Pattie's Place

Remodeling Nightmares

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This is our current project, my craft room, after ripping up carpet,
stripping off some UGLY old-lady floral wallpaper and painting.

One of my favorite things to do is decorate. I am avoiding working on my current project, as I type this post: a craft room which is taking me over 3 months to do! (Possibly because I’m really SO GOOD at being a procrastinator?) Or maybe my pace slowed down when I went back to work in August. I want to just take my time on this room since it’s my baby. It is going to be hot pink and lime green. I know, teenager right? Well I want it to be bright and cheery. I have used a Pottery Barn rug as my inspiration.  I will be finished with it in the next few weeks (if my daughter will come and help me….she’s a master of organization…I know…how did she get into my family, right?!) when I’m all done with it  I’ll post all about it.

We layed this laminate plank snap down wood flooring from Costco. It is so easy and
looks really great when it’s done. 

But in the meantime, I just close the door and go fix up some other area of the house. We have slowly been remodeling the entire house, starting more than a year ago on the kitchen redo. I cannot tell you what a mess it is to do demolition on a 40 year old house. I had no idea that dust and crud would be literally in every nook and cranny of our home, in our clothes, and our orifices. My nose had snotty dust in it for weeks! It was hard to sleep because psychologically you think you are breathing in insulation or something cancer causing! It is the worst part of remodeling hands down! But  I don’t  have lots of photographic evidence. I would not want to go back there again. It was before my blogging days so I didn’t document the before pics very well. Just a few times I thought something was funny. Just imagine a huge dusty mess….everywhere..and piles of furniture in the center of each room.  It was just so completely awful. My advice?  Move to a new house if you have the choice.

Cute Mr. Moss tiling the floors. He always has a smile on his face…
He worked half a day at his business and then worked for me the
other half most of the summer…I’m a real slave driver it seems….hmmmm…

I think the 2nd worst part of remodeling is having people “drop in” to see your progress. Here I am in the ugliest fat lady shorts and painty t-shirt you can even imagine being caught dead in, all sweaty with clods of snotty soot and drywall bits hanging from my nose, hair and neck. I’m covered in swabs of black paint from my face to my ankles, and I’ve got an electric sander in one hand and my painter’s hat covering my dirty, unwashed hair, and the place looks literally like a bomb has gone off. The stuff that used to live in the kitchen is all piled high in all the surrounding rooms. And my husband invites somebody at the door to come see what we are doing!!! Argh! Are you KIDDING ME? Is it too late to run and hide somewhere?Why don’t you just ask me to pull my pants down for all to see? That’s about how humiliating it is.



Yucky Yucky floors when we ripped up stuff
you don’t wanna go there!


I still wonder what people thought. My poor future daughter-in-law saw the progress as Devin would come home to pick up this or that in preparation for his August wedding in St. Louis. And I would just die of embarrassment that she saw such a mess. We’d be standing there all gritty with a cold piece of pizza in one hand and an icy Coke in the other hand. Or else we were sweaty dogs standing on ladders in the middle of it, ceiling fans and cd player all rockin on high,   paintbrush or hammer in hand. It was like…well….kinda redneck city….real hillbillies.



  We sold an old wood burning stove  on KSL.com for a few hundred bucks. It took 4 heavy
 cowboy dudes from Woodruff, Utah to get it out the door! Fireplace is next…


The 3rd worst thing about remodeling is making all the decisions. As you can see I was deciding between brown and yellow paint on this wall above. The yellow won out. You actually get so sick of choices you need to make that you may start just asking each other to just choose anything. I have heard that from lots of friends of mine who remodeled. The more decisions you can make ahead of time where you are not pressured, and have time to compare prices and styles, the better. Once you are into demolition mode, the decisions almost have to be made already, or you start to get stressed out. Make all the plans first, know what you want, then decide and order.

 I didn’t know you could LOVE appliances like this! LOVE LG frontloaders with STEAM!

Don’t wait and rush out to stores and think it will all be easy. That’s what we did with fixtures and appliances, thinking it would be a breeze. It wasn’t. But we did get lucky buying appliances at Best Buy. We shopped Sears, Home Depot and Lowe’s. Lowe’s was second best in my opinion. They had real good deals too, but Best Buy had better customer service hands down. We kept going back to the same guy for microwave, fridge, stove at Best Buy and our dishwasher at Lowe’s. When it was time to get the washer and dryer we chose Best Buy again and got top of the line LG front loaders in red for half off. They had one little dent on the side that wouldn’t show anyway. Gotta love a bargain.



Here is our ceiling we raised. Yay for us! It was super hard work. John put the pendant lights up
our boys helped us put all the cabinets up  in a day. EZ to do. I painted….and painted…and painted…



When most of the project finally got finished, like lots of do-it-yourselfers, we quit just short of getting completely done. You just somehow lose your will to go on. Your best is kind of good enough. We still haven’t put on the top crown moldings on the cabinets and we have only painted half of the ceiling white. And we have not put the knobs on all the new cabinets and drawers, although they are chosen and paid for.

 But for all intents and purposes, the kitchen is done. Just don’t look up. 🙂 More on our remodeling to come….

Adding on a Walk-in Pantry

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This pantry used to be a solid wall in our laundry room just behind the kitchen. Off of the laundry room (just to the left) there is an office and to the right is a small half bathroom. In the office was a shallow cabinet for office supplies. But we just never used it. It had a bunch of junk stored in it and paper. In the bathroom there was also a cabinet.We stored linens in there. But it wasn’t used to it’s capacity. We always thought a better design for this house would have been to nix the 2 shallow closets in the 2 rooms and instead have a walk in pantry off of the kitchen. So one day John decided to do it himself.



This is the door,  that used
to be the wall,  that was knocked out by a saws-all,
 to make the cool Pantry that John built.



Here’s the office wall redo…it used to be a closet!

The first thing he did was take the doors off the 2 closets in the 2 rooms. Then he took all the shelving down from the closets and knocked out the walls in between the closets. So there was a see through huge hole between the bathroom and the office. Kind of funny to go to the bathroom in there while somebody was working on the computers. Luckily this project only took a couple of weeks in John’s spare time. 😀

He got out his saws-all reciprocating saw, and started by cutting a hole into the laundry room wall to see how much space he’d now have to work with. He went and bought 2 by 4s to make a frame for the doorway, and bought a new small width door and moldings for around the door. Then he put in a light fixture. He used the laundry room switch so both lights go on with one flip of a switch. He used green low voltage lighting so it never gets all hot in there.



And this used to be a wall, no door, no moldings
and now it’s a nice and messy pantry! Some
day I’ll clean it up and reorganize it…






Then he drywalled the huge holes in the walls from removing the doors and closets. Then he mudded them and sanded them smooth and on one side, the bathroom side he put a chair rail and beadboard in white. I finished it off with a vinyl scratch on saying. It turned out cute. We added a piece of granite to the top of the old cabinet I had painted dark brown. We got the granite from Tile Outlet in Draper. The lady there sold us a 2nd that we could use for both of our smaller bathrooms for about $250 bucks. And each bathroom only cost about $100 bucks to install.  So cheap!  Then we bought a new marble vessel sink from Stone Depot in Salt Lake. They also have good deals there on granite. They did our kitchen granite. John added green sea glass backsplash tiles to it. It took us a while to decide on green glass. There were so many pretty options! This project only took us a few weeks too. On the other side, the office side, he added a piece of chair rail and I still haven’t painted it, being the procrastinators that I am.

Brucie, hanging tough during the office remodel…he’s got a rough life…

We added a ceiling fan to the office…

Repainted the crown moldings and walls…

pulled up the carpet and put in laminate wood flooring… here’s
John, working on the computer…The office is always so neat…

I still have a lot to do in the office.  It’s all drywalled in but not painted on the chair rail or below.  What did I tell you about running out of steam? I’ll finish all these loose ends this summer. But the bathroom turned out nice.

I always liked this song…from Aerosmith…



We got a real deal on this marble sink, only $60 bucks!
Then I put up a purchased brown metal beaded mirror



I painted the little box on the toilet I found at a garage sale and made a plant arrangement
(fake plants of course) and the green matted nature pictures (so pretty!)



I got this glass candle fixture for $5.00 at Down Home East
What a deal!  Fake plant below, I kill anything real!


Then John had to look inside this gaping hole and start to design a pantry out of it. First he tiled the floor and continued it onto the laundry room and the small half bath. He had never done a tile floor before but he said it turned out pretty easy. It’s kind of like a puzzle.

We used large 16 inch tiles so it went pretty fast with the purchase of a tile cutter. It was noisy but I think he enjoyed tiling. These 3 projects were the first we completed in the remodel. We started these in the spring of 2009. It was messy and noisy, but they went pretty fast. We were done in about a month, I think.


John tiled the pantry, laundry room and 1/2 bath with this porcelain tile.

 The Laundry room we just repainted and tiled the floor. Then we ordered a new washer and dryer in red. The ½ bath behind the kitchen we painted green and had new tile, new fixtures, lighting and the marble vessel sink and the granite countertop. We also added white beadboard and chair rail. It is so pretty. All the fixtures are those brown oil rubbed bronze finish. I love those so I chose them most often in the remodel.



The beadboard added a lot…and to think that this
used to be a closet! Amazing!




We got the vessel sink in green marble from Stone Depot in SLC, the oil rubbed bronze sink fixture from
Overstock.com for about $120.00. John did the green glass backsplash…. 


While I painted walls and cabinets and ceilings and laundry room and den, basically painted the entire summer long, John was busy doing the he-man work. He drywalled the insides of the pantry and used the old shelving from the 2 demolished closets. We decided on just a U shape of shelves as you walk in with 5 levels. He joined boards together with bisquits. He would come and get me to ask my preference on things, depth of shelving, how many shelves, how low to the ground to start the first shelf, etc. It was fun to see it coming together.



This used to be just a gaping hole between the small closets


The sad part is that it was so nicely organized when we first got it all done. All my fine china was up top, then there were canned goods, then linens, then baskets on the bottom full of oddball things. Then we decided to start the kitchen remodel. So I had to take everything that was in the kitchen cabinets, and squish them into the new pantry while the remodel went on. So it has not completely recovered. I need a day of just redoing the organization cuz it’s kind of a mess in there. But it is wonderful to now have so much more space. Tomorrow I’ll post how we did the laundry room and office. Yay Johnny. You are becoming quite the cool carpenter dude. :O

Sick Day

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Boy getting sick and feeling dreadful for a few days sure makes you appreciate the everyday healthy feeling you have. I rarely get sick since I’m a first grade teacher and you just build up antibodies to all kinds of things that get coughed and sneezed and snotted on you. 😀  I think I actually got this illness from my grown daughter. We went out to lunch 2 weeks ago and she was on antibiotics for a sore throat. I should have skipped the lunch. hmmm. It was fun anyway. We both love Rumbi Caribbean Grill. LINK HERE

So since I had a 3 day weekend, John and I went off to our cabin to read and watch movies and relax and boy was it snowy, rainy and windy. We didn’t even get to take out the 4 wheelers. I made enchiladas and orange rolls and we just holed up by the fireplace with our dog and electric blanket. It was fun for us to just hang together and talk. That’s half the fun for me. John figured out a way to use our cell phones and laptops to get Internet service without costing a dime so we could check email, shop, do face book. But I started feeling crummy on Saturday. I usually only get sick once every other year and it is always strep. I just know the telltale body aches and headache signs as well as sore throat and puffy glands. I debated whether to go back home or stick it out hoping for the best.

Brucie, the spoiled Boston Terrier…Brucifer when he is bad…

I should have gone right back home. I waited until Monday and I could not even swallow. Yucky! So I made an appointment and my doctor of course had quit 2 months ago. What is it about female doctors in Utah. They only last 2 years. My last 2 doctors who were female quit and moved out of state. My OB doctor is a female and last time I called they said she isn’t even taking more patients till after December. That was in September. She is very popular. I guess most women prefer women docs.

So I had to see the on call guy. He is an old man.  I got there 15 minutes early and had to wait a half hour in the waiting room, watching while 2 other people were ushered in walking very slowly like older people do. I wondered what ailed them. I brought my own magazine because I’m afraid of all the germs on the ones in the doctor’s office. Then one interesting article about Michelle Rhee, Chancellor of the D.C. Schools caught my eye in Time magazine and I had to go over and get it anyway. I probably got another disease from that. Oh well.

  I couldn’t believe what I was reading!!! Since Mayor Fenty did not get reelected (because of all the needed changes he and Michelle made to the school system there) she decided to step down so the new mayor could hire his own chancellor. She said she would have been a lightning rod for anybody wanting to play the blame game anyway, and she had done her best to make changes against all the forces and lobbies against her.  Link HERE

I admire her.  And I’m going to join her Students First organization. Link HERE  In fact I did as soon as I got home. She is now working on Governor elect of Florida’s transition team. Hmmmm…. I wonder if he will run for president someday and she will be in a president’s cabinet someday. She does have a masters in public policy from Harvard for heck sake! Anyway, I wish her luck in her endeavors. She is one to watch in education for all you teachers out there.


I like the broom analogy….sweeping out the bad teachers…


 She said in the article the hardest thing was listening to people say that she didn’t wait for a consensus vote or buy in and things like that. She said on important things there may never be a consensus. Even when you show people all the facts, they still won’t see it sometimes, like in closing so many schools that had under enrollment and firing teachers who had missed 78 days, had hit students or worse.  I remember when our district wanted to close several schools and they had these community meetings. My husband and I went to one and we gave our opinion and listened to many others. Most people only look at things by how it effects them personally. And so I believe what she is saying. When you move quickly even when you can show why you do what you do, you still get a mess of backlash. Tough job.

Well, as I sat waiting in Dr. P’s office I could hear him shooting the bull on the telephone. It did not sound like a professional call. Those walls are thin. That is so annoying. And to have to undress down to my jeans is just ridiculous. I seriously considered ignoring the nurse, I was feeling so rotten. Then to have to sit up there on that high table, my back started to hurt, so I just gave up after 15 minutes and went and sat in a comfy chair. Then when he got off the phone he went to the old couple’s room before mine. Just great,  20 more minutes. I looked out the window. It was starting to get dark! I got here at 4:30!  Why oh why couldn’t they just call it in. I know what I have.

Oh! These are to die for….I let them rise an extra 45 minutes…that’s the fluffy secret!

 Anyway he knew what I had too.  He says “Whoa! That’s bad” when he peeks down my throat, so I thought that my prescription was an easy next step. Oh no, this is the slow talker, thorough doctor, I’ve had on call before. I guess I would appreciate it if I had a strange disease..I begged him, “Please doc, I know what I have, it’s strep throat, I only get this and I get it once a year”. Nope. No way.  The old man has no mercy. He makes me go down the hall to the lab (just like last year when I got strep) and get attacked with the long q-tip by a mean old lab worker.  I swear I almost barfed on her, but I did feel like biting off her hand. Why do they have to be so rough? Jeez, what if I had been a kid? I’m thinking…if this is your best bedside manner, I wonder what your worst feels like!   By this time I wanted to cry.

Why are they so afraid to give out antibiotics? I’m not abusing them! I’m not a druggie or a pusher.  When you are feeling at your absolute worst they want you to stand up, run in place and do push ups it seems like! Where is the comfort, care, and compassion when you need it? Why put on a gown just to listen to your heart when you barely can lift your achy arms up?  And why lay on the table, Puleeeeeeaaaase!  Give me a break old man.  So of course it came back positive. I was just glaring at him by this time.  Oh and I had to go sit in his office this time and wait again, because he was on to patient number 3 by now. Give me strength Lord.

I could hear his nurse out there calling in prescriptions for all the old people. That’s nice of her. He did have a nice nurse who made a funny comment on my weight. I didn’t take off my coat but I slid off my shoes and she thought that was funny. I told her I just didn’t care.  She laughed at that.  She is heavier than me.
So after he gave me the gosh darned prescription he said, “If your husband is feeling a sore throat coming on tomorrow just call us and we will call him in a prescription.” What the heck! Why, oh why when you are feeling your utter worst, like you want to die, like pins are sticking into the back of your throat when you have to swallow, do they make you jump through all these hoops and then just give the freakin prescription out to your non-sick husband? Is that fair? I think it should be the opposite. Sick people get a break. Non-sicks should go through all the hassle. Maybe I’ll call it in just so I’ll have a selection of drugs on hand for next year’s bout of strep.  It’s times like these I think women who are married to any kind of doctor are very lucky.  Or hunky Dr. McDreamy from Greys Anatomy would have been a VAST improvement over old, grumpy Dr. P. At least while I’m miserable I could enjoy looking at him.

Dr. McDreamy from Greys Anatomy…he woulda made my day….kinda better….

So as I walked out I asked the nurse if she would call in MY prescription so I could have it ready at Smiths when I went to pick it up. She said sure, which Smiths? The one down the street, just the next shopping center over, same street. She looked blankly at me.  (What, you want an address or something? You’ve gotta be kiddin me! It’s a block away!)  Oh, I get it.  It’s almost 6:00 and you want to go home. ” Never mind” I say.  I had also had it. So as I realize I still have a few more hoops to jump through and I feel that sense of defeated, complete and utter frustration boiling up in me. It reminded me of how you feel when you are having a baby. Nobody really helps you. You are all on your own, begging for people to make it easier for you, but nobody really does, they just explain why you can’t have this or that, when you know it would help you and why you need to do what you are told. Can you tell I don’t really like medical people? I’m not very subtle am I?

On the way out I see a pharmacy sign and nobody is in line. Can I finally catch a break? I don’t care if it costs me extra (they always say it doesn’t but I never believe them) I pay the 10 bucks for my Amoxicillin and I go home to feel miserable for another 24 hours.  Here it is Tuesday afternoon and 5 pills and a 1 substitute plan written out for my class, and 6 Tylenol later and I still feel sore and achy but a little bit better. And I realize all the days I feel great and never really appreciate the wonderful gift of food, eating and drinking, being able to be productive, move around and get things done. I’m sorry, God, for being a flake in the thanks and gratitude department. I get it now.



Not my normal happy self …messy desk, yucky throat…bad hair day….


 I’m so lucky 364 days a year to be a healthy person and to be so able to enjoy my life.  I get it that others suffer serious pain and torment, those who were all parked around the hospital near my doctor’s office.  I appreciate my mean doctor and how he needs thoroughness so he can help me exactly. I guess I wouldn’t want it any other way. Thanks to technology and science too. I was thinking that I’m glad I’m not a little house on the prairie mom because I would seriously have lost it by now, without very nice drugs, to make me feel better.  Thanks to docs and nurses too.  You guys rock, when you’re not makin me wait on a cold table in my underwear.

Martin Luther King Day

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One of our great American heros who has his own national holiday on Monday  is Martin Luther King, Jr. Every year I read the kids in my classroom a non-fiction big book . It  has pictures depicting the civil rights movement in black and white photos, taken during the time of  King’s peaceful protest era.



It is always amazing to me that the kids are shocked by the unfairness they see in actual primary source photos of the time. When I show them the pictures of “colored bathroom only” signs in the book, or the “blacks sit to the back of the bus” signs, and I ask them, “Do you guys think this is fair?” they always will unitedly chorus in the negative.



Rosa Parks being arrested and fingerprinted for
not giving up her seat on the bus to a white man

 The book has pictures of the police using firehoses or dogs on people they think are “out of order” and women shouting at black kids entering the first southern desegregated schools. Nobody in my first grade class thinks these things are right. It still amazes me that adults of that time thought they were.

So I think this little bit of history is important to share. To get kids as young as six thinking about ways to protest things they don’t like, in a peaceful, yet effective way is a good thing. Especially in this era of lawsuits and bullying, and crazy violence.  For kids to see that there are lots of things in this world, run by adults, that still are not fair is important, in my opinion. And to show them that one calm, but focused voice, can help create change. And even kids as young as six can see the differences between things right and things wrong.

So we do a portrait of Dr. King and put it on the bulletin board along with writing projects by the students about  what their “dreams” for the world would be.  It’s always funny to see things like: “I dream that there will be no more bad guys”….and stuff like that.  But it’s good to get kids to synthesize what they learn in a new way. So I do it for that reason.  Hey, world peace isn’t just for the Miss America Pageant you know!

These portraits always turn out really resembling Dr. King.  The key is to model each and every step and explain as you go. Some of them turn out a little comical, like a Mr. Potato Head, but others are really artistic and well done. I can always spot my budding artists by January of each new year. Anyway,  Here is how I do it:

Using 11 x 13 white paper I have them draw a brown  oval, potato shape (not that I’m trying for potato heads!) right in the middle of the page, leaving about 3 inches blank at the top and bottom of the page. I do it first on the board on my own paper, then they follow me. It is a totally directed drawing lesson.


We memorize this poem and recite it in pairs at week’s end


Then, right in the middle of the oval we draw a nose. I tell them start with a line and a c on the left side of the nose, then a line and a backwards c on the right side, then in the middle a loopy capital M shape, or 2 pointy mountain shapes together. We talk about balance in art and putting things in a balanced way on the page, like a nose in the middle of a face. My husband said I should put the eyes in the middle of the face. He took more drawing classes than I. I’ll have to try that next year.

Then I talk about perspective and how the eyes should be halfway between the nose and the forehead and the mouth should be halfway between the nose and the chin. We do the mouth next. We are still working with a brown crayon.  It is really in the shape of kissing lips. I tell them do 2 hills for the top of the mouth, and a very flat and wide U shape for the bottom of the mouth. Then fill it in with a line across the midde.  We lightly color that in with brown and add a little pink.

On either side of the head and horizontal with the nose draw 2, small ears, small capital C shape on the left, backwards C shape on the right. Inside each ear, draw kind of a question mark on either side. (backwards on the left ear)

Next halfway between the nose and forehead but about an inch lower towards the nose we do 2 eyes. We switch crayon colors to black.  The eyes look round so do a top lid with a wide half circle. Then fill in a black circle under the wide half circle top lid and color it in stopping with a little tiny white circle in the middle. It will look like a pupil when we are done. Then do bushy black “caterpillar” looking eyebrows above each eye and a thinner, and straight, bushy black mustache above the mouth. Some of them forgot the mustache but I didn’t catch it.

Then starting from the top left ear, we are drawing in the hair in small squiggly circles in a spiral around and around the outside edges of the head, stopping at the right ear. The squiggles should be only about 1/2 inch tall or thick. It will look like a very tight, short afro when you are done.

Next we will do his clothes. We will start with his white shirt and red tie. Still using black we go under his chin and draw a Capital W for the 2 points of a white shirt above the tie. Then under it we do a long V for the top of a knotted silk tie. Then draw a long, leaf shape for the bottom of the tie. Then I tell them to choose a red crayon and color it in red, or do red, white and blue stripes or polka dots in the 3 patriotic colors. The best looking is usually plain red. Then we draw the shoulders coming down and 2 lines for the sides of a blue suit jacket and color that in Navy Blue, very presidential! 

When we are about done, I ask the kids to print at the top in Blue or Black crayon or marker: Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. (I have to teach them what Jr. means, they always want to know). Then we draw a little American flag on a pole on one side of him, and a few little fireworks on the other side. I teach them to do the fireworks just starting with an X and then adding a few, longer criss crosses to the x.  I do them in red and blue. Sometimes we will do the fireworks with red and blue glitter glue.

 It ends up looking like this!  Super cute kid’s art. Some years we do speech bubbles on white paper and I post the best 5 or 6 of them around the portraits. Then underneath we add our “Dream for the World”.  It always turns out to be a nice, patriotic bulletin board for late January going into President’s Day in early February.

Happy Birthday Dr. King! And thanks for making our world a better place, and for teaching us how one voice can change the world.

Valentines Decorating

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Ever notice how Bare Naked the house looks after all the Christmas stuff is put away? Well, it has been a whole 2 weeks that the Christmas decorations have been taken down and I’m kind of missing all the glitter and tinsel. And it’s only like a month till my other favorite holiday comes around, Valentines Day! I’m kindof in the mood….and  I want to get a lot of use out of all my stuff….. sooooo…..does it sound like I am rationalizing? Well I am.. just shoot me now.

I really love all of  the cute conversation hearts and red chocolates boxes and cupids that make up the holiday of love.  I’ve got a lot of cute stuff stashed away in my February decoration bins. I guess, it’s kind of early but who cares…I’m gonna get them all out and decorate the place up again. 

I used to always buy my kids a valentine of some sort as they were growing up. Somtimes it was just a baggie full of chocolate kisses. Sometimes it was a little toy or something. But the last few years I’ve mostly spoiled the grandbabies. This year I have some sweets stashed for my adult children from Christmas clearance racks, (but I better stay away from the Almond Roca, that stuff is lethally addicting!) I also had cute stuff I bought for the girls after Valentines last year.  I keep them all year long in a deep closet in my bedroom. There is an assortment of gifts any given time of the year. It’s fun to go and see what I can find when I need a quick gift for a friend.  Sometimes I forget the cute stuff I have stashed there.

I love to change the pictures and decor of my gallery wall to match the holiday. I change the black iron cones to different flowers and greenery as well as adding seasonal doo dads to them like sugared valentine hearts and red berries. And I love getting out my seasonal placemats and runners for my kitchen table.

I like the kitchen to look cheery with a few new hearts and flowers! It helps my attitude when I have to go out into a frozen world every day. I keep this LOVE lamp lighted all month. It’s a fun night light when I wake up in the night with insomnia or just coming home from work. 

I found this cute cookie sheet at Hobby Lobby last week for 30% off with a coupon. I had forgotten my coupon and the lines in there were really long. This nice man behind me offered to look it up on his phone and the lady at the checkout took his phone and copied the code from there and gave me my discount. Wasn’t that just so nice of them? People can be so sweet. I felt sorry for the guy having to wait in that long line with his daughter to buy stuff for a school project. Yuck, I remember those days well. Been there, and DONE THAT! (times 4)

The valentines cookie sheet will be a fun activity for my students at school and for my monthly family dinner at my house with all my kids. My girls will love decorating some sweet sugar cookie designs.  I’ll have to be on the lookout for some really cute valentine candy. At last Sunday night’s dinner everybody was commenting on my cute candy bowls. And I can’t really just leave them empty now can I?  Megan (my 2 year old granddaughter) must have found all the bowls herself and had these little chipmunk cheeks full of candy everytime I looked at her.  Boy I bet I’m in trouble for that!

This time of year our family also likes to make a pilgrimage down to Heber to go to the Crater there at the Homestead Resort. HERE is some info on it. It’s one thing we did very soon after moving here to Utah. We went snowmobiling and then afterward bought tickets to swim in this natural hot spring where a crater top is built over it. It is so fun to go there, get into your bathing suit and run, freezing as fast as you can from the dressing rooms to get into the nice warm water. My son just went last week and took his wife and 6 month old with him. She LOVED it! He said she was cooing. My husband and I went last January. It ‘s a very fun getaway for about $8.00 bucks. But you have to call ahead and make a reservation. Everything is steamy inside and everyone we’ve ever met swimming or doing a scuba dive or a lesson there is always in a jolly good mood. 

So here’s to finding the fun this Frozen January. And heres to hoping it warms up real soon. Recess duty is really no fun when it’s 20 degrees outside! I’m SO GLAD my nice teachers didn’t make me do it today. We stayed inside and played Heads Up 7UP instead.   Cheers!

Penguins on Parade

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My very favorite children’s book is called Tacky the Penguin by Helen Lester. She is a wonderful children’s author. Check her books out HERE The story is all about a comical, odd bird who does not conform and doesn’t fit in. (hmmm…maybe I feel a kinship to this bird, ya think?)  I love books like this because of course, by the end of the story, all those who didn’t really like Tacky, grow to love him when he saves the day. The author has written a slug of similar books starring Tacky, and he cracks me up in every single one. It teaches kids a lesson too: that just because somebody is different doesn’t mean they don’t have a lot to offer. (yeah, all of us oddballs have something to offer!)


My Favorite Children’s Book Author. I want to
be just like her someday….HELEN LESTER


So we start by reading and laughing at Tacky and all his antics in several books. Tacky does odd things because he is an “odd” bird.” (It repeats this phrase throughout the story). We brainstorm other types of penguins like scientist penguins, doctor penguins and football star penguins, and I ask what kinds of things each would like to do?  I take all their crazy ideas and we do a brainstorm on the board. For example, a rock star penguin might like to play guitar on stage and sing in a microphone. A football player penguin might like to tackle other penguins and throw football spirals, or make touchdowns in an icy stadium full of screaming penguin fans. This takes time and energy. But I may have a future Mark Twain or Hemmingway in my group, who knows?


Every day during Penguin Week we read a Weekly Reader, or Scholastic
News, or a Science Spin and add facts to our “Waddle You Know” Penguin Facts Booklets.



Then we use a story frame.  It goes something like this: My penguin’s name is ____. He lives in a place called ____. He loves to _____.  One day something awful happened…..Pretty basic. we write every day.  It’s just like soccer….it just takes daily practice to get good.

 I always ask them to add 2 describing words to their stories after they are done. Word choice is an important feature. We like $100 words like “fantastic” and “awesome” and “humungus” a lot better than $1 words like “good” and “nice”And our word wall is papered with $100 words the kids have come up with. So you don’t have to reinvent the wheel every writing.

We did the story frame and story illustrations over 2 days. I gave them a little sheet of black and white penguins to cut out similar to those above, and I always leave space at the top of paper for illustrating. So 1st two days were “sloppy copies” and illustrating the story.(So I’ve had time to edit them all after school!) 3rd day we started the tear art penguins and we write our final copies. This keeps the kids engaged with variety. We kept reading penguin stories, non fiction penguin books, and poems and songs along the way.


Yankee Doodle Tune to this goofy song… We love
to sing in my classroom…people should SING MORE!


For the penguins we tore little, 1 cm strips of white paper into a pile of “snowflakes bits”. Then we used a  9 x 9 inch square of dark blue construction paper and glued the little snowflake bits on the bottom of the page forming a small “hill” for penguins to stand on (or snowboard on….LOL ).

We then drew a black “potato” shape on black construction paper and tore around it. This was the body. Glue that on the hill. Then we tore a black round head and tore 2 “finger shaped” flippers. I punched out white holes from a hole puncher and went around each desk and dropped 2 holes for eyes. They glued those on their heads and used a sharpie fine point marker to make tiny black dots on the eyes. Then they tore 2 small, orange feet and  cut out a yellow triangle beak.



I use this bulletin board to see where everybody is in the Writing
Process…each student has his own car with velcro and they
move them as they move through the process.

 

The little cars and the road are just from border packs I bought at Lakeshore Learning.


Lastly we tore white oval tummies shaped like smaller potatoes and glued them on.  Most kids wanted to add some “snowflakes” coming down…with the leftover white bits, and some hats and scarves with leftover scraps.  And then of course some added guitars, snowboards, microphones….gotta love it!  Here are our finished characters!  Notice some of the kids wrote “Head” and “K2” on their snowboards? I had to chuckle at that. We obviously have some little skiers and snowboarders  here in good old UTAH! Swish…:()



Fun song we sing to the tune of I’m a Little Teapot
Here’s Katy the Singer Penguin on stage…the audience looks kinda upside down!?


The stories they came up with are hysterical. My favorite is Katie the Singer Penguin! (I’m thinking she likes Katie Perry’s California Girls?) This is why we become teachers. Art imitating Life.  Oh yeah!





Paper Bag puppets we do on white lunch bags from Costco
We add this cute poem on the back and SING!



 Here’s our cute finished bulletin board. penguins on parade! Too bad I don’t love the cold like I love January projects….yeah…the snow is getting to me kinda…..Bring me my arctic parka P-P-P-P-L-E-A-S-E!

January Snowflake Snowmen

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I love the crafts of January. In my classroom there is not enough January time to cover all the cute crafts I have in my filing cabinets. My favorites are Snowmen, of course. They have been done a gazillion different ways over the years. Last year we did this same craft only using white painted circles on light blue butcher paper. This year we tried something new, and I think they turned out really cute!

First we started with 3 different kinds of circles. I found this cute snowman head. It is a 5 inch circle.
The middle white construction paper circle is 6 inches and the bottom circle is 7 inches. Cut out circles for the students (little kids can’t do a circle real good). Then I showed  them how to fold them 3 times. First, in half, then fold in quarters, then fold into 8ths. Then I showed them how to  cut out triangles on each side of their “cone” to make snowflakes. I told them they can cut out half circles too but NOT to cut anything out of the rounded edge on top. You want to keep the circle shape  of your snowman.

Get a large piece of dark or light blue construction paper and glue all 3 circles down in a row. (Be sure to leave room at the top for the hat.  Add a black or colorful square for a hat (3 1/2 inch square) and top that with a brim at the bottom of the square 1 inch x 5 inches in the same color. Some kids added a pattern to their hat using 1/2 inch squares.

Add a scarf to your snowman using a pattern of 1/2 inch squares. And also add arms. Some years I’ve used popsicle sticks on either side. They are cute and add dimension and texture. I think I’d do that again next year. This year I tried using brown construction paper 1/2 inch by 3 inch arms, then added 1 x 1/2 inch “fingers” on either side of the arm. Cute!

Buttons down the front are from leftover 1/2 inch squares. Kids went crazy here. I encouraged a 3 pattern design for hat, scarf and buttons, but not everyone complied…hey it’s art…DO YOUR OWN THING!

Lastly, we used some paint stamps or foam stampers I got from Oriental Trading. If you want to check it out, go HERE They used white, washable poster paint in paper plates to stamp with and I just layed a little sheet of wet paper towel in each to kind of soak up the paint. Then they chose 3 different snowflakes to “paint” onto their picture. The ones we used I got on clearance last year and I don’t see them now, but I would use foam peel and stick stickers shaped like snowflakes too. That would add dimension.

Sing this cute song to Itsy Bitsy Spider!

They turned out great. I’d have added some fine, white glitter to the painted snowflakes when they were wet if I had some at school. Next year I’ll remember to add that to the snowflakes! After we were done, we sang a few songs and read some poems. This one above  is to the tune of Itsy Bitsy Spider

Then of course we had to do Snowman stories! To get a great link for a story frame from Lakeshore Learning  for my teacher friends Go HERE. Then click on Snowman Writing Frame.  It’s got a cute lesson plan too. We named our snowmen, talked about where they lived and what they liked to do for fun. We wrote “sloppy copies”, edited them, then rewrote them on nice, snowman paper.

I like to give kids more help than just the word wall when we write so I have a monthly word bank. Here’s the one for January. And guess what? It’s a snowman! Go figure. It’s 18 degrees outside most days! EEK!

 Adorable! Here is my cute bulletin board.  Makes you want to pour a cup of hot cocoa, pull up an recliner chair, and “read the papers” NOW DOESN’T IT JUST?

Best Date Night Ever!

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I just got back from one of my favorite kinds of dates with my husband, Mr. Moss: dinner and the bookstore. I’ve been a read-a-holic since I was about 7 years old. I was a shy kid in elementary school, I took after my dad. I was not good at sports, I didn’t take dance for long, I wasn’t a particularly good artist.  And I wasn’t very social in my neighborhood. But I loved going to the library down in Redondo Beach right near the Redondo Beach Pier and Fisherman’s Wharf. It was right across from the beach on this big, green, plot of land; kind of a dog-walking park with sea-salt air and great views. My dad had lots of health problems with his circulation and arteries, so his doctor told him to walk every night. As a 5 and 6 year old kid, I was his side-kick.  I was the baby of the family until my sister Debbie took my slot when I turned 6. And then my mom was always busy with her. So my dad and I were pretty inseparable. I loved going everywhere with my dad, riding on his shoulders. He really was my hero. He’d let me yak away in the car to my heart’s content. I don’t know how he did that. I would have driven ME crazy! I know he was a quiet man, but he must have been really patient too.



My handsome dad                                         

I knew the hardware store man and the donut shop old lady by name, I went there so often with my dad. He was constructing a family room addition to our house, and doing all the work in his spare time. He was a machinist by occupation but he loved building things too. He built and layed all the brick for my parent’s beautiful  floor to ceiling fireplace. (very 60s mid-century modern). I distinctly remember putting each and every off-white brick into this tin bucket of water, watching it bubble while it soaked, and waiting till my dad was ready to place it on one of the many tiers of that brick wall. Then when he was ready he’d grab it out of the bucket, give me a little nod,  and I would go over and pick up another heavy brick and we’d repeat the process. We listened to the Dodgers games on the radio. (Sandy Kofax was all the rage at the time, pitching no hitters) I would watch dad,  mesmerized as this huge, beautiful,  white-brick wall and marble hearth of our home came to life.

He and I took long walks around parks, high school tracks, and the 3 surrounding cities’ libraries.  I had a library card to all of them.  Every 2 weeks we’d visit a different library to check out books while he’d leisurely trek the walking path, getting in his 2 miles. My very favorite was the Redondo Beach Library.

The musty, old book smell as you walked downstairs to the children’s section, I can still recall. The whole back wall of that library was window, and you could look across the street and watch the waves on the beach crash as you sat in a window seat or at a little kiddie desk and peruse the pile of books to make the selections for the week. I loved all the Nancy Drew series, the 3 Investigators, all the Hardy Boys mysteries. If it was about kids who were into detective work, I devoured every book.  Beverly Cleary books were in my arsenal too as well as non-fiction books about animals and how-to books on crafts or experiments. I think those visits gave birth to my love of science in the books either from the Bookmobile that came around to my private school, or else those nights at the Redondo Beach Library. I would bring home a huge stack every few weeks, and then anxiously waiting for the school day to end, so I could go lay on my chenille pink-and-white ballerina bedspread, in fantasy heaven, reading all my favorite authors. 

Now, as an adult, I’m a teacher, and I get to read some of my favorite books to my students for a living. How lucky is that!  We are just starting one I remember a 4th grade teacher of mine reading to us: Mr. Popper’s Penguins. I loved that book and I still get all choked up and teary as he says goodbye at the end to his beloved pets; the penguins he brought to fame. We are doing a very fun unit on Penguins too because, hey, they are just so darned cute, why the heck not? Black and white art projects are so eye catching for a bulletin board too,

Anyway. I always get my students to do penguina from a pile of torn, white, construction paper. They are doing everything from snowboarding to standing in ballerina tutu and toe shoes. They always turn out so cute. And the first graders’ stories about “Johnny the Weight Lifter Penguin, and Katie Perry the Rock Star Penguin are so hysterical, I wouldn’t want to study any other South Pole animal!

So as I think about dates nights I have spent with my husband, it is no wonder I still go back to a happy place from my childhood, a huge room full of delightful books. After hitting the early hour at Pei Wei for some Teriyaki Chicken (half rice, half noodles, with pea pods added and extra teriyaki sauce) we always go over to Barnes and Noble at the Southtowne Mall. Me, being the cheapskate that I am, don’t always buy a book unless it is for my little first grade peeps. I just grab a dozen to peruse in one of their big, beefy chairs, and read a  few chapters of each. Anything I really like I make my husband (who is over in the next chair perusing computer and business books) look them up on Amazon on his Droid to see if I can get them for less. He actually ordered one for me right on the spot that we found for $28.00 at Barnes and only $2.65 plus shipping on Amazon. It’s one of the latest by Maria Bartaromo, The 10 Laws of Enduring Success. I love her writing style. She is very interesting being in the journalism and money fields since graduating NYU in the 80s, mostly working for CNN when they were new.

I picked up another book from my pile and as I looked over at my husband, he was reading the same book. It was a green and black business book that caught my eye, Crush IT “Don’t bother buying this,” he says, “It’s already on my Nook”  Okay! Good to know.  I guess old married people really think along the same lines. I read through about 5 books, reading a couple chapters of each. One on the secrets of longevity (how people live to be 100 or something like that) and another one my husband dropped in my lap called Skinny Bitch. I know he didn’t mean anything by it because I’m really not very skinny. 🙂 The funny thing was they both were about the same basic 8 chapters: diets consisting of: eat lots of fruits, vegetables, tons of water, beans and grains and disgusting stuff like soy and tofu and why we need to walk a lot. Oh and no sugar. NO SUGAR? Drag. One was definitely more entertaining than the other.

My last book I took off the “New Arrivals” was Rosanne’s new hilariously irreverent rant and I had to stop after a few uncontrollable belly laughs caused raised eyebrows from a few of the other patrons, and so I put it back on the table too. She has always made me laugh but she’s also a little too raw for my taste. And boy she has an opinion on everything and everybody. But I took a phone picture of her recipe for homemade noodles from her Russian Jewish grandma. She says they are the best on earth. And I love homemade chicken noodle soup. So we shall see.

It is kind of embarrasing when the poor sales girl comes over once or twice an hour asking “Are these books yours and  are you  done with them?” I always lie and say, “those aren’t mine”. She smirks and picks them up to put them back on the shelves. Sometimes I do it with just a ton of magazines. It is funny how when I used to order the O and Women’s Day and US News and World Report or the other myriad of weekly or monthly mags we’d get, I never really read them all. I would read 1 or 2 articles and then tire of them. But to go to the bookstore and have literally thousands of magazines to look over, it is something akin to Christmas morning for me.  I absolutely love to spend time there. And they ALWAYS give me my teacher’s discount. Such lovely people there at the Barnes and Noble.

 I usually will find something I like and take it home as a little party favor for the evening.  Then we go get some ice cream to top off the night: A McDonald’s hot fudge sundae or John’s favorite, an apple pie. Sometimes we get a Redbox if it is not too late. It’s fun to get our pillows off our bed and drag a quilt or two and the dog down to the basement and I set it all up on the bigscreen while John pops the popcorn. I grab cokes out of the mini fridge down there and we settle in.  Greatest date night on earth. mmmmhmmmm.

Thanks pops, wherever you are, for my love of reading. And thanks for taking all that time listening to my tiresome babble and walking around and waitin’ while I was the kid in a candy store at the old Redondo Beach, California  Library.  I love you man….

Holidays are over…Was it Everything you Thought it’d be?

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Every year at Christmas I have to relearn a lesson. Don’t get your expectations up high about the holidays, so then you won’t be disappointed if something isn’t “just right”. A retired teacher friend of mine taught that to me a few years ago. She used to be just like me. When she had a celebration she was looking forward to, and everybody was coming, she got excited. Then when it was over, she would feel that sense of “letdown”.  I always think this or that experience is going to be so awesome and wonderful, and it sometimes turns out to be kind of a dud.  Sometimes it is a family gathering. Sometimes it is a gift I’ve given somebody I think they will just freak out over! Sometimes it is something I’ve been given that just doesn’t “float my boat”.

One year I remember buying my husband the first, small, personal computer Apple sold. It was
shaped like a vertical  rectangle prism. It was the first MacIntosh computer. I picked it out with the help of John’s electrical-engineer brother, Steve. He was at BYU working on his masters in the early 80s. They had a special deal on computers for grad students and he let me get in on it with him. To say we were both excited to see John’s face when he opened the gift is a real understatement. I personally thought about nothing else for weeks. You see, my husband has been a computer geek as long as I have known him. He could be the head of the Best Buy Geek Squad. He regularly reads 3 inch thick computer manuals full of some kind of weird  language.

Taking some time off in St. George this summer…

But I did not know what a low key reaction he would have to our gift. He never gets high expectations
about gifts. He appreciates them, but the world does not revolve around them, if you know what I mean. His response when he ripped open the package was……wait for it……”NO REALLY?”   That’s it. That’s all we got.  A calm, quiet question. What a SUPREME LET DOWN!  My brother-in-law and I still chuckle about his reaction. We thought he was going to jump up on a table and break out into song or something!
Nope. He’s a guy who rarely gets ruffled. It is one of his best qualities actually.



Grandpa with his girls…

 A year and a half ago was our 30th wedding anniversary. (Hooray for us!) John wanted to buy me a new diamond ring to celebrate. I’ve always admired solitaires, something that would sit up taller than my wedding ring; and I thought I’d like a silver setting instead of gold. All my friends were getting anniversary rings too.

I looked off and on and shopped for 6 months. I didn’t know what I wanted. (I did not recognize that I really didn’t care that much). They all looked pretty to me. It is funny how when others around you have something new you think to yourself, wow, I think I might like one of those too!  But the funny thing is, I know myself. I’ve never been an expensive jewelry person. I’ve never gotten my nails done every 2 weeks. I don’t love traveling much. I’m just not that type of person. I’d rather spend my time  and my money having fun experiences at home with those I love, not just wearing something expensive or going someplace exotic. 

Family biking on dad’s birthday.

I have a very good friend who is the opposite of me. She has to travel at least 3 times a year if not 5 or 6. She cruises every year, goes to Europe, Southern Utah regularly and is always planning a trip. It is one of those things she told her husband that makes her happy. She also gets new rings and jewelry a lot. She and I love to share our things in common: partying, entertaining, cooking, movies and going out to dinner. We have a lot of fun together.

 But when I had the chance to spend a chunk of change on traveling or buying a timeshare to see the world in, or buying a cabin close to home,  I knew the thing that would give me the most pleasure. I’m kind of a homebody, so I knew the cabin would be well used by our family and it has given us a lot of joy. This is what I decided would mark our 30 years of marriage together. It’s been a super fun place to hang with family.



Our 30th Anniversary Bear Lake cabin summer of 2010

I’ve always told my husband, “don’t buy me expensive stuff, I will probably just lose it”. I don’t care about fancy cars, I just want them to run and be comfortable. I don’t like really expensive restaurants. I just cringe when I look at the plate of food that is costing as much as cart full of groceries and the food just seems to dry up in my mouth; I can’t really enjoy it much.  I think it’s cuz I don’t appreciate expensive stuff. It’s just stuff to me. I never minded buying expensive instruments for my kids who played everything from violins, cellos, french horns and trumpets, AND pianos, to flutes and electric guitars. I felt those things had great value. (plus you could always sell them back for about the same price) 😀  I guess I’m just very practical.

So my spouse has learned, the hard way. I have lost myriads of nice watches next to pools. I’ve lost 3 cell phones he’s given me, leaving them in restaurants or having them stolen while I wasn’t really watching.  I think maybe I just don’t like having “stuff” attached to me, I want things simple, easy.



Devin and Caitlin December in Salt Lake


So why did I think I’d like a new and expensive diamond ring? I don’t know. I think it was, you know, the thing that everybody was doing.  I watch a commercial, I think I need that thing…the truth is I have everything I need. But I found that when I made the final decision and got my ring ordered and picked it up, it did not make me happy. In fact, it was the opposite.

Surprisingly, I was disappointed in that ring. It was a big letdown for me. Kind of like the holidays can be sometimes, after all the buildup and the planning. It was a 1 3/4 carat princess cut with 2 rows of baguettes on each side.  It was everything I thought it would be, and it was nothing for the pleasure it gave me.  I decided to send it back. Luckily I had a good return policy.  I decided that I don’t need diamonds.  I just want a variety of jewelry, everyday stuff. I’m just an everyday kind of gal I guess.



Johnny and me on our Anniversary.

The other day I  found the perfect ring for me.  It is 2 carats of CZ but to me it looks really pretty.  I love how it looks all sparkly under lights. And the best part of all was the price I paid for it….$21.00 at Overstock.com. My husband just laughed and said if it starts to look dull, I could just go order another one. 🙂 I put the money in savings from my expensive diamond solitaire ring. So… If you want to see a picture of my new cheapie ring,  go here. 

My husband (who appreciates quality stuff) just shakes his head at me. But I’m enjoying my cheap CZ sparkler. I think it is funny that it made me happier than a ring thousands of dollars more. I have learned a lesson about my own high expectations. If I mentally don’t put out these high hopes, then my hopes are not dashed….because they usually are out of proportion anyway. And I realize that I’m not one to appreciate really expensive or fine things. If I can get it at a reasonable deal, I appreciate “the deal” or “the hunt for the deal” much more than the actual product itself. That’s just  the way it is for me.



Josie and me at Christmastime.

 And I am a happier camper just appreciating all the great “stuff” I already have around me and the great people in my life. So many others are suffering and I have so much.  I’m going to keep my expectations on the down low and just enjoy the journey instead. 🙂 And if something serendipitous comes my way, that adds to the joy or fun, I’ll embrace it; but I am going to keep my goals and expectations simple and cultivate more gratitude this year.

I asked everyone at the Christmas dinner table, “So what are your New Year’s resolutions?” And my son-in-law said, “None. I don’t believe in them. I’ll make goals throughout the year but not just at New Years.”  What a good idea. Why become disappointed in ourselves when we fail once a year? That’s just
another way to feel a discouraging letdown! I’m going along with Gary instead.  I’ll sprinkle little goals throughout the year in 2011.

Bedtime stories to the grandbabies.

I have a friend whose husband is going to jail this week  for a crime he was unaware he was committing in an internet mail order business. I feel so sad for her family to lose their dad for a year. I have a former colleague who lost her husband 2 days after Christmas. She had just retired from teaching last year! I feel such a sadness for her knowing what she will be going through this year. It makes the “small worries” of life just fall away when the large tests of life loom over friends of mine. So this year I’m not going to sweat the small stuff or get my knickers in a twist. I’m just going to be content…. and enjoy…. and most of all appreciate my life, my freedoms, and my family. These are the greatest things anyway! Have a happy 2011!




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Cleaning up Christmas

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Well Christmas was almost a week ago and it is snowing like a crazy white-out scene here.

Looking out the front door…

Looking out the back deck…

And our backyard terraces…all covered in snow!

 So I am thinking about putting all my 14 bins of Christmas crap away today. But I don’t really want to. I want to go out to lunch and shopping to add more crap to my Christmas bin pile! EEK! I better lock the front door from the inside and keep myself locked up. Too many good sales out there today to tempt me!



part of the nutcracker collection.


I loved the gifts I got from my friends and relatives. I have a friend who bakes a special pie each year for her favorite people. We have been the recipient of one of her special Razzleberry pies for several years. It is an out of this world homegrown berry pie that is so mouth watering you never forget it if you get to taste it. I dream about this pie for months after.



Lots of junk to put away…



One summer Barbara and I went up to North Salt Lake to “thin out” her mom’s raspberry bushes (orchard really)and the weather did not want to cooperate with us. It started to rain really hard. So here we were doing a Martha Stewart digging with shovels and hoes in the garden scene, and I remember getting seriously cold and chilled! But we dug up a tuft of good, wet dirt with each Bear Lake raspberry bush we gathered, and all in one day, we potted them back at our own homes to hopefully grow lush and full by summer.



Monday night dinner w/ family b4 Dev and Cait flew out to St. Louis 



That summer I got tired of all my weeds and a nice boy across the street needed mission money, so 2 problems were solved at the same time. He pulled all the weeds in my rock garden and along the walled pathway leading to my garage…the pathway was filled with those wonderful raspberry bushes and they had little buds on them. He must have thought they were really weird looking, tall and gangly weeds! What a bummer that day was. All that effort down the drain. So Barbara has pity on me and shares her harvest once a year with me. She is a lovely person and a very talented cook and I love her and her family.



Christmas morning brunch w/ everybody



This year I sent her a 1/2 gallon  of apple juice and cinnamon wassail mix in a tiny little carton decorated by a giant Santa tin pail. It was very cute! Another favorite neighbor with little kids I got a selection of gingerbread men already made up and packaged from Smiths. I added white icing mix and a collection of tiny candies for them to decorate with. She is my favorite photographer. All these cute items were inside a cute Santa bucket. I love those and they have them every year at Smiths. And hey, it is easier than wrapping or even tissue bagging! I’m all for easy folks! (actually I’m kind of lazy to be truthful!)

For my kids I got them the obligatory jeans (returnable from Costco if they don’t fit) and a shirt or sweater from Kohls, (also very returnable if they don’t fit) for the boys. For the girls I got Bath & Body stuff,  a cute jacket and scarf and kitchen things like a new spice rack or Christmas servingware. We got Gary a giant popcorn machine he really liked.



Tiff and Gary



We got Jeff some Cabella stuff like an elk caller…He’s gonna get an elk for sure this year with that great caller hehe!

But I think the funest gift I came up with was actually restaurant giftcards to their favorite place. I wrapped up a bottle of Famous Dave’s BBQ sauce with a ribbon and a giftcard for my son that I happened to know LOVES BBQ. It is his favorite place to eat! He also liked his electronic toys. 

Marisa sure liked her fairy outfit from Uncle Dev and Aunt Cait

My daughter has always liked IHOP. So her giftcard was to there.  I know her girls love pancakes too. I think my granddaughters (3 of them) got the brunt of the gifts this year.

Megan got a fairy costume too…the wings were so pretty!
Marisa LOVED opening her presents!

 And I hope my kids weren’t too tired having to open yet another gift for one of their own kids. (one of them is only 6 months so she eats the packages rather than rip them open herself)

Josie’s not really into it yet…wait till next year though…!
I don’t know if Brucie enjoyed Devin dressing him up  like doggie Santa…but we enjoyed laughing at him!
He wouldn’t keep his hat on…that silly dog!

My youngest son got a bunch of BBQ tools to go with his outdoor grill we got him last month for his Birthday. And we got them all some games. They are avid board gamers. I’ll let you know the ones we deem the most fun in a later post.

Megan was always fascinated by all my nativity sets…She loved all those cute wise men… she must think they are a new, cool kind of action figure…:)

more crap to put away….

Well I happen to know my daughter-in-law likes burgers at Red Robin. So the Red Robin giftcard was for Cait and Dev. They are very busy and it’s a good takeout place I’ve heard. He also got silly things that I know he’ll play with like: 3 colored syrups to go with his summer snow cone machine. And a big yellow tool box with tools that we put some vinyl letters “Devin’s Tools”.  It looked like a kindergarten lunch pail. I hope he wasn’t embarrased for all his friends to see! hehe…

What can I say…we are all….KIDS at heart! They will have fun playing with those. When they aren’t watching themselves dance on the TV. Have you seen that Kinnect electronic game? They always look  kinda geeky dancing around on camera to me.  Maybe that is the point, I don’t know…

My favorite gift was a silver punchbowl from my daughter. She knows me so well and knows I love serving pieces of all kind. I love to entertain and cook. And having pretty things gives me a  reason to have a party. It is hammered silver and has a silver pedestal and it matches one of my favorite silver platters.

Merlene….jam making queen and Grandpa Don…nicest guy on the planet!  



OOPS! Weren’t these jellies all for me?  



Relax you guys, I’ll give you your jam next time you come over…Sheesh!

 My mother-in-law brought us a selection of homemade jams. ( I think maybe she mean’t these to be for each of my kids? …oh well…) She is a wonderful 87 year old lady who still gardens, cans and does wonderful jellies and jams. She could run circles around me. She skied circles around me for years, up until she was 74! She probably still can ski better than me….:)

Motorcycle mamas… riding our quads
Playin’ with the dogs…



Candyland and her new BUG board game…Marisa likes games too..
.(I’m taking pics from my recliner perch & the dog is
 between my feet.  He goes where mommy goes 🙂



Heather and Mike I think…hard to tell…
could be Becky and Brandon…

 
After Christmas Day we went down to Bear Lake for a few days. We had such a fun time hanging out at our cabin, riding quads, eating turkey dinner and playing Loaded Questions and Wii.  It was a belly-laugh-fest. Everybody was in such a fun mood, it was too bad the weather turned so fierce and scared everybody back home a day early. But we had fun anyway with my little granddaughters, and several of the extended families who came.

Megan reclining like Grandma…we both know how to relax!

My daughter Tiff and her 2 girls going sledding…
Come on guys! Let’s go have fun in the snow!
Samantha, Pattie, Robin, Becky, Dallas, Brandon, Heather and Michael….John’s taking pictures of us all…

I love having time off to go out in nature and remember all the beautiful things of this earth. It is so serene there. We saw many tracks of animals all around our property but only saw one set of brother and sister, young deer that came right up to our basement, sliding glass door. Then they just got bored and sauntered off down the road in single file. Too funny. They aren’t afraid of any humans, that’s for sure.



Tiff and I and John all got in some good reading time…Tiff’s got her Kindle…Megan’s playing ipad games…



I love you grandma….
Ah darn it! It started snowing again!
Our family Christmas 2010

Have fun packing up all your holiday stuff and don’t forget to “ring” in and enjoy a great new year! (or you could just honk the horn and clash pans together like we do) Cheers!