It's like this...

This has been a year..... Well, what year hasn't eh? An entire year, 365 days and I'm too tired to figure out the hours and minutes. I started blogging in January and it's been a good way to keep a record of the year with pictures and journaling. I've made some wonderful friends via this medium, and I wish you all the very best in the coming year. I'm sending off the old year by having made a turkey dinner for my sister's family and ours. It was a wonderful meal and I'm glad they came to share it. We've played games, drank sparkling cider and the children have been shooting off fireworks for hours. Upward and onward....

See the pretty truck in this picture? With the pretty blond inside of said truck? The blond is fine, but the truck is DOA. It appears that the head gasket has blown. We are not in a position to do anything about it. Yay us! Now there's the problem of how to get The Teenagers To Seminary, School, College, Work, etc. School starts next Tuesday. ....Happy New Year to meeeeeeeeee.....Happy New Year to meeeeeeeeeee...... Ah yes. 2007 is looking like fun already! Edit: After much consideration I've realized that there is a higher purpose to this whole thing. The demise of the truck is God's way of keeping my daughter from driving over to her boyfriend's house. He does work in mysterious ways, doncha think?

Hot Hubby took three girls out on the town today. I was not included in the romp. Two blondes, and a brunette were on his arm. He took them to lunch at Ivar's downtown on the Seattle waterfront. He was honest about his activities today, and even took pictures to document his day. Here is one of the blondes and the brunette, feasting upon fish and chips. Here's the second blond, sitting with Ivar himself. Ok, Ivar is dead, but that's another story. As you can see, Hot Hubby has excellent taste in lunch partners. He also took them for a ride on the carousel at Westlake Center. Then things went to the pigs. At the Pike Place Market. Here's one of the cute blondes with the Pike Place Pig. Here's the brunette with the same piggy. Yes, I was home, slaving away, while they were out having fun. ...slaps back of hand to forehead in dramatic fashion.... And yes, we still have snow out here in the boonies.

Last night we were hot, so we opened our bedroom window. Our window stayed wide open all night long and we woke up to snow this morning. And a wee bit of frostbite. Our doggie Cassie loved it this morning when I took her out for a romp. We offered to drive Stephanie to work this morning, but she declined. I think there is some sort of Teenage stigma attached to having mummy and daddy drive you to work. Here she is carefully walking in her high heels. And look! We didn't catch Bigfoot on camera, but something nearly as hard to find. The elusive Teenage Smile! Yes, it is real and not just an urban legend. And now I think I'll crawl back under the covers.

It's over. And according to a commercial on televsion tonight, there are only 364 days until the next one. Remind me to write a letter to the person who wrote that ad, and then hunt him/her down and hurt him/her. It's like someone asking a woman who has just given birth, when's the next baby coming? Ok, here's the low-down, the 411, the truth the whole truth and the whole enchilada. For the record, there were no enchiladas involved in the sumptuous meals during the past two days. Christmas Eve there were two dinners. First at my sister's house, and we had pigs in a blanket, potato salad, ham, lots of cookies and goodies. Here's my Ashley, my father and my Allison that night. My sister gave our father one of the best and funniest presents that night. It's the biggest remote I've ever seen. We're not saying that his sight is going....but um...his sight is going. When my older sister Cheri was brought in, she was in her extreme happy mode. She...

And apparently it may have worked. What might that be, you ask? Well, I'll tell you. I killed our Suburban. You know, the one we should never have bought in the first place? The shiny expensive bauble that was going to take us all over Washington state tomorrow in a wild frenzy of familial visits, over indulgences in artery-clogging items full of trans-fats and sugar, and of course the no-holds-barred present unwrapping. In three different places between now and Monday evening. This was the plan. The plan is not to be. While you're pondering this, here's the picture I surreptitiously snapped with my cell phone camera when the kids visited Santa tonight. The male in the photo without the white facial hair, was not pleased at the prospect of being seen at the mall, in a tie and with his parents At one point I forgot my place in the whole grand Teenage Code of Conduct While Out In Public, and I tried to touch his hand, thereby breaking a MAJOR rule and perhaps eve...

I don't care what vicus anyone says, Christmas is a time for us to revel in the warmth of family, of friends near and far, and to overindulge in goodies. After all, The New Year's Resolution Revelry will soon begin and you can start to take off that extra baggage that you put on during the holidays. It's a vicious cycle, but one most Homo Sapiens adhere to year after year. So in honor of the season, I baked some custard tonight. In the oven. Yes, me. I did it. Stop looking at me like I'm off my nut. I can bake custard if I want to and I wanted to so I did. I haven't had any like this since I was a little girl and watched my mother wrestle the water filled pan in and out of the oven. It turned out well, even if my younger daughters didn't like it. What do they know about hardening their arteries? Nothing, that's what. I've also made a double batch of Spritz cookies, the kind you make with a cookie gun, a single batch of Russian Teacakes and a ...

Picture this......forty gazillion people in a small room, listening to children (and one adult) play in a Christmas Piano Recital. You'd think it would be uncomfortable, right? Well, ok. My bottom was hurting by the end of the program, but it was well worth the pain to see the joy on the children's faces and the pride on their parent's mugs. Unbeknownst to me, my SIL Tara took a short video of Allison doing her rendition of The Twelve Days of Christmas for the crowd. We heard various renditions of Jingle Bells and Silent Night, but Ally was the only one to play what she played. Here's the video. If you don't have cable Internet, it might not work for you, so feel free to skip it. I'm not sure why she played this song, as it wasn't quite ready for prime time. You should hear her play a song from Pirates of the Carribean . She rocks on that one. If you can't or won't view the video, then a pox upon you. Ok, not really. I've given up wish...

First of all, it's nearly Christmas. I just thought I'd put that out there for any of you that may have missed the bell ringers with their red cauldrons standing outside of most stores, the houses blazing away in a technicolor race to see who can waste the most wattage in your subdivision, and the arrival of red and green envelopes in your mail box with Christmas cards tucked away inside. Don't expect to get one from me before Santa squeezes down your chimmeny to drop off your exhorbitant credit card balance sheets gifts. It's not that I'm not going to send them out. I will. I think that perhaps I will be calling then New Year's Cards instead this year. So, and here's the biggie, if any of you would like to receive a New Year's Card from moi, would you kindly send me an email with your snail mail addy? Also, one of my pictures of The Great Truck Crushing Tree has landed on the news here, where there are still thousands and thousands without power. ...

This has not been fun. First the flooding. Then the wind. Oh my, the wind. I can honestly say I've not heard wind the likes of that in quite a few years. We were without power since Thursday and it finally came back on today, Saturday. Of course after the power went out, Mother Nature decided to send us Frosty the Snowman. There was no actual snow, just freezing temperatures. You could see your breath in our home. Brrrrr. Since we had no big trees near our home, we were lucky in that no trees fell on us. My father was not so lucky. Remember my post about my baby girl learning to ride a bike? And she sort of fell into my father's pride and joy truck? Well, guess what happened to his baby? Ayup. The neighbor's tree, and not even the entire tree, fell on another neighbor's garage, his truck, my father's truck, my father's Lincoln (which used to be my mother's car) and also crushed a camper behind my father's garage. Here's a view from the b...

Today the wind was blowing so hard the rain was coming down sideways . Very weird. Very blustery. The power flickered a lot, but never went out here. People in other places lost their power, and some are still without lights. Another storm is coming in tomorrow and it promises worse wind. Yay! If I put little parachutes on the kittens and toss them up into the jet stream, do you think I can send them off to find new homes? Yeah, me neither. I spent more time out of bed than in bed today, so that's a good thing, right? I managed to get the kitchen cleaned up, found out that all the good pizza had been eaten (grrrr) and even made chicken fajitas and a vanilla chocolate chip cake for dinner. Go me! Tomorrow, if the wind isn't too scary, I plan on going out and doing the majority of my shopping. Thank the Lord for plastic, or it wouldn't be happening. Sigh. jingle bells...jingle bells...jingle all the way into bankruptcy.....

Why oh why is the teenage brain so incredibly self-centered? She is told to pick up dinner, pizzas, at five. She agrees to this. At ten after, there is no sign of her. I call her cell phone. Repeatedly. And then some more. I am getting upset. Then I am getting concerned. I call the pizza place. It's half an hour since she was supposed to pick up dinner. It hasn't been picked up. She's still not answering her phone. Cue Mommy Worry Alarm: ...is she ok? Did someone kidnap her? Where is she? Why isn't she answering her phone? She has that thing attached to her body like another appendage....Please....let her be all right.. Husband goes to get the dinner, as he is near death. Still no answer from the girl. I send a text message. I leave a voice mail. I call again. She answers. "Um....Hello?" "Where ARE you?" "I'm at Jesse's" Aha. A boy. A boy. "What about our dinner? You were supposed to pick it up over half...

Nothing to report. Nothing to see. Lost except for my wonderful mother-in-law who sent a box of advent calendars. The children raced to get theirs and to start eating their way through the chocolate shaped trees, trains, santas and other assorted Christmas things to get to the correct date for today. My children have the most thoughtful grandparents. They're always doing sweet things for them.

Today was Monday, generally my most favorite day of the week, but alas, today fell quite short of my lofty ideal. I have family coming from out of state for the holidays one of whom will be staying with us and I should have spent the day cleaning some part of our house. Apparently the house won't clean itself. I've done not one lick of Christmas shopping for the children. I could have been out there pounding the pavement and contributing more to our debt. (I'm not sure that it's possible to make it worse than it is....but then again....) I certainly hope Santa can pick up the slack for me. I have a great deal of Christmas baking to do. Did I do any? Nope. The kitchen is free from the enticing smells of cinnamon and sugar and savory goodness. Ingredients don't put themselves together all on their own. The Christmas cards won't take it upon themselves to write themselves, and today proved just that. My day was spent mostly in bed. I'm feeling a bit les...

Today was the annual Christmas ship ride around Elliott Bay, off the Seattle waterfront. It's for special people of all ages and their families. We go every year with my sister Cheri. It's filled with Marines, Army, Coast Guard, Fire fighters and EMTs. (This is usually why my seventeen year old agrees to go). There's a band on each end of the large ferry boat, the Seafair Pirates , who hand out stickers, chains, necklaces and other pirate booty. My niece Nicole, Ashley and Allison managed to get quite a bit of plunder from them. Before the pirates would give them the booty, they made them shake their booties in dance. One of my sister Cheri's favorite special friends, is Wayne. Wayne is never seen without one of his trademark ties except during the Christmas season when he dresses up as Santa. Wayne has some pretty wild moves with his dentures and I was afraid at times that they were going to fly out of his mouth and smack me in the head. Thankfully they stayed pu...

It's Saturday, the momma cat and her two remaining kittens are lazily lounging around. Chris is so bored that he's playing guitar in his bed. Of course he wasn't happy that I took a picture of him. It took me four tries just to get that picture. We decided to take a drive south to near Mt. Rainier where my brother lives. I had to retrieve my cat carrier, which he had, and we just wanted to get out of dodge anyway. So a road trip it was. Along the way we saw a number of these. Hubby snapped that photo from our vehicle. We stopped at the Alder Lake Dam. The water was quite brown. While we were there, a loud warning sound blared and a male voice said, "This is Dam Security, please move your vehicle off the dam immediatly" We hadn't even known we were under surveilance and there were no signs telling us we couldn't be there, but we did as we were told. We took that dam security guard seriously. We stopped at my brother's neighbor's house, and pl...