Other Fun Little Things

A video I watched today called this time of year 'airport time' and I agree.  It feels very surreal.  Fast and Slow.  The kids are off, but Billy is working, and stores are open weird hours.

This first picture I guess could have gone in the Christmas post, since it actually happened Christmas day, but it didn't make the cut.  I made up some leftover containers for my mom, sister, and cousin.  Since my mom was sick, I just bagged it up and stuck it on the porch.  This was a wise choice, as Sarah and Acea went down sick not long after, with whatever my mom had!

Grace wanted to go shopping for some organizational items, so the day after Christmas, we met Daddy for lunch, then went to the thrift store.

She found exactly what she was looking for, and used some of her Christmas money to buy it.

Then she came home and set up her new 'art station.'

I made a big mistake and bought some rose bud fertilizer to help some of my indoor plants.  Unfortunately for me, when it got wet, it smelled like rotting fish. ew.  So, after a week of the smell not really receeding, I added repotting my plants to the to do list, and did manage to make it happen!  My succulent has lost most of it's leaves from the trauma, so hopefully at least one of them will propagate!  

Despite picking a warm day to work, so that the stinky soil could go in my raised garden beds, it was cold and I worked inside in my kitchen sink.  It was messy!  But worked well and I think both plants will enjoy their new pots.

The following day, we ended up going back out, because we forgot to bring Emily's Eb Alto Saxophone to get the register cork replaced.  While we were out, Grace wanted to go to a thrift store, but as we were in the same area as we had been the day before, we opted for an international market instead.

Google lens makes things so much easier, and we bought this "fairy tale cake."  Oh.my.gosh.  it was soooooooooo good.  Very rich, you really only needed a tiny piece.  I cannot get over the fact that frozen and thawed cake could taste that good!

In the mood to host a tea party, so took a picture of some of the options available for later reference.

Grace and Emily picked out some things to try, and I bought this paste that I'd read about in a book I read (earlier this year? last year?)

Building a Squishmallow fort was a fun activity for Emily, Grace, and William.

Heleena came over for the night, and they had a good time with makeup and dressing up!

My mom found a free organizational solution for my cousin, but wanted to spruce it up a bit, so I cut some vinyl.  She applied it today, I thought it looked pretty good.  

She did it after he left for work today, so I don't think he's seen it yet.  I might not report back, unless he is supremely unhappy with the result, which would be quite surprising, and I would want to record the reasoning. lol.

Stacking stuffies in various piles and popping out of one has been a pastime for the girls (excepting Alice) the past two nights!  I have a few videos too.

I'm glad they are enjoying their Christmas gifts!

I am anticipating this being the final post of the year, shy of New Year's Eve, which might go on next year, and the year's weather log!  See you in the new year!

later days

Christmastime

We decorate for Christmas after Thanksgiving dinner each year, so our season is short, but we tend to be so busy, that it isn't such a bad thing.

I saw a cute little video online of someone wrapping their toilet paper, and I wanted to decorate our toilet paper too!  I didn't have the fancy patterned paper that they used in the video, but I liked our little candy cane toilet paper towers. = )

My mom helped me pull a years' worth of mostly thrifted Christmas presents from Sarah's basement, and it was more than I anticipated. = O

These were most of the squishmallows.  We pulled the ones with tags for the girls to gift to their friends for Christmas. The VOA that I bought them from informed me that they were donated by Claire's at the mall, since they weren't selling very well. I also set aside the Halloween ones that accidentally got mixed in with the Christmas bags. 

Billy was invited to his company's Christmas party at a bowling alley, despite only having worked there for a few weeks.  It was nice to meet some of his coworkers!

The set up was really cool, there were lanes in the party room!  And a private buffet/bar area!

Billy and I bowled with his coworkers Wendy and Sarah, and Sarah's significant other, Don.  I won game one, but our second game was cut short, but as Sarah was in the lead, we declared her the winner.

It was a nice evening.

Emily was helping me cook dinner earlier in the week, and I didn't hear her ask about the tomatoes, and she was already halfway through cutting up one of my Roma tomatoes, before I saw what she was doing. =- (  I feel like I was able to recover it for a salad display for my mom's meeting though!

Usually, the day I get the molasses in my Kroger order, Grace is after me to make the gingerbread houses.  This year though, without that prompting, it was Christmas Eve before I made time to make them!

We had a diminished supply of molasses, since we used it for the St. Lucia cakes at Alice's band concert, but the dough held well, it was just not as sweet. had Alice helped me make the dough the night before, so that we wouldn't have to wait for it to solidify in the morning.  Even so, it still took hours to make, because of the wait time between each round for the mold to cool back down.

One the gingerbread was done, and the icing* whipped up, the fun could begin!

Emily went with her bff Abby to see Santa.  Her mom sent me the pictures, and I love all of them!

I feel like this year has been just the right amount of festive!

later days

*Michigan is switching to requiring all eggs sold in grocery stores to be cage free, so the past two grocery orders, they haven't had eggs. = 0  So, we stretched a single batch of icing for two houses, because my egg stash is running low.

edit 12-30-28: added in the gingerbread houses, since we didn't make them Christmas day.