Some People's Bedroom Revisited

Some People are on the ball today: living room is dusted & vacuumed, Vegetable Curry is in the slow-cooker, Ecuadorian Stew is simmering on the stovetop & the garlic, salt, peppercorn & pork loin are getting up to heat for Green-chile Shredded Pork. Taking a moment out before wrangling the dining room, Some People want to share with you an update on the mess Some People created a couple of weeks ago.

The near-debacle was quickly remedied -- in under a week -- Some People want you to know they aren't slackers.

The offending chimney was erased & the exposed walls were patched & skimmed. the missing floor & ceiling were also patched. A pinkish/mocha-creme semi-gloss was applied to the walls & a glossy grey toned white was whisked onto the ceiling. A new chocolate speckled mocha coloured carpet was added to replace a very scary orange & brown shag & loop carpet of dubious age.

The existing, partially stripped woodwork was left as-is because 1) Some People don't want their kids to become stoopid from lead paint exposure, 2) Some People don't want to become stoopid from inhaling stripper fumes by trying to remove paint without ventilation in the dead of winter. Some people will just call the resultant look "old world charm" or, in modern parlance, "shabby chic."

Carpet badness vs. carpet goodness. Note the so-NOT super awesome hallway carpet.

 Skim coat, primer & such... & voila!

One last shot for now showing how Some People used shiny paint to cover up the ceiling-of-many-glaring-errors (someday to receive a tin ceiling)...

Since we know you were wondering... yes, the red light district bulbs have been replaced.

One last note: Some People found a fabulous duvet slipcover & curtains for this room at the Pottery Barn outlet store -- perfect with the carpet & walls. However, now that Some People have been looking at them for 24 hours, Some People think the linens don't work so well together. Some People think we should lose the curtains for something else. So, Some People will let YOU weigh in on the matter once there is daylight enough for photographs.

Hoppy Harrah's Daze

A Merry Belated Season's Greetings to ALL! 

A new camera. This should prove interesting.

Ha. Las Vegas stole our internet but not our moolah. We'll call that a win. Let's just say our past week has been festive & we'll work on getting some of the news to you as time, children & a massive cooking storm allows. Until then, much love to everyone. (& if you called while we were away... We were away. So that's why we didn't answer. It's not you. Oh, & we didn't  actually go to Harrah's, it just sounded Vegas-y.) 

November Leftovers: Wild Cranberry Jelly

In November, we made wild Alaskan cranberry jelly. The cranberries in Alaska are of a different nature, with a distinctly different flavor. We love them. But they aren't for everyone. Here's how to make the jelly:

1. Find a place like this:

2. Find & pick the cranberries. This step will take many, many days.

They grow in small clusters, like this: 

In tangled undergrowth like this:

3. Freeze them (if you like, to increase the flavor), then put them in a pot with a dash of water & some good organic, raw sugar (not that nasty white, ultra-refined stuff).

4. Gently simmer them for a long, long time. They will smell somewhat nasty as they cook. That is just their nature. Trust that they taste better than they smell.

5. Once they are cooked enough to begin breaking up, use specialized, scientific-grade sieves, strain them to remove the tough seeds (larger-gauge sieve)  & hazy skin-sludge (very fine gague sieve) : 

6. Reduce. Reduce. Reduce.

7. Once the natural pectins have kicked in, get that goodness into jars & give it a hot waterbath to seal it up. The end result is magnificent!

8. Serve on English muffins or crumpets for a scrumptious treat!

Wild Alaskan Cranberry Jelly. Pretty as a picture.

November Leftovers: Jump, Jump, JUMP!!!

I'm working on trying to get a post-a-day in for this blog, taking a moment to record the things that passed us by in the madness of November/early December. While we were still in Alaska, Hawthorn was really grooving on his Johnny-Jump-Up. Rowan thought it was pretty groovy too. While we were camping out on the hillside for a week, I managed to take a video of his antics. I think it is hysterical, but I might be biased. What I find particularly amusing is the look he gives his brother when he gets too loud (see at approx. 20 secs.). Could it be foreshadowing a future sibling dynamic?

November Leftovers: The Epic Snow-Fort We Left Behind

Since I am trapped in the living room/dining room complex policing the children so that they don't injure themselves too badly on the chaos, I thought I could do a little bit of a November retrospective over the next couple of days. That month just up & got away from us, but there were some moments worthy of mention. Well, at least to me.

That big pile 'o snow in the picture to the right is a snow plough berm located in the parking lot above our Midtown apartment in Anchorage. Before we moved out & back onto the hillside, Rowan & Daddy did their best to take advantage of its snow-fort potential. It is a huge pile of snow. To appreciate the scale, you have to look at the size of the shovel & entryway. Even then, it doesn't really do it justice.

Here we have Rowan demonstrating the headspace they were able to create in just a couple of days:

The boys were disappointed to leave all this potential behind, but I will tell you something -- I am pleased as punch to have left it for starry nights. Just look at this: 

The photo on the left gives a false sense of darkness because Daddy used the flash. The photo on the right is sans flash & represents what it really looked like that night. That is the light pollution bouncing all about the overcast snow-globe Anchorage sky. Although there are times when it is convenient, mostly I just find it disappointing because it obscures the Northern Lights. In all the years we have been living in Alaska, I have witnessed them only once, five years ago... at that very same apartment in Midtown.

Well, they had a great time while it lasted & luckily for us, we got a nice bit of snow after we arrived here in Utah. Not enough for a berm & snow-fort of epic proportions, but enough for a cute little snowman. It's really all about recalibrating our standards... a good practice in flexibility. ;)

Some People

Some people cannot stay on task.

Some people made a plan to help restore sanity to their otherwise maddeningly dilapidated house by setting a very clear & attainable goal: give the aesthetically challenged kitchen a mini-facelift for $500 or less.

Approximately forty eight hours after setting this well-considered & suitable goal, some people are sleeping in the living room because their bedroom looks like this:

Sheesh. Some people... what are they thinking?

One never knows just what some people will be getting up to next.

9 Months Old!

Well, we have arrived unscathed, via airmail to Utah. I'll tell you, I was was totally prepared to post baby's 9 month birthday announcement yesterday, except... I took the photos in the evening & if you haven't been here, our house is chock-full of fuzzy-wuzzy, cozy-feeling, mood-lighting. I forgot about that. So, the end result of my photo shoot was images of hazy baby streaking across the room or flash-induced baby-blindness. Thus, I decided to wait until daylight.

This morning, the Changeling decided to weigh in on the new paintings gifted to us by the plein air artists we sponsored in our home during this year's Escalante Canyons Art Festival. Here, he's giving us his 9 Month poker face (read: hiding the solitary incoming upper tooth that makes him look like he should be given a banjo & renamed "JimBob").

Of course, Moma likes the more chaotic, less perfect but mood-filled action shots:

 Reflecting on sunlight one moment, ready to eat the camera the next. 

(Note how well he hides his JimBob tooth in shadows.)

Oh yes, as I mentioned earlier, he has this special relationship with the cats. The dynamic is shifting. He is working on trying to snack on Fat Pants whenever possible & he has gone from patting Miss Pearle to head-butting her. Nonstop. She moves away, he charges forward to butt her again. She moves a few steps. He butts her again. They do this all over the living room. (I have video proof.) It is seriously making me wonder about Miss Pearle's sense of humour.

Head-butt, in the butt. Hey! Let's do that again! (again, again, again!)

Our best wishes to everyone! May your early holiday season be bright & filled with much amusement & love.

Hey! Let'sGo Bowling!

We are drowning in boxes & bins, mid-move. I started this post more than a week ago & feel the need to get it finished & posted. Hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving, or un-Thanksgiving or whatever you do or don't do. :)

There was this television commercial when I was a kid, one of those low-budget local adverts, with a cheesy but aggravatingly catchy tune & lyrics that said nothing more than "Hey! Let's go bowling, let's go bowling... Hey! Let's go bowling, let's go bowling..." I think it was for Salt Lake Bowl & am sure a few of you will remember it.

Well it has been echoing in my mind for days.

It was so snowy & we were all suffering from cabin fever... so much so that we broke down & went to the mall. (*gasp*) & this is how our day went down:

Rowan got his first taste of bowling on Veteran's Day, baby too (sort of). It was a first for me as well: the first time I have ever bowled without using the squat-&-roll-technique. Bending over & hurling a ball with both hands through my legs might have been ok when I was younger (& svelte... & under the illusion that I could do it & look 'cute') but childbirth has rid me of any desire to squat in public. 

But lest I prattle on about it, let's get to the pictures. 

Yeah, I don't like the shoes so much either.

 Stop, Drop & Roll.

Patience... grasshopper.

As luck would have it, we were also able to capture Rowan's first spare on video:

Ball One.

Ball Two, to capture the spare.

And for those of you who keep score:

Afterwards, we had lunch, then hit the arcade -- the kind where you have to buy 25￠tokens. Then, the kids put in copious amounts of effort & cash into earning tickets in order to exchange them for cheap stuff they could just go buy in another part of the mall for less than half the price of all those tokens (+ tickets + effort). Somehow, that crazy backwards exchange rate is just convoluted enough to be appealing to most people. Hmm... it sort of reminds me of some other crazy economics... yes, well, let us not digress. ;) 

We had a delightful snow day & Rowan, triumphant, went home with his first taste of bowling & a $10 Hot Wheels car.

Baby's Brain

Rowan has a fever. What does this mean? It means he wants to sleep all day & I just might get to do a little catch-up here. That is, when I'm not herding baby away from electrical cords & thoroughly delicious bits of paper.

If you were wondering about the nysatgmus that appeared an earlier post, so were we. So was the doctor. In October, we took baby to get an EEG. How much fun is that? Not much, but the EEG technician was super nice & the chair was comfy, so I guess we can at least call it pleasant. Except for all the wires & stuff.

Cell phone photos... always so high quality.

Yesterday, we visited with the Pediatric Neurologist. He is the only Pediatric Neurologist in the state of Alaska -- a very busy man (hence the wait). He is also a very kind, gentle man & we took to him right away. Too bad we won't be seeing him again. Yay! Actually, as much as we liked the doctor, we are happier to leave him to his work -- with someone else -- because he says baby looks great! The EEG was normal, his examination went well & he says just watching him, he thinks this baby is going to be just fine. 

Of course, there was the one caveat that if the nystagmus (or a handful of other symptoms) (re)appears, we will have to follow up again. However, we will deal with that if it happens. For now, it's happy paper trails & cat tails for baby!

8 Months Old!

8 Months.

Tiny baby had to go to the doctor's office again today, this time because he has on heck of a case of gastrointestinal distress. (Read: explosions in the diapers, or rather, right out of the diapers.) We came home with a nifty BIOHAZARD bag. Kinda like trick-or-treat, only not really.

I say "tiny baby" because we were disheartened to learn that he probably lost weight during this sickness & he weighed in at only 14 lbs, 4 ounces. This has him gaining only about one pound over the past two months which is, well, not stellar. They want to see him again for a weigh-in in two weeks. *sigh*

So we'll try to keep it in perspective. Seven and one-half months ago, we were here:

This evening, we are here...

BIOHAZARD bags and all...

Happy Total Halloween Disaster!

Well, Moma is up to her ears in sick kids that decide to be sick (in all the icky ways) one minute & bouncing off the walls the next, but I promised a certain special person I would get this post done tonight, so I'm going to make it brief & picture-filled. 

(This week I will try to do some catch-up posts on recent goings-on. However, Rowan is out of school now, so who knows when I am going to get a break anymore! @_@)

Unfortunately, it snowed like crazy & our outdoor photos are messy while our indoor costume photo shoot suffered for lack of decent light, space, background & motivation. Our temporary apartment has the MOST HIDEOUS curtains you have ever seen. Ever. I promise. So, we threw a sheet over them. Also hideous. Rowan hated the flash & the picture-taking, so he closed his eyes & complained nonstop. Chris was crabby because he didn't eat all day & because I kept messing up his camera settings. The Changeling didn't want to be held, probably because somewhere else in the universe there were plastic bags to be found & eaten. Oh, yeah & the photos make me look fat. Not that I don't still have post-baby pudge to work off, but I swear that camera has a personal vendetta. 

So, pretend I am sharing the out-takes, ok? Just imagine that somewhere I have this amazing stash of truly awesome photos that I am submitting to a family magazine or something.

Our usual Halloween haunt is the Alaska Zoo's "Zoo Boo" & this year was no exception. We arrived late because of the hopeless efforts to take good pictures & the need to drive slower than molasses through the blizzard patches. The upshot was that Rowan scored all sorts of extra booty because everyone at the treat stations was unloading the last of their goodies.

Snow, snow, snow. I say "boo" to that.

"Pumpkin Bowling" (in the snow)

So, this guy took the best photo of the night. Lucky him.

 

Two totally not-so-good family shots with totally not fabulous sheet in background.

Best overall photo of Rowan & his "Buddy" (Dinosaur Train) costume. Nice, huh? Note FAT PANTS in the background, he is being cute because he wants more food because he thinks he is starving to death.

Probably the best overall photo of Daddy except for the blinded & fleeing kid.

Ghetto glamour-shot... NICE sheet!

 Trying to be all "Moma & Baby," forgetting that the hideous sheet is over to the left & the messy cat tree turned storage shelving is behind me. Can it get any better? I think not.

Oh, wait, it CAN! All the boys together, all completely unable to see! NICE socks guys.

Ok, here's something really cool. Just listen to this cat while you forget you saw all those ridiculous pictures...

Now, remember that sound. File it away in your memory under "Very Important." If you ever hear that sound while wandering through the jungle, get the heck out, fast.

Well, so much for brief. I hope you enjoyed the catastrophe we called Halloween & I hope yours was fun & fruitful with way better photos. ;)