Grandma Mary and Bumpa's holiday gifts arrived today and the holidays were joyfully extended. One of Bean's gifts was a horse towel for the bath, which was put to good use tonight after a bath with her rubbery duckies!

Bean exclained it's 'cozy'!!!

I never, in a million years, considered I would end up with the horse-crazy daughter (I was never into horses when growing up or even, now). However, I am totally indulgent and encouraging towards Bean on her growing horse and horse-themed collections, most recently ordering her Painted Ponies flannel bedding on sale at Garnet Hill...

 

We are going to our next door neighbor's New Year's Eve party. The convenience of being so close to the fete is quite attractive. Even more attractive, the girls are going to grandma's for the night!

Our neighbor said it's 'fancy dress' so of course I took the opportunity to create a fabulous piece of frippery for my party attire: a top hat fascinator!

It will be worn with a sequined pencil skirt purchased last year, on super sale, from Anthropologie. I used the extra sequins that came with the skirt, to adorn the tulle poofs around the top hat. The skirt colors are orange, gunmetal, green and a yellow-gold on a gray mesh background. I will wear a black sweater and finish with black fishnets, a skinny leopard belt and green pom pom shoes!

 

 

 

Without a melt-down of sorts from Lulu. Eddie and I commented, this has been the pattern with her, for the past four years. It's nearly a Christmas tradition.

Heard from a crying Lulu because of her stinky behavior:

"I don't want coal for Christmas!!!"

One of these years, Lulu, just you wait, one of these years.

On Xmas Eve, Dad translated for Bean since she can't write, yet.

 

A pony for Bean with long hair to brush and style...

A "My Little Pony" coloring and activity book.

 



 



 

A snazzy new winter fedora for dad to keep his noggin warm.

 

 



 

Pretty pony pajamas for the horse-crazy Bean!

 

Lulu got a nifty art travel carrier complete with art supplies. Santa told her he'd heard about her artistic talent. She also got a grown-up necklace and BOTH her Barbie movies. The morning has been spent working on art work while watching her DVD's.

 

Happy Squirrel is one talented gal: StuntBunny donut pops. Yep, she's very talented! They are almost too pretty to eat, but we're going to, anyways, because I'm 100% sure they are delicious, too.

 





Bean needed something to blow her nose with last night. We had run out of tissues so I told her she could use a paper towel, though it wasn't very soft. The paper towels in the kitchen are currently white on the back and a floral print on the front.

Exclaimed Bean, "I don't want to blow on the flowers, the flowers might get dirty!"

I never thought about it that way.

 

 

 

Today I had working lunch at Ping in Portland's Chinatown.

I had the stewed duck leg noodles with mustard greens. Delicious! I also had a Paper Tiger drink, which was made with red potato vinegar and grapefruit drink (non-alcoholic).

I loved it!

 

Lulu made this awesome clay farm for me yesterday in Camp Fire inservice. It's on my desk at work, and I love it!

Going top center clockwise, a windmill, the yellow square is the hay, the blue is the pond, the pink, the pink on the purple, pigs. The red and orange in the lower left corner is the barn, the middle orange and pink is the house, and the green with the stick in the middle? That was originally, Lulu explained, for baby ducks to "gnaw, gnaw, gnaw" on.

"Really?" I asked, rather surprised. "I don't think ducks do that, nor do they have teeth."

She chose to amend her explanation that it was for baby horses to "gnaw, gnaw, gnaw" on.

I suppose they could have been baby vampire ducks, don't you?

Grandma made Lulu's dress, to match Bean's for this holiday season. Bean's dress is Lulu's dress froma few years ago, spiffed up with sequin trim on the ruffles and bows for added glitz on the stage.

 

 

 

 

 

Eddie and I have been in a bit of a shared funk since the terrible news from last Friday. It's especially difficult for us as Lulu is the same age and school class as the youngest victims. That really hits home for us. Fortunately, Lulu is oblivious to the news (we don't watch current television) and that has, I believe, protected her from knowing what has happened in the world and our having to try to explain the horrors in a way she'd understand. She hasn't voluntarily mentioned anything to us, either, so her little friends at Camp Fire in-service must be insulated to a certain degree from the news, as well.

And perhaps, as being in the first grade, their little minds are thankfully not aware of current world events because instead their thoughts swirl about prospective playdates, who has the green color crayon at the table, and it's not fair that someone else gets to be at the front of a line in school.

Lulu told me that one of her Camp Fire teachers had to "…have a conversation…" with her yesterday.

"Oh? What did she have to have a conversation with you, about?" I asked.

Lulu didn't disappoint, and gave me the low-down in Classic Lulu fashion.

"Well, she talked about boring stuff and then I got distracted, but she said if I was good for the rest of this week, on Friday she'd give me a treat."

Unabashed proof of her selective hearing at its finest.

Lulu decided on Saturday night, while Anti-Auntie Hobbs and Uncle Patrice were over at our house for dinner, that she now would like the Barbie "Fairytopia" DVD from Santa this year. She wrote it on her trusty Barbie Fairytopia board for me to see. I directed her to go and tell Ellie, which she quickly did.

"Ellie, I'd like to have the Barbie Fairytopia movie for Christmas this year..." she said quietly by the Christmas tree to Ellie. She then told her to tell Santa of this request on Ellie's next return to the North Pole about her behavior and set Ellie up, under the tree, in front of her board so there would be no mistaking her request before her jaunt back to the North Pole.

However, Santa is already bringing Lulu "Barbie and the Diamond Castle" DVD for Christmas, as that was on her previous holiday list prior to Saturday nights epiphany.

I'm referring to the second part of this funny stand-up routine clip.

The clip isn't long and parents everywhere can relate. Click here to watch!

Bean, has become Queen Pooter in our family, all of a sudden. We refer to her as "stinky bottom" and let me tell you, the shoe definitely fits.

She's still absolutely adorable, stinky bottom, or not!

 

I remember when I was four years old, I had a babysitter who watched me during the day, at her house, named Fran. She lived a few blocks from the school my mom taught at the time, in a mid-century Ranch House.

Fran had taken to calling me "Missy" instead of 'Melissa', a moniker I wasn't keen on. I remember mentioning it to my mom how I didn't like it, and her instructing me to tell Fran, the next time it happened, to please not call me that.

Well, the next memory I have, is Fran doing laundry in the basement, me standing at the top of the stairs looking down at her, her calling me Missy and my asking her to not call me that, but call me Melissa.

I distinctly remember her yelling up at me, and not in a nice way either, I might add, that she'd "...call me what ever she God-damn wanted to!!!"

Yeah, it didn't go over to well, and may have strongly contributed to the fact that even to this day, I strongly dispise that name when people, generally strangers or people I don't know well, think they can refer to me as that. They very quickly learn, it's not a name to be uttered towards me, ever again (a look that can kill, I've been told!).

But I digress...

Yesterday, Lulu and I were at an appointment for her to see a foot specialist. Her ankles roll in quite a bit and she has no arches. I wanted to see if there was something we could start doing for her, now, instead of finding out in her teens that we should have started when she was younger. We were sitting in the waiting area and I was filling out new patient paperwork. The receptionist called out something to the effect of "I need you to fill this out for Lucinda, too.." and Lulu said to me very quietly but seriously, "I don't like it when people call me Lucinda, but its okay if you do, because you're my mom."

"You don't like being called Lucinda?" I asked, curiously. "What do you want to be called?"

"Lulu."

"Oh." I replied. "Okay. What do you say when people call you 'Lucinda'?"

"Please don't call me that," was her answer.

I'm finding the start of her identity, fascinating. Interestingly, the only people who call her by her birth/proper name, tend to be doctors offices and the like. I have to put the full name down on paperwork but I always make a point of putting "Lulu" in parentheses.

We should be fairly safe for the time being, I hope.

Poor Lulu, she looks like she was jumped in a back alley...

 

 

 

And then this one is our favorite, because she looks like she's on some great pain medication (however, she's not, it's just a great but awful picture of her!).

 

 

Last night I went to get Lulu at Camp Fire and she had a bright pink splotch on her left cheek. I wondered if she had a rash or something, but it turned out she was involved in an accident on the playground earlier in the day after lunch. Someone (a boy from another class) was running on the playground and accidently ran into Lulu and her cheek with his head.

OUCH!!!

 

You could tell that the area was swollen and that she was definitely going to get a black eye out of the deal.

But my oldest girl is one-tough-cookie (as she proved when she broke her arm last year) and has an innately high threshold for pain, this incident being no exception.

This morning, Lulu looked worse for wear, but she's still my trooper!

 

 

Of course, Bean wanted her picture taken last night, too, so Eddie obliged. Bean, true to form, hammed it up!