BESTED!

Beaten by an 8-year old! Repeatedly.

I can't beat him at chess. His gleeful giggles during the game probably don't count as sabotage, do they? Eh, that's okay. His gracious manner of winning - happy, but not ugly about it - make it easy to enjoy losing.

I've gotta get on the ball, here, or they're all going to by-pass me quickly and refer to me in the future as their "poor, strange mother".

Kiss those babies!
~Dy

This Says it All

If I were asked to make a list of all the things I'm thankful for this year, I'd have to point to this picture. It's got it all:



The big one, there, buried under the children - where do I start? My marriage, my support system, my partner, my heart's desire. He won't always laugh at my jokes, but he'll always love me; and I, him.

Those four wonderful, affectionate, healthy, sweet children. They're full. They're warm. They're loved. I couldn't stay up late enough to count the blessings just from the five people in this photo.

The futon that got us through last winter.

The walls that will get us through this winter.

The warm clothes on our backs, and the fact that we are blessed with living where we are, and are able to live our lives the way we choose.

I don't know what's up with that towel on the couch, but even that is a reminder of the many things, both financial and emotional, that we've been able to share with the children (it's one we bought for our Florida trip this summer).

The boxes in the background are filled with things to donate - good things that still have "plenty of life" left in them, and I'm thankful that we can be on the giving end for a change.

The globe we use for lessons - our lifestyle, our goals, our life.

The home Miss Emily was born in, and her brothers have helped to make. (I watched her truck down the hall, singing to herself as she looked for Smidge after supper, and I got teary-eyed to know that, God willing, she won't ever have to learn a new home, a new hallway, a strange place to call home while she's little. She won't stand in a dark hall at midnight, crying because she doesn't know which room is ours. I. Am. So. Thankful.)

There are only about eleven years of my life represented directly in that photograph, but they've been an amazing eleven, and have filled my heart and my cup to overflowing, with gratitude and joy.

Happy Thanksgiving!
Kiss those babies!
~Dy

My eyes hurt!

They're watery and twitchy. No, I'm not sick. I've just been putting together a Christmas wishlist for the boys today. They've spent the last week pouring over catalogs, although oddly enough, only at my insistance. I don't know if they're just used to never getting what they'd really like (anybody remember the breeding elves?), or what it is, but it took some serious tooth-pulling to get either of them to sit down with a marker and circle things they'd like. Normally, it's not much of a problem. They've always been so easy to shop for. But this year... this is the first year I've noticed that I'm *officially* clueless. The things I ooohhh and aahhhhh over, thinking they'd just go nuts about, they give me the same look I gave my mother the year she bought me a complete bedding ensemble that every six-year old girl dreams of... and I was 14. I try to keep in mind my own mortification at that time, and encourage them to guide me and keep me from going down that ugly, confusing road.

James did circle two items from the Mindware catalog. That gave me a place to start, at least. Then, when I logged into the Mindware website, he knew all about so many of the items and said, "OH, that looked really neat!" or "I would LOVE this one!" Well why didn't you mark it in the catalog, you goofball? Maybe he was just trying not to be greedy. *sigh*

So, I've got a wishlist started at Amazon. I noticed that I'd also started one, um, back in 2004, but I didn't start it until something like the 20th of December, and by then nobody needed ideas for the boys, so we never had a chance to play with it. (Beethoven's Wig is still on there, though - *I* really want that one! *grin*) Right now, it's just things we think the boys would like. Tomorrow, we'll get online with each one and let them each browse and pick. It's going to have to be them. There's so much junk available out there that I felt dizzy after sorting through it today. Hopefully, they'll have some ideas to start us off and we can get it figured out (and then, ordered and shipped without having to pay overnight shipping! WOOHOO!)

We're just getting too old for The Last Minute. Halloween about did me in. *wink*

And I know I've posted this place before, but if you haven't checked it out, you really need to. Even if you're done shopping. Just the catalog blurbs alone are worth perusing (although, seriously, they do get some mighty nifty stuff, particularly if you like things a bit quirky): American Science and Surplus. I have literally laughed aloud while reading through their Christmas catalog this week.

Kiss those babies!
~Dy

Home Remodel - Kids' Rooms

OK, I'm no longer on the lam... Yay! For anyone interested in the play-by-play slideshow, complete with excuses, I mean, comments, you can view the pictures here.

For the less motivated (or those on dialup), here's a quick shot of direct before and afters. I tried to get shots from the same angles. Interestingly, there is only one existing photo of the nursery from its days as a blacklight bong water dormitory. Huh. Imagine that. So, in brief, here's the nursery:



As you can see, we still have "storage issues" to address. That will come. (Hopefully, so will closet doors!) There aren't many photos of this transformation, because this room was the first bedroom we did - it had to be ready by the time Miss Emily made her grand debut. So, we were a bit under the gun, as the kitchen and bath also had to be done fairly soon after we moved in. So. Well, there ya go.

The next set of pictures is from the boys' room. We took a little more time with this one. (As in, we still aren't completely done. We get to the trimming of the closets and sort of wander off to work on something else. It's a theme - you'll notice it with the other two bedrooms, as well. In ten years, when I get around to posting those pictures.) Again, more detail, and more photos are in the slideshow. This is just a brief before and after, side-by-side comparison. I give you, The Boys' Room:



I included that bottom picture for two reasons: it's really cute, and it shows the toy shelves we built. This was a quick and easy project, the fruit of my warped desire to make stuff and Zorak's equally warped need to make certain it's solid. We'll be building another one to put in the nursery, which will hopefully address some of the storage issues mentioned above. It's designed to hold three of the larger Sterlite bins, or four of the smaller ones, on each shelf.

Well, time to go play!

Kiss those babies!
~Dy

Oh, for Pete's sake!

I just spent three hours uploading the before and after pictures of the renovation on the kids' rooms to a Yahoo! folder. They've "upgraded" the system, which meant that a great deal of that time wasted er, spent went toward figuring out the new system. OK, fine. But the pictures are up.

When I went to change the setting on that album to public, however, I received a nifty little notice that my account has been flagged as "age-restricted" due to violations of Yahoo's police regarding inapprorpriate images.

What.

The.

HELL.

Is up with that?

If I'd know that (oh, I don't know, perhaps a little notice via email would be a good way to let someone know they've set off a flag? a little heads up that there is, obviously, a problem! because I can guarantee you I'm not uploading or sharing ANYTHING inappropriate or damaging - argh!!) and I could have saved myself the time, effort and frustration of doing this tonight, just gone to bed at ten, and dealt with this during business hours.

I do hope tomorrow goes more smoothly than this did. Ugh. And really, I think it's neat that Yahoo has taken the extra step of looking out for folks who might be violating privacy or ethics concerns. I do. I just think that, considering the potential for the occasional blip in the screening process, better communication with its users would be nice, as well.

Oh, well, it's time for bed, anyway.

Dy

The week in pictures

Here's the proud boy with his first loaf of bread.



Miss Emily loves rice sticks and stiry fry!


Balto, head of QA for flooring installation...


And here, the boys are enjoying the spacious new layout. We threw the futon down on the floor for TV watching, and can stash it in the guest room when we're done. (Yeah, only one of them is actually watching TV. Seems the pad also makes a great wrestling mat and GP play area.)

Oh, and we don't usually live with newspapers and boxes piled around the living area. The overall clutter in the background is from the Blue Willow, which I was unpacking from storage when I snapped the picture! WOOHOO!

And Balto, ever so patiently letting Miss Emily play with his tail. I've got to try to get actual video of this, it's hilarious.


And that's pretty much been our week - laughing, learning, enjoying.

Kiss those babies!
~Dy

Virtual Friday

I really like Zorak's work schedule. Every other Friday, he's off, so we have an extra day to work on the house, or play with the kids. We usually blow the evenings by staying up way too late to watch Scrubbs and then a movie or two, but the time spent together is really nice. Sort of makes up for those last two years of school, where we never saw one another, even on weekends.

Today was cold-cold. Not like Michigan cold, but colder-than-Yuma cold. I'd venture to say it was close to Denver-cold (Zorak says no, but he was inside... and I'm feelin' like a weenie.) And it was beautiful. The boys were content to stay inside and play, work on their lessons, eat. Smidge really wanted to go outside to play, but not alone. So he stood in the foyer with his shoes on, hoodie in hand. He just stood there, staring at us, just waiting for someone to cave. (Nobody did - did I mention that it was kinda chilly out there?)

The kids and I found a recipe for making mulled cider out of regular apple juice, so we just had to try it. Some may poo-poo the idea that the two are even remotely similar, outside the basic apple DNA, but I've gotta say a few things in favor of this little plan: economy, year-round availability, and sheer freakin' fun. C'mon, how often do you let your kids heat a dry skillet and throw whole peppercorns in there? Or stir a handful of cloves and broken cinnamon sticks into a whirlpool in a pot? If you're eight, or six, or three, (or, um thirty-three...) that's fun! The flavor turned out pretty good, so we served it up with supper, and Zorak eyed us suspiciously. The knowledge that we'd gleaned the recipe from a website called Cooking For Engineers didn't seem to help any. (Of course, the fact that we were having a mongolian-like noodle dish for supper probably didn't help any, either.)

And now, it's quiet. We read "The Strange Dog" chapter in Farmer Boy tonight, so the boys are feeling particularly appreciative of Balto Dog. I am, too, really. For all the deer he chases away, he's really a loyal and affectionate dog, and it is nice to know his early alert systems are functional. Wish we could turn it off til the end of hunting season, but eh, can't have everything.

Zorak picked up a movie this evening, and he's ready to get started on our long weekend lounging. Time for a little touchin' base, and general appreciative sharing all around. Good stuff, this marriage thing. ;-)

Kiss those babies!
~Dy

What's For Supper?

Here, we're having potato soup, fresh salad (boiled eggs, cheddar cheese, Dubliner cheese, red bell peppers, green peppers, onions, celery, all decorated with greens), and fresh breads.

For those who are WF/GF, if you haven't tried the French Bread rolls recipe in GFG Bakes Bread, OMG - they're to die for! And even better, if you just make one large lump on a baking sheet instead of little dinner rolls, it comes out flat enough to be used for foccacia, but just thick enough to be sliced horizontally and toasted for breakfast bread or used as sandwich bread. I think I'm in heaven, and I know John is!

We had a tornado watch today. James stayed in the hallway, with full canteens and his shoes on, reprimanding me on each trip I made up and down the hall for not keeping the baby by the basement door "just in case". We stayed home, cleaning, making sure we have enough clean clothes and pre-cooked food to get us through a power outage. (I live in fear of losing power with a washer full of wet clothes. Focus on the small things and the big ones will just whiz right by ya!)

All is well, and the ground is beautiful, buried among all the leaves!

Kiss those babies!
~Dy

Missed it by "that much".

Drat. The new positions of the printer cabinet and the computer desk have left me without photo upload abilities. The cord is about two feet too short.

James made his first loaf of bread today. All on his own - prep, mixing, proofing, shaping and baking. I was there mainly to remind him not to measure right on the edge of the counter, to keep stirring, and not to measure right there, on the edge, of the counter.

He used the "Learning Loaf" from Marilyn M. Moore's The Wooden Spoon Bread Book, which is a wonderful one-loaf recipe that's easy for small hands to manipulate. The loaf turned out beautifully, not even "for a first loaf", but really nicely done. He was so proud. He ran about giving everyone a piece of bread, and while he'd originally thought he'd just eat the whole thing in one sitting (probably all alone, in the closet), the delight everybody else took in his creation called for cinnamon sugar toast all around! John is now anxious to make his first loaf of bread, and Smidge is really happy to have fresh bread any time he wants.

The others are still sick. Miss Emily has figured out what those white floaty things in the boxes are for, and she's not impressed. Thankfully, she hasn't begun Smidge's tactical maneuver of wiping the snot on a sleeve just seconds before the tissue comes within range. It won't take long, I'm sure. Right now, she's under the illusion that she can simply outpace us. It's cute, but kind of sad, because she's honestly baffled that we catch her every. single. time.

Going barefoot seems to be Miss Emily's answer to the traction issue. (Tried the shoes - she was having none of that, thank you for trying.) So, she stands at the diswasher and talks with me while I tidy the kitchen. I don't get much done, for all the staring down toward my knees and cooing to the baby, but it does make the chores a lot of fun.

You know, Zorak rebounds from these renovation pushes much more quickly than I do. Just thought I'd put that out there. We haven't even purchased baseboards yet, and he's already dreaming of vaulting the living room ceiling, adding the den, and turning the master bath into a closet. The most encouragement I can offer him, as I rub my toes back and forth on the floor, is a weak, "Yeah... that'll be... *gulp* great." Poor guy. He needed a wife with stamina. What he got is a wife with a sense of humor. Ah, well, whatever works, right?

I got a delightful surprise yesterday morning! Just the day prior, I was thinking that we hadn't had one of those beautiful, sparkling, fog-drenched mornings yet - the ones where the barn is just a shadowy sillhouette in a shimmering pool off in the distance. I loved those last year, and isn't it about time for more of those? Well, yesterday I walked into the living room to find everything illuminated by a diffused, glowing light. Looked out the window, and there it was - a Faerie Morning! Ohhhh, coffe just tastes better in that kind of weather.

And now, as part of my plan not to drive myself into an early grave, I'm going to head to bed before midnight! Woohoo!

Kiss those babies!
~Dy