Company

Relatives are great. Relatives with babies are wonderful. Relatives that let you hold their babies are even better. My cousin Aimee, her husband and daughters are visiting us this week, and as you can see we are having a wonderful time with Ida Mae. She is just over two weeks old, and likes to be held. There are lots of volunteers when Aimee asks if any of us would like to hold her. She always says, "You don't have to, but if you would like to hold her now you may." I think it is funny that she is still saying we don't have to. No one has turned her down yet.

Here is Ida Mae and I.

Hooked on Crochet?!?

I know this will come as a great shock to most of you, but I have done it. I've learned how to crochet. Below you will find pictures of my first completed project. This does not in any way diminish my love of knitting, or make me want to use my knitting needles for decorative purposes only and go out and buy a set of hooks. Since I know that crocheting takes three times as much yarn for the same amount of square footage, I most likely won't be doing many blankets either. :) I really don't like the look of crocheted clothing, so this will probably be what I make most with my new craft skill. There is also a possibility of a crocheted snowflake here and there. ;) Now it is time for all of you to comment and tell me how proud you are of me. This means you Amy.


The completed blanket.

All folded up.

The edge.

A close up of the sheep fabic.

Here is a close up of the fabric I am making the next blanket out of. I really love the retro look of the cars. This one will actually be a gift. :)

Cookies for Grandpa

Here is number two of the monthly installment of cookies for Grandpa. (Did I forget to post month one?) This time we made Double Chocolate Cookies. It is a Martha Stewart recipe that came out of the holiday cookie book from last year. She didn't disappoint. Below you will find the recipe in case you are so inclined to make something yummy. I just have to say that you probably shouldn't make them before you've had breakfast. Yeah...that is what I did. You may be tempted by the wonderful aroma of Ghirardelli chocolate melting in the oven to eat one warm from the oven before you've had your cereal. Okay, okay, so I had a cookie before breakfast this morning. It was REALLY YUMMY!

Packed up cute.


Double Chocolate Cookies

1 cup flour
1/2 cup cocoa
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 lb. good quality milk chocolate
(4 oz. of that should be chunks and 4 oz. chopped coarsely)
1 stick unsalted butter
2 large eggs
1 tsp. vanilla

Whisk the flour, cocoa, soda, and salt together. Set aside. Melt the coarsely chopped chocolate with the butter. Cool. Put in mixing bowl and add sugar, eggs, and vanilla. Mix until combined. On low speed, gradually add the flour mixture. Fold in the chocolate chunks. Scoop out onto baking sheets lined with parchment. Bake at 325 for 12-15 minutes or until lightly cracked but still soft. Cool on parchment on wire racks.

Yield: 3 dozen

Robinson Crusoe

Last night I wanted to do something with Alice, but she said she had to go read part of Robinson Crusoe for homework first. I told her that she should skip it and play with me because she would probably just read about him chopping something up and burning it to eat. Later on she came back after she had read her chapter or so and this is what she said, "He didn't burn something to eat. He made a board out of an entire tree." HA!

Today At School

I just got back from helping out at school. Today was the 100th day of school so the kindergarten class did things together all day with the 1st and 2nd graders. They were put in groups of four and moved around from station to station. It was a rather chaotic. :) Here are some of the funny things that some of the children said to me.

1. Are those your real feet or are you wearing socks?
Those are my socks.
Can I touch them?
No.
2. If you tell me sit down one more time I won't invite you over to my house.
3. How old are you?
20.
Really! My mom is older than you. My dad too. They are both 34.
4. Are you a parent? (I get this one a lot, but today it was from another teacher. Do I look older than I am, or do people think that 13 year olds have babies?)
5. My Mom doesn't like anyone to know how old she is. I'll tell you though. Consequently another little girl over heard just how old E's mom is and started yelling it for all to hear.
6. Did you know my dad looks like a teenager? He really does. People think he is my mom's kid and my brother. They really do. He looks just like a teenager. People ask her if he is her child.
7. Did you know I can write my name in firthive?
8. E asked me if I liked being seven. I said yes. Then she said, “Oh, the good old days when I was seven. Wait! I am seven. This is the good old days.” (She was then very happy to be living in the good old days of her life.)
9. R asked me to tell her a secret. I whispered “Cherish the cat of the orient” (Very old family joke that most you won’t you get.) into her ear. She smiled really big and said, “WOW! Really?”

I was helping kids write sentences about what they would buy if they had 100 dollars. A little girl thought for a long time and then got so excited and said she would buy scissors. Lots of scissors. Oh, the wild dreams of 6 year olds. Just think she would to be able to cut something whenever she wanted.

It's Valentine's Day!

Happy Valentine's Day everyone! Here are some pictures of the festive things around our house. Since all my sisters are gone there really hasn't been anyone to celebrate another "Rotic" Valentine's Day with. (That's romantic without the man for any of you who didn't catch it.) I made a nice dessert from the February 2007 issue of the Martha Stewart Living magazine (page 53 for any of you who have a copy around the house). They are Chocolate Éclair Hearts with Milk Chocolate Whipped Cream. I ate one all by myself because Mom and Dad weren't really in the mood for dessert. It was a good recipe if you were thinking about trying it. Debbie was going to come over tonight, but she got 2 feet of snow at her house yesterday and wasn't able to make it out.


Here you see our Valentine towel with the Éclairs cooking in the oven behind it.

This is me in my pink clothes. The front of the outer shirt says, "Je T'aime" on it.

These are my new Valentine socks from Naomi. Thank you, Noam! I love them.

Here is what I gave my mom and sisters. Sorry yours is going to be so late, Naomi!

Chocolate

Okay, so I started eating chocolate before lunch. (I blame my sister for that) At least I am not as bad as this person who made a chocolate sandwich.

I Heart Buttons

This is a little something I made this evening. We didn't have enough pink and red buttons for a more holiday look, but I made one in white instead. It blends with the curtains rather well, and I will probably keep it up even when Valentine's Day is over.

My Dresser

You have all been asking me for pictures of my dresser with the mirror, so here you are. There was much controversy over what direction to hang the mirror up, but in the end it we decided on horizontal. I wasn't going to post more room pictures until it was all done, but I guess I will go ahead and do some now. The mirror was put up last night, and today I decked it out for Valentine's Day. (A big thanks to everyone who sent me Valentines.) In the one photo you can see a little bit of the art I put up in the closet. You shall see more of that later when I get the shelves painted and everything organized.

Invitation

We are throwing a "gift card shower" for our very old friend (Adam) and the girl he is going to marry (Meghan.) We weren't able to arrange a real shower before their wedding in June, so we decided to do one through the mail. It will be gift cards only, and that will eliminate a lot of shipping costs. Below are pictures of the invitation that I made up. The inside is blank because we are still working on the wording. What do you think? I took a lot of thinking to get it right, but I am happy with how it looks.

Mary Janes

Look what I did. I bought baby Mary Janes. Yes I know…sigh… I don't have any children, but that doesn't really matter does it? I've fondled them a few times before, but yesterday they were 80% off. That means it only came to $1.60 a pair. If you saw something you wanted REALLY BADLY for only $1.60, would you have gone home empty handed?

Valentine Happy

I haven't even slept one night in my new room yet, (due to the decided lack of curtains) but that hasn't stopped me from decorating it for Valentine's Day. I must tell you that I didn't think up this idea all by myself. This week I found myself with a lot of time to kill in the dentist waiting room (I was waiting for Mom's appointment to be over). It was actually great because they had TONS of current magazines that I like to look at. The heart garland idea was actually the inside of a card, (It said something like, "Don't leave me hanging” on the front with a mini garland inside) but I thought it would look great in a bigger version. Voila! I will probably put one up over my new mirror and also the bulletin board if they get hung up on the wall before Valentine's Day comes around. Go make something out of pink and red paper. It'll make you happy, I promise. ;)

The garland over the headboard.


A close up of the hearts.




The kit I am sending with Alice to give to Hannah.

Huh

HowManyOfMe.com

There are: 2 people with my name in the U.S.A. How many have your name?

I think this is pretty good. I am willing to share my name with 2 other people. For your information, there are only 750 people in the whole United States with our last name. I don't know all of them, but I'm sure we're related.

Name That Show

Here is some trivia for you. (Naomi, Alice, Hannah, and Mom, you don't get to answer.) Really I am only posting this to see if Micah remembers this show or not. (Or anyone else for that matter.) Post me a comment and tell me if you do.

Hint: "Mork calling Orson, come in Orson." (That was a big hint.)

  

  

MORE SNOW!

Big surprise, eh? We thought it was. Between last night and today we've gotten at least another 6-8 inches. This afternoon, I slapped Vaseline and Carmex all over my face and headed out to shovel. I got about half way down the driveway when I realized that the Vaseline and Carmex were no longer preventing chapping. Time to come in. I took some more videos that I might post, but you are probably getting tired of watching the snow fall. One of these times I am going to get a good video of the plow going by. Speaking of which, one of our neighbors has their car parked at the end of their driveway. I presume it is because they haven't shoveled in a few days and couldn’t make it to the top of the driveway, but it seems kind of obvious to me that it is a bad idea to park there during white out conditions. Hello? It seems like the friendly orange plow, or traffic that can't see the car could easily run into it. Maybe they want a new car.

 
Alice is the queen of the snow bank. 

 
Yeah, it is deep here. 

 
We get to shovel again. Happy, happy, joy, joy! 

 
The snow banks are very deep. 

The Snow Storm on Saturday

Alice in the Snow

Cleaning the Roof

My New Room

Today Dad worked really hard to finish with all the painting in my room and then he and I set up the bed. I REALLY LOVE how it is looking. My desk needs another coat of paint (hopefully tomorrow), and I also have to paint the dresser. I'll post more when it is all done, but I am so excited about it and I wanted everyone to see.

 
The nice new bed. 

 
The corner that the desk will go in. 

 
The view from the door. 

Happy Birthday, Alice!

  

 
Yum! Chocolate Pudding Cake