Christmas Letter

In case I missed your email somehow. It's hard for me to keep track of things perfectly so please don't be offended if it happened to you.

You know you're ghetto when...

• You go to change your child's diaper, open it up and then leave it on saying either in your mind or to your husband, "Oh, this isn't full yet, it can hold more" and then you close it up and let them wear it for a few more hours.
• You talk up this special dessert and then after building the appropriate amount of anticipation and excitement from your family, you put frosting on graham crackers.
• You have canned fruit for dessert.
• You get out a baby wipe instead of filling the bath tub.
• You dilute your yummy smelling foam soap (more than twice) to make it last longer.
• Your kids get excited to have a dinner from a box.
• Your kids beg you to go shopping for toys (but they are referring to the local dollar store).
• You kids hide things at the normal store when you tell them you can't buy them so nobody will find it and then next time you're there they can buy it.
• You actually find it humorous and heart warming that before your neighbors moved, they scattered all their stolen shopping carts around the apartment complex.
• You look around your house for toys your kids haven't played with in a long time and wrap them up for Christmas presents.
  
• You let your friend with no experience in cutting women's hair cut your hair all based on the fact that her husband's hair is really cute and you figure that if she could do his hair, surely she could cut your hair. Then half-way through the hair cut when she tells you that you're the first girl's hair she's ever cut, you just laugh and say, "It's ok." After a few days when the shock wears off and your husbands tells you that you HAVE to go to a real salon and get it fixed, this is what happens.

So I wasn't really intending to have such short hair but the girl at the salon said that it was so crooked underneath that I had to go this short to even it out. I'm still in shock and it has been about a week. I actually have to do my hair now which is a change and unbeknowst to me, I have this funky waviness or kinkiness in the back/middle of my hair but just there brought on by motherhood so I have to blow dry AND use a flat iron. I'm getting better and better at it though and hopefully will be liking it soon. I do miss a ponytail though.

Well, are you ghetto too? How? Do tell.

Tre Beret

Here are some pics from our Christmas card photo shoot. It was pretty funny because Greg was using our shades from the car dashboard and standing by the window where the sun was shining to reflect it onto the girls. Then we had this whole set up with a blanket by the closet being held up by clothes pins--and I bet you thought we went to a studio, right? No? You could tell we were using a fleece blanket by the closet held up with clothes pins and using our car shades to reflect the sun onto the girls' faces? Dang. Oh well, here they are anyway.



Much later, the girls had changed and we were getting ready for dinner and Chloe asked if she could take some pictures with the camera and do a photo shoot. Maybe if I had started taking pictures when I was four, I'd be more professional now. Anyway, next thing we know, this is what she has put together on the couch:

Brrrrrr to the BRRRRRR!

You thought yesterday was cold?!!!!
P.S. This is a.m.
P.S.S. Am I the only one who LOVES atomic clocks?
What kind of inaccurate world did I live in before?

Brrr!

When we got up today, this is what we saw:
I mean talk about cold when your windows are freezing up.
When we looked at the thermometer after breakfast, this is what we saw:
Apparently the low of the night was -15 F. That is crazy cold. Let's just review the fact that water freezes at 32 deg. F. Just so you know, when it is this cold outside, this is what happens to your body:

• You instantly cough as soon as you breathe.
• Your eyes start watering (and simultaneously the tears start freezing but only sort of because they are still on your face and your face is warm). It makes it feel like your eyelashes are going to crack off.
• Your bugars instantly crystallize causing your children to cry. It is quite painful actually. Think about it, your nose is always at least moist inside all the time. Feels like some serious sharpies.
  

So this morning we had a Primary party at the church. We live across the street so obviously we just walked. It was just me and Chloe. We were fine on the way there but on the way home, we had a windchill. Chloe was ok and then suddenly there was this wind gust. We couldn't really see because we were tearing so much and then Chloe started crying. I told her that crying was only going to make it worse and so she tried to suck it up but she couldn't walk with the wind in her face so I had to wrap her scarf around her head and cover her face and then I led her by the hand. I felt like we were modern-day pioneers.

Christmas Traditions

Hello, blogging buddies. Greg and I were talking about fun family traditions and just thought that I should tap into this whole computer wealth of knowledge. I'm assuming you know me pretty well so your responses can be catered to more of what you know I would like and not think too cheesy. If you mention reading something, it would be great to reference titles because I'm interested in either good Christmas books or stories that I wouldn't mind re-reading year after year albeit spiritual or fun.

Thank you for helping and hopefully the comments will help you with some new ideas too.

We don't have many traditions yet (thus the shout out for ideas) but for breakfast on Christmas, I've made gingerbread waffles now for 2 years. Then you put applesauce and whipped cream on top. It is delicious. Here is the link to the recipe and if you scroll down you'll see my comment on the website about it. We make them in a belgium waffle iron but don't fill it quite all the way so when the waffles press out the result looks like a snowflake so we call them "Snowflake Waffles".

My friend Rena gave me a good one today. She stole it from a magazine. You do a Christmas book advent and wrap the books and put them under the tree and then read one Christmas book a night. She just gets the books from the library since you can check each out for like 3 weeks but is also filling her library with books she'd like to keep forever.

(Adding another one so my sister will have to share a different idea)
My sister lets each child buy a new Christmas ornament each year to add to their personal collection. The ornament is something that represents the child's interest/personality. Then when they are grown up, they will have ornaments to take with them to put on their family's tree.

Ned Needlelander II

Try as we might we couldn't get Chloe to agree to a different name for our Christmas tree this year. Our tree last year was Ned Needlelander--partly in honor the 3 Amigos and partly due to the amount of needles that landed each day. This tree hasn't been losing needles like that but nevertheless, he's "Ned". We thought this was one of the major advantages of getting a real tree because every year it is different. Maybe next year we'll have a girl tree. You've got to love IKEA. Where else can you buy a real tree for $20 that is still alive that is. It is pretty much the luck of the draw when you go because all the trees are bound in twine and all look the same. Our new method this year was running our fingers down the branches to see how many needles initially fall off. It was my theory that this would prove just how fresh the tree is.

Chloe and Daddy did the leg work while me and Tats waited for them. There were a few too many tree obstacles for the stroller.
Here's the winner. See how much better he looks than all the rest of the trees? That's what Chloe kept telling me.



Here we are all together. This nice foreign gentleman took the shot. I don't think he noticed that Tati was in there.

It was a super fun night and we had a great time decorating the tree the following morning.
There really is nothing better than watching Chloe decorate so meticulously. It's nice to see our tree evolving. When we first got married, we made ornaments: bows- out of a roll of velvet ribbon and some icicles out of sparkly pipe-cleaners. Although they look a little ghetto now all these years later, we just don't have the heart to get rid of them.

Smallville, Canada

I've been meaning to blog about this but I keep forgetting. So Greg sent me this video of a meteor shower that took place last week. Apparently it hit down close to my city and we were supposed to have felt a little bump (which I'm immuned to having grown up in CA) and hear a sonic boom. We live next to a pretty busy road so we didn't really hear any of it though.

Meteor rocks are supposed to instill people around with special powers (according to Smallville). I'd say it is true because boy does Tati have a talent for mega pooping but then she had that power before the meteor. We'll see what happens. I'll let you know what special powers emerge around here. Until then though, check out this video link. It is pretty crazy looking. Does that mean I'll have to keep my eyes out for Tom Welling? :-)

Happy Thanksgiving!

These are some gourd mermaids. Yeah, a bead bra on a squash. And a mini pumpkin turkey. You make feathers out of paper and then tape them to toothpicks and then stick the toothpicks into the squash. I mean sure, I come up with these ideas but girlfriend takes them to a new level all her own.

So Canada Thanksgiving was back on October. Some nice people from the country of Turkey invited us over for dinner funny enough. But you all know we love to keep it real so we had Thanksgiving #2-American Style with all you alls. We outsmarted Canada this year though and bought our supplies in October when they were cheap and when they were available. Cranberries always go so fast and I love them in pretty much everything you could bake them in. I also love cranberry sauce but I've only ever had the canned kind when you slice it and make a PacMan face out of it (was that only in my family?). This year I made some from scratch and it was delish. It was better the second day though. The first day it tasted a little too much like Christmas. Anyway, after narrowly escaping my turkey catastrophe when all the giblets were frozen inside the bird and the clock was ticking, all ended up on time and delicious. I did question whether or not I'd be able to enjoy the bird after the giblet incident but apparently I recover quicker when I'm starving. Anyway, here are some pics to enjoy.

Tati Before:
(This girl can EAT! That is a full tray. That's a lot of food! She easily out ate her big sis.)

Tati During:

Tati After:

Yeah, that's right, she ate it all!!! She is going to eat us out of house and home.

Daddy After:
(We all know that feeling.)

Didn't get much rest though. These girls love him sooooo much!

Family traditions? Well, we always do thankful slips (Chloe told me stuff to write down for Tati like, "I'm thankful for my silly big sis.") and we usually put them in a bag and then read them on Thanksgiving. This year we decided to hang them on the wall. I liked it a lot better this way because we were able to see the gratitude all month long. It ended up filling almost the whole wall, my camera just doesn't have wide lens.
We always have some Martinelli's. This year we drank out of these little crystal goblet things my parents gave us. It's fun making toasts and this year it was really fun to see Tats take a sip. I wish we could've caught it on camera but sadly our camera battery ran out during dinner. Also, this year we dressed up for dinner which was really fun. It made everything just seem more festive and special.

It has been a little weird living here because the Christmas decore comes out everywhere in stores and stuff right after Halloween. It kind of throws your holiday calendar off a bit--but then again so does the weather. I've had fall leaves hanging for some of the Thanksgiving decore and the leaves on our trees have been long gone for weeks. We're excited to officially have the "ok" to start our Christmas decorating.

The Blog Fairy

Have you been enjoying my new header and new background? Do you wish you could have a cute header--something personal for your fam or something original and different for the holidays? So my childhood friend, Emily has started a new website. Here's a picture of us from back in the day!

(Aren't we cute. We're tidepooling. Notice my rolled socks. Greg says I look exactly the same. Do I?)

It is called, "The Blog Fairy". She has some free holiday backgrounds (for now and more to come later I'm sure) and also does custom headers or backgrounds. Right now she's doing a give-away for a free head-to- toe blog makeover. The deadline is Dec. 1 so go to her blog and tell her you want to be in the contest. For those of you still set to "minima", this may be that chance you've been waiting for. Anyway, she's a super great girl so spread the word to all your blogging friends and have them tell all their blogging friends and so forth.

Mom, what's up with your outfits?

What? We match?

No, that's not it. You guys look like Target.
(Photo courtesy of Chloe.)

We do look like we work at Target, don't we? How sad, but there is no Target in Canada. We're looking forward to Christmas in Oregon where I'm sure we'll go to Target a coo-koo amount of times and our relatives will totally not understand our thrill but for those of you already on the Target train (namely Rebecca and Emily), don't you feel my pain?

(disclaimer: After seeing myself in this lovely shot, I took my hair down. A little too Tori Spelling reality show, right? It always seems like a good idea to mix it up and do a new hair do but then I feel like I look like either a hick or trying to look too young for my age.)

Canadian Papoose

When is the last time you heard the word "papoose"? For some reason it seems like I said it a lot when I was a kid. Can't totally recall the "why" part of that. Maybe it had something to do with watching "Paddle to the Sea" so many times.

Anyway, this is my Canadian Papoose Car Baby. I never knew these things existed before. This girl offered to let us borrow it for the winter. They are so cool. It is like a carseat sleeping bag.

It even has a flap to cover their faces for the super windchill.

I love it because you can just put like one cozy blanket inside on the kid and then you're done. You don't have to worry about the bulkie blankets getting in the way of the seatbelt in the car or worry about any blankets falling down.

This is an idea I could've come up with but somebody beat me. It is made my Jolly Jumper (Cuddle Bag) in case you want one.

Science Padawan

I realized the science force was great with Chloe one day as I was channel surfing. I happened upon a Discovery Channel special that was talking about mega ice dams and catastrophic floods in Washington, Idaho and Montana millions of years ago. After a few minutes of intense listening and scrutiny I suddenly became aware of another person in the room. Chloe was sitting in the love seat next to me. In an effort show some mercy I asked her if the show was boring and if she wanted to watch "kid tv" or the Food Network. "No, Daddy," she replied without breaking eye contact with the tv, "I like this show." As pride swelled deep within me I realized my dreams of one day having my very own budding science padawan were coming true.

Well, this past weekend was yet another opportunity for Chloe to wax strong in the Jedi Scientist ways. The University of Alberta Earth Science museums put on a "Science Saturday" for kids. Basically take all the people at Disneyland, stuff them into the halls and rooms of a single university building, then, in the pore spaces between people stuff tables with activities to teach kids about science: i.e. fossil rubbing, fossil casting in clay, origami crystals, bug stuff and (my favorite of course) rock/meteorite/mineral activities.

She loved it. I was especially proud of how interested in the minerals and rocks she was.
The volunteers working the tables would ask her questions to get her to think about stuff like "Where do meteorites come from" and she would sit, thinking and respond "They are like little planets that fall out of space, like shooting stars." Yeah, she's only 4, not bad.

My Yogis

Maybe this is a normal, documentable step in the baby process but I'd like to think my kids are extra special and they just naturally have exercising tendencies. It will be like, "crawl, crawl, crawl (pause, pause), yoga pose, (hold, hold), crawl, crawl, crawl". It's very cute. What's this pose called again? Help me out Amber.

Here's Chloe from back in the day:

And here is my new Yogi. This fool can hold the pose FOREVER! Glad they don't have my abs.


I'm just waiting for her to start throwing down some push ups. She's practically on her way already.

Emergency Substitutions

I just wanted to share my knowledge here. Something cool I learned. I wanted to make a cake but I had no eggs, it was too cold outside and I really didn't want to load my kids into the car, out of the car, into the stroller (Tats), out of the stroller, into the car, out of the car and home just for a measley pack of eggs. But I really wanted to make this cake and the recipe definitely said, "2 Eggs". What's a girl with a craving to do? So I took my problem to the internet and after reading many stupid ideas (like if I had "egg substitute" or "liquid egg" do you think I'd be googling this question to begin with?), I stumbled upon a real genius one.

1 egg= 2 T. of mayo

Yeah, I know, it sounds crazy but it made sense to me. And it made WAY more sense than the one that said to substitute corn starch. Huh?

Anyway, you wouldn't even know the cake wasn't the original recipe. In fact, dare I say the cake turned out even more delicious. Really moist. So if you're in a bind, do it, it works. I don't know how true with substitution would be for everything but at least for cakes it passed.

FYI, my favorite kind of egg:

First Snow

Well it happened. It didn't last very long but it happened. It is funny because I swear if we let her, Chloe would try and live off eating just ice and in this case snow. She goes outside to "play" in the snow and then all she does it eat the snow. It has been that way since her first snowball. And no matter how cold it is outside or how much she has eaten, she still wants to eat more.
Tati didn't know what to think. She was just mad that we had to put so many clothes on her and then she couldn't really move around so she was bugged by that too. But she sure was cute.

Since we were in the backyard, I just loaded her up in Chloe's car seat so she could see us. She got sick of being held.
It didn't last very long though because it wasn't super freezing but it was perfect for making a snowman.