First Snow! well, almost

The first snow was actually yesterday morning, when the temperature dropped to 32 degrees, and it started snowing big wet soggy snowflake clumps. But I didn't have my camera then. I was in the car, driving the little boy to preschool. Yes, it was interesting. This picture is from the next morning (this morning!) after it had snowed during the night. It was also lightly raining, so by noon, it had all melted away.

I know it's not as much as say, Colorado had, but it was still SNOW!

Gremlins?

Or am I losing my mind? I can't find an entire folder of papers and I know exactly where I put it....oh, wait, i put it away already. oops. okay, if I know where that is, then I can call around to find boarding for the pets over Thanksgiving. I hope it's not to late to find someplace. It's already the 2nd of november, and the boarding kennels tend to fill up fast for the holidays. At our old place, they would hold a spot for Gallant, no matter how full they were, but, that's neither here nor there ;)

at least it wasn't the gremlins this time...

Familly weekend

First off, because almost all i've done this month with the blog is reject comments, is, Please, if you would like to leave a comment, write it in English. I know that I enjoy other people's blogs even when they don't write in my own language, but I don't speak other languages, and if I can't tell what the comment is saying, it isn't accepted. Sorry!

We had a nice weekend with a visit from my sister, SisterS, and her friend. We mostly hung out and played with the kiddos. They watched Little Sister's highschool football game (no, she doesn't play football. She's in the marching band) and all in all, i think everyone enjoyed the weekend. Little J didn't want them to leave, of course. He had people that would build block towers for him! taller than Little J! He came out with a new phrase this weekend too: "Get your hands off of me!" he was being naughty at the time, so I had to try not to laugh at him.

My cousin, the soon-to-be physics doctorate, also stopped by on Saturday evening. It was kewl to see him, i hadn't in a while. He was in the area for the Homecoming football game at our (yes, we went to the same college) alma mater. The Ravens won, as opposed to Little Sister's team :) I learned something new about my cousin: he watches anime. I never would have thought, that my little cousin with no sense of humor (not really!) would grow up liking Japanese cartoons.

On the knitting front, I made it to the knitting group at the library on Thursday, and managed to start my Christmas knitting. Two of the 3 kids have Christmas stockings, and I need to make one for LittleG, too. It's started, and if I can find enough time, maybe I'll make ones for BigJ and I, too. We'll see.

Some days, you really need a cup of tea

Luckily, I have this lovely flowering tea that my dearest husband gave me. I think it's the Lavender Delight White Tea, but isn't it pretty? Now, after 15 minutes fiddling with my internet browser) I'm going to go drink it.

Post 2 of 2 - Knitting!

What I've mostly been knitting for the past two weeks is Swiffer covers - now I need to sew buttons on them. But, on Monday I recieved a box in the mail - it was the DishRagTag!

Here's what was in the box (not including the instructions and cards):

There was a lovely cotton dishcloth, in the official pattern of DishRagTag2009, yummy bath salts, and (not pictured) a ball of red, white and blue striped cotton yarn.

The left-over yarn, after I knit a dishcloth out of the striped cotton, is in this picture, along with the dishcloth itself, a tin of mints that went inside the box when I sent it, and a new ball of cotton yarn.



I stayed up way too late knitting it, but, not counting the interruptions, it only took 2 or 3 hours to knit. fun!

Post 1 of 2 - Birthday!

Little J's birthday was a lot of fun! In a grand family tradition, his mommy and daddy procrastinated until the last minute, but I think the cake was a success (at least with the little people), and that's what counts.

This was the cake that I made for Little J's birthday cake. Big J saw it online, and pointed it out to me, months ago. When Little J saw the picture, he asked, "Me have shark cake?" (over and over, and over...) So, I had to fufill his little heart's desire, and make him a shark cake. The only difficulty, was that Little G was trying to blow out the candles before Little J got a chance!




We did eventually manage to convince the girl that she should wait for her brother to blow out the candles, but it was difficult :D

The cake was yummy. I used a recipe from King Arthur Flour's website for a vanilla pound cake, store bought vanilla frosting (note to self: it melts when it gets too warm) and we had chocolate ice cream with it.



And, after cake and ice cream, there were presents! Little J had already received a wooden train set from Aunt R and Uncle D (Thank You! The kiddos play with it quietly) and a card with money from his Grandma and Grandpa. Mommy had a Ravensburger puzzle with a Papo knight figure, and a Ben10 sticker book for him, and daddy picked out a SharkAttack hotwheels car playset for Little J. So, not too many toys for mommy to find places for, but enough to make him happy.


And, even Big J liked playing with the sticker book...

feeding frenzy, radishes, and a new vaccum

This post is a bit random, it covers different things that have happened...

I fixed up lunch for the kiddos, and here is Little G dipping her fingers in ketchup, peanut butter, and yogurt. She prefers the yogurt, her brother likes ketchup better. The yogurt and ketchup were intended to be for dipping tortilla pieces. Below is a picture of the tortillas, I made snowflakes for the little kids. They thought it was so cool!







And, Big J's parents sent the kids presents from Thailand! Below is a picture of Little J and Little G wearing native Thai costumes. Little J and G like them because the clothes are jingly - there's little bells sewn on.

I tried my aunt's recipe for microwave pickles last weekend, and I'm not sure it turned out right. First, the recipe is for pickling onions, not for radishes. But I really love pickled radishes, so I thought I would try (it took trips to two seperate grocery stores to find the ingredients.) Then, I missed the step that said to COVER the container before microwaving. Big J complained about the smell of vinegar in the kitchen. He's the sensitive sort. The radishes looked beautiful at the halfway mark, when I stirred them, and the liquid had already become a lovely clear red, but after 10 minutes of microwaving, the radishes are all shriveled and cooked! AuntR, did I do this right?

Tonight, we had a door-to-door vacuum cleaner salesman come by and give us a demonstration. He was very good at his job, and the vacuum was very good at it's job. He left us with a new vacuum, and removed our old vacuum, just like magic. Big J and Little Sister are very excited, and have all sorts of plans for vacuuming and shampooing the carpets. I can't wait (to have them vacuuming for me!). Hopefully, this more efficient vacuum will decrease the allergens in the house and help with Big J's allergy symptoms.

more updates since moving

ah, i haven't posted for a while, have I? well, Big J arrived at the airport safe and sound last weekend. For a while, we were afraid that he wouldn't get to us until the next day. He had missed a connection, and although the airline put him on standby, they weren't sure if there would be room, and the next flight would arrive the next morning. Flying standby DID work, and I picked him up and he arrived home around midnight. Yay!

Since then, we've opened boxes, bought a king size bed, cleaned water out of our basement carpet (It rained. Lots. Jay's theory is that it seeped under the back door, but I'm not sure... So now we own a dehumidifer and a shop vac. Home Depot is very useful.) and I've seen a couple of movies.

Ponyo, by Miyazaki, was very cute. It's loosely based on "The Little Mermaid" fairy tale, but with Studio Ghibli's japanese sensibility. I really liked the little fish-girl, with her chicken legs and stick figure arms. And the mother that explains she makes milk for her baby. :) And, the music score includes Wagner's (I think) "Ride of the Valkyries". Love that song! (and the ending Ponyo song sticks in my brain...)

I'm almost done with my watermelon socks! Yay! and thank the little knitting gods, because I am getting so sick of that project. Double knitting is not for me. Yes, I can do it, and yes, I'm probably getting pretty fast (or I was, before I reached the ribbing) but i truly hate having to do twice the amount of work for apparently half the result. I have my next project planned, actually, I need to make Christmas stockings. Like the ones I've made for Little Sister and Little J, the littlest girl and my husband and I need our own. Hmm...i wonder what box that pattern is in?