Daisy Pillow

For Father's Day, which was also our anniversary, I asked Ralph and John to go see a movie, go see two movies, in fact, and to leave me home, alone. They did, and I enjoyed some peace and quiet, and worked on this pillow. To find out more about it, click on the Flickr link on the right sidebar...
Ralph and John returned, having enjoyed their movies, and Joseph surprised us with his arrival, and we shared a yummy barbecue dinner together.
Ahhh, we're through the Ralph's birthday-Mother's Day- Ralph's graduation-my birthday-Father's Day-anniversary season of celebrations. It always overwhelms me!

post holiday post

Putting away Christmas, emptying rooms. I'm not ready to end the suspension of schedules and responsibilities. (That's a perk of working for a school district that takes a full month off for the Christmas holiday!) I'd leave the Christmas tree up for another week, except that Ralph just sent me an email reminder that the curbside tree pick-up is tomorrow. (That was true when I started writing this post, three days ago!)

Once the tree is down, and the floor is covered with dried pine needles, and boxes have been hauled from the closet under the stairs, then the rest must follow. Sorting, wrapping, packing away, and remembering the good times we had with everyone in the house this Christmas.

                                                                    

P.S. Isn't this table runner beautiful? I WON it!
From the Connecting Threads blog. Isn't that cool?!

This ornament, a little mouse asleep in a walnut shell cradle, was made by our friend, Jenny, when we were newlyweds.  Poppy loved it, and hung it down low, where she could see it, instead of its usual place near the top of the tree. (Small ornaments on top, large ornaments on the bottom, colors and styles and motifs evenly distributed.) It's remarkable how a child refreshes the perspective at Christmas, from the decorative to the meaningful.

Here's Ralph doing my least favorite chore of the season,
unscrewing the posts that hold the tree in place. Thank you, Honey

This year we made it to the bonfire in Solvang/Santa Ynez. What a bonfire! Area residents are invited to bring their Christmas trees, and the pile is huge! Even as we were leaving, people were still bringing trees. And in the background the organizers played music; Light My Fire, Smoke Gets in Your Eyes, Hot-Hot-Hot... so cute. John gets so embarrassed when his mom bops to the music. And when his mom uses words like "bops." (Just doing my job!)

Then we went to Anderson's for Split Pea soup. Yummy! Ralph and John were good sports about getting their pictures taken, don't you think?

Here I am!

This blogging stuff is harder than it looks. Especially around Christmas; I was so busy, too busy to stop, take a picture, and describe what I was doing or how I felt about it. Plus, I was working on presents, and I didn't want to post pictures before the giftees received them!

Star in Star for Molly

Star in Star for Emma

Dog for Mackenzie.
Made from a pair of Bill's Nordic ski socks.

Then, I had the BEST Christmas EVER!
There came a point when anything that wasn't finished didn't have to be finished. When the focus was on being ready for my kids to come home for Christmas, and that's all. The Tree got decorated, the lights hung on the house, cookie dough in the freezer. Ready.

What an honor that everyone came and stayed! There was lots of game-playing, and movie-watching, and hiking, and tide pooling, and visits to various parks, and cookie decorating, and lots of talking and laughing!

There was plenty of great food, but food wasn't the focus as much as being together, and working together. Though I didn't work at all! I cooked twice, and I cleaned once. The rest was all done by my great family! Homemade pizza, the most awesome macaroni and cheese, delicious tempeh and veggies, salads; healthy, wholesome goodness.

Honestly, the more I hear about other families, the more I like mine.

Joseph said, "I like this grown-up Christmas," and I know what he's talking about. The grown-up perspective that wasn't about presents or expectations, plus the magic of Poppy's Christmas experience made it all fun.

I wrapped several of my Christmas books, and every day Poppy unwrapped one or two, and we read them to her. After learning about the Nativity story, Poppy rearranged creches to honor the most important figure.

The adult kids enjoyed an evening out while Ralph and I took Poppy, with the required popcorn, hot chocolate, and Christmas cookies, to see lights on houses. And she loved Christmas presents, from the boring pajamas and slippers to the Light Brite and pink scooter!

On Christmas Day, the household doubled in size with the addition of many uncles and aunts and cousins. I loved every minute of it. Ralph never got to play croquet, thanks to the weather, but there was ping pong, Spades, Scrabble, and plenty of conversation to go with all the good food!

I still want to show you a couple other things I made for Christmas.

A dress for Bethany's favorite childhood doll, Becky. Remember the Strawberry Shortcake dress I made for Poppy? Bethany totally saw the resemblance, and loved it. Poppy isn't really old enough to love Becky yet, so Becky will continue to live here in uninterrupted sleep until Poppy is ready to treasure her.

You either think this is creepy, or cute. It's me, huggable, with a plateful of cookies and an armful of books. Got the idea from Angry Chicken. Bethany said Poppy had fallen asleep a few times holding a broken Christmas ornament photo of me. This will be cozier.

Have I gotten you caught up, now? I'm still trying to keep up, here!
Happy New Year! I hope I'll give you lots to see here this year!

Santa's headquarters may be at the North Pole...

Today in the mail there was a letter addressed to Santa Claus, at my address!

And inside, Poppy's Christmas list.

Ten out of twelve items begin with either "Barbie" or "Pony" as the descriptor. I'm guessing there's going to be a great amount of pinkness under the Christmas tree this year. Pink is fine! When Bethany was her age, she wanted everything Strawberry Shortcake for Christmas, and everything Strawberry Shortcake then was scented! My entire home smelled like strawberry jello, and I felt sticky just breathing the sweetness!

Shopping for this list isn't as easy as you might think. There are a lot of little girls who want the same things, and websites tell me the items are not available in stores. If I commit to buying online, I pay for S&H; is it worth it to look around town first? Of course, I need to check with Bethany and Max first, and see how serious this list is. 

Mrs. Santa had better get some sleep. Ho ho ho!

I get a week off!

I made two of these for my two intervention groups at school.

photo by Nicole Gerulat

The tutorial is found here, at One Charming Party.
After reading a Thanksgiving story to the kids, I brought in the turkey on a platter, and I cut it open, to reveal this:

photo by Nicole Gerulat

The kids were so cute, so enthusiastic about the popcorn-filled turkey! I chose two students in each of my two groups to get the drumsticks. They looked so cute eating popcorn out of the drumsticks! Of course, I was too involved to remember to take pictures until it was all over. Besides, I can't put pictures of the kids online, and I didn't want to just take pictures of their hands and the backs of their heads. Here is my picture of what it looked like when we were all done!

One of the kids brought me flowers today!
And another brought me a present!

Yesterday one of the kinder teachers and I had an impromptu talk with the school principal about the intervention class. We told her the kids are doing really well, and she was very supportive of the whole concept. This morning she took me aside and said she'd looked over the assessments, and the kids in my class have not only made great progress, they've progressed at a greater rate than the kids in the regular class, and they are all approaching, at, or above their target scores.
The affirmation of my work felt so great to hear! I know the teachers have been really supportive and enthusiastic about the class, but the objective data sealed it. And today the kids were all hugging me, and telling me they'll miss me (even though I'll still see them every day at lunch!), because after the Thanksgiving break I'll be starting with a new group of kids! This next group of kids will be more of a challenge. The first group was mostly bright, ready to learn kids who were intimidated or uninitiated. This next group just doesn't get it. Bring it on! But I'm really going to enjoy a week off work, first!

This Strawberry Shortcake is the cutest ever!!

What's in a costume?

When I was a kid, planning a Halloween costume and putting it together and going out in it was really the best part of the season. One year I was a frog, wearing green tights and turtleneck, and spats over my shoes and a 3D mask I made of cardboard and paint. Another year I wove skeins of green yarn into a wig for a witch costume, and I sewed a black dress with long, bell sleeves. I helped one of my sisters make a robot costume from cardboard boxes with moving buttons and levers, and we made countless hats with varieties of animal ears.

When I had my own kids, I didn't allow them to choose costumes that were gory or evil, and I didn't make outstanding costumes, but I encouraged them to have fun and to be creative. 

Often, their costumes were based on pajamas or sweats or something that could be used in everyday wear, or added to our permanent costume collection for ongoing play. Our costumes reflected who we were, and who we wanted to pretend to be.

1986

1995

End of sweet, creative, wholesome costumes!

Now for the costumes that are 

Not Appropriate for Fall, or anytime.

I really like costumes and dress-ups, but I've been distressed by all the gory, gruesome, truly scary costumes worn by younger and younger trick-or-treaters. Still, I was appalled at some of the skanky costumes I saw online for little kids!

No little girl should be dressed as a French maid.

Or a saloon girl.

Cowgirls are cute, and rodeo is big where I love.
 This little girl's outfit is sure to appeal to someone
with a rodeo fetish. 

"Mack Daddy Pimp" costume.
In sizes 4-6, 8-10.
That's disgusting.

"Major Flirt"
Women in the military deserve more respect.

Ew, ew, ew. Little Bo Peep
These "Bratz" Costumes are just right for parents
who want to turn their daughters into jailbait.

Why is Little Miss Muffect
wearing leopard print? Icky.

Adult costumes are getting more raunchy. There are many variations of this fella's: the petting zoo, the one-eyed monster, the "treats" dispenser. Funny? Kinda. But I wouldn't want to see it on anyone I know!! Tasteless and gross.

But there are some things that just shouldn't be sexualized.

A sexy cookie monster?

Big Bird? 

How could anyone think of Sponge Bob
and sexy costume?

Finding Nemo? Really?

Ahem...

And please...

How could they do this to Strawberry Shortcake?