316...Celebration Time, Come On! (Dec 24)

A farm scene nearby. Man, that horse looks cold!

So this is my 316th post!! Yay!!  Instead of a celebratory 300th post, like I'd hoped, I'm doing a celebratory 316th post!  Why 316? Well, a couple of reasons. There's this 3/16, which is famous in my world. And then there's this 3:16, which is famous throughout the whole world!

I would like to invite all of you to a party, of sorts. :o) Of weak sorts, as a matter of fact! :o)  To thank all of you for coming and visiting my little cow spot here, I would like to give a little something to one of you. Little. :o)  To one lucky commenter, I will give a $20 Starbucks gift card! Yay!! That's 3 grande mocha lattes and a cranberry oat bar around my house! :o)

Here's how you get lucky: In honor of Grandma R's birthday yesterday, leave me a comment with a short note about your favorite grandma memory, or an attribute about your grandma that you hope to have, or a recipe that is special because of her, etc. Then on Friday night, January 2nd, I will randomly choose a commenter, and that person will win the gift card. Sound good? Good. Go on, leave a comment, and tell me about your grandma, then.

Grandma (Dec 23)

Well, today was Grandma R's 98th birthday. What a wonderful celebration! People were trickling in and out all day long, there were quite a few flower deliveries, the mailman had a thick stack of birthday and Christmas cards, and the phone didn't sit in the holder for more than a few minutes before it rang again. :o)

She's a wonderful lady. And she was very excited to meet Mookie. And Mookie was kind enough to be mostly awake (for a while) when we first got there. She took a nap after about an hour, and then when she woke up, she was ready to meet (and charm) the next set of visitors. :o) It's fun to be around Dave's family, too. They're a bunch of light-hearted, fun-loving, cool people. Remember when I went to The Price is Right? I went with Dave's cousin, Anne, and her mom and aunt. This was the first time Anne and Judy got to meet Mookie because she was still cookin' when we went on the show. :o)

But this day was about Grandma. Here are 5 things Dave has to say about his grandma: She is (a) smart as a tack, (b) warm as a good hug, (c) sweet as molasses, (d) sneaky as a kitten, and (e) spring as a chicken. :o)  When I asked him about a (short) best memory, he said "I got a million best memories!" And he finally settled on the times when he was a kid that she would take him to Farrell's Ice Cream in Ann Arbor, and made it so much fun that he felt like he was getting away with something. (See? Sneaky as a kitten.) :o) This is probably why Dave has such a deep love for ice cream! :o) When Mookie was born (I've probably told you this), Grandma sent her some money. When I asked Dave what he thought she would like to give to Mookie, he said "Ice Cream," without hesitation. :o) I laughed and told him he needed to come up with something else, and the second thought was a teddy bear, because Grandma love love loves teddy bears. So we settled on the big, pink bear you see in Mookie's monthly letter photos.

Grandma R is wise, loving, generous, kind, smart, funny, considerate, and so many more that I don't want to say "and fun" because that would imply that there was actually an end to her attributes, and there simply is not.

There is something about grandmas that make us long for the past, but look toward the future at the same time. We wonder if we could have lived through the Great Depression. If we could have birthed our babies without all the modern conveniences (in our homes, no less). If we would have welcomed the "microwave era." And then we wonder if we'll be like them when we grow up. Will our grandkids idolize us as much? Will we be as gracious (and grace-full) as they are? Will we have hobbies that we long to teach our grand-daughters? Will our grandkids clamor to the kitchen to "help" us make that special holiday recipe? There is just something about grandmas, isn't there?

Well, enough philosophical waxing...

Today I took about 10 pictures of the four generations: Dave, his dad, his grandma, and Mookie. Needless to say, two turned out. It's kinda funny to look at the outtakes, though. :o) Baby looking this way, Grandma looking that way, Dad blinking, Dave yawning...etc. :o)  Anyways, here are the two that made the final cut for the scrapbook.

yawning baby

everyone actually looking at the camera! :o)

And, in honor of the frigidity, here's a picture of Mookie in her snow bunting. I give you Baby Nanook:

Ain't she cute?

(If I get a better EskimoBaby photo, I'll post it, k? Because you haven't had nearly enough of that yet!) :o)

Happy Christmas Eve!

Berries (Dec 22)

Here's a photo of the view out our window at the moment. A few green leaves, and some lovely red berries.

I suppose if I was really brave (and really dedicated to this photo project), I could have gone outside to take the picture. Instead, I took it through the glass. Where I was warm. :o)  It's pretty cold here in northern Mich, folks. Pretty cold.

Tomorrow is Grandma R's ninety-EIGHTH birthday. 98. So we'll be spending some time with her, of course. And I hope to get a few nice photos of Mookie with her sweet Great-grandma. Seriously, that lady is an incredible example of what/how/who I want to be when I grow up. She's awesome. I'll tell you more about her tomorrow night, I hope.

(btw...the in-laws have dial-up, so posts will be few, and photos will be small...sorry!)

Marriott (Dec 21)

We're in Michigan (Petoskey, to be exact). FINALLY. (sigh)  Two days of travelling sucks rotten pond scum. Frankly.

BUT, we're here, and the game of Pass-the-Baby has begun. :o)

We did stay in a hotel in Detroit Sunday morning. (Which is to imply that we didn't get in Saturday night as we were scheduled) (And slept in the bed from about 4:30 - 10:15 a.m.) (Mine eyes, they are aburnin'.)

Even though we were not in it long enough, it was a very comfortable room. And there was a big window that allowed lots of lovely sunshine to come in. Here's my capture of the sunshine and the baby and the room:

Hope you're doing well and enjoying these last few days before Christmas.

Sunbathing (Dec 21)

After 3 days of "dim and grismal," the sun came out on Thursday, and my kitty ran right over and worshiped it. She sure loves to sunbathe. It's a nice treat to have a sunny (though, very chilly) day in December. I could get used to this!

Reasons (Dec 20)

Another thing about Thursday (the day of the very cute Santa pictures) is that it was Dave's birthday!  It was a pretty busy day, and some little girly decided to act like a big girl and not sleep AT ALL during the day (ahem), so she decided 4 pm was a perfect time to sleep for 4 hours. What that means is that she and I didn't get to take her papa out to dinner as planned.  So instead, we had sushi at home. :o) Dave loves sushi, and it was just kinda fun, and low-key. Which is nice.

But while he was eating his surimi? sushimi? surinami? raw fish, he opened his birthday cards.  Here's the front of the one Mookie made for her papa. (It was all her idea, by the way)

Santa (Dec 19)

I took a bunch of really fun pictures yesterday, and just can't decide which one to post! It helps when you've got such a cute face and silly personality to photograph, right?

Seriously. Can't decide. If I (a) had more time, (b) wasn't incredibly tired, (c) wasn't kinda stressed with general holiday stressiness, and (d)...um...I don't really have a (d), but I didn't want to finish with (c), so there you go...If I (all of that), then I'd put up a slideshow of some of the 71 awesome and HILARIOUS photos I took of my sweet Mookie today.

Instead, I will give you one. But, which one? I narrowed it down to 12, and can't get much further. And as much as I know you would love to see all 12 photos...Mom... :o) ... I'm not gonna do it.

A little backstory. Yesterday was a couple of things. One was Dave's work Christmas party. I knew that Santa would be there to hand out presents, and I had to think about what Mookie would want to wear. :o)  I then remembered that my sister-in-law, Terri, had sent Mookie a cute little Santa suit, so I put that on her, and decided that whatever we were doing next was going to have to wait while I took some pictures. Oh. My. Goodness. Also, for those of you that have gotten your Christmas cards already from us, please accept my sincerest apologies for not sending you the much cuter picture. :o)

My girl. I could get lost in those eyes.

Now, you didn't think I could seriously post only ONE, did you? Hah.

I can hear her squeal in this one.

And, because three is a magic number...

Here she is taking a header off the sofa. Cracks me up every time.

(yes, I caught her)

And if you flip that one over, just for fun, she looks like Garden Gnome Santa! :o)

Bonbons (Dec 18)

I decided to make my mostest favoritest Christmas-time cookies and give to some of Dave's colleagues at work...the White Chocolate Cranberry Oatmeal makes-me-squeal-with Delight.

Mmmmmmhhhhmmmmmm.

I made a double batch, because, well, I knew I'd be eating half of them! I know I'm not alone in this. You do it, too...

When it came to the presentation, I thought of the cello goodie bags (from the dolla-bins at Target), and snipped the sealed end off to make a little tube. I put three cookies in each (oh, how I wanted to only put two in so I could eat the third...), and tied each end with a curling ribbon.

I love how they look like gigantic bonbons. :o)

Shades (Dec 17)

As Timbuk 3 would say,

The future's so bright, I gotta wear shades...

Mookie was fascinated by Dave's glasses, so he put them on her. Doesn't she look cool? :o)

Desktop (Dec 16)

The Shabby Princess makes digital scrapbook desktop templates and posts them on her blog...and lets you download them for FREE!!

I've now decorated my computer screen for Christmas! How cool is THAT?!?!?

I totally dig how the left side is left blank so the icons don't get lost in the fray. And I love the colors. And I love that it's free. And I love the fact that I spent about 2.3 minutes doing this, and now I've emailed it to the grandparents, and they're gonna love me even more! :o)

Now quit staring at Ol' Blue Eyes, and scurry over to The Shabby Princess and make your own!

Bicycle (Dec 15)

Sunday while Dave was driving down Hawthorne in Rancho Palos Verdes, and I saw something really kooky. I made him turn around and come back to it so I could take pictures. While he was doing that, he kept asking what he was turning around for. And I couldn't describe it. I could only say, "Aahrt. Eet ees aahrt." (In my best French accent.) (You can tell that, though, can't ya?)

He thought it was an apartment complex.

Oh, no. It was way more complex than that!

Behold. The Red Bicycle of RPV:

I've never been one to claim to know anything about art, so I'm not going to try to interpret this. I just thought it was cool.

And SO southern California.

Dessert (Dec 14)

Well, it got up to a brisk 58° yesterday. Brrrrrr. So, after dinner, I made us a couple cups of warm-me-up.

Mine was regular hot milk chocolate, and Dave's was his favorite: hot white chocolate.

(Bonus: I got to use the leftover white chocolate from the strawberry incident)

Lady (Dec 13)

At Henry's (aka Wild Oats), they have teeny tiny little apples called Lady Apples. They're expensive, but apparently they're tasty...

Almost (Dec 12)

Almost done...

They're not Joe's, but they are oatmeal cranberry cookies. :o) (they look like scones, though, don't they? Guess that's what I get for using oil instead of butter!)

Mmm...oatmeal cranberry cookies taste like Christmas to me. :o) Love love love.

Blurry (Dec 11)

Last night, as Mookie and I were lying on a blanket on the floor reading a book, she accidentally hit me in the eye with her little hand. Not a big deal, except that in that eye was a gas-permeable contact lens. The rigid kind. Also known as "hard contacts."

And out popped said contact lens. If you've ever worn hard contacts you know that something as innocuous as a big sneeze can knock out a contact...so a good swat from an infant is no match for these little lenses.

I'm pretty blind without my contacts or glasses...and that photo up there, of Gypsy (although really hard to take with an automatic focus camera) is about how blurry things are to me without assistance. :o)

And as you may know, hard contacts are pretty expensive. Like $75-$100 each. So I was not looking forward to making that phone call to the eye doctor tomorrow morning.

I did my most reliable finding-lost-contact tricks, and didn't find it without moving, so I risked it all by getting up (gasp!) and going to get a flashlight. (The glare off the contact makes it much easier to spot.) I swept over the blanket with the flashlight inch by inch. To no avail. Then I decided it was about time to pray. :o) I know I should have led with the big guns, but sometimes I forget. :o) 

My prayer was kinda rambly, and in the end I was pretty okay with the fact that I was just going to be wearing my glasses till after Christmas. All the while, Mookie was lying on a far corner of the blanket just cooing to herself in her usual cute way, and I happened to see a little glint. A little sparkle on the blanket that shouldn't have sparkled.

And there, 4 feet from where I lost it, I found my wee little contact lens.

And now I can see again. Thank you, Lord, because I didn't really want to wear my glasses over the holidays! :o)

Melted (Dec 10)

While the end result is very pretty and festive (and, may I say, tasty), I don't know that I'll be melting any white chocolate chips again any time soon.  There is more to melting chocolate than I thought!

But if you find yourself about to dip strawberries, go, quickly, and find your corn-cob-knobs. They will be your new best friend.

Hello (Dec 9)

So a few miles from my house, there's this corner. And on this corner, there is the "Hello" Liquor and Clothes Outlet.

I find the fact that one can buy socks with their vodka funny.

And it's a clothes outlet, as though the t-shirts are at close-out prices.

And why is "Hello" in quotes?

Questions that keep me up at night... :o)

Kicks (Dec 8)

Itty bitty pink canvas kicks.

Stayed on her feet for about 18 seconds. :o) Guess that's why they call 'em 'kicks', eh?

Spacesuit (Dec 7)

It was nighttime, again (happens every day, I know). I had some time to kill, again. So I busted out the bubbles and the camera, again. :o)

Ever the persistent one, I know.

My favorite one? I saved for last. I just wanted to share these others with you first.

The tree. And the cat. :o)

For a little humor...

Roger Houston. The shuttle Christmas Tree is decorated. We are go for Angel Power-up. EVA complete.

Mookie to Santa. Mookie to Santa. Difficulty steering. Please advise.

(can you see her little spacesuit helmet, or is that only in my imagination?)

And, the money shot:

Stronger (Dec 6)

Every day she's getting stronger. Every day she's getting bigger. Every day she's getting ready.

Now, she didn't get herself up on her knees...she had a little help. But she stayed there and weebled and wobbled a bit before she toppled over.

I know she'll be up on her knees crawling really soon, and that's why I wanted to document for all eternity that on December 5th (when I took this picture), she still needed help from The Mama.