December Week #3

This week was both more and less busy somehow...  We had a couple nights with NOTHING happening, which was delightful.  But also two nights where I had three hour plus rehearsals and Craig had to chaperone the Jazz Band concert one night (which he actually loves doing), so the busy nights were REALLY busy.  If that makes sense.  When we were home, Craig and I each took turns helping the kids wrap presents.

I tried to document that, and ended up with all these terrible pictures:

Angry Ryder, goofy Colton and... what is Camille doing???

Angry everyone!  Colton is about to punch the present???

This was the best I got, and none of them look good. Sigh.  It's a good thing I'm not some big instagrammer!

This reconfirmed for me that the photographer who did our family portraits is a miracle worker.

Anyway.

Saturday was my concert day AND it was the day for the youth temple trip.  So we were trying to figure out rides for him, babysitting for our little kids, and getting me to both my concerts and Craig and Kendra meeting up with his parents at one of the concerts.  It all felt very complicated.  We managed to make it all happen, despite my kids informing their babysitter that we didn't them her until Monday (WHAT THE HECK????  WHY WOULD THEY DO THIS????  AND WHY WOULD SHE LISTEN TO THEM???????).  In fact, now that I'm typing this, all things went pretty smoothly, considering!

Pretty Christmas concert!

I went to the after party for a bit and actually enjoyed myself (I suck at mingling in large crowds, so this was rather remarkable).  When the girl I'd driven with said she needed to go, I was actually a little sorry to be leaving already!  But then I got home to find Ryder up looking like this:

In all the hustle and bustle of the day, I'd completely forgotten to give him his daily dose of Zyrtec.  Poor guy!

We kept him up for a while making sure his allergies didn't get worse.  I think we need to get an epi-pen for that kid.  Despite our testing, we have NO idea what's causing this.

While we stayed up late, Ryder and I amused ourselves by trying on Craig's glasses.

Oh, yeah, I'm smokin.  Also, because of the towel rod behind me, it sort of looks like I'm sporting some very wacky pigtails!

Ryder looks like quite the intellectual!

Sadly, I totally forgot that church was delayed the next Sunday and Craig didn't think to remind me until after I'd woken everyone up.  I'm still kicking myself for that!  But church was lovely.  And short!

And then that afternoon we did our Angel Tree stuff and visited a widow in our ward.  This was hard, quite frankly.  This lady lives in a smoky trailer (her husband was a smoker and MAN that stuff just never goes away), she's hard of hearing, and between her mumbling and her accent, she's incredibly difficult to understand.  All this to say, this was not an act of service I was looking forward to, but I was very proud of my kids who did their best to gamely sit politely and be kind and attentive while we tried to visit.

And then, that night, our neighbors held their annual solstice party.  As I just said, I am not good at mingling, so I sort of dread things like this (while I simultaneously desperately want to get invited because I hate being left out even more.  I'm a puzzlement).  But-- magic-- I actually had a really great time!  We probably kept the kids out way too late, considering they were all on the brink of being sick.  But I was enjoying chatting with people around the fire and really did hate to leave.

Weird.  But nice!

December Week #2

The next week was just packed.  I started out Monday by helping my friend (who is the YWs president) try to build a blanket fort at the church for their Young Women's Christmas party.  This kind of thing is NOT what I'm good at-- really, I wished I could have sent Craig in my place to help her, because it is exactly Craig's skill set!  But I tried my best to be helpful.  What made it all doubly hard is the fact that the walls are all cinderblock, so good luck attaching anything to those walls!  We were hoping for cozy, soft, and warm.  I'd also contributed a couple foam mattresses to sit on, so that was nice.  Here was what we ended up with:

The low table is for crafting, and one in the back is for refreshments

I think with the lights out, it will be okay?  (We couldn't turn the lights off right then because the piano was being tuned!)

Anyway, that was my Monday morning, which was only difficult because that's my usual shopping time, so I always feel a bit "off" if I don't get that task done.

And then, I had choir that night and our director decided to re-seat all of the women.  This was a process where he makes us all sing in groups of twos and threes and determines which voices blend the best and seats us all accordingly.  This is a) really scary.  And b) just really scary.  To make matters worse, he moved me away from my friend Leah and put her next to my other friend Rachel, and placed me between two elderly ladies.  And commented offhandedly that I had a "bright" voice which didn't blend easily.  He said the same thing about a couple other women, one of whom I keep hearing because her bright voice REALLY doesn't blend well with her fellow altos.  But I hadn't realized I was one of the culprits!

So I got home very unhappy about all that.  I couldn't decide if I was more upset about my bright voice, or about not sitting with Leah, or about the fact that Leah and Rachel were now sitting together without me and would probably become best friends together and I'd end up excluded (because that's what always happens with girls).  I didn't sleep well that night.

I think Michael must have felt bad about all that because the next day he emailed me and Leah a picture of us sitting together at last year's Messiah Sing-In.  It was a nice gesture that I had no idea what to do with.  I texted Leah and her response pretty much summed up my feelings: "I was pretty sure last night that he still didn't know my name but I guess he does?"  Anyway, it was perplexing-- who took the picture?  Where has it been all this time?  Why am I wearing the same outfit as some girl two rows behind me?  But I do really love the picture, so that's nice:

Leah sitting between me and her twin sister

There was no scouts that night, so Craig's parents came and babysat for us so we could do a whole bunch of other things, starting with our Panera date night/Amazon shopping.  I love sitting with my bowl of broccoli cheddar soup while we buy gifts for everyone.  What a cozy lovely way to do your shopping!  As soon as we were done, we zipped over for a quick rehearsal my choir had with the Charlottesville Municipal Band, and then headed (late) to UVA's Messiah Sing-In.  Leah couldn't come this time, so that was a bummer, but singing beautiful music is still wonderful, even if you aren't sitting with friends (a good lesson to remember for choir, I suppose).  And-- what pleased me no end-- we got to sing my favorite chorus, "And He Shall Purify"!!!  So I came out of that happy as could be.

Wednesday I was hosting my book club, so I spent all morning making goodies for that: peppermint fudge, killer crunch brownies, and Peanut Butter Graham Cracker Bark.  After I was all done, I remembered that one of our members doesn't eat sugar.  Oops.  Probably should have grabbed a veggie tray or something for her!  Oh, well.  In addition to all the baking and cleaning, I was a little more stressed than usual because I was going to try and facetime with the author of our book (Tracy McKay, my dear friend, who wrote The Burning Point).  Since I am not good with technology, Tracy was finishing finals week and wasn't totally sure she could make time for this, and we NEVER know who is going to show up for book club, I was kind of a stress case.  I hate having so many unknowns to deal with!

Camille REALLY enjoyed helping me in the kitchen!

As it was, the evening was lovely!  We had seven people come, which is the most we've had in a long time, Craig was able to make the facetiming work and even screencast onto the TV for me, and Tracy found time for us and we all had a lovely chat.  PHEW.  I was so relieved when it was all over!  Why do I do things like this???  And I spent the rest of the week finishing off all the leftover treats.  So that was a win!

Thursday morning Bentley had a dentist appointment that went very badly and I'm still trying to figure out what to do about.  (Long story short: she filled two cavities and opted to not bother with novocaine WITHOUT TELLING ME.  Mama Bear is not happy about this.  Especially considering the business is named Dentistry with a Mother's Touch.  What the crap???  I got mad at her right there in the office and she apologized and explained her reasoning.  Which made some sense, but not enough to convince me that we shouldn't just change dentists.)  And Thursday night Craig had to work late.

Friday we had freezing rain so school was delayed two hours.  This sounded nice in practice, and I did enjoy sleeping in.  But then the kids were insane and Craig still had to leave for work so I had to try and get them all out the door on my own and meanwhile I had a bunch of things to do that I now had two less hours for and THEN my neighbor texted me asking we could "talk."  She said, "don't worry, nothing bad" but of course I spent the whole day stressing about what could be wrong.  So while I was trying to run to Wal-Mart and visit a friend in the hospital on way less time than I should have had, I was also worrying obsessively, as I am prone to do.  It turned out she just wanted to ask if I could babysit occasionally next month.  No big deal, all that stressing for nothing.

That night was Kendra's first band concert!  She did a great job and we were so proud of her!

There's my girl!

Then on Saturday we had our ward Christmas party!  The theme this year was "Laughing All the Way" which I loved-- I have gotten so tired of church parties feeling the need to be super serious about Christmas.  They were asking members to perform silly Christmas songs as part of it, so I volunteered our family to do something, since I wanted to be supportive.  Unfortunately, I didn't really take into consideration the fact that Craig is terrified of singing in front of people.  He finally was able to drive home this point by explaining that the way I feel about the drop tower is the same way he feels about singing in front of others.  Sorry, Craig!  I didn't know!

Anyway, after playing around with several ideas that didn't work (could we do Sleigh Ride but make it about our big blue van?  Nah-- too many words and it's sung way too fast.  Could we do a spoof on Jingle Bells and change this "sleighing song" to a "slaying song" and make it about Buffy the Vampire Slayer?  Nah-- probably too violent for a church party and not enough Buffy fans in the audience...), I finally realized that the perfect song to use was "O Christmas Tree."  It's short, just needs an easy rhyming couplet, and it repeats a lot!  Done.  I wrote a bunch of silly lyrics about various members of our ward.  The trick was to be funny without being mean (which is REALLY hard, actually).  My favorite verse was this gem:

The Osman Fam, the Osman Fam

We are so glad you moved in

It is so nice to look and see

Someone who has more kids than me!

The Osman Fam, the Osman Fam

We are so glad you moved in!

That got some good laughs! It ended up being 7 verses long, which was probably overkill, but oh, well. People seemed to enjoy it. Even Craig had to admit it was a raging success. But he asked that I please never do that to him again.

Since this was a fun party, they had cute stories for the kids and then Santa, too!

Br. Foeppel (who tore his shoulder tendon recently) telling the kids a story

Waiting to see Santa-- I love Camille's grin here!

Last time Kendra sings with the primary kids!

So that was delightful! The next day, Sunday, was the Municipal Band Concert, which people from my choir were singing at. (It was voluntary, so not the whole choir; there were probably 40 of us?) . Unfortunately, that overlapped with Craig and the kids going to see Bethlehem Village in the town of Afton, put on by a local church there. So Craig took the kids without me.

Ryder was really grumpy until he got some hot cocoa into his system

Standing in a chariot!

 An actual well!

Who doesn't get excited to see a camel?

They had a great time.

I came home from my concert and had two blissful hours of peace and quiet all by myself in my home. I didn't even do anything all that fun-- I cleaned up the whole kitchen and then I practiced my choir music. But no one interrupted me or created extra work for me during that time! When I was cleaning, I played the classical music station on the radio and no one tried to change it to Baby Shark or forced me to pause it so I could hear their various complaints. I love my children to death but getting those two hours of peace and quiet was something I truly had needed.

So the week ended on a peaceful note!

Quote

I'm reading an article about Zora Neale Hurston, and it has this marvelous quote from her: "Sometimes, I feel discriminated against, but it does not make me angry.  It merely astonishes me.  How can any deny themselves the pleasure of my company!"

This is so wonderful.  More people (self included!) need to adopt this attitude.

It's been years since I read Their Eyes Were Watching God.  Clearly, I need to go read it again, and possibly some of her other works, too!

December Weekend #1

I'm constantly amazed at how quickly time slips through my hands.  December is half over and I feel like I can barely catch my breath.

Last weekend I headed up to Manassas for the annual White Elephant Gift Exchange.  Of course, I had to get there early and eat at Cafe Rio, where a bunch of my friends managed to join me. 

Me with Tracy and Jacqui and being wonderfully photobombed by Lenee and Christina

This year my friend Emma was hosting the party, and she took it up several notches.  She made white elephant sugar cookies for the refreshments (in addition to a bunch of other yummy things!) and then gave out little white chocolates that were elephants, too.  Who thinks of stuff like that???

I managed to open the VERY BEST PRESENT (although Andrea Kunz promptly stole it from me, so I didn't get to keep it):

This party has a tradition of passing around a poster of Anitra (the party's founder) that says I Believe In You.  This year, Emma made throw pillows of Anitra with her catch phrase and also one of her and her husband that says Sweet Dreams.  I was in hysterics!

There was also a box of doughnuts with Jackie proclaiming, "I Do Nut Believe In You!"  I didn't manage to win that either.  But I probably didn't need the doughnuts anyway.

Great party, Emma!!!

Slightly smaller party this year, but still so much fun!

I didn't stick around as long as I normally would have because I wanted to visit my friend Vangie who wasn't able to make it to the party.  Luckily for me, her house is on the way home, so I popped over and we had a nice chat before I started yawning and figured I'd better start for home before I got too tired!


Craig, meanwhile, had taken all the kids to Charlottesville's Grand Illumination:

They all got light-up pins and candy canes-- a magical night, indeed!

"Spruce Springsteen" looks very festive and...  shrub-like?

This is what happens when you let your teenager take pics!

And of course, they finished with ice cream at Chaps.  I love how you can see Craig in the mirror!

The next day we didn't have much going on (HALLELUJAH!!!), so it gave us time to play with pets:

Here's Ryder delicately luring Scooter back to his cage (after Kendra let Scooter out two minutes before her piano lesson!)

Kendra loves to carry Oreo around

And Craig could finally make his beloved Spritz cookies!

Also, Ryder and Bentley now know how to make ramen AND eggs for themselves!  I guess they're all set for college now!  My work is finished!

Sunday was super busy.  I got to leave church early and attend the Staunton and Waynesboro relief societies.  Both were great and, as always, I am LOVING getting to meet more of the members in the area!  The teacher in one ward I think is meant to be my new best friend.  I was worried about leaving the kids sitting all alone, so I'd arranged for our friend Juneanne (or as she lets the kids call her, Junebug!) to sit with them. 

And then that night was the stake Joy to the World concert, where I got to hear Sarah sing two solos, and of course enjoy all the other wonderful music, as well.  Craig's school choir sang at it, too, so he got to get points for being a good administrator!  Woot!  Unfortunately, by the time that was over, there was no way my kids were going to be able to sit still for the First Presidency Christmas Devotional.  Some day we'll get there.

Yay for Christmas!

It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas!

Since Thanksgiving was so late this year, we felt like we were losing out on Christmas time and were frantic to get decorated as fast as possible.  So on black Friday we dragged out all our decorations and got to work!  We were lucky because the weather was GORGEOUS, so we did all our outdoor stuff: wreaths on the outsides of the windows and lights in the bushes.  Then on Saturday, while I was busy trying to make a magnolia wreath for Relief Society, Craig took the kids out to buy a Christmas tree.

They visited a tree lot and found this adorable little one:

And then they went to Costco, where for the same price you could buy this:

I guess since this is in our house, you can guess which one we bought!

It was a little scary not knowing what it would actually look like unwrapped, but Costco didn't let us down!

So merry and bright!

As if we weren't already feeling a bit of a time crunch, Craig decided the young men should come make cookies at our house on Sunday after church, so we (HE) had to rush around getting all the boxes put away almost immediately.  It made for a very busy Saturday but now our house looks festive AND clean, so I'm very happy.  And the cookie making was a huge success:

Camille is in heaven working with Addison here...

Poor Owen has wheat and egg allergies, but that didn't stop him!

Watching Christmas movies once the kitchen is all cleaned up!

Also, Craig took Kendra Christmas shopping. And while they were out and about, he surprised her by letting her get her ears pierced!  She was so cute, she told him they'd better not because she was worried I'd be mad.  She didn't know that we'd been plotting this for weeks!  She was very brave about it all and I think she looks so pretty!

It's hard to see, but she chose tiny star earrings-- very fun!

I feel like the entire month is already booked solid with concerts and parties-- it's going to be so fun!!!