Inside the Fishbowl

The First of the Handmades: Photo Albums

I decided that I wanted to have a simpler Christmas this year; only a few presents.  Then I panicked.  We have a huge Christmas tree.  It's 9 feet tall with a diameter at the base of 7 feet.  Eight measly little presents under tree would not look too exciting to my children.  Of course any presents look exciting to kids, but my mind was not clear enough when I started to hyperventilate in the middle of the Imaginext aisle at Toys R Us to realize that.  

I stuck to my resolve, though, and only bought the kids four gifts each.  They were bigger (in size) than I had originally planned, and not the small simple gifts that I originally imagined.  And I'm hoping that when Kaitlin asked me why Santa didn't bring that many toys, it's because she's overheard me preaching the philosophy of less is more, and not because she's a greedy as a goblin.

At the time of my little public breakdown, I also resolved to make some handmade gifts for the kids, our parents, and my nieces and nephews.  The niece and nephew gifts have not been finished yet.  But you do get until the end of January when the gifts are handmade, right?

So, I have yet to take photos of the gifts I made for the kids.  I may be able to get to that tomorrow.  I have taken pictures of the photo albums that I made for our parents.  I have to say I was really excited about how they turned out.  I also have a new favorite book to make.  I can feel a class coming on soon!  Any takers?

The book I made for Jeremy's parents.

My parents' books.

These albums are 8x8.  I made them big enough to hold one 5x7 photo per page in either portrait or landscape orientation.  I chose some of the best photos I had of the kids from 2008--at least one per month so their growth is documented.

Oh, and I thought I'd show you the pile of wrapping paper and packaging that our "small" Christmas produced.

Next year I'll try again.  Maybe more handmade.  Definitely smaller.  One day I'll post a picture of our playroom. You'll know what I mean.

But seriously, I really want to teach a photo album class.  Please leave me a comment and let me know if you're interested.

Surely it must end

Sorry no photos today!  My day has not exactly been photo-worthy!

The flu continues to make its way around our family.  Yesterday and today it was Kaitlin's turn. Fortunately she doesn't seem to have what Jeremy and I have had--hers is a stomach complaint, which seems to have ended.  I hope she's feeling better tomorrow.  Yesterday and today she's missed going to see Santa at the mall, her gymnastics Christmas arty, and her in class recital at dance.  She has a fun day ahead of her--preschool Christmas party, playdate after school, Grandma and Grandpa Hanks coming for a visit in the early afternoon and then a mommy/daughter "double date" to The Nutcracker with her friend from dance, Rylee and Rylee's mom.  I hope Kaitlin's improved health signals the end of our families maladies for a while. 

Having a sick kid as old as Kaitlin, at this time of year, is not such a bad thing I've decided.  I was homebound today and I got a lot done.  I cleaned up my family room, stairs, and landing (yes, they were messy!), finally ordered my Christmas cards, and got a lot of work done on Jeremy's and my parents' gifts.  I also managed to play with Alex enough to keep him happy and we only had a near tantrum.  I'll be burning the midnight oil for several nights to get everything wrapped up (both literally and figuratively--ha!) before my mom and dad arrive on Tuesday.

I'm loving the handmade gifts this year.  I might even try to do completely handmade next year, or at least buy only handmade from Etsy!  ;)  It's been so fun to think about what each of my children will use and love.  It's gratifying to know that I have talents that enable me to make useful and fun things for the people I love.  I hope everyone likes what I've made them!

Winter Cheer

Hey out there!  It's been a while.  We've been home from Paris for two weeks, but the flu last week, and trying to tie up Christmas preparations this week have kept me busy and off the computer for once. I promise to do some Paris posts (oh, joy, you're thinking!), but they will have to wait until Christmas is over.  I will try to get some photos of my handmade gifts posted, though they're not the most exciting. Just some stuff that I've been meaning to make for K and Alex.  Christmas seemed like a good excuse to get those projects out and finished.   

On Friday night our Dish Network receiver went kaput.  It's a brand new one, must have been defective. We get our new one tomorrow.  I'm tempted to keep that a secret from the kids.  It's been absolutely heavenly not having the TV on whenever they have downtime.  And it inspired them to want to go outside and play in the snow this afternoon.  I didn't grow up in a snowy climate, so I don't really understand the magic that snow has for children.  All I know is that my kids love it and they don't mind being cold to be able to play in it.

Alex thinks he's making snowballs, but he's really only throwing snow around with his hands.  Oh, yeah, and that's Kaitlin outside without gloves on!  We couldn't find her snow gloves and she refused to wear her knit ones.

Oh, how I love the cold weather runny nose!  But look at him--he's so happy.  Alex takes after Jeremy.  They're both happiest in the outdoors.

She is getting so old!

How did this one get in here?  Fingerless gloves (well glove--I have two of them!)--my first knitting project.

This is a terrible picture, but look a their legs!  They were completely encrusted with snow and the legs of their pants were a little crispy.  Proof of a good time playing in the snow!

Tonight I'm off to Salt Lake to see the lights with the youth in my church.  It's going to be so cold, but worth it.  This is one of our favorite activities!

Happy Valentine's Day

It hardly seems like Valentine's Day, or any other holiday up here were I live.  My neighborhood caught a huge chunk of the storm, though, thankfully, not the worst.  It took me nearly two hours to get home from 106th South yesterday afternoon--an hour and 15 minutes of which I spend trying to go the three miles from the freeway to my house.  I was driving on State Rout 92, or the Alpine Highway, which is still closed until midmorning this morning.  My poor nephew and all the kids who live in my neighborhood were stuck on their school busses for hours--some as late as 1:00 AM, with no food or water for a great amount of that time.  We still have ten kids stranded a a church in the area where their police escort had to leave them.  Several husbands didn't make it home last night, including mine.  Note to self:  never let Jeremy buy a Mini again!  Or any car that can't handle a little driving in the snow.   We have a lot to be grateful for.  Everyone from our community is safe--if not at home, then somewhere, which is a tremendous blessing.  And I, in particular, am grateful for my 4-wheel drive Explorer.  I am not a fan of that car.  But yesterday it got me and my children home safe.  It allowed me to navigate around all of the other cars that had spun off the road.  And as always I'm grateful for DVD players, which prevented my kids from crying for an hour and a half, and allowed me to keep my head and stay calm, even as I was shaking, and feeling very close to throwing up--I was that scared.

The wind howled all night last night.  The drifts in our yard are incredible!  Here are some pictures of the "winter wonderland" to which I woke up this morning.  Enjoy!

When I opened my garage door this morning this is what I saw--12 inches of snow packed up against the garage door, and rolling drifts going down my drive.  That's going to take some shoveling!

These are some trees in my back yard.  They're about waist high on me.

Valentine's Day Jeremy Style

When Jeremy plans something he goes all out. He never does anything small. Everything is designed to be big, beautiful and bring the most happiness he can possibly give. This Valentine's Day was no different. During the course of our marriage Jeremy has had to be away on Valentine's Day quote a bit. This year added to our Valentine's Days spend apart. Jeremy had gone to Denver the previous day to see a concert with some of his friends from work. I really don't mind. . .anymore. But I do think it has helped turn me into a bit of a Valentine's Day Scrooge.

In my Scrooginess I had thought Jeremy and I weren't going to do anything for each other for the annual Day of Love. A few weeks earlier Jeremy surprised me by planning a night away for us at Sundance for the weekend after Valentine's Day. We had dinner reservations at The Tree Room, a nice suite with a hot tub, and 90 minute hot stone massages at the spa--all set up by Jeremy. Most men would consider their job done, but not Jeremy. Maybe he felt a little guilty about being away. Maybe he just likes to spoil me. But the morning of the 14th he called me and told me to put a note on the door if I was going to be gone announcing that the door was unlocked and asking anyone who had a delivery to drop it off inside the house. What! That's not exactly the kind of thing a woman wants to do when she's home alone! Of course I suspected flowers, but not the flowers that I got. The Scrooge within me was kind of thinking that Jeremy's assistant would should up with a vase of flowers. (I know--it sounds terrible. I'm issuing a public apology right now, honey! Sorry.) It's just that he seemed so sure as to this delivery's arrival time. Ok, no excuses. It was very cynical of me to think that. So I went about my day, going to the gym, hanging out at home, napping while the kids napped. Nothing came. I wondered what was going on. Jeremy got home from Denver at about 3:00. There were still no flowers, but he came in bearing other gifts-a Dora and Diego Beanie Baby for Kaitlin and a box of the most fabulous chocolates for me.

I know you're thinking, well, that's unoriginal. Flowers and chocolates. It's not like he's the first guy to think of that! Let me banish those thoughts from your mind. The chocolates that he gave me were from La Maison du Chocolat a French chocolatier that makes the most amazing chocolates. If you ever received a box of chocolate form la Maison du Chocolat, you would never turn your nose up at it as being unoriginal. This particular box was full of chocolates made from ingredients that symbolize love in seven different countries. Lucky for me, my current diet only allows me to eat one a day. So get to savor this box of chocolates for quite a while. And, as you can see from the picture, that particular box is the gift that keeps on giving. Isn't the box itself enough to die over? It has a hinged lid, gold paper lining, and a red ribbon tie on the outside. I'm going to have to find something fun to do with the box once the chocolates are gone.

After Jeremy gave us his presents he asked if he could take Kaitlin out on a Valentine's Day date. Lately Jeremy's been so busy at work that Adventure Buddies has gone by the wayside, so of course I readily agreed. A girl needs some quality time with her dad, and besides, her bedtime is early enough it's not like I would have been by myself at night. They quickly got ready and took off to Thanksgiving Point to see the dinosaur museum, then to Cafe Rio for some dinner. I also got Alex and myself ready really quickly and headed over to the quilt store in American Fork to look at their fabric. Dangerous, dangerous thing to do, but I restrained myself and only bought some backing fabric for a rag quilt that I began years ago--hey I think Valentine's Day can include little acts of love to oneself, don't you? Then I ordered some takeout Chinese food from a Chinese place I've wanted to try. It was a lovely afternoon. But, when I got home, still no flowers.

Jeremy didn't get back much later than I did. We put Kaitlin to bed and settled in for a very romantic night of watching some of our backlog of show on the TiVo. Finally at about 9:30, just as Jeremy was about to go to bed, and I begin my reading for the night, the doorbell rang. What--who rings the doorbell at 9:30? The flower delivery person, that's who. In her hands she held an enormous vase of two dozen roses. The poor thing still had a car full of flowers still to be delivered. I guess Flowers on Main in Lehi had a good year this year, though perhaps some angry customers wondering where in the world their Valentine's Day flowers were!

It was a good day--capped with the knowledge that our Valentine's Day celebration would continue on Friday at Sundance. I think that a little of my Valentine's indifference was wiped out. I realized that I could do more to make the day special for my family--like doing anything at all! Thankfully we have Jeremy who knows how to do holidays.

Oh, and in case you're wondering, because I don't think I'm going to post about it, Sundance was good. The Tree Room did not disappoint. I had the best buffalo steak in the world. Our room was nice, but the people above us were so loud! Don't you hate that? The morning at the spa was also good. I don't think I'll do a hot stone massage again. It wasn't therapeutic enough. But, despite these little complaints, the weekend was a success because I got to have some extended one on one time with Jeremy. Just being together makes any place perfect. . .almost. ;)

Good Mail--Valentine's Day and Beyond (and Before)

Am I officially the last one to post about Valentine's Day? Good, that's what I meant to do. Well, not really, but if it makes me feel better. . .

It was very enjoyable to read everyone's Valentine's Day posts. It looks like the Good Mail network didn't fail to send around the love this year. I hope to participate next year, or maybe I'll get my act together and do something fun for a holiday when you're all least expecting it!

I was grateful to be the recipient of some fun good mail around and for Valentine's Day. First, Jenny sent me these, the cutest thank you notes ever! Thanks Jenny, they were such an unexpected and delightful surprise. You are really thoughtful!

Next, our book club had the delightful surprise of a package of good mail waiting for us at Collette's house last time we met, from Melanie. We were all taken aback since none of us has ever met Melanie, though we have enjoyed getting to know her better through her blog. I'm not sure that even Jill would have thought to send a box of goodies to a group--though I'm not sure we have any other girls out there who meet regularly for something like a book club whose members all also belong to this wonderful blogging community. Do we? Anyway, Melanie sent us these totally cool magnets featuring Paris, in honor of our Paris trip, and some Cadbury chocolate bars. Sadly mine didn't last long enough to take a picture. It was very yummy, though. And, I have to say, Kaitlin was ecstatic to have some "magadets" to put on the fridge. You may be able to see that she had a lot of fun smudging up the surface of the fridge before she put the magnets on. She had to clean the front with a diaper wipe. Such a good little helper!

After that little spurt of good mail, I wasn't really expecting anything else. After all, I haven't sent out good mail since before Christmas! (Does the thought of taking two little kids to the post office freak anybody else out as much as it does me? I really need to try the home pickup service they offer now. So handy!) So, you can imagine my happiness when I received several things for Valentine's Day in the mail.I received cards or notes from Hannah, Michelle, Amy M and Kristi. Thanks ladies. Your creativity astounds me and you really made my day for several days in a row (they didn't all come on the same day).

hen, I was the lucky recipient of one of Jenn's fabulous packages. I always love good mail, but Jenn really goes all out! This was such a cute, fun package to receive. No wonder they were late! You did a lot of work on these. Oh, and I have to know, what is your secret for making soft Rice Krispie treats? Mine always come out hard as rocks! Please share.

Oh, I can't forget Jana's cutest delivery of cookies and scrapbook goodies in the little red mail box that I'm sure we're all really wanting to pick up a few of ourselves. Did that make sense? The cookies didn't last long enough to take pictures of, but the cute wrapping they were in is serving as a stand in. Jana, you need to share your chocolate chip cookie recipe. It's delicious! You always say you can't cook, but you can bake (unfortunate cake incident aside!) which is a talent unto itself!

Finally, I got a really cool package from Jill. It was full of things Japanese. I love Asian things. I love books that take place in Japan and China. I love Japanese paper. I love Asian decor, mainly furniture and art. I love Chinese food and Japanese candy. I would love to adopt a baby from China someday. So, Jill sent me a book of Japanese short stories by Junichiro Tanizaki called Seven Japanese Tales that I am very anxious to read. Also included were these Japanese art cards that I love. I really would love to frame some of them and hang them in my "studio". And, the best part, there are a ton, so expect to receive a sample of them soon--as soon as I figure out how to have the Post Office come pick up my good mail to-be-sent.

Thanks everyone who remembered me. I know I've been absent. I know I am in serious debt. But it's been really nice to be able to look forward to going to the mail box thinking there might be something other than the most current Pottery Barn catalog waiting for me. Oh, and Jeremy, when you read this, don't worry. I didn't forget to mention the things you gave me for Valentine's Day. That's tomorrow's post. No, really, I promise. I'll post tomorrow.

Merry Christmas--a little late, as usual!

As usual I am posting late about things that should have been posted about at the time. I'm out of practice with the whole blogging thing. It's time for me to get back to it. There's virtually no record of my life for the past few months!

Christmas. It was a realy nice day, though it started really early. Both of my kids have colds. Add that to lingering jet lag and you get earlier than normal mornings. Christmas began at 5:30 AM. (Hannah, I feel your pain!) Kaitlin woke up because her nose was stuffy and she couldn't breath. Jeremy went up to see if he could lay with her to get her back to sleep without any luck. So at 6:00 he brought her downstairs and turned a movie on for her. By 6:30 Alexander was awaike, so I dragged myself out of bed, threws together some of Michelle's banana chocolate chip muffins and called my brother to come over so he could open presents with us. While we were waiting for Adam to get here Kaitlin let me into her little mind when she said, "I'm not sleeping. Santa's not going to come." POor little thing. She thought she hadn't slept long enough for the guy in red to stop at our house. I reassured her that I thought she'de slept long enough, and then I showed her her letter from Santa. I'm sure this isn't unique to our family, but Santa always leaves us a letter. My dad writes it in his beautiful Santa handwriting. This year we were fortunate to have my dad staying with us so that we could continue the tradition. He also wrote the letter for my sister's kids, so in our family Santa always has the same handwriting. How's that for some continuity?

Christmas with an almost three year old is much more fun than Christmas with an almost two year old. Last year we had to beg Kaitlin to stay in the room to open her presents. Admittedly, she had way too many, a problem we remedied this year by setting a smaller budget and sticking to it. This year she was very into her presents, and everyone elses. She opened the majority of mine and Jeremy's gifts as well. She whooped and hollered over every gift. It was really fun! KK's main present was a Little People Castle, complete with king, queen, princess, fragons, a noble wood cutter to save the princess from the dragons, aminals, etc, etc. (I just love Little People!) She loved it and had played with it for hours. She also got Diego's Rescue Pack, which she didn't like when she found out it talked. She's come around and now ressures me that she likes it "a wot." She also got some books, puzzles, and best of all, a huge Dora doll. Now this Dora doll cost us $5 at Toys R Us with our purchase of over $100, and that dang doll is her favorite toy! She won't go anywhere without it. Go figure. Well, I could have figured, because that's the way it always works out, isn't it?

Jeremy, who is an amazing gift giver, did another great job for me. This year he made a list of all my interests and bought me presents to correspond. He found my saved shopping cart in Amazon, and searched the "Customers who bought this book also bought. . ." lists for books based to give me. I did end up with some duplicates books that I'd already read, Snowflower and the Secret Fan and Gilead, but he bought me the hardcover copies where I only had the paperback, so I didn't mind, especially since those were two of my favorite books this year. He also looked at my iTunes library, found the songs that I played the most, and looked them up at Pandora, a web site that helps you find music you'll like. I haven't listened to them all yet, but I'll let you know if there are any gems in the lot. He also bought me things to do with sewing, cooking, scrapbooking, blogging, a necklace, and a super soft sweatshirt to replace this old tattered Arthur Anderson one he had from his internship back when he was in the accounting school at BYU. I got Jeremy some vintage photos of his favorite places in the outdoors from this cool webiste I found called The Historic Photo Archive, and matted and framed them. He also got one of those Phillips digital photo frames, a watch and a leather bound atlas containing all of the national parks in the country. ( You may have noticed that I haven't mentioned my Pink Christmas gift. That's because it was so cool it deserves a post all of it's own. I'll be posting about it soon. But until then--thanks Jordan! I loved everything! I can't wait to get back into the kitchen so I can wear the darling apron and try out some of your recipes!)

After we finished opening presents, my dad and brother left to go over to my sister's house. When they finished they all came over here for breakfast. We had German pancakes, Michelle's muffins, yogurt with granola, ornage juice and hot chocolate. It was delicious! The kids, though, only wanted to get back to thier toys, so nobody stuck around for long, which was fine with me. When everyone left we put our kids down for naps, put ourselves down for naps, and slept off the effects of our early morning. Later we got together at my sister's house for dinner. And even later than that my sister, brother and dad all went to the airport to pick up my mom.

The rest of our week has been crazy, as usual. We've had lots of time with the cousins and my parents. We hit the after Christmas sale at Papaya & Co in the the Riverwoods. I love that store! We also briefly hit Target, but that was mostly to get a few things that I'd forgotten for our day-after-Christmas dinner. Since my mom didn't get here until late on Christmas night we had our family dinner on the 26th! I made a really yummy ham, homemade rolls, mashed potatoes and a veggie. Nothing too fancy, but, hey, I wnated to go shopping on the day after Christmas. I didn't have a whole lot of time.

Friday night we went to the deli at Thanksgiving Point for a light dinner and then to see the lights. We had two free tickets from Thanksgiving Point that came in the gift basket they gave Doba. It's amazing how mcuh fun something like the lights can be when two things are in place--free admission and an enthusiastic child. Kaitlin thought it was really cool. We definitely liked it better than last year. Friday my mom left to go home. Saturday we mostly took it easy. The kids slept in 'til 8:30 (totally unheard of!) so we had a lazy morning. Kaitlin and Alex still have their colds so we hung out at home until the late afternoon when we went out to find some dinner and formula for Alex. We came home and hung out with my dad, watched a few episodes of season one of The Office and the movie My Super Ex-Girlfriend--it was ok. I wouldn't hightly recommend it. Today's going to be another lazy day. I'm keeping the kids home from church. I don't want to pass this cold around. It's terrible and it hangs on forever. I know technically Kaitlin's probably not contageous, but I want her to rest as much as possible so she can get better.

Well, that brings me up to date. Just in time for the new year!

Happy New Year everyone!