Jewelry Organizer

I've been mentioning to Scott that I would like a jewelry organizer for a while, and he bought me one for Christmas!  I hung it today, and organized all my jewelry on it.

In the process, I cleaned out two out of three jewelry boxes that I had sitting on my dresser.  One was a larger box, and one was a tackle box that my mom painted for me to store earrings in back in about 6th grade.  And I threw away a lot of earrings that have been sitting in there since 6th grade...

In the process of hanging this up, I was reminded how frustrating plaster walls can be.  I love old houses, but I also recognize that they have their issues.  The jewelry holder was supposed to hung by drilling holes, hammering in the little plastic holders, drilling screws into those, and then sliding the jewelry holder on to the screws.  Of course, the plaster, just kinda disintegrates, then the plastic things won't go all the way in when you hammer them, and then they start bending and smashing.  I ended up putting in the screws, then hammering the screw/plastic in together.  It was a long frustrating process that involved dropping screws behind the dresser multiple times.  It made me long for dry wall.

Christmas 2013

The weekend before Christmas we had the Evenhouse family Christmas celebration with my side of the family.  I had a busy week, and ended up doing most of the food prep late on Friday night.  Our friend Travis was in town from Oklahoma, and he and Jake came over for supper and karaoke.

Singing and making apple pie...I can multi-task!  Sorry it is sideways--it is right side up where it is saved on my computer, but keeps loading sideways.

Laurel and Uncle Crisco, aka Jake

Travis and Laurel

 I believe I handily won this round of karaoke!

On Saturday we drove to Pella for Evenhouse Christmas.  We started at 9am with breakfast, including Carrie's homemade cinnamon rolls...possibly one of my most favorite foods in all creation.  We had hoped to open present in the morning, but my brother had asked for the wrong weekend off from work, so had to work until 3pm.  So we got to hang out, play games, eat lunch, watch Wipeout, sort the presents 3 or 4 times, and then finally open when he got home!

 Mom had put together a game for us.  She took all of our faces and photoshopped them into famous people's bodies.  By famous people I mean Harry Potter, Tinkerbell, Dora, Captain Jack Sparrow, etc.  We   had fun trying to figure out all the faces and characters, and Mom had silly prizes for everyone.

Doug shows off his "arm tattoo sleeve."  Looks almost real!

Laurel managed to take a nap on my lap.

Crammed around 3 tables for lunch.

 Jim got off work at 3pm, so at exactly 3:01, every one of us with a cell phone sent him a text message telling him to hurry home so we could open presents!

Laurel enjoyed ripping off the wrapping paper and playing with boxes.

I gave Scott a 50 mm fixed lens for our camera.

Carrie and Tim received "Cutt'n & Strutt'n" this year.  This movie has been passed among family members since I won it as a Sportsman's Club dinner at church a number of years ago.  3 1/2 hours of turkey hunting, including the best turkey fight every caught on film!  

We gave laurel a ball slide.  It didn't take her long to figure it out!

Garion loves giving Laurel hugs and kisses.

 We decided to just stay home on Christmas Day.  We took a couple family photos before opening gifts.

I give Scott a rock or stone every year for Christmas...I try to remember to pick one up somewhere cool on vacation--Charleston, the Ozarks, Gettysburg, etc.  In the Bible, the Israelites erected a large stone called Ebenezer, and it was a reminder of the faithfulness of God to them for all generations.  I give rocks to Scott as a reminder of my love and faithfulness to him!

Peekaboo!

I am soooooo excited!

Laurel received this play station from Uncle Lance and Aunt Dorothy.  She loves it...as you can see because she spent a lot of time kissing it.

My parents went on vacation to northern Arkansas during Christmas week, and took two of my nieces.  They had snow on Christmas day for the first time in 80 years, and everything at the resort and in town was closed for the whole week.  

Uncle Jim came to our house for Christmas Day.  We did another round of karaoke, played Mexican train dominoes, ate, and watched the Doctor Who Christmas special.  Fun times!

 We will be heading out to visit Scott's mom after New Year's, so there is still more Christmas to come!

Christmas Memories

This is the first Christmas since Grandma Evenhouse passed away, and I'm finding myself thinking about how much she loved Christmas, and how much she passed that love along to us.

Here's a gem from Christmas, 1992.  

 When we lived in the Chicago area, we would visit Grandma and Grandpa often.  Usually about a month before Christmas, when we would go to their apartment for Sunday coffee time for Pizza Night, Grandma would bring us into her bedroom one by one, and show us what she got for everyone else.  She loved giving present so much that she couldn't wait, she had to show someone!

Even after we moved to Pella, we still went back to Chicago almost every Christmas...until we persuaded Grandma and Grandpa to move to Pella themselves!

We could usually persuade Dad to let us open one present each about a week before Christmas (like mother, like son...).  Then on Christmas Even we trouped over to Grandma's...sometimes we planned to eat first, but usually the first thing we did after walking in the door was open presents.

 Grandma didn't do a lot of cooking or baking, but one thing she made every Christmas was kolaches (or kolachkies, if you want to spell it phonetically).  These are bavarian pastries that are little squares of pastry with a filling in the middle (we always had apricot), then the edges folded up and pinched together, baked, and covered with powdered sugar.

 Grandma would always hide the tray of kolaches on top of the fridge so that we didn't eat them all right away and ruin our meal.  We always managed to find them, though!

 Grandma used to buy herself Estee Lauder perfume every year, and then would get the "bonus" giant make-up kit and give it to us for Christmas.  It usually had 3-5 eye shadow combinations, some blush, lip stick, eye and lip liners, and more!  So I wore Estee Lauder make-up for years...we did not have much money growing up, so it was a blessing to have one nice thing!

 Our family tradition was to open presents one at a time, from youngest to oldest.  Jim always got the first present, then on up.  I am usually Santa. Jim, Carrie, Colleen, Lynn, Mom, Dad, Grandma, Grandpa.  We've carried on that tradition, although now there are a lot more little kids!

judging by the wrapping paper, I think this is actually a birthday gift.

 My sister Carrie and I got married in the same year.  Doug had already been part of the family for a while (right between Lynn and Mom in the present order), and they already had 5 kids!  Our husbands really threw off the handing out of presents that year: Tim (Carrie's husband) is younger than my kid brother Jim (she's a cradle robber...or is she a cougar?), and Scott (my husband) is older than Doug (I guess that makes me a gold digger)!  

 Last year on the day we celebrated Christmas, Grandma was not able to come to our house, so we all walked over to the Comfort House to see her after our meal and after we opened presents.  We brought treats even.  She loved it!

 She still managed to critique my kolaches: "the pastry is a little too thick, and not quite enough filling!"  

She still managed to eat 4 or 5.

 On Christmas Day, Mom, Dad, Scott and I were on vacation in South Carolina, so Lynn and some of her kids went to visit Grandma.

Grandma with Olivia, Garion, and Abby

Grandma Evenhouse passed away early in January of 2012.  We miss her, especially this Christmas.

Grandma, this year I think I nailed the kolaches.  Not too thick, not too thin, plenty of filling.  I'm having one for you!  I love you!

The Raccoon Whisperer

I was given a raccoon doll that makes noises for Christmas, and Laurel enjoys "talking" with it.  Here she is in her first starring role:

Salt!

My sister sells Pampered Chef, and last month I did a catalog show...as a result, I received $215 worth of free Pampered Chef items!  Awesome!  This is the 2nd time I've done a show, and both times I got over $200 of free stuff--I like this!  I use these opportunities to buy the items that I have always wanted, but didn't want to spend that much money on.  One of those items is a salt and pepper grinder with a bamboo holder.

While he was stationed in Germany, Scott bought a couple bags of rock salt in Halle.  Now we finally have a place to use it!  I also put in all of my peppercorns...guess I need to buy some more.

Last night I thought I would have a cup of hot cocoa.  On the back of the packet was a recipe for "Double Creamy  Chocolate Chai" that sounded delicious, so I tried it!  Make the hot cocoa using milk, then steep a chai tea bag in it (I used vanilla chai).  Top with a little cool whip and dried orange rinds.  Yum!

Babies Galore

Last week my friend Sara and her son Eli came over for a baby/mommy play date.  Sara and I were roommates for a while, got married about a year apart, and had our first babies 6 weeks apart.  It is nice to have a good friend who is in the same stage of life as me (aka: married in our 30's, having our first kids in our mid-30's), and we try to get together about every other week

Laurel is a little taller, but Eli definitely has a bigger head!

 This past weekend Scott and I went up to Gladbrook, IA, to spend Friday night at my sister Carrie and her husband Tim's house.  They had work Christmas parties both Friday and Saturday night, so we took the Friday night shift, while the Klinge grandparents were in line for Saturday night.  This was a good test for us, if we should somehow end up with twins...Kendall is just over 2, Laurel is 8 months, and Oren is 1 month old!  I changed 5 diapers on 3 different kids in 2 hours!

Scott burping Oren.  Laurel has never been willing to take a bottle, so I think Scott kinda enjoyed feeding Oren.

Laurel and Kendall played "together" for a few minutes.  Most of this involved Laurel trying to pull the string on this toy while Kendall pushed her away.

Scott holding the babies

We were not able to get a picture with all three kiddies looking at the camera.

 Kendall went to bed around 8:15pm.  She wants someone to sit on her bedside table while she falls asleep...just sit there silently while she tells you a couple stories, and eventually settles down.  Laurel tends to need "mommy time" at night, so I ended up sitting on the bedside table holding Laurel while both kids fell asleep, and Scott gave Oren a bottle and put him to sleep.  We then had approximately 20 blessed minutes during which all 3 children were asleep!

Laurel doesn't sleep well in her pack n' play, so I put her on the boppy pillow on the living room floor.

 Laurel and bedtime have not been friends for the past month or so.  When she was really little, she slept in her car seat.  At about 3 months, we transitioned to her crib, and that went really well!  Then we started putting her to bed even before she was totally asleep, and she would fuss a little and go to sleep.  Then we started just putting her pacifier into her mouth in the middle of the night instead of me nursing her, and she went right back to sleep.  She even slept through the night a couple times!

Then a couple months ago she got her first 2 teeth.  She had about a week of lots of crying throughout the night, then the teeth popped out and she was happy again and slept well...for a couple weeks.  Then she got the flu right around Thanksgiving and since then, bedtime and sleeping has not been fun at all.  She will not soothe herself to sleep.  She will fall asleep on my lap or on Scott's lap, and be totally out...but then the instant we put her into her crib, she starts screaming.  If you pick her up, and stops screaming right away, and goes back to sleep--until you lay her back down in her crib.  

We have tried the 5-10-15 method.  It often turns into marathon crying sessions.  Last night she cried on and off until 3:30am!  Sometimes I even nurse her in the middle of the night again, but she still wakes up as soon as we put her into the crib.  However, she sleeps like a log if she is in our bed...problem is, we really don't want to have the baby sleeping in our bed all night for weeks, or months, or years.

Tonight it only took 4 tries and 45 minutes.  We'll see if she stays asleep, or if we get a middle of the night screaming episode.

so peaceful

Check out her crazy tuft of hair sticking out on the left.

 Laurel slept for about an hour on the floor Friday night, but woke up shortly before Carrie and Tim got home.  Then she was wide awake until about 11:30pm.  When she finally fell asleep, she actually slept in the pack n' play until almost 1am!  However, we didn't want to keep everyone else awake with a screaming episode, so we just put her in our bed...two adults and one baby in a full size bed is a little crowded.

I want my mommy!

A Christmas Story 2012

Last weekend we had our annual "A Christmas Story" party.  I am not sure how many years we have been doing this now...I found digital pictures going back to 2005, and I think I had a party for a few years before that...and I know we did it at least one year in college, and I graduated in 2000!  So, I randomly decided that this year would be the 10th annual "A Christmas Story" party.  Thanks to all our friends that consistently come to our house, eat yummy food, and watch the same movie year after year!

This year I decided we needed a leg lamp, so I found a picture and printed it over 3 pieces of paper, and taped it to the front door.  My hope was that the light shining through the window in the door would give us "the soft light of electric sex gleaming in the window."

Eating some snacks during the movie

We put Laurel into her pj's in the hopes that she would get tired and go to sleep.  Right...

We do turn the heat up for this party, but it seems we like the temp in our house just a little cooler than most of our friends...but we do supply blankets!

Who do I look like?

Laurel is now 8 months old, and definitely developing a personality.  People often ask who she looks like.  It's hard to know--Scott and I both had white-blonde hair as kids, and both have blue eyes and very pale skin.  What do you think?

Laurel at 8 months old

Colleen as a baby.

Scott as a baby

Ok, I will admit some leading on my part...I chose pictures where Laurel and I are making the same face.  It's only fair...I had to carry her around inside me for 9+ months!