here's how it really went down.

last week, i totally punted on telling you about our week. it involved christmas and millions of pictures and mentally processing everything and lalala. i just didn't want to deal. but here i am: back, and ready to face last week head-on, just like grown-ups do sometimes. look at me go!

first, let's talk about this bacon 'heart' i attempted the morning of christmas eve. it turned out more like a bacon 'lump.'  it still tasted awesome, but i will admit it's the most disappointed i've ever felt regarding a piece of bacon.

then this happened to penelope.  she got this dress as a hand-me-down from a friend a few weeks ago and has basically not taken it off since.  also, she's wearing one monster foot and one mitten and a hat.  yeah, i don't know.

growing up, on christmas eve, my mom would always allow us to open one present before going to bed.  it took me an embarrassing number of years to realize it was always pajamas.  i would get so excited to get to open a gift early, then so disappointed when it was just jammies - every year for years and years.  i have passed this fun/sad tradition down to my own kids, but they were surprisingly stoked to get jammies.  (when i told atticus they could open one present early, he responded, 'no, i don't want to open any presents tonight because then i won't have anything to open in the morning.'  WHAT?! what kind of benjamin button five-year-old am i raising?!)

before donning said jammies, we thought we'd scrub the kids down so their stench wouldn't drive santa away.  (haha, just kidding; we don't do santa.  and luckily for them, you can never stink badly enough that the baby jesus will stop loving you, but wow - it was time for a bath.)

after getting out of the tub, they got to dry off with these adorable bunny towels a dear friend made and sent to them:

THEN! CHRISTMAS MORNING!  it began slowly: i didn't even get the kids up until like 9:00.  they know to just play in their rooms until i come get them in the mornings, and i admit i've been pretty delinquent about it lately.  but you know what?!  i got to start christmas morning at 9:00, which is better than at the buttcrack of daytime like lots of families have to do, so i refuse to feel guilty.  (i do feel a little guilty, truth be told.)

once they got up, they had their cursory christmas 'ring around the rosy with Aunt' binge.  then we finished wrapping some gifts.  then i made some coffee.  then it was 10:30 and the kids starting opening gifts.  it was an amazingly laid back beginning to the ensuing chaos.

finneas got a Bonk Stick, which i found in the target dollar section.  basically, you hit stuff with it and it lights up and there could not possibly be a better gift for finn ever made.  he kept kissing it.

finneas also got a stuffed fox, whom he named neil.  (for those of you playing at home, he now has an alligator wearing a polo and golf pants, whom he named wesley, and a fox wearing a sport coat, whom he named neil.   his friends are quite the sophisticates in both name and dress.)

my mom made the big kids a puppet theater, and finneas did not hesitate to go headless over it.  (yes, yes, he lost his head.)

and to sum up christmas day, here's a photo of everyone crammajammed into our tiny house.  there are few things i love more than to be in my home on holidays, surrounded by people i love.  i love hosting celebrationy stuff and inviting everyone and their mom over.  this year we had a college student join us.  just know: if you're ever vagrant or in need/want of a place to visit on holidays, this lady is your hookup.

and finally, a day or two after christmas, we decorated a gingerbread house (or, as penelope called it, 'a jinglebread house.  a ninjabell house.  a gingerbinge house').  todd said it appears to be the gingerbread equivalent of a mobile home.  it does kind of look like the contractor was a bit drunk...

and that was Christmas Week.

(oh, and ps- thanks to all of you who sent christmas cards and letters!  we love hearing how everyone is doing, and what you've been up to, kind of like a blog on paper.  this year got totally away from us and i didn't get a letter of our own sent out, but don't give up on me! keep me on your mailing list and i'll try to do better next year!)

how to have a crafty christmas and also not murder anyone.

we're having a crafty little christmas this year, mostly because in october todd took his car in for maintenance and it cost us over nine hundred dollars.  (yes, you read that right, and yes, i felt nauseous when i heard the news, too.)  so the budget for the kids' gifts is $10.  total.  combined.

so...ramshackle crafts it is.

one thing i have yet to consistently remember about myself is that, deep down, i usually really hate crafting.  i always forget and i look at pinterest and am like, oh i could do that/sew that/glue gun that!  how hard can it be? and i drop down and get my crafty on grrrl and it starts out actually really great.  i ride this wave of 'i am woman, watch me handstitch' for a while and feel pretty invincible.

but then something goes wrong.  my bobbin runs out of thread.  the tension gets all wonky.  i glue gun my fingers together.  and then i start cussing under my breath, but try to fix the problem and power through.

but then the problem is unfixable and something else goes wrong.  the freaking ruffle isn't ruffling.  the mesh is getting stuck in the sewing machine gears.  the machine stops working altogether shortly after the (last) needle (i have on hand) breaks.  and then, oh honey.  i go ape crap.

no more under-the-breath cussing for me.  i'm calling down curses from heaven on my sewing machine.  i'm threatening to rip the handmade doll (or, the unfinished parts of the handmade doll) limb from limb.  and then i storm out of the room and start to blog instead.

which is why i'm considering printing out a transcript of my blog for each of the kids, putting it in their stockings, and considering them christmas'd.  i think they'll like it.  at the very least, they'll appreciate that their gifts didn't come at the cost of me murdering someone in my craft-rage and spending christmas in prison.

merry handmade christmas, kiddies.

thanksgiving twunny twulv.

there are lots of things you should know about me, like how cats freak me out a little because they stand in their own litter, and how if i could be any kind of professional it would probably be a professional organizer.  or, if i had to be an athlete, i'd want to be a pro wrestler because we all know they don't actually do anything but look all ripped.  another thing you should know about me is that i love hosting holiday get-togethers.  mostly because it gives me an excuse to have a bunch of people that i love around and to use my pretty garage-sale dishes and vintage linens.  also, one other thing you should know about me is that i never iron anything.

 

25-cent real silverware?! don't mind if i do.

 

 

i love decorating for holiday meals.  probably the highlight of my life.

also, we had some mormon missionaries come over for dinner.  just like the pilgrims did at the first thanksgiving. 

once you go bacon you'll never go backon.

if you know me at all, you know that i'm basically obsessed with two things: the duggars and little house on the prairie.  this post is inspired by little house on the prairie because the duggars only eat turkey bacon, which offends my third obsession, which is bacon.  (turkey bacon is not bacon.  don't even try to proselytize me.  you will fail.)

okay.  so, like i said, this post is about bacon and little house on the prairie and not the duggars.

in one of the LHOTP books, ma ingalls wraps a turkey or a rabbit or something in salt pork (read: bacon) and gets all kinds of compliments and receives them graciously because she's ma ingalls.  and i have since been super intrigued by what goes into wrapping some kind of roasted animal in bacon.

fast forward to a few years ago (four, maybe?) when i found this recipe for spice rubbed turkey wrapped in prosciutto.  only, this is america people, so i clearly ditched the hoity-toity italian salt pork for the obvious:  the duggars.  whoops, i mean, bacon.  (see? i think about the duggars 24/7.)

AND, OH LAWDY.  turkey wrapped in bacon....turkey. wrapped. in. bacon.  noodle on that for a second.  just say it out loud and really slowly.  i'll wait.



so needless to say, thanskgiving has never been the same since.

i realize i should have posted this before thanksgiving to give you a chance to try it for yourself this year, but i just didn't want to put myself on the hook for judging you if, for whatever god-forsaken reason, you chose not to try it.  so i'll give you the benefit of the doubt, give you a year to fantasize over next year's turkey, and look forward to hearing my praises sung next november for being the angel that delivered this recipe to your doorstep.  and every year after that when you refuse to deviate from this recipe.

so...seriously.  try it.  love it.  pay me royalties every time you make it.

and so help me, if this is the part of the post where you get ready to comment about how you don't like bacon, just know that to do so will warrant an uppercut directly to your jugular.  just try me.

lots and lots of updates

okay, so i have been really bad at updating. i know. so this might be pretty long; bear with me?

todd's birthday was the 24th, so he used some vacation time and we partied it up in style! which pretty much meant that i cooked catfish, he opened a few presents, and we carved pumpkins. pumpkin carving for his birthday has been our tradition for the last four years - it's kind of nice to have a "thing" we do every year. i like that we're establishing family traditions.

i, in typical fashion, went at my pumpkin with reckless abandon to carve catherine zeta jones. meaning, i carved a face with a hairline and called it good. todd, in typical fashion, went for the elaborate. (the first year he ever carved a pumpkin, he made this really detailed old man with a bunch of wrinkles and even a little tear. overachiever.) unfortunately, the pumpkin must've been a vessel created for ignoble purposes, because it couldn't withstand the scrutiny with which todd was trying to carve it into an ultrasound picture. (i liken it to a bar of soap trying to be the canvas medium for the david.) that being said, a large chunk came off the front and todd had to resign himself to carving a happy giant. or, as i maintain, the michael douglas to my catherine zeta. both look equally like the celebrity they're supposed to impersonate. which is, not at all.

after carving the pumpkins came the main event of the evening: PUMPKIN SEEDS! this is what we wait all year for, i'm not going to lie. they're so good! and every year, i end up eating enough to make me sick of them for the next 11 months until it's pumpkin season again. todd ate so many his teeth started to hurt. (but not break, which is always a good thing. he broke his tooth on ice cream once.)

the next night, todd's parents came to visit. his mom's birthday is the day before his (as is my mom's, coincidentally), so they came down to see him for her/his birthday, and to spend a little time with us before they left for arizona for the winter. saturday night we went to church and then out to red lobster where we stuffed ourselves silly. sunday for lunch we went to hickory park, where we stuffed ourselves silly. i'm not kidding, by the end of sunday todd and i were both sick, and it lasted until tuesday morning or so. we're not used to eating out that much. so while it was super super nice of his parents to take us out for such nice meals while they were here, my tummy is glad to have a break for a while.

last weekend jes and i drove down to mt. pleasant for the baby shower my mom threw me. it was really great. i got to see friends i hadn't seen in years and visit with my parents (though it was a pretty short visit). i'll have to put up pictures soon!

i came back saturday night in time for church and to go to andy's rock band party. i'm so glad todd helped me get dressed up...while i still didn't look "rocker" (i wore a spice girls tshirt.), it was better than what i could've come up with by myself, that's for sure. todd looked great. i even convinced him to put on eyeliner. nice. we partied hard (well, todd partied hard, and i partied enough to make my eyeballs shrivel up) then i fell asleep on the couch. or, to be more rock 'n roll, i passed out on the couch. must've been the rootbeer.

(yep. rocking out with margarine and a spice girls tshirt.)

whew...so that's that. and here we are, 3 1/2 weeks away (or more. or less.) from our little guy's homecoming. i'm so ready. he dropped a few days ago i think, and since then it has been so hard to get around. walking is hard, and is made harder by the feeling that he's just going to fall out, so i walk around like i 've spent too much time in the saddle. i'm feeling really tired, too. but, you know, i feel really blessed to only start feeling "pregnant" during the last month of it all. it could've been much worse. can't complain! however, we'll have to see what i have to say about the whole experience after labor...