I Sleep in a Salad Bar

Or at least, it feels like one.

We have a television in our bedroom.

We have kids.

They snack. 

You do the math.

Sometimes when I roll over, popcorn kernels - you know, the old maids - go flying across the room and pitter patter across the hardwood floor with alarming noise.

Sometimes, I swear, I have croutons in body places there should not be croutons.

Wrappers between my toes, and gummies between my...well, never mind.

And someone's five year old (I'm looking at you, Mike Williams) colored with a highlighter on my bedspread. With his mother sitting right there, coloring her Megamind page and not even noticing! Can you believe it. Some people's parenting skills. So, now I have orange highlighter all over my bedspread, which is covered nicely by a Lightening McQueen blanket (romantic, I know. I should probably get a photo and pin it on Pinterest so you too can have the sexy getaway we call our boudoir) and food in the sheets.

Ah well. I like to think of the cracker crumbs as an exfoliating scrub that some women would pay upteen dollars for. And the hot cocoa scented pillow cases? Moisturizing and better smelling than the Axe body spray I bought Gianni for Christmas, which I had to hide posthaste because my eyes were bleeding from the odor emitting from his neck, like Pepe le Pew.

Speaking of Christmas, my eldest has inherited my holiday depression: sadness that all this merry making is over which starts around 2 days BEFORE Christmas. We started in with our depression last Saturday, and drank our weight in eggnog as we cried into our cheese ball. We perked up slightly by the sight of our gifts - well, she did anyway. She got a Kindle and I haven't seen her in 3 days now. I hope she's eating. I can just picture her emerging from her bedroom with a Rip Van Winkle beard, a withered old crone. Yes, a crone with a beard! Use your imagination.

In other news, the girls are enjoying school, though of course, they're off right now. In all the sold out theater for Les Mis, Anna was the only kid. I don't know whether other parents feel it was not appropriate for children (I covered her eyes during the prostitute scene) or if kids these days are uncultured ignoramuses. Good think I spelled ignoramuses correctly the first time, or I would have had to delete that whole ironic sentence. Anyway, she was enthralled since she's known every lyric since she was eight. The sequel to Shadows Gray will be out momentarily so naturally, I feel like throwing up. It's like giving birth, except - 

nah, it's nothing like giving birth, never mind.

But I am nervous. I hope you'll read it. 

I'll leave you with a quote from the G-ster:

Said to his father: "I love you more than Christmas and tacos."

Cora pipes up: "What about me?"

G, thinking hard: "I love you more than ... geckos."

(He only has a slight love for geckos, so no one knows if this is a compliment or an insult). 

And looky, looky, what Santa bought me!! A camera!!

" Thank you, baby Jesus, for being born so that I can risk burning down an entire church once a year in your memory." - The prayer of Gianni. Kinda like the Prayer of Jabez, except not.

 I love technology...but not as much as you, you see...No, I really love technology more.

What? Chocolate reindeer butts before 7 am? Why, don't mind if I do, old chap!

Marshmallow Madness

I've gotten a little weird about marshmallows lately.

I think I need to open a shop or something. I'm coming up with all sorts of wild and crazy flavors. I didn't even know I liked marshmallows, not really. I mean, a S'mores now and then is tasty enough, but mostly I like the roasting part, and then I feed it to a ravenous wolf child. I remember making homemade ones once as a wolf child, and although they were good, they were super sticky and more like marshmallow fluff. 

So, I'm going to share with you the basic recipe, because I love ya, and it's really a sort of sacrifice on my part, because now you'll know how easy they are and you won't be impressed with me any longer.
Sigh.

Now, a basic marshmallow recipe is more or less the same wherever you go on the web, and so please forgive me if I don't site the original source, because who the dickens knows who the original source is anymore? But to be totally fair, this particular recipe came from the bakers at Baking Bites. So, stop by and say hello!

Also, I still don't own a camera (someday, some rich blog reader is gonna feel sorry for me and mail me one anonymously. I just know it.) so you'll have to use your imagination in parts, and bear with my google pictures. 

So, here goes, moppets:

Homemade Marshmallows

                       .75-oz unflavored gelatin (3 envelopes of Knox gelatin)

1/2 cup cold water
2 cups granulated sugar
2/3 cups light corn syrup
1/4 cup water
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon vanilla extract

Line 9 x 9-inch pan with plastic wrap and lightly oil it. Set aside.
In the bowl of an electric mixer, sprinkle gelatin over 1/2 cup cold water. Soak for about 10 minutes.
Meanwhile, combine sugar, corn syrup and 1/4 cup water in a small saucepan. Bring the mixture to a rapid boil and boil hard for 1 minute.
Pour the boiling syrup into soaked gelatin and turn on the mixer, using the whisk attachment, to high speed. Add the salt and beat for 12 minutes. After 12 minutes, add in the vanilla extract beat to incorporate. Here's where you have fun adding in your wild mix-ins.
Scrape marshmallow into the prepared pan and spread evenly (Lightly greasing your hands and the spatula helps a lot here). Take another piece of lightly oiled plastic wrap and press lightly on top of the marshmallow, creating a seal. Let mixture sit for a few hours, or overnight, until cooled and firmly set.
In a shallow dish, combine equal parts cornstarch and confectioners’ sugar. Remove marshmallow from pan and cut into equal pieces with scissors (the best tool for the job) or a chef’s knife. Dredge each piece of marshmallow in confectioners’ sugar mixture.
Store in an airtight container.

Now, a few notes on the original recipe: the mixture in your mixer is going to become very nearly, wet cement. HAVE YOUR GREASED SPATULA AND GREASED HANDS READY. I'm not kidding. The first time I did not, and well, I nearly glued myself to the counter, the whisk, the television, the computer, and the dog. My hair was glued to my cheek, my hand was glued to my nose, and I nearly burst a gut laughing at myself. So, be prepared. Don't say I didn't warn you. 

Mix-ins I have tried thus far:

candied ginger (I snipped tiny pieces and laid them in the bottom of the dish, added in the marshmallow, and snipped some more on top. Pressed em in a bit and voila!) and powdered ginger.  DELICIOUS! And sophisticated. I mean nothing says sophisticated like Ginger Marshmallows, am I right? You know I am.

Peppermint. Have a small wolf child crush some peppermint sticks or candy canes in a ziplock bag with a heavy pan or rolling pin. He will enjoy this immensely and you will have smooshed-to-smithereens peppermints. Stir in (and when I say stir, I use the term loosely. Remember you are working with wet cement). Add a swirl of red food coloring.

This is Peppermint Patty, not a peppermint stick. Don't crush her in a ziplock, please.

Snickerdoodle. Dump in a BUNCH of cinnamon and up the vanilla. I'm not kidding you - these are out of this world. 

Other flavors I'm itching to try:

Lavender. Add in some lavender and some purple food coloring? I don't typically like lavender in my food, but I think this would be nice.

Salted caramel.  These are definitely next on my list.

Browned butter and sage.

Maple.

Rootbeer.

Mocha or coffee.

Brown sugar.

Lemon (with zest! Mmmm. I love lemon zest!)

Chai tea.

Got some crazy flavors for me? Wanna be my partner in my marshmallow making business? 

post christmas

So how was it, my little elves?  How was your Christmas (Christmases? Christmasis? Christmas'? Whatever.  I'm going on my fourth week of eating nothing but sugar, fat, sugary fats, fatty sugars, and the occasional slab of meat.  Don't judge.  Also, in my quest to have cute bohemian type hair (drat you, pinterest) I've been wearing a purple plaid headband all day to go with my disheveled ponytail and I'm pretty sure I've cut off the blood flow to my brain.  We have blood in our brains, right? I mean, ideally we do, right?  Again, whatever.)  Where was I before my addiction to parenthesis took over?


Christmas.


It came.  And now it's gone.  And I'm left with that terrible let down feeling that only comes once a year and can only be relieved by a steady diet of pie.  It starts earlier every year.  The let down feeling, not the pie.  Well, sometimes the pie.  This year my sadness at Christmas being over began the second I woke up on Christmas Day. Which seems a little premature.  


It was a lovely day, but it's always the anticipation of the lovely day that is the loveliest for me.  The Jolly Old Elf, as usual, bit me in the tush.  Gianni was determined to receive a particular Lego brand fire truck with dalmation.  He wanted this more than life itself, more than a cup of sugar, more than a day in his underpants, more than world domination.  I tried to talk him out of it but that always makes me feel like the scene in Miracle on 34th Street when Kris is so appalled at the thought of gently urging children to request certain toys that he clangs Mr Nail Biter Mustache Guy on the head with his cane.  Well, he had other reasons, but that was certainly one of them.  Anyhoo, I planted many a sub-conscience thought in my Pooky's head that maybe he'd like something better, something less expensive, something more practical, something like play dough or a glow stick, but no dice.  The Pooky is very one-track-minded, which is evidenced by the squillion rounds of Monopoly Deal he forces me to play each and every day.  He wouldn't be talked out of it and so I haunted several toy aisles in several stores looking for the magical dalmation/fire truck Lego set and finally found it at Toys R Us.  Me being me, of course, I left without buying it, thinking cheerfully to myself that I would drop by in a day or two if I hadn't talked him into play dough and buy it then.  Of course when I dropped back by two days later (a scant one and one half day before Christmas) they were sold out of Over Priced Lego Dalmation Fire Trucks.  Naturally.  My honey bunny being the dear that he is, managed to buy it on the Site-to-Store Walmart thingamabob.  All I had to do was go pick it up.  One and one half days before Christmas.  I don't like Walmart one and one half days before St Patrick's Day, much less that close to Christmas, but I figured my procrastination served me right and I fully deserved to be pepper sprayed, trampled, and maced by people in their pajamas and sports bras.  


Oddly enough, none of that happened and the purchase was a success.


Christmas morning arrived and Pooky eyed the gift with a ponderous look on his face.


That's the wrong one, says Pooky.


He was quite enthralled and delighted with the bag of Cheetos in his stocking though.  


Oh, I haven't shared a recipe with you recently, so here's a good one I just discovered.


1 cup scalded milk, cooled to bath temp 
1 stick butter 
sprinkle with yeast
add: 3/4 honey, a tablespoon salt, 2 eggs
Add 4-5 cups flour


Let rise.  Shape into beautiful rolls.  Let rise.  Drizzle with butter.  Turn on oven 375.


Leave house to go see a movie.


Come home to Homemade Coal for your stockings.  They'll be black and hard as rocks.


This may seem like a lot of work and expense for lumps of coal, but nothing says Christmas like homemade.


Maybe it's the headband.  Maybe it's the toy shopping.  Maybe it's the sugary fats.  But I seem to lose brain cells this time of year.  You?

Beelzebub crafts and so do I

The only time of year I do crafty type things is December, zero hour, right before Christmas.  


And by crafty I mean hot glue, glitter, needles and thread kind of crafty, not rub my crone hands together and stir my cauldron kind of crafty.  I don't even own a cauldron.  


So here's what Miss Anna and I have been working on lately:

The lotions are a fun recipe that should have been a piece of cake but actually involved me searching for three weeks for a food processor, finding said food processor on craigslist, picking it up, searching high and low for beeswax, discovering it costs four jillion smillion dollars, frantically texting my crafty queen, Genesis, for alternate ideas, promising to kiss her feet when she told me to go to a health food store and buy a beeswax candle ($4, not four jillion smillion dollars), go to said health food store, learn to work food processor (which I love almost as much as I love Genesis), and then making five times as many batches as I thought I would have to because the amount was very small.

Whew.

We call it Vanilla Pudding Lotion because it looks like vanilla pudding.  There isn't any vanilla in it though.  I should have called it Honey Pudding Lotion but I didn't think of it until now and I used a sharpie to make my tags.

Cause sharpies are where it's at.  Booyah.

These are batches of my favorite facial wash.  I've been using this and nothing else for three years now and I love, love, love it.  You will love it too if you jump feet first into the Oil Cleanse Method, promise.  All it is is extra virgin olive oil (I use 3/4 of the bottle) and castor oil (1/4) and a couple drops of tea tree oil.  It takes off make up like a dream and leaves your skin softer than a baby's bum.  Plus, it's cheap.  And it doesn't sting your eyes when you accidentally buy water proof mascara.  So, anyway, you just massage it in and take it off with a very hot cloth.  Voila!  Dewy skin that is free of chemicals and animal byproducts and questionable things.

More lotions.  I hope my little sister, niece, and mom in law aren't reading this.  If you are, girls, please practice your surprised/delighted faces when you open these.

Thanks.

These are headbands I made for my wittle bunheads at the ballet studio.

All thirty something of them.

I may or may not have hot glued my fingers together at some point.   Hey, look!  I do have crone's hands.  

And of course, there are the obligatory batches of homemade deliciousness.  My favorite is the toffee in the christmas tree jar.  That's for my soon-to-be brother in law.  


Please ignore the crumbs and sequins in the crevices of my table.  Thanks for averting your eyes.


Oh, and I also made a scrapbook!!!!  That's a four exclamation point sentence right there.  I hate scrapbooking.  It's from the devil.  My personal hell will be a never ending scrapbooking party, complete with frightening paper cutting devices and endless stickers, with Lucifer barking orders at me about crooked borders and embellishments.  But I do love Anna and I do love how much she loved Nutcracker and how many photos she took, so I whipped em all up at Walgreens, scotch taped em all onto fancy paper, stuck em in an album, and wrapped it up under the tree.


The things I do for love.


Merry Christmas and may all your crafting be pain free, sparkly, and merry!

If Cousin Eddie Built Gingerbread Houses

When it comes to bread...
...pizza
...fudge
...Christmas trees
...dishwasher detergent
...coffee
...dark chocolate
...trash bags
...feminine hygiene products
...paper towels
the motto 'round these parts is no substitutions, spare no expense, from scratch or name brand.


When it comes to gingerbread houses
...crafts
...DIY projects
...homeschooling
...laundry soap
...make up
...dog food (sorry, Milo, that horse may have turned)
...ziplocks
...butter
...did I mention DIY projects?
the motto 'round these parts is easy, cheap, fast.  Which sounds more questionable and awkward than it actually is.


So, while our fudge may be homemade (see last year's post ) our gingerbread houses are graham cracker/tub o' frosting el ghetto wonders.  


After I built the walls for him, Gianni asked,
'Do I get to kick it over now?'
Because, of course, the only logical to do with something constructed is to demolish it.


During the Extreme Make-over; Gingerbread House Edition we watched Christmas Vacation.


Which we really need to get a family friendly rated version of one of these daze.  But oh my, it's funny. And the source of year around quoting.  Speaking of which, can you name the movies these Christmas movie quotes are from?


'Tis a ponderous chain.


If I woke up tomorrow with my head stapled to the floor, I wouldn't be more surprised.


I can't put my arms down!


We elves like to stick to the four main food groups: candy, candy canes, candy corns, and syrup.


Well, here's your hat, what's your hurry.  Alright, Mother, old Building and Loan pal, I think I'll go out and find a girl and do a little passionate necking.'


We ate a bowl of sugar, field dressed a cat, played with shot guns, drank some brown liquor, looked for women...


The insolence! The audacity! The unmitigated gall!


I want you to get married.  I want you to have nine children.  And if you only spend five minutes a day with each one, that's forty-five minutes and I'd at least have time to go out and get a massage or something.


Well, you really can't spell families without lies.




First correct answer gets a homemade gingerbread house and a batch of fudge a warm, fuzzy feeling.  And also a Christmas card.

sometimes

Sometimes you have to drill your four year old like a potential oil field about the True Meaning of Christmas.  Because when you are a Santa lovin' family, but also Christian, you have to groom your children to not embarrass you in front of church friends by staring blankly when they talk about Jesus' birth.  So you have to plant that holy thought in their playdough moldable brains every opportunity you get by randomly barking out,


'Why do we celebrate Christmas?'  

This way when someone from church asks he can stare mutely at them and whisper,

 'presents?'

but when a total stranger tells him he's cute, he'll respond with a passionate shout of,

'JESUS!!!!'

that sends them scurrying the other direction in a flustered state of mild panic.

Are we the only ones with this particular problem?  It's a pickle.

R.I.P. my jolly old elf

Two days ago came the sudden death of a beloved one in our home.

His death was, as I said, sudden.  
Anna was helping me unpack like the good little slave labor she is.
A few minutes later, she disappeared.
Then, she came back.
Handed me a pile of letters.  Eight years or so of Santa letters.   Unopened.  Suspicious indeed.
Since she had left to go get reinforcements (Cora) I was really up a creek without a paddle.  Or a life jacket.  Or a granola bar.
We had to have The Talk.  Not That Talk.  The Other Talk.
I was sad.
I am still sad.


At least I have Gianni.


Is it wrong to keep having babies just to keep the magic of Santa Claus alive and well in my house?


The girls weren't angry.  Cora actually seemed very nonplussed, but now that she has her own room (Roo and Moose are sharing) she has become very teen-like.  Anna cried a little.  But then I started telling her funny stories about Daddy and I being Santa and how much fun we have and how one year, etc, etc.  Now she's excited to keep it up for the little ones in her life.


Then I stuck my foot farther up my mouth. 


They have never really believed in the Easter Bunny.  I always thought that was a dorky one and I just can't figure out a way not only to make it likable and believable but a way to tie it into Jesus' resurrection.  


So, little kids, after Jesus had been dead for three days, the Easter Bunny rolled away the stone from the tomb!  Jesus climbed on his back and together they hopped through the town leaving chocolate eggs to all the good little boys and girls.  


It doesn't have a good ring to it, never mind that it smacks of sacrilege. 


So, anyhoo, as we were talking of Santa, the subject of the Tooth Fairy came up.  I also think the Tooth Fairy is a bit weird and faintly creepy, but whatever, we've always done it.  Of course I am the world's worst tooth fairy stand-in and the fact that these poor offspring of mine haven't figured out the truth sooner is a miracle since I forget at least 3/4 of the time.  But anyway, Anna said something about the Tooth Fairy and I said something about her not being real of course, but I was so shaken up about the whole Santa thing that I wasn't really thinking straight or listening properly and I THOUGHT we were talking about the Easter Bunny.  Which they already know isn't real.  Not the Tooth Fairy.  Which was what we were really conversing about now.  Which they didn't know wasn't real.


Silence fell as I realized what I had done.


Anna squeaks,
'You mean the Tooth Fairy isn't real EITHER?'


I have to stop blogging now so that I can go buy my traumatized daughters a pony.

After seven breakfast suckers and the upteenth gift, Moose is too weak to lift his head off the Christmas football...

Even Milo had candy canes for breakfast.

christmas '10

1.   You know you are in possession of all your girl hormones when you can't watch Kermit the Frog as Mr Cratchit and Miss Piggy as Mrs Cratchit talk about the loss of their little piggy/froggy love child, Tiny Tim, without crying.

Other things that choke me up:

Game shows.

Winners of reality shows.

Hymns.

The last sentence of a good book.

A song on the radio that would be really good on a slide show at my own funeral.
What?  I'm the only one who does that?
Nevermind.  Forget I said anything.

Most movies of the animated kind.  Small striped fish who are lost in the sea and their dads are searching for them in spite of being scared themselves?  Gets me.  Old men in flying houses with small boyscouts?  Don't even go there.  Dogs and wolverine/hamsters reunited with their owner?  Sniffle.  Toys that band together to fight an evil purple teddy bear, only to be DONATED BY THE BOY WHO HAD THE AUDACTITY TO GROW UP?  I don't wanna talk about this anymore.

2.  Christmas here was quite nice, though different.  I am accustomed to spending the holidays with my nutso extended family so there was definitely something missing.  Something of the crazy kind.  Something of the Mama-does-all-the-cooking-and-I-sit-back-and-munch-on-salt-and-vinegar-potato-chips kind.  I now know what it's like the be the matriarch of the whole fam damily: you spend upteen hours preparing food that everyone is too full from snacking to eat.  I don't wanna be the matriarch anymore.

3.  However, ham gravy?  Oh my stars and garters.  Seriously, folks.  Give me a bowl and the largest ladle you can find.  I will never go back to turkey.

4.  Evidently, it's some sick kind of April Fool's Day equivalent in Mexico today.  So, if you too, have smart alecky Mexican friends who post things like, oh, I don't know, THAT THEY'RE PREGNANT, do not believe them.   Very funny, Lori, very funny.  My neighbor thinks she's funny.  I was already online onesie shopping, living vicariously through her, picking out paint for her nursery, and naming them.  Them, because they were going to be twins.  Rosalie and Ricki...I thought it had a nice Spanishy flair.  My hormones don't know how to handle the switch now.  Not kind, evil woman, not kind...guess I'll go back to naming my niece/nephew now.  Humph.

5.  Anna was quite happy, even thrilled, with her generic knockoff el cheap ghetto Target brand doll this Christmas.  Everything that came with it broke within nanoseconds, but hey, that's why hot glue guns were invented.  No, Schroeder, hot glue guns were NOT invented for you to hot glue everything in your room to everything else in your room.  Note to self:  hide hot glue gun.

6.  My luvah boy took me to see True Grit last night.  Fanfreakintabulous movie.  Whatshername will most certainly get the Oscar, which is exciting for me because I don't remember the last time I have actually seen a movie that was nominated for anything. 

7.  We introduced Provolone (who would like to be referred to as "P.J.s" now because it took him 16  years to realize his initials spell that) to our particularly strange and odd Christmas traditions, and it spite of what he will tell you, he totally enjoyed them.  Here's a rundown of how my Christmas Eves and Christmas go (remove the parts with my extended family - WAAAA!):

Christmas Eve:    Eat clam chowder and cornbread (incidentally, I have now perfected my cornbread recipe....if you're lucky, I'll post both recipes.  Ya know ya want em!)
                          Open one gift.  Surprise!!  It's pajamas!  It's always pajamas, silly pickles.  I got scotty dogs ones this year.  We got all the group home kids pjs and slippers.  They rather liked this part.
                           Read two poems:  The Cremation of Sam McGee (cuz nothing says Christmas like cremating corpses) and Jabez Daz, which is like the best poem in the world, especially for you Santa haters out there.  I think it would make the most perfect Tim Burton movie.  Does anyone know how to get a hold of Tim Burton?
                           Sing Happy Birthday to Jesus.  This year he had orange bundt cake.  We enjoyed it for him.
                           Send small children to bed, where they are for once, happy to go.
                           Forget to be the tooth fairy for the FOURTH night in a row.  I'm not sure what would happen if the tooth fairy and Santa crossed paths out in the flight plan there anyway.
                           Stuff stockings with beef jerky, chips, toothbrushes, chocolate, and anything else small.  Anna got bacon flavored chapstick.
                           Giddily wait until it's time to put out other sneaky gifts...like ghetto el cheapo Target knockoffs of American Girl dolls...
                          
Christmas:
                          Wake kids, because my kids are weirdos in the grand tradition of me and my sister, who always had to be woke up on Christmas morning.
                          This is the part where my sadistic mother takes as loooooooooooong as is humanly possible to "put in her eyes."  Translation: contacts, cuz she's well, as blind as a bat without them.  She's gonna smack me for telling you this, but I think she does this on purpose just to make us wait.  Then she has to make her tea.  Then she has to find her camera.  The she has to find the film for the camera.
                          Four years later...open gifts.  Revel in the crass commercialism.
                          Eat scrumptious orange rolls.
                          Eat candy all day.  Never get out of pajamas.  Never brush teeth or hair.  Watch movies.  Eat more candy. 
                          The end.

8.  I had pictures to go with, but the dumbo uploading refuses to upload.  It took 20 minutes of my life I will never get back, time that could have been spent licking the ham gravy off my plate.  But if you want to know what our Christmas photos look like, just look at a Gap ad, or maybe Ralph Lauren.  We look just like them.  I'm the tall, willowy blonde.

9.  I don't appreciate the hysterical laughter.

the stockings were hung

We lost our stockings in the move.  Yaah for $12 at the Dollar Store, some crafty kids, and a hot glue gun! They have been replaced...probably just in time for me to remember exactly where I put the original ones.  I think they turned out nicely, if I do so say myself!  And I do.

Cora and her friend, Lydia.  She's very shy, the poor kid.

If you've already watched the holiday classic, It's a Wonderful Life, then go rent this fabulous movie.  It's the same director and has old mean Mr Potter, except he's the jolly old grandpa in this one.  It's such a good movie.  And wonderful for watching during stocking making.  I love the batty ballerina sister and the romance novelist mom.  I want to be a lily of the field! 

Sorry.  No one got that reference.

I adore Jean Arthur...she was cute as a button and had great comedic timing.  And she got to act with Jimmy Stewart AND Cary Grant, the lucky duck.  If I can't be Julie Andrews or Angela Lansbury, then I'd like to be Jean Arthur.  The clothes, the glamor, the heels!  Jury is still out on that 1940s hair though; that was one unfortunate decade for women's hairstyles.

In other news, most of the group home kiddos have gone back east to see family.  It's practically quiet around these parts.  Except for those Williams' kids.  Gianni was in the bath yesterday and here is a snippet of our conversation:

G sticks his tongue out and says,
"Guess what this is, Mommy?  It's on my tongue!"

Actually, since his mouth was open and he was trying not to drop the object off his tongue, it sounded more like,
"Dess what dis is, Mommy?  Iz on my tund!"

I squint and peer closer.  Whatever it is, it's not very big and kind of looks like a tiny peice of yellowish/greenish ... food?

"I don't know, what it is?"

"It's a booger."

Then he closed his mouth and swallowed happily.

The End.

How Not To Make Christmas Candy

Because the world is just a nicer and more organized place when it's listed in numerical order, and also because it's easier for me to jump from bunny trail to bunny trail without thinking of an appropriate segue, here's the latest posting - in numerical order, if you please.

1.  There is a black hole of moving from which precious things never return.  Sucked into the latest one are one pair of Anna's snow boots (which probably wouldn't fit her this year anyway, so no loss), the left boot of MY snow boots (big loss!  BIG LOSS!  My feet are cold!), my jewelry box with all my expensive, priceless family heirlooms jewelry (bought at KMart), my homemade birthday calendar (so don't be surprised when I forget your birthday), and all five of my family's Christmas stockings.  I think I will make new stockings, but I'm trying to figure out how to do so without my holiday elves's help.  I know, I know.  Terrific mothering.  But nothing brings out my OCD tendencies like a craft project.  They'll hot glue the snowman hats on crooked!  They won't use the right colored ribbon!  The letters won't be symmetrical!  Yes, I know it would be even cuter that way, but you don't have to walk by them on the hearth every year and wince at the mistakes and try to peel the dried glue off and redo everything when they're not looking.  Maybe if I tell them it's part of their Christmas gifts then I would be free to work on them alone?

2.  Another year has come and gone and the holidays have somehow snuck on me again, in spite of me looking forward to them all year.  Suddenly, it's too late to learn how to knit and make homemade potholders for everyone!  What the hey??  I barely got my cards out in time and it was by the skin of my teeth, I'll tell you.  By the way, when you ask your hubby to pick up the cards at Walmart don't be surprised when he returns with three things you didn't ask for and no cards.  And I forgot to take the red eye out before I hit the "I have edited my photo" and "proceed to checkout" button, so please be aware that although I tease my kids about being demons at times, they aren't literally red eyed demons.  At least I don't think so. Photographic evidence says otherwise.

3.  I have had in my mind for several weeks to do a super duper cute blog about my marriage, complete with lots of older photos, but I had to wait until I could buy an ink cartridge for the printer.  So I bought one.  But now the printer is broken.  So never mind.  Maybe for my next marriage.

4.  I really was a slacker when it came to homemade gifts this year.  I'm feeling rather guilty about it.  Normally I bake a ton.  Remember those truffles?  Oh, I know you do, my little friends, I know you do.  But like I said, somehow December snuck up on me.  I did make some peanut brittle for family, but it was causing me major anxiety.  Every year, bout this time, I desperately want to own a candy thermometer.  The problem is, I never remember I need one until I'm in the thick of making candy.  So, I do the ol' drop a bit into cold water trick, but I gotta say: not the most reliable method in the known universe.  So half the time my fudge won't fudge and becomes  ice cream sauce and my divinity is simply something you pile on spoons and feed to your kids for breakfast.  I meant dessert.  So this year, I decide to do peanut brittle, because that just sounds like a manly man candy that would be appropriate for the Papas and Papa-in-laws and Brother-in-laws in my life.  Oh, you didn't know that there is feminine and masculine candy?  Well, you are welcome for that knowledge.  Men don't want petit fours and lavender infused truffles, silly ones.  And girls don't want peanut brittle because - well, OK, we might want peanut brittle.  Anyway, though, my sauce took flippin' FOREVER AND EVER (welcome to the Department of Redundancy Department) to come to the hard crack stage.  Hard crack stage is evidently somewhere between a few minutes of boiling and Christmas of 2012.  And of course I was making it at the last possible second - basically when I was supposed to be at the Post Office mailing the said peanut brittle, not sweating over the stove whispering desperately, 'Come on, baby, come on, cook, drat you, cook!'   Needless to say I stopped a few scant moments before I should have and the brittle turned out less brittle than say, chewier than gnawing on decade old candy corn.  While I was frantically trying to boil the sugar syrup, I was also trying to make penuche for my mommy.  Penuche is like a brown sugar fudge.  Again, a time when a candy thermometer would've come in real handy like.  But fudge only has to reach the soft ball stage, so that's not quite as time consuming as the sugar syrup for the peanut brittle.  However, attempting to make both at once, keep a nekked three year old out of the vicinity, pack boxes for mailing and do all the other tens of hundreds of things that need to be done, is a bit redonkulous.  It's not easy to make fudge in a hurry too.  Well, the marshmallow kind with the sweetened condensed milk - that one can be done speedy like, but I prefer to really torture myself at Christmas and not cheat with the easy recipes.  So anyway, my penuche got to the appropriate stage and being in a hurry I didn't want to wait for it to come to room temperature all by itself, so I stuck the pot out in the snow.  Then when I brought it back for it's beating it was still too hot so I stuck an ice pack under the mixer and then I really did cheat: I let the kitchenaid beat the snot out of it while I ran around like a chicken with my head cut off, trying to salvage the peanut brittle.  Now even when penuche is exactly perfect, it still looks like a pile of poop.  Baby poop mostly.  But when I don't have time to let it set perfectly and then slice it neatly into tiny little squares, package it into a pretty Christmas tin (only one with a Norman Rockwell scene on it will do), label it with a gold sparkly pen "To Mommy", and then carefully place it into the box of Endless Delights (which is what I like to call the box of presents I sent), then here is what I actually end up doing after the whole snow and ice pack debacle:  toss the pan into the van and when I've gotten to the UPS Store, attempt to slice it in the parking lot with a plastic knife someone left in the backseat.  My fingers froze.  It didn't have enough time to set.  It looked like baby poop and not even pretty squares of baby poop, just a steaming pile of baby poop.  So I slap it on some aluminum foil, while muttering henious curse words like "son of a nutcracker!" and "oh, sugarplums!" under my breath.  During this special holiday season, it's important to keep your cursing Christmas friendly.  So, Mom, when you receive your box of Endless Delights, I do so hope you enjoy your steaming pile of baby poop, because it came from the heart from me to you.

dear santa

Dear Santa,

If it wouldn't be too much trouble, and if you have room in the sleigh, big guy, I'd really like new carpeting.

Actually, it doesn't even has to be new.

Just not pink.

With raspberry mauve faded spots.

And if you're so inclined I wouldn't mind trading in the circa 1987 pink plaid couch for something...oh, I don't know...something that's not circa 1987 pink and plaid.

I've been a fairly good girl all year for the most part.

Sincerely,
MMW.

Viewer Discretion is Advised

No,no, this post will not be about anything naughty.  Get your minds outta the gutter, folks, for goodness sake.  No, it's simply about the Big Guy.  The Jolly Elf.  The Man in the Red Suit.

And the only reason viewer discretion is advised, is just in case some little eight year old is reading my blog.  Which is highly unlikely.  But far me it from me to dash their childhood dreams.

How much do I love this guy?
Quite a lot.

Every year some well meaning, but totally irritating child tells my children (who also can be well meaning and totally irritating) that there is no Santa.

They never believe the child.

Cora is ten.  She still believes.  I love that kid.

 Incidently, I also love this print.

The only difficult thing about Santa is the gifts.  According to Anna:

'Don't worry about the cost of what I'm asking for Mom, Santa has it covered!'

Amazingly, they've never asked for a pony or a jet.

But they've come dangerously close this year.

Anna wants an American Girl doll.

Somebody please kill me.

Do you even know what those dang things cost?

I could find a cheaper pony.  Still have my feelers out for a less expensive jet.

Also hoping she will do something terribly naughty so I can just fill her stocking with cheap coal.

And here's the other kicker:  in order to PROVE beyond a shadow of a doubt that there is a Santa, Cora has decided to let no one - and I do mean no one - know what she wants for Christmas.  The letter will be written, she will walk it to the mailbox herself, and she will wait until the designated postal service worker drives up, and personally hand it to her, so that NO ONE can tamper with it.

Crappity crap crap.

Pardon my french.

I now have to follow the postal worker to retrieve the envelope and plead for it back, which is most likely a federal offense.  Then I will be taken to court where hopefully a nice lawyer and his girlfriend and Natalie Wood will all be there for me, cheering me on, and where we can all prove together that there is a Santa Claus. 

Now don't start telling me how you were right in not ever telling your kids there was a Santa to begin with.   Tawni, hush up and go light your menorah.  I still freakin' love Santa.  Love the trees, love the lights, love the presents, love the cranberry sauce and the holiday music and the birthday cake for 6 pound 8 ounce baby Jesus.  Love every holiday movie ever made.  Quote em all year round.  Love everything Santa stands for...but I may be up a creek this year.
And how.

Will they be devastated to learn the truth?  And will that inevitable day be this year?  I wanna cry at the thought.   I remember the year when the girls were about seven and six and we slept Christmas Eve at the High House.  Andy Kohler helped us play the jolly elf and marched around the deck in his heavy boots, ringing sleigh bells.  Oh my heart.  The girls were so enchanted and DESPERATE to get to sleep.  It was adorable.  And stumbling out each Christmas morning, rubbing their eyes, heading over to the glow of the tree, ready to see what Santa brought down the chimney?  Oh my.  Nothing better. 

Please, baby Jesus, let it last one more year before they grow up on me and elope with a gang of tatted up bikers.

Amen.

Christmas trees

A mere 1.47 minutes on the road... didja know the wind blows in Wyoming?


"Hey, Andy, ya want me to lean on a shovel or something?"




Small men-children with sticks. What could possibly go wrong?




Uh-oh. Hansel realizes he forgot the bread crumbs.

Oops. Put this one in twice.

I cut up small, toddler sized pieces of turkey for the Moose. He hollered, "BIG CHICKEN!" cuz he wanted the drumstick. What baby wants, baby gets. Come to Papa, big chicken, come to Papa.

If you're impressed at my sudden photography skillz, it was Mrs Kohler's camera.

Last week was our annual Christmas tree hunting, stalking, butchering, expedition to the North Pole. It just isn't Christmas until near death experiences have been lived, tempers have flared, marriage vows have been stretched and re-thought, small children have cried, and my Charlie Brown tree is safely kerplunked in my living room. For those of you who enjoy killing the spirit of Christmas and making Baby Jesus cry by purchasing a plastic tree, I will pray for you. But golly, you are missing out! Only a few things went wrong this year:

We nearly ran out of gas. Halfway to Mt Crumpit we have to make the decision: push forward, put in the last dollars out of our checking account, or turn back for the company car. Anna's oh-so helpful suggestion? Why doesn't Daddy just go back and get the other car? Yeah, Daddy! Why don't you just walk 30 miles and return in a speedy fashion? Maybe you could bring a sleigh and eight tiny reindeer while you're at it?

We nearly slid on ice to our deaths. Ok, not really. But it was hilarious when Mike pulled over and rolled down his window to talk to the Kohlers who were in their car and they kept driving right by us. "Hey! Stop driving!" my exasperated husband shouts. "We're not driving!" Genesis yells back as she hangs out the window, "We're sliding!"

I can't speak for anyone else, but I nearly got lost. There is a fine, thin line in the forest, between I-know-where-I-am, and I-am-fairly-certain-that-I-can-retrace-my-steps, and I-suddenly-hear-nothing-but-the-wind-in-the-trees, and if-I-go-one-more-step-I-will-officially-and-utterly-be-lost-and-on-the-five-o'clock-news. And I don't like being on camera. I freeze. I don't even like speaking when there's more than three people around. Even if all I have to say is my name and where I live, I panic. Those are easy questions. I should know the answers without getting all clammy. I really don't want to be interviewed about being dumb enough to get lost in the woods of Laramie while searching for a Christmas tree.

Afterwards we learned that there apparently is a small RedBull stand manned by Christmas elves in the forest. This is the only explanation for the two feminine youngsters who had absolutely NO energy for tree hunting and whined approximately, oh I don't know, THE WHOLE TIME, and yet were bouncing off the seats of the minivan like mexican jumping beans the whole drive home while their little brother was trying to nap. Actually, I'll give it up for Anna - she came wandering around the mountain side right as I was navigating that fine, thin line I was telling you about and quite possibly saved me from certain starvation, exposure, and being eaten by wild bears. Together we sawed down our tree and kept each other from back flipping and somersaulting and triple axle-ing down the hillsides. The only excuse I have for Cora is that she must be on the verge of teendom or something because that kid sleeps for like, 12 hours at a time, eats like a lumberjack, and still complains of being tired.

Now the tree is up and Christmas can begin. The cards are almost ready to be picked up at WalMart. The shopping is...not even started. Our eleventh anniversary is next week. I'm getting a taste of what it's like to have four children as I babysit the Quinnster for a whole week (stay tuned for what I hope is gonna be some Kodak moments this week). Jobs are being applied for and sent off into cyberspace where they're never heard from again. Holiday movies are organized by importance and order of viewing. Santa letters have brought unbelievably adorable joy to the small kids faces. School is on the back burner as we do crafty holiday things instead (who cares if my kids become adults who can't balance their checkbooks, they can thread a sewing machine and make chocolate truffles)! If you want a Christmas card of my cute offspring to stick to your fridge all year 'round, make sure you send me your address.