Thur. 1/3/13 :: Ornamental

Tonight is the last night our Christmas tree will be up.  It’s huge and sits right next to my desk. It will come down tomorrow to make room for the invasion of my new computer. We have gazillions of ornaments on the tree, and I decided to try my hand at snapping shots of a few that were in range of my tripod. I still need some practice with these settings; these shots are what came out best. :) 

Above are two out of the dozen or so felt ornaments we have that my mom made. We always had similar ones on our tree growing up, so besides just being really cute, they feel very much like “home”. :)

Next, a third felt ornament is having a polka-dot-elephant party with one of the huge plush ornaments from our Rankin/Bass Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer set. Mark is a big fan of those holiday specials. The snowman is also from that set. The metal and stained glass angel is one of the many many angel ornaments I have from a past obsession with them. I have enough that I once did a 6-foot tree entirely in angels. (We don’t have enough stuff-free space to set up two trees anymore.) The purple glass guy hanging below the elephant is Grimace of McDonald’s fame, a gift from Ronald McDonald, who Mark works with from time to time. :)

The fake stained glass drummer below is part of a DIY set that I did to help pass the time in my hotel room while working on the road for Ericsson. I think it was in 1991. If my memory is correct, I did these while working on a project in Wharton, TX. The town made national news when it was hit with severe flooding a few days after I left. The acrylic reindeer is one we picked up at the mall years ago. It just looks really cool when the light hits it right. :)

The Big Mac is another from Ronald McDonald. Kaylee received the candy cane star at a Girl Scout gift exchange last year. The Packer ornament was a gift from my dad who was a HUGE Packer fan. It was a little good-natured dig at Mark, who has become a die-hard Cowboy fan since moving down here in '91. I always hang it low on the side of the tree nearest my desk so that I can see it while I’m working. :)

Finally, we have our two “baby’s first Christmas” ornaments. We actually received two different ones as gifts for Matthew (both Noah’s ark themed – must have been big that year), but had to hunt down one ourselves for Kaylee and had a heck of a time finding one.

That’s it! Fourteen out of the approximately 7,352,687 ornaments that hang on our tree every year! :)

Mon. 2/13/12 :: The Sand Man

We had another lecturing magician stay with us this weekend, Alan Sands. He had a little time off between stops, so he was able to hang out an extra day and keep Mark occupied. ;) Even got down on his hands and knees and worked on trying to refinish one area of our wood floor that is especially scratched up. I swear it was all his idea. We don’t normally put our guest magicians to work doing home improvements. LOL

He left behind a little souvenir as well. Can you tell what part of his lecture covered? :)

Thur. 2/9/12 :: Borrowed Boredom Buster

One of Matthew’s friends had left these Munchkin card games behind last weekend, so he and Mark decided they would see if they could figure them out and play a bit while we have them here. They spent the better part of the afternoon and evening reading rules and analyzing strategy and explaining thing to each other, and I think they might have actually gotten to play a little bit too. ;)

Wed. 2/8/12 :: Outgrown Games

Mark decided to do a little closet rearranging/clearing (to make more room for his magic, of course), so we went through our game closet and pulled out all most of the games the kids were too old for. We were able to free up a lot of space and had quite a large pile for our next charity pick-up when it was all done.

Wed. 1/25/12 :: Brace Yourself

Matthew has been going to the orthodontist for x-rays and such about once a year for the past 5 years, ever since his dentist noticed a cross bite on some of his back teeth. They kept an eye on things, but said he didn’t need any immediate treatment. When we went in last summer, they said he needed his last two baby teeth (upper canines) extracted, since they weren’t budging, and the adult teeth were trying to come in in front of them. So we had his dentist do that, gave those teeth some time to start coming in, and then took him back in to the ortho today. Now that all his baby teeth are gone, and things are settling in, they gave us the news that he will be ready to start braces in about 6 months, and presented us with a statement of what it will cost and our payment options. {gulp} It’s nice to have the info up front, and it gives us a chance to brace ourselves for the impact to our bank account. ;)

Sun. 1/8/12 :: Space

Our house is cluttered. The “stuff” just comes in at a much greater rate than it goes out. And then it just stays. And accumulates. We’re a long way from being candidates for an episode of “Hoarders”, but we will never be mistaken for any of the homes in the glossy decorator magazines. So that being the case, any area that becomes devoid of clutter stands out in stark contrast. This space beside my desk is where the Christmas tree stood. We disassembled the 9-foot tall, 4 to 5-foot wide (I’ve never actually measured) monster of metal and green plastic yesterday and sent it back to its resting place in the attic. And so now there is this expanse of naked space.

I’m sure it will be filled back in with something soon. Prior to the holiday decorating, an extra dining table covered in dead computer monitors and random piles of paperwork sat here, but the table has been relocated to the “sitting area” of the master bedroom, and it will probably stay there indefinitely. An old glider rocker that we bought before Matthew was born, which gets shifted to various rooms, often sits here; in fact, it has rubbed the paint off the wall at the edge of the window. But the rocker is currently in Kaylee’s room, and she has decided she’d like to keep it in there for the time being.

So for now, it is just space. Barren. Distracting. Disturbingly unsettling. Space.

191/365 – Sun. 7/10/11 :: Estimate This

One of Kaylee’s favorite activities from her math class this past year was the  “estimation jar”. Kids took turns filling a jar with between 100 and 1000 small objects, and then everyone would try to estimate how many were in there. Kaylee was disappointed that she never got a turn to fill the jar, so we’ve been doing our own version at home this summer. Items in the jar have included pop tops, crayons, playing cards, marbles, embroidery floss bobbins, coins, beads, buttons, and dice.

182/365 – Fri. 7/1/11 :: Summer Swelter

Just plain hot.

171/365 – Mon. 6/20/11 :: As the World Turns

We’ve had this interactive globe for quite a while. Normally, the kids don’t use it much, but it’s been sitting out in the family room for a few days, and it seems like one or both of them are playing with it every time I turn around.

161/365 – Fri. 6/10/11 :: Kaylee Sandwich

The couch cushions supply endless hours of entertainment. The kids go in spurts where they will play with them almost every day, using them as everything from forts to obstacle courses to horses to… um… giant slices of bread. Makes me wonder why we buy them any toys at all. ;)

148/365 – Sat. 5/28/11 :: Let Down Your Hair

We’ve had “Tangled” at the top of our Netflix queue for ages, and we finally got it this weekend. Kaylee’s Rapunzel doll joined us for the viewing. :)  Definitely worth the wait; one of the best movies family we’ve seen in quite a while! :)

144/365 – Tue. 5/24/11 :: This Is Not A Test

That’s an angry looking weather map if I ever saw one. The tornado sirens went off tonight (surprisingly rare for us), and we had to get the kids out of bed to take cover in the bathroom. Fortunately, the storm passed without an actual tornado in our immediate area.

[More observant readers may have noticed that there was no day 143. Since I am actually a couple of months behind on posting these, I’ve decided to try not to worry about filling any gaps with a relevant photo like I would normally do if I caught them within a day or two. In the interest of getting back on track, I’m going to fight my inner perfectionist, and just go with what I’ve got. I will probably find a few more gaps as I work through these; I’m just going to pretend I don’t notice them. ;) ]

136/365 – Mon. 5/16/11 :: Sound Check

The family room was a sea of cables and speakers as Mark tested the sound equipment in preparation for tomorrow night’s magic banquet.

131/365 – Wed. 5/11/11 :: Medicine Counter

Kaylee’s symptoms keep morphing. She’s moved on from the stomach symptoms to ear pain, sore throat, and a low-grade fever, and then sniffles, stuffiness, and a wicked cough. Poor kid is just miserable. :(

130/365 – Tue. 5/10/11 :: Bubble, Bubble, Broil and More Bubble

We received a lovely thank you gift today of meat from Omaha Steaks. It came packed in dry ice, so Mark took a chunk of it and dropped it in a glass of water to show the kids what it would do. It went on bubbling and foaming and misting and  for quite a long time!

124/365 – Wed. 5/4/11 :: Firelight

Just loved the pattern of the sunlight was coming in through the blinds and hitting the fireplace surround this morning. :)

118/365 – Thur. 4/28/11 :: Leaning Tower of TiVo

Mark hogs the TV enjoys relaxing in front of the  TV most evenings, so mornings are my time to catch up on watching the shows I’ve TiVo’ed. Sometimes this requires a creative balancing act to block the blinding sun glaring in from the high arched windows.

Top of tent perched on back of desk chair. Loop on bottom corner of kids’ play tent attached to hook on mantle. It reminds me of the beginnings of some crazy balanced tower in a Dr. Seuss book . . .  “and the bottle’s on a poodle, and the poodle’s eating noodles”. . .  “Fox in socks, our game us done, sir. Thank you for a lot of fun, sir.”     :)

116/365 – Tue. 4/26/11 :: Jensen Meat

Mark grilled us hamburgers for lunch. Love that the meat company of the patties we buy shares our name. :)  Too bad we don’t get a cut of the profits. ;)

105/365 – Fri. 4/15/11 :: Shred Fest

Mark decided last night to tackle a rather large backlog of old account statements and such we had that needed shredding.

I think we ended up with four of the large bags and three or four of the small bags stuffed full by the time we were done. What’s funny is that un-shredded, the paper probably would have only filled about half of one of the large bags.

Any guesses as to what’s been added to the mix here?

 

Shredded CD’s! So sparkly! :)

95/365 – Tue. 4/5/11 :: Colorful Castoffs

We finally got a semi non-windy day, so today was Weed War Part 2 – granular weed ‘n feed treatment . These are a few of the abandoned toys I dragged up onto the patio out of our overgrown jungle of a backyard to clear the way for the spreader. I have a feeling most of the poor toys I found out there are not going to be salvageable.