Anybody Home

I must say it again, Cindy and Kevin's wedding was absolutely beautiful.

The reception was fun too.

This picture fell out of the post below.

Truly, I have NO IDEA what has just been said.

Apparently it affected Daughter and my sister Carol, but not nephew Chris.

This one is suitable for framing, don't you think?

Isn't it beautiful?

He fashioned the frame from scrapes of oak molding from work. He also routed it, as he has been learning how to use the router at work. The stained oak matches the woodwork in the livingroom perfectly!

Oldest Son and Daughter-in-law came up for 24 hours this weekend.

For the St. Nicholas Party, and, to celebrate Oldest Son's birthday.

THGGM and I LOVE Amazon.com and it's 'wishlists'. Shopping for the book lovers in the family has never been easier. Oldest Son was happy with his four new birthday books.

Baby Boy, who is surrounded by books at my house, seems delighted with them also.

Although I do believe he wishes for a few toys for his birthday.

At least in this picture he seems to be deeply contemplating something.

Birthday parties around here really aren't all that exciting.

Son-in-law is researching some new technology.

Daughter-in-law is reading a book for the pure enjoyment of it, NOT for a class.


Nephew Chris is helping Youngest Son fine-tune a philosophy paper which is due today.

Yup. We sure do know how to party around here.

The birthday treat was donuts.

We went to Hunan for lunch.

Baby Boy didn't quite want to go to sleep!

Only 10 days after St. Nicholas Day, we had our family party.

We started celebrating St. Nicholas Eve when THGGM worked in retail.

We rarely saw him around the holidays, so we, being the good Dutch people that we are, decided to celebrate on St. Nicholas Eve, with a party for which we drew names, and bought a gift for our 'special person'.

THGGM no longer works in that environment, and is even relaxed around the holidays, but the tradition has stuck. Somewhat. We just change the date every year.

This is officially Baby Boy's first Christmas. He seems impressed.

Because I happen to know that he was JUST BORN!

I remember it all so well.

From having worked with children, I always wondered what they were thinking.

I asked God for a baby that would talk early, and tell me what he was thinking.

Good grief! What was I thinking!?

He wasn't more than two when I realized that he didn't ask questions like other kids his age. So, I asked him, "Oldest Son, why don't you ask questions?"

He looked me square in the eye like I was some sort of idiot and replied "Because I already know everything."

Isn't he handsome?

He still is.

I'm sure THGGM would have taken the day off to play Risk with him today, if Oldest Son still lived in Michigan.

(do you hear 'cats in the cradle' playing in the background?...)

Happy Birthday Oldest Son!

I'm so thankful God gave you to our family!

One of our favorite thrift stores had all Christmas stuff half off. Now, if you come to my back door, these snowmen will greet you.

I think I have survived this migraine. Every night, a little bit of it comes back to remind me that I should not think that I have won, yet.

My parents are enrolled in their prescription plan. How in the world anyone could expect old people to figure this out on their own, I will NEVER understand. I'm very thankful for the two kind voices on the phone who helped me through this. I laughed out loud when the voice mail attached to the number I called said to check out their website. My parents are 79 and 80. They do not have a computer. Last week when I went to their house to fill the pills, they were playing an 8 track!

I took a very good picture of my parents at the church Christmas party tonight. While cropping it, I noticed that my mom is wearing her old glasses. She has two new pair. Something for me to track down. They did find her purse. I needed medicare cards to sign them up for the new plan. So so very very glad they found her purse. It was stuck way under the front seat of the car. I wonder if her old glasses were in her purse?

I told THGGM tonight that contrary to what HE believes, it does indeed look like Christmas in our home tonight. I made three batches of cookies today. I could not finish one of them, as when I dumped the chocolate chips and butterscotch chips together in the pan, it occurred to me that those chips weren't semi-sweet. Oh, if only I had realized that before I mixed the two bags together. Like I had time to separate the chips. Someone should invent a magnet for this sort of error. Although, I suppose I could just read the bag before I open it. Oh, well. My freezer is filling up with things I should not eat.

My dining room table looks like a bird flew into a fan. Somehow, feathers removed themselves from the bag and took a spin around the table. Unfinished projects. It says 'Christmas' to me.

"The Heart of the Family" is now in the category of 'books I have read'. I really liked it. A lot. Dog eared many pages. Now I am reading John Grisham's "Skipping Christmas". This is the first Grisham book I have read.

Baby Boy had his first molar come through this week. It made him extremely sweet and extremely cuddly. Yesterday I saw him leaning on the giant footstool that has taken over the living room. He had his index finger way back in his mouth. I asked him "What's wrong?" and he put his index fingertips together signing 'hurt'.

Tomorrow I must paint eight soup cans black. Go to Michael's for white pipe cleaners and something else. The something else will probably keep me awake all night, as it was very important.

Shouldn't there be a way to tell stupid people to just STOP being stupid? I would think that if someone told me to stop being stupid, I would stop. Although, I do not suggest you try this while I am eating chocolate.

The migraine song running through my head this week has been Burl Ives singing 'Have a Holly Jolly Christmas'. It. Won't. Stop.

Time seems to be running funny lately. I pulled out some of my favorite Christmas reading material, and it seemed like I had just read it. I used to tremble with excitement to read them. I suppose if I added up just how many years I have been reading some of them, it would explain it. I simply MUST read "The Best Christmas Pageant Ever". Even though it seems I just did.

I could go on like this all night. I had coffee at 5:30. But, no. All good things must come to an end. I must go separate the chips, finish the cookies and clean up the kitchen.

And me, already being a pumpkin.

Oh, wait. He is EVERY day!

Well, mostly.

But Beppe (that's me) had a migraine last night that chose to linger through the day.

Baby Boy took an hour and a half morning nap.

Then, he happily ate his lunch and played quietly.

Generally quiet play does not suit him.

He learned how to properly get out of the rocking chair. He's good at it. In fact, the only reason he wants to sit in it is so he can get out and hear me clap wildly at his phenomenal skill.

But most of the day today he was content to rock his 'action figure' Jack. And play with Jack's belly button.

Have I mentioned lately that the past 11 months and six days have been the most fun 11 months and six days of my life?

Misty, migraine-colored memories, of the way we were.

This creepy looking little pillow is THGGM's favorite Christmas decoration. If I 'forget' to put it out, he will say in his best whiny voice, "Where's my pillow?"

When my children were the age they are in that pillow to the left, I had the best 'best friend' in the entire known universe. She had a daughter Oldest Son's age, and two older boys whom she homeschooled.

She would take ALL THREE OF MY CHILDREN in exchange for me doing artsy stuff with her kids.

Her boys were so much fun! The clothes pin angels reminded me of the time THGGM, her two boys and I sat around our kitchen table and made dozens of crazy looking clothes pin ornaments. THGGM made a 'snow princess' which really impressed us all. I should have kept her, and called HER my favorite Christmas decoration and see if he would allow that to be on display! Anyway...I digress.

The pillow was made by coloring on a sheet of paper with fabric crayons, and then ironing it on to a piece of white material. It was one of our 'artsy' projects. THGGM wasn't present when I made this one, so - being poor and all - I made my sample project into a Christmas gift. He LOVED it. I'm sort of embarrassed by it. I got a little too much crayon on the kids facial features, and they ended up with very large mouths (i always wondered how that happened, seeing how i'm so quiet).

Each child has behind his back two things that were very important to them at the time. Youngest Son has his Ernie doll and his bear blanket. They were ever-present in his young life. Oldest Son has Baby Bear and a book. He always had a book. Baby Bear now lives in the bottom drawer of my dresser - in hopes that someday I can repair his nose. Daughter has our cat at the time, Dude, and 'who-knows-what'. She ALWAYS had 'who-knows-what', though I know not why.

That's how they dressed, too. Back in the 80's.

The pillow is more than twenty years old.

I'm having a hard time believing that, but it's true.

This is when it pays off to have bins filled to the brim with thrift store purchases.

I had three bags full of old wooden clothes pins.

Another bag full of lingerie lace.

Left over 100% cotton balls from the Bible School sheep project.

The silver bells already on the ribbon were left over from Daughter's wedding nearly three years ago.

The only problem I have with them, is that they are hard to display without it looking like an angel lynching is going on.

I've even tried hanging them from their backs, but that only caused them to look like giant moths.

Baby Boy is eleven months old today.

He walks.

He calls me "Beppe".

In this picture, he is teasing his great grandma with kisses.

He would NOT give her a kiss!

He would lean in for one, and then turn his head away and laugh!

But, when it was time for her to leave, he gave her a big wet sloppy kiss, and made her day!

(they've both had their flu shot!)