Tuesday, December 29, 2009

These Dreams

I had this horrible dream this morning before I woke for the day. I guess you could call it a recurring dream, as I have had it several times in recent weeks. I dreamt I went back to college and enrolled in a bunch of music classes.

Except, I didn't want to be a music major. But I had this overwhelming feeling that it was what everyone thought I should do, and so I was basically pressured into doing it. But, I found out (as I always do) that the required choir class was scheduled at a time that I couldn't attend it, because I had to take care of my kids. So I went to choir and made my appearance, then realized I needed to be home and so I left.

The weird/sad/twisted thing about it was, when I walked into the choir room, I had this attitude that I was somebody important or uber talented. I was some sort of choir big shot (lol yes, I am aware of how ridiculous that sounds.), or at least I thought I was. {Which is so incredibly laughable, as I was far from a key player in my college choir.} And I was waiting for people to react to my leaving.

...and no one did.

And for some reason it made me so frustrated; why, I am not sure. I didn't want to be there in the first place, so why would I care?

Dreams are so strange...

Speaking of dreams; I want to share some more of my real life dream, my beautiful children.

My oldest and his gorgeous, golden, sparkling eyes...

I can't get over how big he is getting. He is starting to look like a young man.
And the "baby", who is not much of a baby anymore; especially since he has decided to start talking some. He cracks me up. We can't understand a whole lot of what he says, but he will talk your ear off. And, he tells a great knock-knock joke. ;-)
My boys are always good-natured, reserved and calm. They are never goofy or cranky.

Meet Goofy...
And Cranky.
I don't know who they belong to.

Until,
D ;)

Saturday, December 26, 2009

Home For the Holidays

Hello Everyone!
I trust you had a wonderful Christmas (or Friday if you don't celebrate. ;) ). We had a great day; the boys were excited and happy with their gifts. Santa brought Kiddo a new Star Wars Lego kit and Port got his first bicycle. Santa found a great deal on a used Huffy at Goodwill (only $5!!!) so we are excited to try and get both boys on bikes finally. Kiddo has had a bike for a couple of years, but he has never really taken to it. Port, on the other hand, has already cruised (assisted) around the house a few times on his and LOVES it! Now we just need to pick up some pads and a helmet for him (Santa forgot that) and he should be set to go.

Kiddo also got a Spiderman Xbox game and has not stepped away from the Xbox ever since. I hate that he is playing so much right now (it is a bit annoying) but I am hoping, as he has in the past, that he will wear himself out from it and we can all get an Xbox break. I am thinking that starting the new year we will be working on a tv/video game diet and so I am letting him get in what he can, when he can.

Even Port enjoys the xbox right now. When Kiddo plays, Port will pick up a controller, pull up a chair beside Kiddo and play right along with him. Of course, his controller isn't doing anything, but he doesn't know that. lol

Both boys got some much needed clothes (as did Hubby and I) and other smaller gifts. Kiddo loves his new Spiderman shaving set and his Leapster, Tag and V-Motion games and has already played with all of them. He kept saying over and over yesterday, "this is the bestest Christmas EVER!" It was super cute.

Kiddo woke us up yesterday morning bright and early, which was kind of a surprise for me because he didn't seem that excited the night before. It was torture for him to wait for Port to wake up. That 30 minutes of looking at all the presents but not being able to touch them just about killed him. Once Port was up we commenced to opening gifts, and the baby boy couldn't have cared less. He was more interested in Kiddo's toys, and honestly at one point Kiddo was more interested in Port's new bristle block set than his own things.

We headed out to the inlaw's property for our Fry family Christmas and we spent the day out there. The boys had fun playing and hanging out - though Kiddo mostly sat glued to the xbox.

Switching gears some here, we had some fun on Christmas eve. It snowed!!! All day, off and on we had flurries. The wind howled all day; it cleared out the massive piles of leaves we had covering our front yard and driveway (which was very nice) and it blew trashcans and flower pots all over the neighborhood. But in the midst of all that it made the air super cold and the rain clouds overhead had no choice but to drop little flakes all over. Nothing stuck, but it sure was cool driving out to the property with snow gusting all around. Port kept looking out the window and yelling "oooooo! preee!" (Port-speak for "ooh, pretty!"). He really loved it. It got super cold that night and we had a pretty good freeze. I haven't had a chance to look yet, but it may have wiped out what little is left of my garden.

Did I tell you my garden was destroyed a few weeks ago the last time it froze? Yeah. Sadness.

Today we have a day of rest before my parents come for their visit. We were supposed to go to Conroe for an extended family Christmas, but we decided last minute it was just too much to drive all the way out there and back in one day and then have visitors on Sunday. Plus, the $$ in gas made it even less practical. We will miss seeing the family though.

And speaking of seeing the family, I have some new family photos for you! If you are on my Christmas card list, you have already seen some of these, but I know many of you aren't so I will share them here.
{It appears we are very small people in front of a normal size fireplace.}

{Kiddo chewed through the log...no really. ;-) }

{My gorgeous boy #1}

{And the Cutie Patootie!}

I can't wait to hear all about your holiday! Leave me a comment and let me know how it went. :)

Until,
D :)

Thursday, December 24, 2009

We Wish You a Merry Christmas

I know I haven't been around much lately, but I just wanted to pop in and wish you all a very Merry Christmas!
I will be back soon with lots to share! Hope you have a wonderful holiday season!

Until,
D :)

Sunday, December 13, 2009

The Face of Love

What a fantastic week it has been!

The holidays are in full swing, the Christmas "spirit" is in the air and people are ready to party!

On Friday I hosted the Musing Mommies holiday party at my house, and it was such a great experience! The ladies that came over were so fun! We did a cookie exchange and had lots of goodies to snack on throughout the evening.

I got my house looking pretty darn good; well, at least the parts my guests saw...lol! I did a lot of tossing things into baskets and boxes and moving them into the other rooms and the garage. It may take me a good long while to clean all that out, but in the mean time I am enjoying the clutter free living and office areas.

Saturday was a bit of a blur... I had planned on doing my Christmas shopping during nap time, but we got an unexpected call from my inlaws. They were in town looking at houses and they were sweet enough to stop by and take us to lunch! Unfortunately, the restaurant was slow, slow, slow, and by the time we got out of there we were 3 hours past nap time and the evening was coming fast.

I went shopping anyway, and got some things done, but man, it was a zoo out there. I hate shopping during the holidays. Next year, I am doing it all on line. The holiday madness is not for me.

I got home just in time to put the boys to bed, worked on our own family photos for holiday cards and crashed at a very late hour. Port woke me up at about 4am, and Hubby and I got to listen to him scream for a good 15 minutes after I changed his diaper and put him back in the crib. Thankfully he slept until after 8 so I got to recoup some of that lost sleep.

Church this morning was fantastic. Rick led the music {yes, I am on a first name basis with him. No, no not really. He doesn't know that I exist. ;-) } and I am so looking forward to watching him perform again at the Christmas eve service. It is such a blessing to have him in our church; he is just amazing.

I can't wait until our Christmas Eve service. Anyone want to come with us?

This afternoon I attended a holiday party with a wonderful group of ladies. I had so much fun! There was awesome food, great conversation, a little bit of poker playing (woo hoo! I won some money for Starbucks! ;-)) and, goodness gracious, Karaoke. Good Lord, that was a riot! Hopefully I didn't embarrass myself too much.

And hopefully we can do it again soon... :-D

Ok, back to editing and designing holiday cards. I think we are sending out New Years cards this year! ;-)

Until,
D ;)

ps. A little more holiday music for you! Love me some Jewel!

Wednesday, December 09, 2009

Greensleeves

Hello Everyone!

I know, NaBloPoMo ends and I drop off the planet. Well, it is just a crazy time for me, so blogging has kind of become something that gets forgotten a lot. I'm so sorry. I will get back to it soon enough. Thanks for hanging in there. I can't wait to talk with you again.

Can I just say, the little Port man ate something GREEN the other day! WAH HOO!! I can't believe it.

Wanna know what it was?

Spinach and eggs. Oh yea baby!

1 can spinach, 4 eggs, scramble in a skillet with a little seasoned salt and the kids gobble it up! YES!

Port says, "mmmm, mmmm, mmmm, goooooo (good)!"

Anyway, this is a quickie today, mostly because I wanted to check in and also because I wanted to tell you about a contest over at MyCharmingKids. MckMama is giving away an HP TouchSmart computer! Check it out and enter!

Much love and Holiday goodness to you all!
Until,
D :)

PS. In the spirit of the holidays, here is a little song for you. One of my favorites!

Friday, December 04, 2009

Sign Your Name

OMGosh I haven't been this excited in such a long time!

Last night

I got to meet

PIONEER WOMAN!

eeeeeee!!

Pioneer Woman, Ree Drummond, came to a local bookstore here in Austin for a book signing. Her cookbook, The Pioneer Woman Cooks, went to #1 on the New York Times Best Seller List, and she has been on a whirlwind book tour for the past few months.

I have had the date on my calendar ever since it was announced, but I honestly didn't think I would make it out.

Well I did, and I am so glad! The bookstore started passing out wrist bands at 4pm. I was able to make it there by 4:30, and they were already on the 3rd color group. My guess is there were approximately 100 bands per color group?? The first two groups, red and orange, were invited to a 6pm signing while the rest of us came back at the advertised time of 7pm.

After picking up my wristband, I sat in the parking lot waiting for Kim (my friend and Musing Mommies podcast co-host) and when she got there, we picked up a wrist band for her and then headed out for dinner.

We drove over to another local Austin joint, Shady Grove, and enjoyed a great dinner inside next to a huge fireplace. In all my visits to Shady Grove, I had never actually been inside. It is a really cute little place! Everything was cozy, dark and somewhat romantic, and the fire in the fireplace was absolutely perfect for the chilly evening. The food was great as always; I had a delicious turkey sandwich and salad with jalapeno lime ranch dressing, and Kim had a turkey club and fries.

Kim borrowed her hubby's iPhone so that we could record some snippets of the evening for our show. It was fun to be able to update facebook and twitter while we were there. Maybe someday I will have such awesome technology at my fingertips. It was kind of funny though, while she was a whiz at using all the cool iPhone apps, making a simple phone call on the thing was a bit of a challenge! lol ;)

We returned to the book store just before 7, and pushed our way through the crowd to a spot on the side in the back. It was standing room only on the second floor of the book store. As we were making our way back a group was making their way forward; 4 country kids and an icy blue-eyed cowboy. {wink} I yanked at Kim's arm as they passed, and when she looked at me like I had lost my mind I made the face. You know, the one that says "omg, look it's someone you should be looking at!". It was Marboro Man and the Punks, walking right past us!

At about 20 after 7, Ree finally made her entrance!

{See MM with the camera? I may end up in that picture! ;) }

She was super sweet and funny during the brief Q&A session. I had fun watching her kids, who were off to the side behind a rack of books, playing and sword fighting. It was kind of hard to hear from where we were standing, but for the most part the questions people asked were somewhat thoughtful. PW handled every question with grace.

After the Q&A she disappeared back upstairs, and the store employees began calling wrist band colors. Since I was in the yellow group, and Kim in the next group, green, we had a little wait before getting in line. Lucky for us, Marlboro Man was signing books at the podium area, so we hopped in that line first.

MM was super sweet too; soft spoken not very talkative, just like I imagined. Of course, I couldn't think of anything to say. I mean, how do you talk to someone you know so much about but who doesn't even know you exist? It is quite awkward.

{with Miss Kim...}

I made it into the official line as the last "yellow" person and Kim snuck in behind me just before they called green. It worked out perfectly! You would not believe the people cutting in line though. And amazingly enough, it was the older women in the group doing most of the cutting. I couldn't believe it! It's not like the lines were obnoxiously long or anything...

Once in the official line we only had to wait for maybe an hour or so. It was moving pretty steady so it wasn't bad at all. It seemed like PW's entire family was there; we saw her hubby and kids of course, her mom, and her sister and brother in law. Everyone was just as sweet as they could be, and you could tell they all enjoyed being there and being with each other.

When we finally got into the room my nervousness went into high gear. I know they are just regular people, but man, I really couldn't think of anything to say! I mean, the woman has the Midas touch! She has a ground breaking, blog world changing website, a #1 best selling book, a phenomenal family life, she home schools, runs a ranching household (oh the laundry!), she has successful dinner parties with other blogging super stars, she is interviewed by magazines and day time talk show hosts and she comes all this way...I get to see her in person and I can't come up with anything even remotely interesting to say!

Thankfully, I am a red head. Now.

lol

She said to me, "you know I used to be a red head."

And I should have said "well I used to be a blond!" but it got stuck in my head and I am pretty sure nothing but a grunt came out.

I do remember asking her if she was going to change her hair back to red. Beyond that, the conversation was a blur.

I just couldn't believe she was talking to me!

Thankfully, Kim tossed the iPhone up on the table and I think she recorded the whole conversation!

We also had her sign a book for a "Musing Mommy" - woo hoo! Giveaway time! ;-)

{Me and Ree. I luv her so much! I wanna be just like her when I grow up! ;) }

{Kim and Ree. Super cute!}

We scored a couple of cool PW t-shirts and had a nice little chat with her sister Betsy about the show. Betsy signed our books too, and she was so incredibly sweet about all our questions. We made our way out just before 10pm, and they had just called the last of the wrist band colors.

I don't know how they do it all with the signing for hours - my hands would have been nothing more than shriveled claws after just a couple of hours.

It was a wonderful experience and I hope she comes back in 2011 with her next book, Black Heels to Tractor Wheels. Woo hoo!!

Maybe by then I can think of something interesting to say to her. ;)

Until,
D :)

PS. I had made a few of my mother's coconut balls to take to PW, but the boys didn't let me make very many and I didn't have time to package them up nicely so I ended up not giving them to her. They are so good though, so I want to share the recipe. My mom sent me the original recipe and I think, as with a lot of recipes, something got lost in translation over the years. So, I kind of had to wing it, but here is what I *think* it should be.

Coconut Balls

1 32oz bag powdered sugar
1 14oz bag shredded coconut
1 can sweetened condensed milk (the regular size can - 10 oz??)
1 stick of butter (just for you PW!)
1 qt Pecans chipped small (optional)
dipping chocolate or
melted chocolate chips mixed with a square of paraffin or a tbls (more or less) of crisco

Mix powdered sugar, coconut, condensed milk, melted butter and nuts (if desired) in a LARGE bowl. You may have to get your hands in it to really get it mixed up. You want the mixture to be moist enough to hold it's shape in the balls, but still slightly crumbly. (If it's too dry, add more condensed milk, if it's too wet, add more powdered sugar.)

Form into balls and dip each one in melted dipping chocolate or melted chips/paraffin or crisco mixture. Set on wax paper to harden or place in the refrigerator to set. Before setting, if desired, you can sprinkle some toasted coconut, sprinkles or little silve candy balls on top to gussy them up a bit.

Balls can be stored on wax paper in an air tight container and a cool place.

Enjoy!
~D


PPS. Hey there Company Girls! I didn't forget about you! Have a great weekend!