How do you spell STYLE?!

Now that Hannah is in first grade, she definitely has a mind of her own in how she likes to dress - the above example is what she wore to school today . . . and yes its four separate pieces and no they don't go together at all but she love it, is proud to be herself, and personally, I hope this attitude of confidence in the way she was created lasts her whole lifetime . . . you go Miss Hannah . . . and as Daddy said this morning on the phone, Uncle Ryan would be proud!!

Turkey . . .

After Thanksgiving, my generous dad (who does all the cooking in my family for the holidays) gave me a HUGE turkey to throw in my freezer to cook "later on" . . . I have been avoiding tackling this enormous beast as I have no idea what to do with it . . . today was the day. I called my wonderful, homemaker neighbor Mandy to come over to laugh at me and I began . . .


And no, Mandy, I don't have a "turkey roasting pan" nor do I feel like running to the store for one . . . I have an idea - I'll just jam the sucker into a baking dish and cook the crude out of it . . .

After Mandy laughed at me some more and advised me on removing the "insides" . . . I was ready to cook . . .

And I peeked . . and it looked like it was cooking!!!! And then I cooked it some more and remembered Mandy said something about "basting it every hour" . . . which I totally forgot to do. . .


And yet, somehow, by the sheer grace of God, when the timer went off, the turkey looked awesome . . . and cooked . . . and "roasted looking" . . . now, if only Mandy stayed long enough to tell me how to cut it?! (and no word yet on how it tastes?!) . . . thanks Mandy for your laughter, friendship and advice and sorry honey for my lack of skills in the Martha Stewart cooking department!

What to say . . .

What do you say to the girl with whom you can go cup for cup with coffee . . . all day . . .

What do you say to the girl who has known you when . . . and what you can be . . .

What do you say to the girl you met in Jr. High . . . but grew into a life long friend . . .

You say, Thanks, my dear sweet friend Sarah for a weekend filled with refreshing, laughing, silly, serious, life changing, none-sense, hard to say goodbye . . . memories . . . .

Coaching

On Monday night, the girls and I went to support Travis and his current sport . . . in case you didn't know, Travis coaches four seasons of sports . . . anyway, this season it's eighth grade boys basketball. The girls were thrilled to cheer on the team and sit right behind the coaches bench . .

After the first twenty minutes, however, I began to question whether it was Travis or I who was doing the most coaching . . . "girls, sit still" . . . "girls, don't lay on the dirty floor" . . . "Haley, please stop climbing on me". . . "Hannah, please stop poking your sister" . . . "girls, please just watch the game" . . . "no, we can't get another drink of water" . . . "not you don't need to go potty - you just went" . . .

Later at home, as I was debriefing the game with Travis and congratulating him on a job well done forming these young men in how to play and live with class, I realized it wasn't such a far off definition for my job as a stay-at-home mom . . . I'm a coach too . . . for back to back seasons . . . for the rest of my life . . . now if only I could find my whistle . . .

Simple Saturday

I decided to make today a "Simple Saturday" and show you a few of my favorite little things. . .

In MOPS last week, we made these cutie patootie journals (a simple composition book covered with pretty scrapbook paper and labeled with wood letters). Our fabulous craft ladies gave us the "Honey I . . ." idea. The concept is having an ongoing love letter or written conversation between you and your spouse . . . and instead of focusing on "honey do . . " it makes you think of things you love about them or are thankful for . . . needless to say, the Marsh couple has started this book and we've already written back and forth three times . . . it's soooo much fun!!

This has become my new favorite night time snack . . . Carr's water crackers with a little slice of brie cheese . . . it's not in the picture because I'm out . . . that's how much I love it!! It's salty, rich, smooth, creamy . . . yummm . . . I better run to the store!!

I love reading blogs . . . hence why I decided to start one . . . I have lots of favorites that I read each day as I have my cup of coffee . . . my top two (and don't be sad if it's not yours?!) are my childhood friend Sarah at www.amongstlovelythings.blogspot.com and my pastor's wife Stacey at www.gfpastorswife.blogspot.com . . . check them out . . .they are both funny, inspirational, and sweet in their own ways . . . keep it up ladies!! (and thanks for the inspiration to start my own blogging adventure!)

I love texting . . . and not like teenagers love texting . . . I don't actually text that much . . . but it's been so nice to keep in better daily contact with my family who live away and daily check ins with my hubby . . .

And yes, I love dish soap . . . especially these nifty Cascade Action Packs . . . we used to buy whatever was on sale in the powder form as we're always trying to save a buck. We quickly found, however, that you get what you pay for . . . our dishes (in a new dishwasher) were coming out dirty - not the point of a dishwasher . . . Travis picked these little guys up one day and we've never gone back . . .they are super convenient . . . super fun for the kids to put in the dishwasher and work amazingly well . . . our dishes come out clean and sparkly!!

And last but not least, my all time favorite little thing in life right now . . . thanks to my sweet in-laws, we got this Ikea gadget for Christmas . . . it's super inexpensive ($2.50ish) and makes your morning coffee taste like a fancy latte . . . you put your coffee in, creamer in, then turn this little guy on inside your cup . . . it froths it all up and tastes delicious . . . even day old coffee is new again!! (I will admit I spilled a little on the counter at first but after much practice over the sink, I'm hooked!!)

Hope you all have a fabulous Simple Saturday . . . I'm off to snuggle the girls on the couch with Travis . . . we're watching old Looney Tunes cartoons with lunch today . . . this is the life!!

Morning Attitude . . .

My dear sweet Haley (4) has started a new tradition of announcing her attitude right from the start . . . two days ago, she said, "Today is going to be a terrible day . . . it's not going to be a great day for me." And wouldn't you know it - her determination was right. She was overly sensitive to everything and had a difficult time transitioning to anything. Yesterday, she woke up by saying, "This day is going to be difficult." Now why a four year old has determined to be so pessimistic right from the start, I'm not sure but wouldn't you know it, it was a difficult day for her . . . TODAY - I decided to change her strategy . . . she woke up and began to announce, with doom and gloom, I'm sure, her morning prediction. I stopped her mid-sentence and said, "Do you think today might be okay?" She put a great amount of thought into this idea and eventually conceded by saying, "Yup . . . I think today just might be okay." Mini celebration - who knows? Tomorrow might just be great!!

News of the New Year

So . . . I had so many big plans of blogging throughout our Christmas season endeavors but quickly learned that you're to busy endeavoring to blog . . . and that's the point . . . so instead of killing myself to fit in a million pictures and stories and update, I've decided to make a list of the last ten days or so . . . more to come I'm sure . . .

My sweet little sister got engaged (cute story!! and she's going to marry a good friend from high school's brother - how sweet!

Rockettes show in Seattle

Christmas morning family fun (Haley said, "Mom - santa made a huge mess! He must have been STARVING when he got to our house!!")

Christmas with the Marsh family including a great time of gift opening, a nice dinner with family and friends, a sleepover, grandpa's french toast, game playing and homemade butternut squash soup!!

A lovely Christmas brunch with some very dear friends and a hilarious "Rock Band" experience

A reunion with some great friends from high school who haven't all been together for 10 years . . . and my favorite is that instead of spending our time laughing and rehashing high school, we transported back to high school with a historical version of "Ultimate Spoons" . . . we love you Michelle . . and so does the Christmas Goat of Joy

Christmas with the Stoebe family including a new version of LCR with quarters (good times), lots of lovely gifts, the infamous bag game, yummy cooking by Papa, as always, and lots of game playing fun

A birthday celebration with my family complete with a Baskin Robbins ice cream cake

A getaway gift from my wonderful hubby to the Semiahmoo resort complete with a Labels shopping trip, lunch at the Colophon, dinner in the waterfront restaurant, morning pastries in Lynden and lots of rest

"Hors d'oeuvre-IOUS Day" with some good friends and family members . . . think food, football and fun - what more do you need in life?

With all that to say - we've had a super fun, restful, jam packed, adventurous, relaxing, exciting, wonderful, memory filled Christmas break. . . we're not quickly anticipating the return to real life and on the other hand, are also craving the return to normal routines. How does that make sense? Anyway, wishing you and yours a wonderful year full of memories too . . . here's to the New Year!!