"mad at myself"

so our girl has taken to her dad's iphone. she loves to look at the pictures and watch the videos we've taken of her. (she's actually slightly better at navigating this phone than her dad!) she knows how to push the button to turn on the screen, slide to unlock and navigate to the pictures. she then searches for the little arrows on pictures indicating videos. we have several of them, but there were a few that we cherished. ones that made us laugh no matter how many times we saw them, or those that were just very sweet.

yes, that's right, there "were" a few.

seems elsie also knows how to delete. well, she knows how to delete but has no idea she's doing it. so we're scrolling through last night and determine that one of our favorites has been lost. oh dear. so we had a family meeting about this. maybe not a family meeting. more like, "oh no, elsie you deleted one of our favorites." her response to this was as follows:

"i'm so mad at myself."
"i'm going to write that down."
"and send it to my gramma so she can write it down, too."

after my giggles subsided we had a quick lesson about seeing a garbage can on the screen of the phone when looking at pictures...and we'll be better about getting them to the computer.

my giggle for the day

elsie's become a big fan of taylor swift. she's even learning the words to her songs. she seems young for this but it could be worse (enter justin bieber, the latest obsession of a sweet girl in elsie's dance class). so she says to me today, "i wish taylor swift was my mom." she wasn't mad at me and didn't say it in anger or anything. just honesty. made me giggle. i guess i can't really blame her.

family pictures

my parents sprung for family pictures for their kiddos this year as a christmas gift. as much as i hate having my picture taken (as many of you know), it was probably time since the last round we did was when i was 12 and i had horrible 80's bangs. horrible, seriously! (this is where i should insert such a picture but, well, i don't have one. honestly, i don't. i wouldn't keep that sort of treasure from you!) the kind where the top half stands erect in a roll and the bottom half rests on your forehead. nothing cute about this. why didn't someone tell me?



i digress. so these photos were very important to my parents, since their family has grown quite a bit since i was 12 and bryan at 15. boy am i glad we did this. (thanks parents!) if you are considering a family photo session, please talk with tara malouf (red thread photo). she's amazing. she shot kayley's wedding and her pics are beautiful (of course, kayley's a beautiful girl so that was going to happen anyway).



she captured some great pics of my mom and dad, and of my brother's family and his beautiful girls. but of course my favorite is one of elsie being, um, elsie:

anyway, if you want to see some of the others, well you can find them here. keep the comments clean people, this is family-friendly!

simple toys

i'm sitting in my kitchen with my kiddo and my husband. i'm telling charles "gee, she just seems like such a big girl to me all of a sudden." i've had the pleasure of spending quite a bit of time with her over last couple of weeks so i'm wondering if that's why she seems like a 'big kid' to me 'all of a sudden'. that makes me sad for a different reason.

so as i'm saying this to charles, elsie is digging in the lazy susan that houses lots of containers and lids, but none that fit with each other. she finds the salad spinner and wants to know how it works. her dad shows her with great enthusiasm. elsie runs to find some toys that clearly need a ride on the "salad spinner". this makes me giggle and then i'm thinking, 'well, maybe she's still got lots of little kiddo left in her." as i'm having this thought, charles is the one spinning the toys in the salad spinner with big belly laughs.

okay, is my girl getting to be a big kid or is my husband becoming a child?

and so it begins.

so i'm a christmas tree snob.

there, i said it. i like fancy christmas trees. white lights, pretty ribbon, red berries, sparkly ornaments that match. and i like my wrapping paper to match my tree, with fancy ribbon and big bows that i enjoy making myself. i'm not shy about admitting this.

charles and i are very lucky to have 2 trees in our house each year because we get them for free, chopping them down from our friends' property (thank you marty & denise!) who will need to cut them down anyway to build someday. one of them is 12 feet tall. yes, that's right, 12 feet. (how spoiled are we?) and they are adorned with lots of white lights, sparkling gold, red and amber ornaments, silk ribbon, and all kinds of pretty things we've acquired over the time we've been together. they are my happy place this time of year. my friends even affectionately poke fun at me for my trees. janna recently texted me, "i need to make an appointment with you to see your trees."

i recall the christmas trees we had when i was a child. multi-colored lights. macrame ornaments of varying colors and shapes made by my grandmother. shapes that never made sense to me or even looked like christmas. beaded ornaments with cheesy pictures of me and my brother glued in the center. then there were the lovely decorations my brother and i made at school. those red and green construction paper structures with visible dried glue globs and random glitter in places that made no sense for glitter to reside. terrible silver garland wrapped around the tree as if it was attempting to strangle the last bit of life from the already-tortured shrub. don't even get me started on what was our tree topper.

i vowed i would NEVER have a tree like this in my house.

i'm a christmas tree snob after all.

.............until now.

on wednesday, elsie came home with this adorable little bag she'd decorated at school as one of her holiday projects. very cute, and she was very proud of it. "look!" so i opened the bag and inside were a few surprises for us. the first was one of her letters (she's learning to write letters by tracing lines on large pages pre-printed with the lower case letter. she's getting pretty good, too.) another construction paper cutout decorated with glued-on things. and then there it was.

a snowman. white construction paper cut in the shape of a snowman, then glued to a......... tongue depressor! (gasp!) cotton had been pulled apart and glued to his body representing the snow. a yarn scarf, brown construction paper hat, GOOGLY eyes and even a carrot nose completed the little guy. "oh, elsie, he's adorable! good job!"

and then it happened. charles said to me, "it should go on the tree."

what?!? you must be joking. that tree? our beautiful christmas tree? um, i think not.

i lost. the snowman won without even trying. he was resting on a branch before i could even form words....

turns out, i love him. so it begins. the building of our new christmas tree, which will take years to complete and which will likely repulse my daughter when she's 15, swearing she'll never have a tree like this in her house. ever.

we'll see about that.

some days....

.....i just feel very fortunate. very loved, very full, and very fortunate. i'm ashamed to admit that i sometimes forget this. especially lately. i can get caught up in what's tough about life and feel anxious and down. (i'm working on this.)

but then i get a reminder. sometimes it's a small gesture by my daughter, like when she wraps her arms around my neck and says, "i love you" for no particular reason other than that's what she's feeling at that moment. or when my husband reaches over and touches my shoulder and it still makes me feel giddy.

but sometimes it comes more like a giant bear hug from life...........a big, warm bear hug that makes me feel very loved. very full, very fortunate, and very loved.

haircut #2

two posts in the same day - i'm making up for my gap in posts.

last tuesday, i took elsie for her 2nd haircut. her first was last december. can you believe that? well, when you have a kid who remains bald for the first year and half of her life, you don't have an occasion to cut her hair. but now....well, it's a different story.

she's blessed with her dad's long, beautiful eyelashes and curly hair. lucky girl. but when you don't maintain those tresses, she looks a mess. so i took her for a haircut to trim up the bottom and maybe do some layers. the stylist quickly informed me that her hair is so thin still that layers would make her look bald again. okay, let's just trim it up so she gets a little more comfortable with the cutting process.

when we arrived, we had about a 15 minute wait. elsie was just fine, seemed perfectly at ease. then they called her name.

uh-oh.

after about five minutes (literally, five) she finally agreed to "go see" the fancy chair. i put her right into the booster on the fancy chair and she settled in nicely. wrapped in a cape, the stylist began cutting. elsie was a champ. and now she's got a very cute little cut to show for it. we're trying to grow out her bangs, so it still looks a little unkept...but cute all the same.