Is It Naptime Yet

Note: I started writing this a week ago but didn’t want to start over, so I just added updates.

We’ve been up to a lot of different things here in the Blake house. Mostly we’ve been spending lots of time as a family hiking and enjoying Science Saturday at the Museum. We’ve also had a a park day with Carolyn and her husband, where they invited us to spend time with them on a rare day which both of them had off. I totally felt special that they invited us to come over since their day offs are never the same.

We’ve also been up to our elbows in cookies. Lilah did very well on her pre-orders and since I’m also able sell extras we’ve had 488 boxes of cookies in our house, though 72 are not spoken for just yet, I’m hoping to sell them as we travel to two more offices and if anyone needs more than what they bought. Update: We’ve sold 478 boxes of cookies. I only have ten not spoken for.

We’ve also had auditions for Cinderella. I’m super excited for the play this year. Unlike last year I was not nervous for the singing audition.

Until I stood on stage and the pianist starting playing.

Then the words almost left me and as I sung a sharp note and for the life of me I could not correct it. I just sang and hoped that whatever came out didn’t sound too bad.

The dance portion was the next day, and so was the children’s auditions. I was helping to teach the older kids dance, and as I had 15 or so pre-teens watching me I could not start on the right foot, and I got flustered and then went to teach the young kids, which included my two girls. We were trying to avoid me teaching the young ones since I had children in that group, but also because I worried that Eden actually would act shy. She didn’t act shy, and they both did really well. The song we used was short and fun. Update: I’m “third girl”, though I’m not sure what that means, and the girls are a part of the children’s ensemble, so no specific role, but I’m just happy we’re all in it.

This past week:
I’ve been delivering cookies everyday with Lilah and not working out and eating more than I should, so I’m sure I’ve gained whatever weight I’ve lost. Cookies are bad, very bad, but they taste so good.

Lilah did incredibly well on her sales. She sold about 400 with pre-orders and I ordered around 80 extra boxes to sell as we went to different delivery spots. At the beginning of the week we only sold a small amount of the extra boxes and it looked like I might have 70 extra boxes to return. On Friday we delivered to Jon’s co-workers, just two had ordered, and we brought all the extra boxes. We borrowed a red wagon from my friend Sam with a nice squeaky wheel, which was not squeaky the day before as we went around the block. Just on the way to Jon’s office, which wasn’t that far, four people stopped us, and we sold 10 boxes. Then we made a killing at Jon’s current office, and his old office, and lastly a building I worked at long ago as a student worker. Lilah loved how much people just wanted to buy girl scout cookies, and I loved that we had succeeded in selling nearly all of our extra boxes. I have learned to have tons of Caramel deLites if we ever go on campus again. We have just 10 boxes left, and I think that is a success.

Jon and I also celebrated our eighth anniversary this week. Eighth. We did a one night get-a-way at a local hotel and my sister Carolyn and her husband Derek watched the girls. We stayed at the Silverton, near Carolyn, and it also has a Bass Pro Shop, so we went shopping and saw why my Dad loves this store so much. Jon bought himself a nice hiking hat and compass and I got a cute baseball cap to wear…sometime…I’m not sure when other than hiking. We had enjoyed dinner earlier and had a wonderful time away from the worries of normal life and parenting.

So that’s our past few weeks of life in a nutshell.

Most are self explanatory….. and I’m being a lazy narrator.

Here is a short little look into our Christmas Eve celebrations.

We were with my family for the reading of the Saviors birth in the scriptures. Lilah and Eden lead one of the songs  and then afterwards is was present time!

Waiting to get started.
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Andrea with a sleepy Z, though I think it was just that particular moment.

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Lilah and Eden leading the music for Silent Night. Eden would just sing that carol around the house and I absolutely loved it.

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Lilah got a cool puppy from Carolyn and Derek, she named him Jack.
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Eden and her dress-up from Carolyn and Derek.
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The girls and me in our pajamas. The girls picked mine out.
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Jon with the girls and Jack.
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Jon asleep in the couch. I think this makes for the third year he’s done this.

Luckily he fell asleep on one cushion so I was able to work around him.

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Our stockings.

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Our tree and presents.
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I have to take one with just the lights….it makes me think of my childhood.

To come….Christmas Day.

Here are the pictures from our visit to Valley of Fire on the 21st. For some reason photo editing has been overwhelming to me since there are so many pictures to look through and post, so I’m starting out small.

Lilah in a cave by the visitors center.

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Eden by the same cave, while Lilah ate lunch behind her.
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On our way to mouses tank.
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Petroglyphs you see along the trail.

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I’m the King of the world.

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The girls sharing a hug by some corner we found off the beaten path.

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A bighorn sheep we saw when leaving the park. This is the first time we’ve seen one while at the Valley of Fire.

Forgive the length of the post, this is my detailed version of Christmas and pictures should be up soon.

Jonathan took two weeks off this year, so we had not only the week between Christmas and the New Year off, but the week before Christmas off. For his first day of vacation, or Monday the 21st, We spent part of the day at Valley of Fire. He wanted to visit the book section at the Moapa Tribal place, or where you buy fireworks, and figured we could go on some hikes out there too. We hiked to Mouses Tank and saw Atlatl rock. We also stopped by the Visitors Center and bought a few things. We showed the girls these cheese dusted larva and salt and vinegar crickets and Lilah now wants to have chocolate covered crickets. I’m sure if she ever has any it will not be because of me.  We came home in time to relax a little and get ready to go feed the homeless with Carolyn’s work that night.

Tuesday the girls and I had a party with some of the mom’s and kids from the old mommy group and with a few new ones. The girls had tons of fun decorating gingerbread men and seeing old friends that are now in a different ward due to the split two years ago. Then that afternoon we went to Carolyn’s work party and they were able to see Santa. Lilah told him she wanted this cuddle cat and Eden told him she wanted dress-up.

Wednesday, I’m not sure what we did this day. It seems to me that we saw people, but my tired mind is not letting me remember anything. I think we went shopping this day. We had the girls go pick out gifts for each other and I had Jon help the girls pick out pajamas for me. He was mostly there to help them pick the right size, I think they may have wanted to buy me an XXL, but the pajamas I received were all them.

Thursday, Christmas Eve, Lilah and I went to Jon’s parents house to help decorate their tree. Eden had a slight fever the night before and got sick on the morning of the 24th. Luckily, it didn’t last and her stomach was feeling better by that evening when we went to my parents for Christmas Eve. Andrea, Brien, and Zarina we were in town so we were thrilled to see them. This was also the night to see Derek, Carolyn’s husband, because he works late he could only visit one family a night for the holidays. The girls got to open two gifts because they had to open their pajamas, but they also had to open the present Carolyn and Derek bought them since Derek would not be there the next night.

Christmas Day the girls got up earlier than normal, around 7:30 am, and we had them wait behind a curtain we had put up the night before. This tradition came from Jon’s family. His mother told us they started putting the curtain up to divide the dinning room from the living room, when they lived in a one room apartment in LA and the children’s sleeping area was in the dinning room. Incidentally it carried over that they put a curtain in a doorway to separate the children from whatever room the tree was in and they had to wait for their parents to let them go past.

We enjoyed a wonderful morning opening presents and eating yummy cinnamon rolls. Since we purchased the Wii and Wii Fit board, the girls got just a few small things. Piggy banks they got to decorate, UNO, Bob Books, dresses, a gift from Santa, and what they got each other. Jon surprised me with Batman The Dark Knight, which was a surprise because we had agreed not to get it, so I told Andrea to get it for us since they had our family this year.  We then visited Jon’s parents and family for lunch and later we headed over to my parents house for dinner with the family.

I don’t remember what we did Friday, probably played the Wii a lot, but on Saturday we saw The Princess and the Frog with Andrea, Brien, Zarina, and Carolyn. We had tried to go all week long, but car repairs, sick children and actual holidays got in the way so Saturday we finally were able to see it together. I think all the children and adults thoroughly enjoyed it and we will definitely be purchasing it once on DVD.

Eden loves dress-up. She loves to wear every item of dress-up clothing, though she has toned down a little, depending on the day. One night she fell asleep on Jon still dressed up and I just had to take a picture, plus Jon was asleep too so it was an added bonus.

She always wears her Sunday shoes for dress-up.

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We also made cookies at Carolyn’s house one weekend for the Monday we fed the homeless in November. This is something we started doing with Carolyn’s work a few months back and I think is really good for the girls. Lilah loves it, while Eden mostly just stays attached to my side but there are times where she is ready and willing to hand out cookies and that makes it worth it to me. We bought the girls the heavy coats so they could be nice and warm on the nights we feed the homeless during the winter and possibly make a visit to the snow, but that has yet to be determined.

Lilah helped with each batch and was wanting to be apart of the entire process. She’s by some of the chocolate chip cookies we made.

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Lilah with our tub of chocolate chip pumpkin cookies. I think we made around 75 total, or three batches.

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Eden with the cookies. She liked bagging the cookies the best.

Well I’ve figured out how to use GIMP, or the image editor in Linux. I can’t make videos, but I can actually edit and post pictures finally! I might be playing catch-up over the next little while as I find time avoiding dishes, which is what I’m doing right now.

Here’s the link to my written overview of Halloween and here are just a few photos of the fun we had. I’m really disappointed because I did not get a  picture of Lilah’s side of the pumpkin. I really loved how it turned out, but in the craziness of getting out the door I must have forgotten. 🙁

Eating doughnuts off a string at Carolyn’s work party.

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Gutting the pumpkin.

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Lilah loved the feel of the goo.

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The girls in their costumes (Glinda and a fairy) and Eden’s side of the pumpkin.

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With their cousin Zarina, the cutest ghost ever. ( Mine were going for scary last year.)

We got a Wii for Christmas. It’s been lots of fun and I am now a Wii widow…at least until the novelty of it runs outs. I would like to play, but the lure of dishes, laundry and the fact that someone else is usually playing makes it a little more difficult. It has been fun and I’m so happy we got the Wii Fit. I’m also lucky because Carolyn and Derek now think of us and what our girls might like when they buy games so we’ll get to borrow and try some out without purchasing them ourselves, unless we really like them, then we’ll buy them. (Sigh to all that comes with a game console, though it is lots of fun.)

We have had a wonderful Christmas and I hope yours was merry and bright. I now need to do dishes and think of something to do for my church lesson tomorrow since we ran out of lessons. So fun.

Christmas is almost here….Are you ready?

I’m mostly ready. I just have gifts to wrap, in which I’m not completely happy with what I got Lilah, but I think she’ll still enjoy it. I’m very excited for this Christmas.

I love Christmas music and so do my girls. They’ll replay whatever CD is in the player, which is Faith Hill, and then they sing to it and create “plays” to each song. It’s a good thing I really like the Faith Hill CD, or I think I would have gone crazy. They always hit play when my hands were messy with truffle making.

Speaking of truffles,  I mostly sold large bags of popcorn for $5 a bag, but I did sell some truffles, though my mom put in the largest order and I will say I’m giving her a large discount because if I wasn’t selling them and she had asked me to make them, I would have done it for free.  I’m happy I was able to make a nice dent and repay some of the money I’ve spent for Sew Lacey. I have a lot of material and after the Holidays I hope to get some motivation back and begin sewing some more. I made a really cute nursing cover and matching burp clothes for a friend recently and am thinking of adding that to my list of items.

I’m so happy for Christmas and can hardly wait for the new year!

Also, the committee met and interviewed a friend’s husband for the play next year and loved him. I’m so excited to work with him and hopefully be in the play.  Once it’s official, as in the board meets and approves him and the play, I’ll give more information. For now I just can’t wait till 2010.

Sorry this post was so scattered. I just wanted to jot down some thoughts while the truffle center warmed up so I could make them. I had it in the fridge too long and now it’s too hard to shape.

A few years ago I decided to surprise Jon with an afternoon date at the end of a pretty hard semester. Since then we’ve made it a tradition to go for our monthly date as a lunch date at the end of the Fall Semester. We also go to a yummy Mexican restaurant that I can only pronounce the first name, Lindo’s, and almost anyone I talk to knows exactly what I’m talking about and can pronounce the last part, Michogcachanigans. OK that last part I made up, but it’s something that starts with a M. It’s near my old stompin grounds and even as I  felt so close to home when I was driving Jon back to work I was so far from our current home.

My good friend Beth watched the girls for me and Jon and I were able to enjoy a nice lunch together. We haven’t been on a date since… well I don’t know when, but that’s because this semester was pretty hectic for the both of us, and it seemed that watching a movie together counted as our dates because that’s all we could afford both time and money wise.

I’ve realized I’m a very set in my ways person and I love traditions, or doing the same thing over and over again. I know Jon likes to try new things, but I’m thankful that he lets me enjoy my rituals and set in my way, ways.

I love you Hunny Bunny and here’s to a couple more end of the semester lunches.