wrapped and ready

i've been a bit quiet lately, december seems to do that to a person. 
tons to do. 
cookies to make (and eat), cards to send (kids wouldn't sit on santas lap so a plan b is in the works which make my cards new years cards), sons of anarchy episodes to catch up on (oh, hey jax), and ya know, the gifts, the wrapping and all that other glitter dusted december business.


i thought i would share some of my favorite gifts i wrapped for the littles from last year. so ya know, if you are in the thick of paper and bows, feathers and curling ribbon here are a few ideas for ya. 
you have exactly 17 hours left. 
ready? go!

i hope you all have a fabulous christmas eve and christmas day or whatever it is you celebrate!!

unsuccessfully doin' nothing

so jeffy the turtle and i are officially in hibernation mode.
i came out of hibernation 4 times saturday to go to an 8am soccer game-that's mine in pink in case you didn't recognize the blonde pony.
it's pretty hard for me to successfully pull off this hibernation gig when my demand to do things, make things and be places is so high. it's really messing with my success in the hibernate department. yes, imma little salty here.

then again at 11am. to make these-

uh, apple pie pockets are brilliant by the way. i stumbledupon (love that site) and found these but didn't bookmark or pin it so i had to go offa my memory-which recently got a year older. ouch. happy to announce that they worked and they were really good.

i will add that these are easy breezy UNTIL you get to that lattice top, but ya can't just rebel and skip the lattice, you could be hung in some states.
oh, wait, maybe i'm thinking of practicing witchcraft in the 1600's. they made a movie about, hocus pocus. anyway, don't skip the lattice regardless. but know, just know, the lattice is the hard part. well, that and not eating 6 in a row. i'll try to post these soon and hopefully find the source.

i came out of hibernation again at 2pm for a 2nd soccer game.
i think my fav pastime is watching my girl kill it on the field. she doesn't let up and she is fast, man that girl is like white lightening....ohh, i feel a new nickname coming on!! my littles all have about 6 or 7 nicknames each. they answer to them all without an eye roll or any hesitation. i don't even really use their given names much. huh, just realized that.

sorry this is blurry, lightening is hard to catch!

back out of hibernation again at 7 for a birthday party. you'll be happy to know that i not only curled my hair and put on gloss but i also wore deodorant. it was an event. sometimes i clean up.

i can't say the same for jeffy. he has not put on deodorant (i repeat, not put on deodorant) and he has only moved his neck a little here and there. he kinda has it made.

so basically, my version of hibernation is to not use a brush (until absolutely necessary), stay in your university of washington pajamas (go dawgs), once home again get back into university of washington p.j.'s, don't worry about a lil apple pie filling in your hair (or on your shirt) and remember that deodorant can do wonders for a girl in hibernation/go mode.

i hope y'all have a wonderful thanksgiving, where you eat like crazy, you go into an early hibernation nap mode (hope you have more success at it than i) and skip the deodorant all together. it's your family right? they'll understand....

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life hacks

still slightly hibernating today so i have no "what i wore wednesday" for y'all today.

i did find this link full of gems from geniuses. i always come through friends. remember that.

truthfully, some make you wanna stop and say, "oh come on, what do i live in a hillbilly commune"??
but ya know, what else ya gonna do with a cassette tape holder? i'm sure it couldn't still be holding a cassette because that would mean you were 120....

but prepare yourself for 49 more of these bright ideas.

check it out. waste about 3 minutes of time but i bet more than once you will think, "wow, that's freakin' genius"!!
how geniuses live

off to go clean out my ketchup bottles...

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hibernation mode

having a hard time getting it going this week. 
feeling like i want to hibernate. 
oh, which by the way we found jeffy, our long lost turtle a few days ago. 
we think he is hibernating, or dying. 
he is barely moving, like realllllly sloooooowwwwllly moving. i know, he is a turtle (and maybe not even a he) but i'm talking major slo-mo here.
here he is.

just standing there, wait, would you say standing or sitting? what would be proper turtle talk since i think technically he has arms and feet and can't really do a whole lot else than what you see here. wow, tiring huh? poor turtles.

anyway, about 7 years ago we released jeffy out in "the wild" of the backyard convincing an 8 year old middle little that jeffy wants to roam and live free. we would see jeffy scooting around here and there, in and out of the bushes, eating his food, and drinking his water for quite some time. he seemed happy, he seemed free. turtles have an amazing show of emotion i'll have you know...

we didn't see jeffy for a very long time until one day our neighbor told us that the strangest thing occurred. you see, a turtle was in her back yard and ate her koi's from her koi pond. i may have muttered something about wild turtles and isn't that interesting and i may have inched my way towards the door never leaving a crime scene so quickly in my life.

we figured jeffy moved on, dug his way out, tired of being fenced in. we hadn't seen jeffy in years! he is an explorer that jeffy. or at least that's what you tell an 8 year old that is clearly on to your "let jeffy explore and roam free" bullshit you are sellin'. 
fast forward. 
that kid, ya know, the smart one that called your jig up? he is 15 now and his turtle has come back from his world-wide expeditions (or at least scaled the perimeter of our yard and evidently our neighbors yard as well) and he is home again. 

jeffy is back in the house, in that kids room. he's huge now.
koi fish must have lots of protein. i mean, not that this would be the same turtle, *cough, cough*, i'm sure there's millions of turtles hangin out, thuggin around, breaking out and massacring ponds and such.

i'm not sure what will become of jeffy now. google isn't being specific enough on what i should do here and siri is seriously no help on this one.

there is a moral.
you see, kids figure it out, turtles come back. but do they sit or stand? 
that is the real question here. 
stay tuned for more jeffy stories, unless he is actually dying and not hibernating, then there will just be 1 more.

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p.s. i promise jeffy will be cared for properly. i'm calling a professional so i know what he needs if he is hibernating-which is actually called brumate. see, i'm already learning peta friends. i will take your advice or expertise though. if you have any please email me and let me know.

yea wednesday!

i get to leave for the airport in 2 hours to pick up my bestie

 coming in from seattle so this is my post today.

i'm way too excited to focus on actual words, i'm too busy doing

leprechaun kicks....

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lately....

lately i've been crafting.
not sure what it is about this time of year but it casts a craft spell on me and i'm lost in gallons of glitter, mounds of metallic paints, pounds of plaster....

the biggest little had a day off and she asked me if i wanted to....craft! gasp! gulp! get me the defibrillator!!! um, i mean, yea, okay, sure, i guess if i have nothing else goin on...*puff of smoke and squeal of tires on road as i am halfway to jo-anns, then michael's, then the hardware store*...

she did a few really cute projects
see-

her picture wall and gold glitter mason jar vase (she's definitely mine)

i decided that i was gonna try my hand at plaster of paris. i've been a little intimidated by that stuff.
i have no idea why, it was super easy. i did plaster a spoon to death (on accident of course) but it's a small sacrifice for these awesome candle holders!

my inspiration came from this concrete & brass lamp-my favorite lamp in the WHOLE WIDE WORLD (at the moment) which you can find in my online boutique, but i'm too pansy to start mixing toxic cement in my backyard. baby steps ya know.

here she goes...

making my molds...

breaking open the molds and taping them off.
i am in love with the 64 fl. oz. imprint from the water jug.

is there anything that a lil metallic gold can't beautify! that's not even a question.

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i gotta create

craft 

made in a day 

<

talk about a role reversal

that moment when your son says those magic words...

"mom, i bet i can give you an airplane".....

here's to a week that flies by!
happy veteran's day to all our vet's- don't forget to thank them for their service.

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turning into my mother

first, happy aloha friday!! i am sharing some throwback aloha today. this might be a new aloha friday blog series for me so i hope ya like.

sunday i was sitting out in the man cave with the hawaiian watching the last bit of the seahawks scrambling to take the win from the buccaneers.
side talk:
why do the seahawks insist on me biting my nails? it's rude, and nasty.
no one under the age of 10 months should have their fingers in their mouths. ever.
i would be ever so grateful if you would just finish the season off with those pretty, stress-free wins. my nails would thank you and i might even donate a facebook, "today i'm thankful for" status on it.

anyway, i'm all curled up in the man cave (i push my way in regardless about what that "no girls" sign says-i'm not a girl anyway, i'm the damn queen up in this house!), chewing up my nails, half holding my breath, praying that kicker makes that winning field goal and i looked down on the coffee table to see the cutest picture of my man and the sweetest little baby girl.

i had forgotten about this day. 1996.
i believe it was saints fan day where you could come and take pics and get signatures.
she must have sat there for an hour, happily eating her crackers, watching all the fans come up and the camera flashes go off.
eventually lil lou (her nickname from infancy which still stands today) got up to toddle around the field through the legs of the real men in black, who must of seemed like giants at the time.

i started to get all emotional and think about how fast time flies. it really does.
and this is where i sound like my mother.
i remember rolling my eyes at her while growing up as she would sigh and make comments of time having wings.
i started to realize i am saying the same things, sounding like my mom.
it's not a bad thing, but that, combined with even having an 18 year old makes a queen mama feel old and get all misty eyed and well, snotty.
literally, hand me some tissues.

it's true though, time takes flight right before my eyes.
this tiny girl is 18.
still as cute, sometimes still as sweet, depending on if she gets crackers when she wants them. she will read this and i am sure she will roll her eyes at me and make a silent wish that she never gets "so old" that she starts to sound like her mother. sigh.


and i always gotta leave ya with the reminder that it's aloha friday, no work til Monday! so spread the aloha to the person on your right, unless they are weird, then hit up that person on your left.
aloha!!

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f.u. retrograde

so apparently mercury is in retrograde. 
this means your life is screwed until the 10th of november when it spins back in the right direction.

well, i ain't buyin' it. yes, mercury does spin in the wrong direction 3 -4 times a year. that is a fact.
but really, we can spend any day of any month and find something that isn't great, or any chunk of time that wasn't our happiest or easiest.
i believe (don't bite me, this is my opinion. my blog = my opinion) that many use mercury as an excuse.
we can blame all the bullshit on mercury being a pain in the ass, retrograding like a jerk-off. focusing on the bad.

i hear a few people around me literally living their life announcing mercury's name every time they spill their coffee, someone flips them off or they generally just have a sucky day.
"mercury! dang it, that mercury. man, i can't wait for mercury to stop retrograding. well, that would be mercury!". all things i hear them say.

i think of all the good things that have happened over the past 3 weeks and loudly announce, "well, what's up now mercury? whose the boss now huh?"
i say this while doing an air chest bump to the skies. occasionally i will spit on the ground and give the sky stink eye, ya know, for dramatic effect.
i won't let mercury rule my life while it's doing it's thing. how hard is it anyway to simply stay in line with the rest of the planets and spin in the right direction? he's really like a badly behaved child...

if you are a virgo or a gemini you are suppose to really be kicked in the balls hard by mercury. sawry.
thank the good lord i am a lucky leo!!
however, if you'd like, you can join my club in not allowing mercury to take a negative effect. i'm having special tee's made up now that say, "mercury, you hit like a little girl". 


if you care, there are specifics we are not suppose to do until the 10th. i repeat do NOT do these things (again, if you care).

-no signing contracts of any kind. hope ya didn't want to start that new job or get married.
-no getting married. it's a contract. sawry.
-don't buy any technology. some people even say don't touch it. if you are a die hard and reading this on your laptop, you're doomed.
-don't travel. not sure if this also means walking, biking, driving or what. just stand still i suppose.
-don't make appointments, like haircuts, etc. you may possibly leave with a dorothy hamil cut. if you don't know the hamil, google it. unless you can't use technology right now then uh, good luck with that "do".
-don't have a birthday during this time. your gifts may suck.


oh, please don't start to crawl into a hole yet. mercury also does some fabulous things as well.
i mean look, paris is reading up on it so she can cope.
if paris can cope, we can cope.

plus....
-now is a great time to commit a crime. apparently police botch evidence during retrograde.
-cleaning your house is good now. so, that's fun right? right? crickets.
-if you are due to give birth it's all good. i can't recall what i read but it was on the "to do" list during retrograde. oh, actually, unless you get married (a no-no) then go into labor in the same retrograde, that i'm not sure about but good luck to you....

...and don't worry, this is the first and the LAST time i will have paris hilton in my blog.
i'm blaming this lapse of judgement on mercury.


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fringe benefits

back in september when we took our wonderful trip to montana we discovered a magical place.

a place that was new and bright and full of treasures.

had we not had a need for warmth, we would have never found ourselves surrounded 

by the abundance of pure enchantment.

ok, we went to walmart.

we needed a blanket because the hotel room bedding freaked us out.

there was no brightness because actually the power went out in the store. 

after my daughter finished screaming, "were gonna die in walmart", making the small child in the cart next to us fall to tears (if i could have seen that mom in the darkness i would have apologized profusely) we managed to purchase our treasures and leave walmart with our fluffy blankets in tow.

however, we discovered a place that you can buy underwear for .50 cents, we did witness our first ever amish couple shopping, that was new for us, and we were most definitely enchanted by the other walmart shoppers.

then we found these.

fringe scarfs. 

(cue angels playing harps)

our 6 dollar treasures.

we bought 3 colors and learned that we were in one of the most expensive walmarts in the country. 

lookit us all classy and what not!!

hmmm...i wonder how much the underwear is in less expensive walmarts. what? i'm curious.

we now love walmart. 

we don't have one near our home but we may have to make time to take a magical, 

treasure filled hunt for scarves and undies.

p.s. see this pic above? tell me that ain't an angel shining her light on my rad scarf? (yep, i'm bringin rad back)

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linking up! the pleated poppy get your pretty on because shanna said so wardrobe wednesday style sessions