Happy Thanksgiving

I am busy counting my blessings this morning, and wish all of you a Happy Thanksgiving filled with food, family, and friends.

But among the happiness of the day, we have some sadness, too.  My Uncle Jack, my dad's brother and my godfather, passed away early this morning.   I have some fond memories of him.  Here's a layout I did of him (on the right) and my dad (on the left) when they were young men.

Rest in peace, Uncle Jack.

Rain, Rain, Go Away

It started raining last night, and did not stop until an hour or so ago.  It's only in the low 50s, raw and cold.  Ick.

So, I did a page to warm me up a bit.  These were some of the hydrangeas that were in bloom when we were on the Cape in July.  After tulips, these are my favorite flowers.  Isn't the range of color amazing?

I'm off to finish getting ready for my Mom's visit.  She's arriving in a little over an hour to spend the holiday with us.  When I picked Jeremy up from school, he told me that he wrote a love note for her today.  She is just going to melt!

Licking the Spoon

I love to bake, but don't do it too often anymore because I really don't need the extra fat and calories.  But nowadays I have a helper or two when it's time to bake.  We made some Rice Krispy treats this week, and it reminded me of pictures I took of Jeremy the last time we made some (in March).  I was in a mood to play with paper, and created a layout today with those pictures.

Jeremy likes to add ingredients and turn the mixer on and off.  He enjoys the process to some extent.  But really, his favorite part is licking the spoon.  He anticipates the moment the whole time we're mixing the ingredients.  Once he receives the spoon, he's quite intent and deliberate about it.

Do you spend a little time licking the spoon after you accomplish something?  Or are you so busy with all those things life throws at you that you just move on to get the next item crossed off your list?  Take a page from Jeremy's book:  take the time to savor the moment and revel in it.  Go lick some spoons!

Notes from the House of Pestilence

"The House of Pestilence" is the label my friend, Jean, assigned to my home this week.  "Why would she say such a thing?" you might ask yourself.

It all started on Friday, Nov.6.  Matthew came home from school and "didn't feel up to" playing with his friends. You parents out there know that statement from a child is a big, red flag that something's wrong.  Sure enough, when I checked, he had a fever.  The only other symptoms were a mild cough and occasional loss of appetite.  So we had a low-key weekend, and Sunday night at bedtime he was fever-free.

But by then Jeremy had started a fever.

Matthew stayed fever-free on Monday and on Tuesday was able to go back to school.  But that evening his coughing really escalated, and when he got up on Wednesday morning he had a fever again.  So off to the docs we went.  They both tested positive for the flu,and Matthew had developed pneumonia as well.  Jeremy was tracking exactly 2 days behind Matthew.  Sure enough, on Friday he was seen at the doc and diagnosed with pneumonia as well.

So, for 8 days now the boys have been home sick.  Matthew seemed just perfectly  normal again today, and it looks like he'll be back to school on Monday.  Jeremy was still feverish all day today, so unless he's normal tomorrow he'll miss *another* day of school.  As I tucked him into bed tonight, he turned and said to me "Mom, I really miss my school."  Me too, buddy, trust me!

We did manage some fun, though.  They were both kind of bummed out Wednesday at dinner time, missing school and their friends.  So Ryan and I offered up a special bath in our tub.  We have an extra-deep garden tub in our bathroom, with nice jets.  We put enough water in to cover the jets, then turned them on.  Jets + bubble bath = bubbles nearly 2 1/2 feet high!  The boys had an absolutely blast playing in it!  And the cat, naturally, had to inspect the situation.

So far, Ryan and I have managed to avoid getting sick, and we're hoping it stays that way.

Belated Boo!

So I'm finally getting around to posting pictures of the boys on Halloween.  We had Captain Rex (from Star Wars: The Clone Wars) and a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle (the red one, whomever that might be) join us for trick-or-treating this year.  And the kids had me make a (somewhat pathetic) attempt at a Darth Vader carving on the pumpkin.

Matthew is (still) in his fake-smile phase.  Partly because he's got 4 missing teeth and likes folks to see his gaps.  Partly because he's just in that phase.  I'm really hoping it will end soon.

We trick-or-treated with our neighbors this year.  Actually, it's the first year we've had neighbors with kids the same age to trick-or-treat with.  It was rather toasty, in the mid-70s, and by the time we got half-way done all of the kids were soaked with sweat.  It's a far cry from the Halloweens I remember in Boston as a child, when we'd have to struggle to get the costumes on over heavy clothes because it was so cold outside.  (Wearing them over our coats meant people could see who we were.  It would have been just silly to put coats over our costumes.)

For the last 4 days, I've been dealing with sick boys.  Matthew popped a fever late Friday afternoon, and was able to go back to school today.  Apparently 5 of his class  of 18 were out sick yesterday.  Jeremy started with the fever late Sunday afternoon, and was still 102 today at lunchtime. So he'll be out another day tomorrow. Hopefully, if it follows the same course Matthew's did, he'll be back in school on Thursday.

 I'll leave you today with a picture of a greeting card I made using November's free kit at Scrapstreet, Thankful by Rachness Designs.  The free kit is a digital kit, and all of the things on the card are printed from a digital creation.  Don't those buttons look real, though?

Bad Blogger!

Readers, forgive me for I have been a bad blogger...  it has been nearly 4 weeks since my last blog post...  Ooh, look at that, I feel like I'm in a confessional again... sounds like it, too.  :)

What have I been up to?

• Lots of school involvement for me in the last few weeks: classroom volunteering, field trip chaperoning, and unpacking and displaying boxes and boxes of books for the school-wide book fair to be held next week.

• My in-laws came and visited for a few days, and we had a great time with them.  They got to see one of Matthew's baseball games.

• Finished up the baseball season.  The team actually won their last game - giving them a 1-and-10 or so record for the season.

• Parent-teacher conferences.  Early dismissals from school for said conferences.  

• Lots of creating for Scrapstreet magazine;  while I'm no longer an editor, I still help out by creating items for the monthly Showroom article and occasionally for other columns as well.  

• Some sewing: one of my bees has a Christmas tree block swap ongoing, and my 12 identical blocks are nearing completion.  

• Those of you who know me well know how much I love diet Coke, and that it was a 2L-a-day habit.  Did you notice the past tense?  I'm officially 4 weeks clean now.  No caffeine in that time.  An occasional fizzy drink like diet Sprite.  (And by occasional I mean only about one a week.)  Lots of flavored waters.  (Love those, not so fond of plain water.)   Amazingly, I did not get migraine-level headaches, only mild-to-moderate ones that were easy to cope with.  

• I also prepped two rooms and a hallway for painting, then had the painters here for a couple of days getting it done.  It's all nice and fresh upstairs now.  Well, if you don't look at the rugs.  I could render down the playroom rug for soup stock.  (Any David [and Leigh] Eddings fans out there may recognize that line...)  So today I got an estimate on getting all the rugs cleaned.  It's a bit pricey, but considering the state of the rugs...  Well, DH and I will be making a decision over the weekend.

• Oh, and if I'm going to come clean, I have to admit to a bit of an obsession with a Ratchet and Clank PS3 video game.  Been spending lots of time shooting things up.  

So, that sums up my last 4 weeks or so.   Busy crazy life stuff.  But I'm back on the blogging wagon.  Type at y'all later.

Fall Quilt Festival

Park City Girl is hosting a Fall Quilt festival.  So I decided to join the party!

This is Midnight Sun/Polar Night.  I took a Jan Krentz Lone Star class in March 04, in which I made the diamonds.  I then put it away because Jeremy was born two weeks later. When Jeremy was three, I began having about 30 minutes here and there when I could actually *do* something, so I started quilting again.  I decided to start with finishing up a few UFOs, and the lone star was the first quilt I thought of finishing.

I pulled it back out in Jan 08 and got it finished up. The animal patterns were traced, scanned and blown up from the batik print in the outer border. They are hand appliqued.  The piece is machine quilted. Because the animals are all North American, and cold country animals as well, and because the colors are essentially sunlight and midnight, I named it for the endless day and endless night experienced in Alaska and Canada.

Just Add Water

It's a nearly perfect slogan for the boys.  Whether it's a sprinkler, bathtub, hose, or pool, they're happy if there's water.  Even frozen water - the ice that collects around the backyard in the winter - can keep them busy for hours.

But the best is the water at the beach. We spent the weekend in Myrtle Beach, with Ryan's family.  The weather was perfect - low 80s, sunny, no humidity.  We walked on the beach at sunrise, did a lot of wave jumping, played mini golf, went to the water park, and had lunches and dinners out together.  Here are a couple of the 540 pictures I took in the 2-day trip:  Jeremy walking on the beach at sunrise, and Matthew leaping into a rather large wave.

It really was a relaxing weekend. Good thing we did it then, because it looks like summer's last gasp is happening here now.  We'll be into the 50s and 60s next week.

Bikes, Jedi Training, Pampas and Scarecrows

Most schooldays, the boys can't play with their friends because of late school bus times and homework.  But on Wednesdays, the local schools dismiss an hour early, and so the boys get a chance to play with their friends.  Yesterday they had an impromptu bike rodeo.  Here's Matthew mugging for the camera - again!  I can't get this one to give me a nice smile anymore.

 

The rodeo didn't last very long, but they all had a good time.  Then Matthew was off to do his homework, and Jeremy decided to do his Jedi training.  Apparently having an angry face with hard, staring eyes is part of the whole Jedi business.

 

It was a lovely fall day yesterday, temps in the low 70s and dry.  The pampas grasses look really beautiful at this time of year.

And Ribby was - for once - willing to sit still and let me take her picture instead of bouncing around being excited by the attention.  Love this shot of her - those deep, soulful, sad eyes make you forget that she's really a scarecrow (if she only had a brain).

Lazy Sunday

Just enjoying a lazy Sunday today.  We've all done some reading and played video games together.  The boys played outside in the backyard with their friends for several hours, and I did some stamping.  The dog decided that the screen door would be much better with a flap in it, and created her very own dog door to the sunporch.  Ryan was not terribly happy about her decorating idea!

Ryan mowed the lawn, and when he was done let the kids drive the tractor a bit.  Ear-to-ear grins on both of those boys' faces getting to drive for the first time!  And they didn't run over any trees, or the garage, or the tool shed.

I've got a few more layouts of our trip to the Cape done in the last week or so.  The first one of Jeremy running to catch up when he saw Uncle Bill showing Matthew his fishing gear.  (Credits can be found here.)

And this picture of my niece, Tori. She's a lovely, confident girl and held her own with the boys.  Not "tough", but secure in herself and able to stand her ground when necessary.  (Credits here.)

And this layout of Jeremy, playing last February in Asia at the Animal Kingdom at WaltDisneyWorld.  He's so good at entertaining himself and having fun!  Over the years I've become used to how roughly the boys play, but I have to admit that him throwing himself onto the pavement at multiple points in the game he invented did get to me once or twice! (Credits here.)