I do say so myself...) You could also make them into gift tags or ornaments or a little Christmas mobile. Have at it and let me know what you do with them!

Merry Christmas Dresses 2010

Friday Photos: Olive in a Basket

Ornaments

For today's advent calendar activity, I took the girls to go pick out their own ornaments.

I was smart to wait until this late in the season.

Miss Cheapy Pants won't stop high five-ing me.

Each girl chose an ornament that completely fit them to a tee.

Ruby:

An animal.

Mom, did you know polar bears eat seals?

Mom, did you know their fur is extra thick because they live in such a cold climate?

Mom, did you know that if they do get too hot,

they just lay down and rub their bellies on the ice?

May:

Bright.

Sparkly.

Pointy and long: perfect for chasing/poking/teasing people with.

Olive:

Pink.

Sparkly.

Reflective.

Round.

Perfect to dance with.

My Podcasts. Mine.

I am a die-hard fan of both This American Life and The Moth podcasts. They both bring me so much joy and delight, it's to a degree where I have a hard time putting it into words. Like, even though they both have millions of listeners, I feel like they were put on the earth just for me and me alone. Crazy? Maybe. Self-centered? Most definitely but that's how much I love them. Sometimes they're shoot-your-diet-ginger-ale-out-your-nose hilarious. Sometimes they're bawl-your-eyes-out tragic. Sometimes they're I'm-so-much-smarter-after-listening informative. Sometimes they're I-can-do-so-much-more-with-my-life inspiring. This morning while cleaning the blinds in the front room, I listened to the latest Moth podcast, which turned out to be of the inspiring variety. It kind of blew my mind. I'm embedding it here and if you have 16 minutes and 50 seconds, I would highly recommend listening.

Richard Garriott: The Overview Effect by The Moth on Mixcloud

Atta Girl.

May: Mom, Paul McCartney is old now.

Me: Yah, kinda.

May: He's still cute, though.

Me: Totally.

May: I just love the Beatles, Mom.

...I have no words. Just an exploding heart.

So Much Better

She Kills Me

Found these on the computer this morning.

Sorry Mom.

No Friday photo today. Please see below. Maybe there'll be a Saturday Photo or Sunday Photo.

Oh! It's the Never Ending Si-ick-ness!

I hope you sang that title to the tune of The NeverEnding Story theme.

I've been sick for a week with two different illnesses back to back, I'm pretty sure and so have my kids at different times during the past week. Olive's been especially clingy and has planted herself in my lap for three days straight, so I've been pretty much confined to my bed during the past little while. Haven't taught my classes and haven't worked out all week. Watched Gilmore Girls reruns, which I haven't done in a looooong time (I still hate Taylor and I still love Jess) and DVR'd Conans and Jimmys. Watched Juno again--the dialogue slays me. Reading The History of Love and trying to like it. Sorry Nicole Krauss but your husband's books are leaps and bounds better than yours. Trolled around Facebook and have creeped sufficiently. Thoroughly enjoying my Anthology magazine. Listened to the latest This American Life podcast. Completely done with my Christmas shopping, thank you Amazon.com. Haven't worn make up since Thanksgiving. Being sick is kind of nice.

You May Give Me a Pair of Gloves For Christmas

If you're not friends with my husband on Facebook, you wouldn't have seen this posted on his wall by yours truly, with the caption that read: "No cooking? No cleaning? No taking out the garbage? I think I just found a new career. Now...how do I make my hands NOT look like a little boy's? Hmmmm..." with a "P.S. - also one of the most creepy things I've seen in awhile."

Blaaaaahg

It's probably no surprise that I've started many a blog post with this exact title lately: Blaaaaahg. And I never even finish it to the point where I can post a complete thought. I just have been blah about blogging lately, but because I have the slightest urge to blog, I figure I should, though it's going to be pretty boring, I should warn you.

Lately:

- We went to Pittsburgh for Thanksgiving and partied with our great pals, the Ringgers. The Jacksons were missed. We figured this was either our 8th or 9th year doing Thanksgiving together. Sniff. It's so nice to have good friends that are more like family so close by. When you love your friends as much as we love the Ringgers, four hours seems really close. It took us six hours to craaaaawl back home on the turnpike Sunday and I still found myself being grateful they are just a drive away.

-We decorated the house for Christmas. I love it. I snagged a relatively inexpensive fresh 25 foot garland and divided it up in three pieces, so even though we have a lead-ridden fake Christmas tree, we have the smell of pine wafting from our staircase, from around our front window and from the top of our book case. Or so I'm told. I haven't been able to smell it yet but anyone who comes to our door has commented on the yummy smell emanating from our house, which I'm willing to bet money is far better than the usual smell of sweaty work out shoes which are located in a big box near the door. Mmmm-mmmm-mmmm...is that Nike I smell?

-I've been busy with photoshoots and Etsy orders. Kind of up to my eyeballs but I'm grateful for them.

-Laundry. Cleaning. Laundry. Cooking. Laundry. Laundry.

-Anticipating our upcoming trip back home to Irvine and Vegas. It's gonna be a short one, folks. Waaaah.

-Talking and talking and talking about our life in 1.5 years. Start up our own practice? Join a network? Join a practice? Beach? Mountains? Desert? City? New Zealand for a year? Hawaii? Sustainable prefab house? Track home? Loft? Bungalow? Public school? Home school? Charter school? Babies? Chicken coop? Goat Farm? Art studio? Laundry.

Friday Photos: Someone's Excited for Christmas

Just a Word of Advice

If you're extremely sensitive to caffeine, and foolishly decide at 10 pm to eat the last slice of Bittersweet Chocolate Flour-less Cake, it would be wise after still lying awake at 1:30 am, to heed the sage advice from your husband when he suggests taking a sleep aid. And then, after retorting* "YOUR MOM should take some Melatonin," you should not stalk into the bathroom and decide to trim your bangs. You might walk out looking like a person hopped up on caffeine who picked up some scissors and went to town...with their eyes closed. And then, after becoming 50% distraught over your new insane-asylum-patient look and 50% distraught over the fact that you actually don't really care that much and why don't you care because you should care and what does this say about yourself and why are you so lame lately, you should not lie awake until 5 am watching Youtube videos of Korean girls trimming their bangs.

*Tena, if you're reading this, I wasn't specifically talking about YOU. This is a joke 30-somethings say to each other as a sassy and extremely intelligent and mature comeback, along the lines of "I know you are but what am I?" to shut the other person up. But let's be honest, you probably really should take a Melatonin.

Project Runway Reynolds Style

Tonight I constructed Ruby a Native American dress for her second-grade Thanksgiving feast tomorrow. It didn't exactly turn out like Austin Scarlett's beautiful, beautiful corn husk dress,

but it was pretty cute, only took me about 10 minutes, used only 2 brown bags and only a yard or two of twine. If I'm on my game, I'll take a picture of her in it tomorrow before she rain-dances off to school. And if I'm really on my game, I'll do a tutorial for all you mamas with little squaws out there.

Friday Photos: Home Bound Buddies

This Week's Meal Plan

I know this isn't very funny or interesting (let's be honest, I'm not very funny or interesting lately) but I always benefit when other people do this, so I thought "Eh, what the heck." Maybe you will, too.

Monday:

-Asian Glazed Drumsticks

-Brown rice

-Steamed broccoli

-Orange slices

Tuesday:

-Chicken Thighs with Artichoke Hearts and Feta Cheese

-Greek salad

-Herbed Lemon Couscous

-Grapes and apples

Wednesday:

Leftovers

Thursday:

-Jambalaya (gluten free chicken andouille sausage used, as well as brown rice as opposed to white, bell pepper omitted)

-salad made with greek yogurt, apples, oranges and bananas

Friday:

-Spicy Lentil Cheesy Tacos (Spread Lite Laughing Cow cheese onto a crisped corn tortilla and spoon into that Madras Lentils)

-Leftover fruit/yogurt salad

Saturday:

Either leftover jambalaya, eggs&pancakes (gluten free for Rubes) or go out. We're going to play it by ear. Daddy will actually be home for dinner for once. Some might say this is cause for a well-planned delicious meal to be made. I say it calls for being with him and not stuck in the kitchen.

Sunday:

-Carnitas/Salad bar with:

-Spicy Shredded Pork

-Black beans

-Guacamole: avocados, squirt of lime juice, dollop of salsa, pinch of garlic powder, pinch of salt

-Mango salsa

-Cilantro Lime dressing: a bunch of Ranch dressing, a dollop or two of sour cream, 5 or 6 tomatillos, a bunch of cilantro, juice of 2 or 3 limes, 1-2 garlic cloves, minced, all blended up

-Brazilian Limeade

-Dessert: Flourless Chocolate cake with whipped cream

I Am So Making This

A wool felt Christmas tree skirt like this one seen on Garnet Hill.

Goodbye cheesy red fabric bunched around the bottom

of our pathetic and very fake Christmas tree.

Someday it will look smashing underneath a real tree.

One that doesn't look like Charlie Brown's tree.

One that smells good.

One that is taller than I am.

One that I don't have to assemble

One that will not give me lead poisoning,

as it suggests that is a possibility from what is printed on it's tag.

One that doesn't have a tag.

But until then, we'll have a beautiful skirt

loving laid around our pathetic and very fake,

(did I mention poisonous?)

Christmas tree.

Friday Photos: Hats