Archive for November 2010

Tuesday, November 30, 2010

Vance is all tied up



Vance is now a member of the group of Those Who Can Tie Their Shoes.

That's right, as of yesterday he can do it himself.

No more Velcro. The world of footwear with shoestrings is his oyster.

...............

In other news, it rained yesterday. When it's cold and rainy I tend to want to make peanut butter cookies with Hershey kisses in the middle. We always have peanut butter on hand but never Kisses. I've banned myself from keeping superfluous chocolate candy, and Nutella for the same matter, in the pantry. I'm fighting a war on the inside.

Plato was right.

Wednesday, November 24, 2010

Speaking of Turkeys...

Here Vance models his obligatory Pilgrim hat made at school.


Pictured behind him is our obligatory Tree of Thanks that the kids and I made. (Sticks from outside, pushed into foam, covered with Cypress tree needles to hide the ugly, and leaves that Vance cut out from construction paper with the things that we're thankful for.)



Tuesday, November 23, 2010

Craft Flop: Thanksgiving Edition


paper bag popcorn turkey

I love One Charming Party. Great stuff is being done over there, everyone should check it out.

I tried their paper bag turkey centerpiece idea.......and it was a flop. Not a total disaster, but I would definitely do things differently the second time around. Not that I'll be making one anytime soon, but in case you do, here's the story:

Head on over to One Charming Party to get the complete instructions.

My issues were that the grease from the popcorn soaked through the small paper bags. And I didn't realize that the small paper bags that I had on hand were "giant" sized. That made my turkey legs look out of proportion. Oh, and mine used a whole lot more popcorn than what the tutorial called for. (Justin was a champ and ran to the store for me twice while I was trying to make this.)





I don't like popcorn or even the smell of popcorn, so having to work with it wasn't the best, but it's a cute idea. If anyone has better luck with it let me know!

Turkeys

On Sunday I took pictures



of the kids playing in the leaves.


For every picture of Jack being a wild-man


there's another picture of him carefully brushing leaves off of Vaughnie.



So sweet. I love it.

...............

I made one of those big paper bag turkeys filled with popcorn. I'll post about it later today. Gobble Gobble!

Saturday, November 20, 2010



Today I am thankful for this airplane because it's bringing the Mr. home.

Justin has been in Singapore and we're ready to have him back.

Have a great day!




Friday, November 19, 2010

In which I talk about Trash TV

I watched Real Housewives of Beverly Hills last night. Here's what I have to say about it:


1. I want to hang my wedding dress in a giant shadow box now, too. Props to you Adrienne. "Bathroom big enough to fit my wedding dress on the wall" will now be included in the Must-Haves for our next house.

2. Kyle, how much hair do you need? And what is the shiny stuff woven into Adrienne's weave? (I'm pronouncing 'weave' like Maya Rudolph did in the SNL skit about The Housewives. Did anyone see that? She uses a breathy W. Hilarious.) My point: Is it me or does this cast of housewives have way more hair than any other?

3. Did anyone else sense that Kelsey didn't want Camille backstage? Yikes, that was awkward! I'd say I felt sorry for Camille, but I don't even think she was present enough to really know what was going on.

4. Taylor's lower half of her face scares me a bit. Not as much as her husband, though.

5. I feel sorry for Kim. I don't know why, but I feel she's the rougher, older one of the bunch.

6. I like Lisa. It may or not be because of her accent.

...............

Today? I may look into a hoist to help me get Vaughn in and out of her crib. Tonight? Fancy Jammie party with the kids. Have a great day!

Thursday, November 18, 2010

November 17



The 17th of November always sticks out in my mind. It's the day we moved to Wisconsin, which would be 5 years and 1 day ago today.

(Not to cornfuse anyone, we're not there anymore.)

I remember Justin carrying me through the threshold and looking over my shoulder to see the moving truck pulling in. Funny, I remember what I was wearing that day and it just occurred to me now that I wore the same exact pair of shoes yesterday.

Fun fact: We've lived in 3 houses since we've been married and they all have had red front doors. Wonder what we'll get with house number 4?

Monday, November 15, 2010

Black Bean Brownies. Say what?

First read about this from www.thisweekfordinner.com. Thanks Jane!

I saw this recipe for brownies and had to try it. I didn't think it was possible that a can of black beans could go undetected in brownies.

That's right. What you see here are black bean brownies.

Drain and rinse one can of black beans. Put beans back into the can and add water to the top. Pour them into a mixing bowl and mash them with the back of a spoon, potato masher, or even puree them with a stick blender. (I went the potato masher route.) Dump in a box mix of brownies (I went with the Ghirardelli double chocolate), stir, then bake to the box's directions. That's it. Nothing else.

Honestly, everyone liked them. Even Justin. I had a hard time eating them just because I knew what was going on. Vance said they were the best brownies that he had ever had in his life, but he's 5 and was just happy to be getting dessert, so his opinion really can't be trusted.

Once you know and taste them again you can figure it out. It was fun to try but I don't think I'll be making these again.

Eat healthy, then go have a real brownie.

Capice?

Friday, November 12, 2010

Dancing Sugarplums in her head?



Might as well bring up the tree and all the other decorations, because everyone is thinking about Christmas already!

I caught Vaughn last night checking out her favorite page of one of the toy magazines. If you ask her she'll tell you that she'll be asking Santa for a Cindewewwa dwess.

...............

It's Friday November 12 and if the weatherman is correct we'll be sweating our balls off again today. Enjoy it and have a great weekend!

Thursday, November 11, 2010

I was trolling around the internet last night looking for hockey sticks.


Here's my train of thought: Hmmm...where would I find a hockey stick? A Sporting Good store...Oh, Dick's!

So I typed in dicks dot com. And I learned the hard way that that's not the right address. Not even close. I wonder how many people have done that. In case you're in need of sporting goods too, dicks sporting goods dot com is the correct answer.

What can I learn from this? Think before you type. Things are not as easy as they seem. Download a Parental Control Bar thingie for when Vance starts using the internet.

I did eventually find my hockey sticks though.

...............

At 4:45 PM last night our blender blended its last smoothie. Rode it's last rodeo. Bought the farm. It was 8 years old.

Wednesday, November 10, 2010

Wordless Wednesday: Baby with Goatee



It's just silly. I'll be back when I have something important to report.

Monday, November 08, 2010

Things look different around here. I know this.


What I don't know is how it happened.

I was watching My Cousin Vinny and then everything changed and I can't get it back.


Happy Birthday to Me

I don't know how old I was here. Maybe 2?

Fast forward 30 ish years. I've lost the tan, still have glasses, and have way more hair.

I had a great birthday weekend. Thanks to everyone for making it so special!

(The boys planned on making cupcakes, but we ran out of time. Thank goodness for leftover Halloween candy!)

Vance's birthday card for me. He made about 8 of them for me throughout the day, but this one is my favorite. This one's a keeper.

Enjoy Monday. The weather here is supposed to be great.

Thursday, November 04, 2010

7:14 AM Thursday



Already crafting with Vance.

He has poo-poo'd many of my ideas for our Family Turkey Project. I wasn't on board with the green felt turkey head, but we went with it. I seem to be the only one bending here.

When he gets the shoebox diorama assignment I'm not giving in as easily.

So, there.

Monday, November 01, 2010

Thankful that it's over: Halloween. Part 3

I always have a hard time getting good pictures of the kids. Halloween was no exception.

Here are the little ghoulies before Trick or Treating.


Vance was a skeleton, Vaughn was a butterfly. It's a little hard to see her wings in these pictures. Surprisingly, she kept the antennae on the whole night.



It was a big weekend for Justin at work so he missed out on the Trick or Treating. Don't worry, we didn't let that slow us down though! Onward we marched!

Or...ran! From house to house to house. When Vaughn's legs wore out we headed back to the house to man our own door.

Vance and I rounded the night out with a past-your-bedtime-but-it's-Halloween spooky movie. 25 minutes in we both decided it was getting a little too scary and opted for a few minutes of HGTV to neutralize all the scary.

Are your kids fighting over candy yet? Mine are! Tears were shed last night over Skittles. We had a great Halloween season but I'm so thankful that it's over.

FIN

Thankful that it's over: Halloween. Part 2

We carved pumpkins 4 days before Halloween and they were a shriveled mess by the big night. We didn't even bother lighting them. Next year we'll do it the day before.

Below, Vance carves his first pumpkin and almost his sister's hands at the same time.



I didn't take pictures of the final products that night, but this is how they looked this morning. Sad looking pumpkins!






Thankful that it's over: Halloween. Part 1

Saturday, October 30. Spooky dinner followed by spooky movie.

Lady's Fingers

Old Man's Teeth

Mummy Dogs & Bones





Spider cupcakes

I packaged 3 of the cupcakes as a Thank You for a dinner playdate that Vance was invited to on Friday night. I made the stickers by reducing the size of the image for the Treat Tubes, printing them out, and simply using a glue stick to adhere. (I should have included a bottle of wine or spirit of choice for the Mom that hosted the kids. She has 3 of her own kids, invited 4 extra kids over, volunteered that day for the class field trip, and worked the class party. SuperMom!)



 

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