New Wardrobe

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My mother is on a sewing roll. Anya and I like this very much because it means packages in the mailbox full of fun new clothes. While the clothes are not for me, they kind of are because I get as much (if not more?) enjoyment out of them as Anya.

Here is Anya modeling her new jammies. You may recognize this fabric from my jammies (Mommy has a jammy dress, and I have jammy pants and shirt!) back around Christmas. This one was a surprise to me because I didn’t realize (or had forgotten) there was any more of this fabric hanging out in Mom’s sewing closet.

This vest I love. I want to wear this vest. I tried wearing it on my head because it fit on my head, but Anya got mad and stole it back. I don’t know if you can tell, but it is reversible. The other side is pink with an awesome and glittery star patch on the pocket. Oh, how I love this vest.

Anya posed for the camera in a yoga pose from school. At least she said it was a yoga pose, and it looks yoga-y to me. Perhaps it is called “Soaring Owl with New Vest?”

Another package came yesterday with a new jumper and pants, but I haven’t taken a picture yet. Soon!


Whoooo’s there?

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Last week, I was staring out the window while doing dishes and I noticed a big owl staring back at me from a low branch of a tree. I got very excited because owls are awesome and wonderful, so I called to Anya to come see it. Anya wasn’t interested. I figured she just did not realize the fabulousness of these huge and fluffy birds, so I decided to try and take a picture of it for her later. It’s difficult to take a picture of a bird (even a big one) through the kitchen window. I could not let this owl go unobserved by Anya, it was my duty as her mother to make sure she saw the owl. I grabbed her and carried her outside and pointed and said LOOK! And she was all, ‘Okay, can I go play Dora now?’

Sigh.

So, I went back to washing my dishes, keeping an eye on the owl so I could catch it in flight if it flew away. When Andy came home, I figured the car would scare the bird, but the bird did not care. I ran out to show Andy, and he ran in to get his camera. Finally Anya was interested, and they both went out to take pictures. By this time the kitchen window was fogged up from the steamy dishwashing, and I missed the owl flying away. According to Andy, he and Anya got closer and closer to the owl, it pooed, and then it flew away. Being the cool photographer person that he is, he managed to get some pictures that made my pictures look like crayon scribbles of a llama done by a two-year-old.

Before Poo:

After Poo:

Andy learned later that our friend was a Barred Owl. I hope he visits often to eat the rodents now that Buddy is no longer here to eat them.


Sound of the shrieking eels

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Isn’t she cute in the new outfit Gramma Cheryl made? Just like a sweet little lamb. Aww.

Who’d suspect such a sweet pixie of being able to produce banshee wails? I suppose anyone who has been around when she was getting her hair washed. We only wash her hair every week or two. Sometimes longer if our ears are feeling particularly sensitive and her hair still looks fine. I don’t know what the deal is. We’ve tried giving her lots of warning, and we’ve tried springing it on her. We’ve washed the dollies’ hair, our hair, Gramma’s hair to show her it’s okay. We’ve tried the shower, tub, and sink. (When the weather warms up, we’ll try a hose.) We’ve used tearless shampoo and magic green fairy shampoo. What’s next? Maybe swim goggles? Sedatives? Earplugs (for us)?


New Craft

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One of my Christmas gifts from my parents was a quilling kit. I first read about the craft in a holiday book form the library, so when I saw the kit, I jumped. I didn’t have the opportunity to play with it until Saturday, when I made a few hearts and a flower. Today while I waited to pick Anya up from school, I made a few more pieces.

I think I need a magnifying glass on a stand ’cause my eyes get all squinty, but it’s really fun. The way the paper changes and holds a new shape is fascinating.


Kitchen – Before

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I tried to find a before shot of the kitchen from the same angle as the after. Eventually I realized that was not possible what with the wall that used to be there. Here are two photos of the old kitchen. The first is from when we had just moved in, and the second was from when we had begun to take down the wall. Neither properly show the hideousness that was the always-looks-dirty, cracking vinyl peel-and-stick floor.

The other side of the room, the dining room, still needs to be painted, so no pics of that now.


Feeling Listy

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  • Friday morning when Andy went to take a shower, he was very sad to discover there was no water. Luckily the water man was able to come out later that morning, and several hours and a bunch of $$$ later, we had water again. Water Man had to replace the electric cable going from the surface to the pump, 310 feet below. That is a lot of cable.
  • Our new kitchen counters have a grudge against glass. This week, the counters have destroyed a glass storage jar and my favorite FiestaWare drinking glass. Stone is very unforgiving. We probably should have installed cork counters instead.
  • I miss Buddy. It’s strange to be outside without him around. Every now and then, Anya will start talking about him, and I’m caught off guard. The silver lining is there is less peeing outside the litter box in the house, and Little Kitty seems to have become a new, much more happy cat.
  • I quilled yesterday. Since when is “quill” a verb, you ask? What is quilling? Pretty much, it’s rolling thin strips of paper around a thing that looks like an icepick (back in the days they used a quill). You make little circles or teardrops or other shapes, and then put many of them together to make a flower or snowflake or whatever. There is a lot of squinting involved.
  • Anya and I built a house for her fairies out of a small box. It’s more like a shack, but I guess with a little glittler glue even a shack can be fabulous.
  • I’ve cooked dinner every weeknight for the past two weeks. No mac and cheese, though I did use hamburger helper one day. I really need to do a menu plan because really the worst part of cooking is figuring out what to make.
  • Our dishwasher still isn’t hooked up. Boo.
  • Last weekend Anya wanted to make a snowman. We went outside, but the snow was powder and wouldn’t stick together. The next day, the snow started melting, so we were able to make a snowman. Anya kept singing the Frosty song, and when we put the hat on the snowman, Anya said, “Happy Birthday!” And then she was extremely sad because the snowman did not come to life. We explained to her that we did not have a magic hat, alas. She seemed to recover quickly from this setback.
  • Doing a load of laundry every day really is easier than doing waiting and doing several loads all at once. It only takes a few minutes to get everything folded and put away. The only downside is that Anya doesn’t have much time to jump on the bed and dance to Strawberry Shortcake in the time it takes me to fold one load of clothes. Oh well, sacrifices.
  • The other day Anya said, “My baby cousin is in my Aunt Becca’s tummy.” Last weekend, she had an imaginary baby we had to carry around. We had to put the baby in her car seat, carry the car seat out to the car, and put the car seat in the seat next to Anya. She got very upset if we left the baby behind. I’ve heard of kids having imaginary friends, but imaginary babies? Will she grow up into an imaginary friend?
  • I made a little color matching game for Anya that uses paint chips and clothes pin. I saw the activity on Me? A Mom?, but I think I had more fun with it than Anya did.
  • I hung out with my scrapbook pals yesterday and finished my 2008 book. Time to start 2009! I want to buy a bunch of new inks for the 2009 book, but, alas, I am retired. Where is my SS check!?!?

Anya Sings

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At dinner tonight, Anya serenaded us with some classics:

Old Mac Donald had some pants, oy, oy, oy.

Row, row, row your boat
Gently down the stream
Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily
Life is but pants.

A-B-C-D-E-F-Pants
H-I-J-K-L-M-N-O-Pants
R-S-T-U-V-Pants
W-X-Y-Pants
Now I know my ABC’s, won’t you come have pants with me?

Hush little baby, don’t say a word
Mama’s gonna buy you a turkey bird,
And if that turkey bird doesn’t gobble,
Mama’s gonna buy you some pants that wiggle.

Rock-a-bye baby in the tree top,
When the wind blows the cradle will rock,
When the bough breaks the cradle will fall,
And down will come baby, pants and all.


2011 Goals

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2011 brings a really big change to our lives, and it will be very interesting to see what unfolds. We’ll see how we do at our goals this year. Many of the goals are carried over from last year, and a few were developed via ouija board. In some cases, the person for whom the goals are stated were not consulted before, during, or after creation of said goals.

Dad

  • Get the floors done
  • Finish painting the kitchen
  • Remove all clutter from the surface of the secondary desk in the office
  • Hang the curio shelf
  • Buy a Mac

Mom

  • Sew Carol a knitting needle case
  • Get three estimates for bathroom remodel
  • Make winter pajamas for Anya before September
  • Make two jumpers for Anya
  • Finish Carol’s bathmat
  • Make Anya’s rainbow blanket

Craig

  • Graduate
  • Get an awesome job with spiffy new degree
  • Become a green belt in kung fu

Andy

  • Activate new dishwasher
  • Finish the plant room
  • Finish putting in the trim and painting the “hallway” area of the basement
  • Paint the dining room
  • Install new kitchen window

Carol

  • Explore at least three new national/state parks
  • Send cards out for all birthdays and anniversaries to arrive no more than a week late
  • Finish Anya’s Christmas stocking
  • Finish 2009 and 2010 books
  • Clean up and maintain the berry bed
  • Grow a garden with Anya and maintain it

Kenny

  • Get drivers license
  • Learn to stand on head
  • Eat ten hot dogs in five minutes (with buns)
  • Sing in the shower every day

Anya

  • Learn to ride tricycle
  • Learn to count over 20
  • Grow a garden with Mommy
  • Learn to write her name
  • Snuggle Mommy every day

I am a Cupcake Warrior

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One can only watch Cupcake Warriors so many times before one must make cupcakes. I hope the judges like my Betty Crocker chocolate cake with peanut butter frosting, which was applied using a ziplock bag with the corner cut off. I’ve never made peanut butter frosting before. It is fabulous. I think everything could be made better with peanut butter frosting: stale cookies, crackers, green beans, the crime rate in DC. Andy teased me about these looking like poopie cupcakes. Hrmpf. No cupcakes for you!

My mom dusted off a bag of 30 year-old paper doilies to help spice up the photo a bit, and I decoratively sprinkled peanuts hither and yon. Hey, I could be on the Food Photo Designer Warrior show, too! (Or maybe I really should be on the World’s Worst Cook show. It’s a good thing I don’t have cable at home.)


No more newspaper

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Our subscription to the little local paper expires next month, and we won’t be renewing it. It’s not in our new budget. The paper is the first of surely many things that weren’t important enough to be thought of when we planned our move to one income.

When Andy told me about the renewal notice, my first thoughts were, “Oh! We need the paper, and it isn’t that much. We should go ahead and renew it.”

Then I realized that isn’t us anymore. That can’t be us anymore.

I enjoy our local paper; it makes me feel a bit more like I belong. It keeps me current on local news like who is celebrating the big 100 and when the fair is. I have to admit I skip all the sports, and I don’t read the seniors column, or the market column, or the church and music pages. Realistically, it takes me about ten minutes to read the paper (as long as Anya isn’t trying to poke holes in it with her fairy wand).

Fifty cents for ten minutes of enjoyment is $3.00 an hour. (I’m not sure what that means in terms of anything meaningful right now, but the Frugal Zealot is always calculating cost per hour, so it seems the thing to do.) I can read the paper at the library for free, and since I plan to spend a lot of time at the library in the coming weeks, being able to read the paper will be a nice something to look forward to.

So, bye bye paper…first unexpected budget victim of 2011.