I give you...the return of the Sarah Palins. Merry Christmas!

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an update (someday I'll be creative again)

I am a horrible blogger who doesn't even deserve the few readers I have who may be still checking in here from time to time. I just haven't been particularly inspired lately I guess. I've also been preoccupied with paint colors, paint decisions, and far too much painting. It's exciting that we're at the point of painting in the basement and I kind of enjoy the actual work, it's the color selection that drives me insane! Why, oh why can't the color look the same on the walls as it does on the little card thingie? I've learned that being brave enough to deviate from shades of tan is not always a good thing. The "toasted sunflower seed" selection I chose for the spare bedroom somehow became more of a "mustardy orange at dawn" after it dried. I keep trying to convince myself (and Jer) that we like it, but I'm sure some repainting is in my near future. Tan is good.

In other news, after a failed eye screening and a letter from the school nurse, Jenna is following in her sister's footsteps and is now sporting a new pair of glasses! Well, she assures me she's wearing them at school anyway. This is her the day she got them. She's also modeling a prototype of the pie she made for the annual 5th grade pie contest at school. She made another one that turned out better for school and we ate the first attempt. :)
Kendall's enjoying having some actual free time now that the play's over. She's been sucked into the Twilight craze and is currently on the third one. I'm also reading Twilight now and something is obviously very wrong with me because I'm finding it rather....boring (GASP!) I realize I'm the only person of the female persuasion who feels this way, so it's obviously a flaw in my brain chemistry or something. Kendall assures me that the books get more exciting and I'm currently at the point where James the bad vampire is after Bella, so things are looking up. Anyway, Kendall is also trudging her way through "Oliver Twist" for her advanced english class & not liking it so much. It seems to be more bearable with a furry friend on her lap.

Thanksgiving was great and it's full speed ahead to Christmas! That reminds me, The Grinch (Jim Carey) is on tonight! When you don't have cable, this is exciting stuff. :)

and 11 year old and a Cratchit

Happy Birthday Jenna!!! Jenna turned 11 yesterday, and since she had an early birthday party with her friends at the cabin last summer, we got to have a family party last night! She had a pretty great day at school - they got to go roller skating for half the day to celebrate the end of the quarter. Grandma & Papa P. came to visit and we all went to Famous Daves for supper (Jenna's choice). Later, Grandma & Papa S. came over and joined us for birthday cake. By the way, the candles revealed 3 boyfriends. :)

Among the gifts was a much longed for Nintendo DS. Yipee!

Today was the opening performance of Kendall's school play "A Christmas Carol". It was AMAZING! Kendall plays Belinda Cratchit and also has a little part as a "creepy ghost child". I have to somehow get a picture of her in the ghost makeup because it's very, very creepy.

Above is Kendall with the other Cratchits and Ebeneezer Scrooge (in black). It takes about 45 minutes to curl her hair like that. I did it yesterday for dress rehearsal and was grateful to hand her over to the capable hair/makeup crew today.

What a lucky girl to be in the company of two such handsome lads. Although something about the middle one makes me a bit uneasy...can't quite put my finger on it.

Kendall should be finishing up the evening performance right now and then the cast is heading to Applebees. FUN!!!

musings of a hunter's wife

Ah yes, deer hunting season is upon us. As I type, there is a poor, probably frozen deer laying in the back of Jer's truck. It's been there since Saturday and to be honest this concerns me a little. How long can it be like that before it spoils or something? But anyway, Since I did not grow up in a hunting family, the whole hunting culture was a bit new to me. My true indoctrination happened one year when Jer took the girls to the farm for a hunting weekend without me. They were maybe 5 and 2 or so. They had a fun weekend with their grandparents and it sounded like everything went just great. Then, I got the photo. Someone had taken a picture of my sweet little babies posing with a dead, gutted deer hanging up to drain or whatever. There was that mangled deer with a little blondie smiling on each side. I was horrified. I just knew my babies had been traumatized and would certainly have permanent emotional damage. I carefully questioned them to gauge the extent of the damage, and was quite surprised that they seemed to have thought the whole thing was pretty cool. Apparently it's not unusual for hunters to pose their children with dead animals.

I delved a little deeper into the hunting culture when we moved from the suburbs to the "rural suburbs". I remember the first fall we lived here, I was laying in bed very early one morning and heard what I thought was a gunshot. My immediate response was a freaked out "Jer! I think I just heard a gunshot!!". He sort of woke up, listened a minute & said "yep, duck hunting starts this weekend". WHAT?? I can hear hunters from my bedroom?! Guess what? Now, four years later, the gunshots don't even phase me. I'm a true country girl.

My next-door-neighbor has this fake deer that looks very real. Every fall he puts the deer in his backyard and shoots arrows at it. Sometimes I'll look outside and see the poor thing standing there with 6 arrows in it's chest. It's a practice deer. Amazing.

Huh, I thought this was going to be a little filler post until I thought of something interesting to say, but I guess it's possible to ramble on about almost anything. :)

election night

As night is falling, the polls are closing and a knot is beginning to form in my stomach, here are a few things that made me happy today:

• It was 70 degrees & sunny. Even now it feels like a balmy spring night outside.
• I filled my tank for $1.94 per gallon.
• I got to vote and wear my "I Voted" sticker all day.
• I got a free coffee at Starbucks because I voted (it was gross & I threw it away..but still fun to get a freebie).
• I had the chance to spend an hour chatting with a gal I don't know very well yet, and learned that she's really nice & fun.

Have fun watching the election unfold everyone! It may be a loooooong night!

Halloween!

This Halloween Jenna chose to dress up as a "Spa Girl"! From a mom's perspective, this is the perfect costume. Easy and free!! I highly recommend it. She and three of her friends planned this together and they all dressed alike. The little gang of spa girls looked SO cute!!

The spa girls made a brief stop at the church party (where I was volunteering) and then headed out for trick-or-treating followed by a sleepover at one of their homes. I was again reminded that I am now the mommy of big kids. Both girls had plans with friends, and since I had no one to take trick-or-treating, I spent the night helping give other kids a fun time at the church event. It was weird. Now, I was happy that Kendall & Jenna had fun things to do, but I did have a small pity party for myself and decided that if Jenna wants to hang out with friends again next year, it's gonna be at our house. :)

pumpkin bumpkins

With Halloween almost upon us, we decided tonight would be a great night for pumpkin carving fun!

Jenna thought it would also be fun to make toasted pumpkin seeds & I agreed, but this meant we had to let the seeds dry overnight and bake them tomorrow. Jer had a hard time waiting....


As is tradition in our family, Jenna created a large, menacing fellow and Kendall made a happy, sweet one. I completed our pumpkin family with a grinning little baby. We showered our new creations with love.....

And turned off the lights for the grand finale!

Muahahahahahaha! Scary huh?

welcome to the neighborhood?

The other day I happened to look out my window when this huge fox came trotting out of the brush by our pond. By the time I ran to get my camera, he was sauntering through my next-door-neighbor's yard and started climbing around on their retaining wall! The pictures are pretty bad because they were taken through a window, I zoomed up really close, and the fox kept moving. I wish they showed how really amazing he was!

While I was really excited to be able to see this guy up close, it was also kinda weird that he was right up by the house like that. I started to wonder if he would eat my dog given the chance. Poor Casey lives under the constant threat of hawks, the mean puggle down the street, and now a giant fox.

But I digress. The fox was awesome and I hope he visits again one day.

this & that

Jeremy went off on his first hunting trip of the season last weekend, so it was just me & the girlies for a couple of days. I decided to seize this opportunity to introduce them to yet another fabulous TV show from their mommy's childhood, Happy Days! The girls (and me of course) LOVED it! Ahh, the memories. I was thinking that I'm so happy my kids like my old favorites & don't think they're old fashioned & lame, but I guess I used to watch "The Dick VanDyke Show", "I Love Lucy", and even the Beav and thought they were pretty cool too. Even though they were in "gasp" black & white. Needless to say, we're pretty excited for our next Netflix delivery of Richie & the gang. Yesterday Kendall told me that she wished she could have lived in the 80's when there were so many great shows to watch, but was quick to point out that 80's hair was not ok.

Thanks to Jenna, our house is fully decorated now with many ghosts, autumn leaves, and even a spider web housing a littlest petshop spider on the mantle. In other Jenna news, she just got her soccer tryout results & she earned a spot on a traveling team for next summer! (I am working on cloning myself so two traveling teams will be manageable). She's also starting basketball next month & has been practicing hard on the driveway. After being solely a soccer family for so long, it'll be fun to have a new sport to watch. Especially one that doesn't require umbrellas & blankets!

Kendall's busy with play practices almost every night, but is having a great time of course. The show is less than a month away now & sounds like it's going to be really good! Dates & times will be forthcoming to all interested parties. :)

This post is a little disjointed, as my brain doesn't seem to be working smoothly this Monday morning, but I wanted to get something out to you my faithful readers. I think I'll get me some more coffee. Have a great day all!

autumn splendor

It was a perfect day on Saturday & we decided to head to Taylors Falls for some hiking, climbing & beautiful fall colors. We thought lunch out sounded fun, but we quickly learned that while we love Taylors Falls, it is sorely lacking in decent restaurants. Our choices were a musty smelling cafe, or this little outdoor burger joint. After waiting an HOUR for our burgers, they tasted eerily similiar to school cafeteria mystery meat on a bun. Actually, Kendall assured us that her school's burgers were much better than these. We choked down what we needed for survival & went on to have a great day in the bluffs. Here are a few pictures. The sky was clear & blue, so I'm not sure why it looks so white? Any photographers out there?

We had to stop at the ice cream shop of course! Kendall had a chocolate/peanut butter concoction & Jenna went for the coconut/chocolate almond something-or-other. YUMMY!