A Very Harry Christmas

From back left: Hermione, Ron, Harry.
From front left: Snape, Voldemort

Introducing Potter Puppet Pals ornaments. I like to think of them as poorly crafted charmingly naive.  I spotted them on Pinterest a few weeks ago and knew that I had to figure out how to make them for Rebekah.

Mischief managed.

Happee Birthdae Rebekah!

Rebekah's Challenge

I'm going to be out of town for most of the week.  So I thought I'd post something I made last week that fits right in with Rebekah's challenge. It's a do it yourself food/weight journal.  Print up whatever suits your fancy, fold it in half, cut a piece of heavier paper out for a cover and sew the whole kit and caboodle together.  I like to finish off the outside with a little masking tape.

Easy peasy.

Sneaky Kids.

Rebekah (the daughter-in-law formerly known as The Zombie Bride) and Nathan surprised us by showing up a day early.  We now have 4 full weeks of them to look forward to.  Four. Full. Weeks.  Many thanks to Taylor for giving them a working vehicle.  Let the games begin.

In other news, Andrew gets home one week from today.  In fact, by this time next week, we should be driving home from the airport (if he makes it through customs in a timely manner).

ROTFL

Rebekah texted me a few minutes ago.  I like to stay connected, but I'm not sure I'll ever truly get the hang of texting.  When it comes to typing on a phone, I have two left thumbs...and they're not opposable.

Alex just got a text from her.  He texted her back and told her that texting is a tool of the devil.

Good luck, Rebekah.

Fun with pictures.

I've been playing around with picnik.  Can you tell?

So long, farewell, auf wiedersehen, adeiu...

I took more pictures, I just didn't realize I had the camera on video. 

Steve, Alex, Nathan and Rebekah left here nearly an hour ago...heading east.  East to Rexburg.  The weather is okay here - cold and overcast... but they're bound to find some snow sooner or later.  I vote later.

Steve picked up some chains earlier today...I'm hoping he won't have to use them.  I think we've only ever had to use them once or twice in the past 30 years.  Les Schwab Tires said he can return them in April if they haven't been used.  We'll see.  We'll see if we remember that we have them in April.

Remains of the Day

"Pikagroom", and "Pikabride" cake toppers...decorated by Rebekah and Nathan.

The wedding is over. The reception is over. The cultural hall was cleaned up. The church kitchen was cleaned up. Cars and vans were loaded up and stuff hauled home. Somehow we ended up with the leftover wedding cake. There was a LOT of leftover wedding cake. We froze the top layers for Nathan and Rebekah to have at a future time...we froze some more to be served as dessert on Wednesday (when they get home from their honeymoon and open presents)....but that still left an awful lot of cake.

Coincidentally I still happened to have a lot of company today. Being the gracious hostess that I am, I offered a healthy breakfast of :

• Orange Juice
• Bacon
• Wedding Cake

My guests didn't manage to make too much of a dent in it. Whatever is left tomorrow is going...going....

Rebekah's dad called me this evening to offer us some of the leftover goodies from the wedding. I told him no - unless he wanted to take some cake off of our hands. He gracefully declined...his co-workers will be reaping the rewards of my "no" tomorrow at work.

Maybe I should post it on Craig's List.

2 Weeks Notice

2 weeks from today: Nathan and Rebekah's wedding!

Less than 3 weeks until Christmas.


Let's panic now and avoid the rush.

Dancing with the Turkey Brine

When Danny started making the turkey brine yesterday, Rebekah loaned him her apron. She put it on him and tied the sash. Danny was okay with it until the camera came out.
Alex showed support by donning my apron - but Danny was still awfully shy of having his picture taken.

I did manage to snap a couple of pictures with quite a bit of swish. Looks like he's dancing...instead of running away from the camera.

Beauty School

Rebekah wanted to cut Nathan's hair...and she did it. Much better than her first efforts on Trevor and Kaith.

Not too bad. I think she'll do just fine on her own from here on out.

That's a good thing, since she'll be on her own (as far as hair cutting goes) in less than 6 weeks.

Apron #3

Rebekah said "Why don't we do some sewing?" this morning. Yeah, yeah....okay. I changed the pattern that we used for the other two - I simplified it while not taking away from the awesomeness of the bias ruffle. Instead of the fiddly border on the side I just lined the whole thing. No hand sewing(yea!) and a few less steps (yea!). It turned out adorable...I just wish that Suzanne was still here to take the picture.

Haircuts and Hairy Apricots

First, the apricots.

My family is not overly fond of canned apricots (I don't really blame them). I've had this can of apricots taking up space in the bunker for years. The expiration date was sometime in 2004. I sent Miriam downstairs to get a can of fruit and she brought up two. A perfectly fine can of pears and this ancient of days can of apricots. Yes, I fed my grandchildren old apricots. The can wasn't bulging and they didn't smell funky so, what the heck...here ya' go. Hopefully we won't end up at Children's with 3 cases of botulism (Trevor did not partake). Kaith didn't seem to be enjoying his - I told him he didn't have to finish it - he said "these apricots taste hairy". The good news is that I now have no more hairy apricots in the bunker.

And now, on to the haircuts. I've been letting Rebekah borrow my clippers and my grandchildren so that she could learn how to cut hair. Yesterday she cut Kaith's hair (I'll touch it up in a day or two). Today she tackled Trevor. I saw exponential improvement in Rebekah's technique. She'll be ready to trim Nathan's hair in no time (a true test of love).

There's a reason these kids are homeschooled....

Rebekah got this picture off my phone. It's a technological miracle. Of sorts.

I took Danny and Lincoln bowling this morning. It was the WAVA "Back to School Bowling Bash". We've gone to other WAVA activities before - but none were as well attended as this one. All 16 lanes were full ... 16 lanes x 6 = 96 kids bowling at once. 96 nerds. Danny and Lincoln were just about the coolest kids there. I'm not sure what that says...

Sparkling Sugar Cookies

I gave Stephanie some sugar cookie dough this morning to use with the grandkids - she brought out my box of cookie cutters and this is what they came up with (with help from Stephanie).

They didn't put together the vignette - Rebekah did. Complete with ring. Ridiculously awesome. Nathan felt the need to make the vignette truer - by biting off 2 steeples of the temple. Now it looks a lot more like the Seattle Temple. I'm not totally sure of the symbolism of the headless couple. Any ideas?

Picture Potpourri

Evidently this was the "beta" version of Nathan's ring box.

This is the actual origami box that Nathan made to put the engagement ring in....

...which he presented to Rebekah yesterday. In case you missed that - yes, Nathan and Rebekah are engaged.

Andrew's mission president posted this picture on his blog today - you are welcome to see the accompanying article here.