Looking Forward

I've been thinking lately about what direction I want to take my blog in 2014.  I have been blogging and then transferring it over to a Blurb book.  Since no one really reads my blog anymore I'm thinking about not blogging and just writing directly in a Blurb book.  That's one option. 
I've also noticed that some of my blog posts last year were opinions/editorials more than just family photos and updates. A good handful of opinions I never bothered to publish. Are the opinion posts more whiny than helpful or do you that read my blog like hearing that side of my personality?  Do you wish I got back to more of the family update and photo style?  I do have enough opinions to take my blog into an entirely editorial style, but is that what anyone wants to hear or is there enough of that in the world already? 
Maybe do book reviews of the books I'm reading? 
I've also thought about choosing a topic to base my scripture study on and was thinking about writing my notes in a sketchbook along with drawings, but I could write them on my blog.  Would that be fun, interesting, or just boring?  For my scripture study/sketchbook I'm thinking about God's women=women in the Bible up to modern day and His role for them.  That sounds like a lifetime of research and a topic that there are lots of books about so I'm not sure.  Maybe a more in depth look at earth, air, water, fire based on my RS lessons the last couple years both spiritually and scientifically. Or maybe human touch. 
I'm open to thoughts so let me hear yours.  Especially if you are a closet reader and enjoy my posts...only you never comment so I don't know you're there.  It would be good to know if there is an interest in me continuing to post or not and if anyone has an opinion or not.  Less and less of my friends are updating their blogs anymore so I haven't really been able to keep in touch with them that way, so I might still check on the 2 people I think still blog once in awhile and keep my blog up?  I don't know.
I'm also thinking about quitting my Facebook account. I originally signed up because my teens are on it, but they aren't actually on it much.  Ana tells me Facebook is now for old people and people her age tweet or text or instagram.  My kids aren't on Twitter or Instagram.  Well, Ana has a Twitter account so she can keep us updated on the ski team news for Isaac so we know if a practice or meet gets cancelled, but we have to ask her to check it.  So my purpose of just knowing what my kids are up to is not really valid on Facebook anymore.   A few friends post fun, interesting, and clever things and I like catching up with them.  But the "political" stuff(a lot of people) and mean stuff (a couple of people) I know post or just forgetting what they say is public is getting me down or draining my energy or I'm getting angry about it.  I know I shouldn't care, but I just haven't seemed to learn how to bite my tongue completely or not let mean stuff bother me ( I can instinctively and impulsively become a passionate defender of the underdog-whatever "side" is being picked on), so it might be better for me to just stop using it.  It's just really bothering me that the media is so either/or, no balance- either you are a feminist and for women holding the priesthood or you are pro rape; either you hate Chickfil-A or love that Duck Dynasty guy, either you like the tea party or you hate America.  It surprises me how many people jump on the bandwagons and put me as a hater on the opposite side of any side just because I don't "like" something or dare to disagree and try to categorize me as one or the other; when my view points are more well, in my opinion, more "middle of the road", sensible, and thought through than just a black or white passionate impulse.  It also bugs me when people get offended that someone didn't catch their bad news and send condolences or say stuff like "now I know who really cares about me".  I also get tired of seeing stuff shared by places with the "F" word or any swears in the title.  It also bugs me when people say I shouldn't care about that.  Anyway, I've been getting really annoyed so I'm thinking I just need to get off.  I might just go to checking once a month in case people message me instead of every day when I'm looking for something to do while waiting for kids to come to the car after their activities.  I'm really not thinking my "online presence" is detrimental.  I don't know, I suppose we will see what 2014 brings.

The Secret Life of Walter Mitty

Love, love, loved it.  :-)  The day after Christmas we went to see The Secret Life of Walter Mitty.  Brian read a review that only gave it 2 stars and I heard the people behind me in the theater say it "sucked", but our family loved it.  I think it's because we appreciate creative ideas and day dreaming, artistic elements, gorgeous scenery, and real life subtle type humor, and the music.  I loved that I could take my kids to a movie that is PG instead of PG-13, that isn't violent, based on lust, or heavy on foul language.  It really suited our family style and tastes very well.  We loved it.  When we got out the door Henry excitedly exclaimed, "Tonight I'm going to dream I'm driving in car through volcano ash!"  I love inspiring movies.  :-)
 Here's the trailer:

Friday after Christmas everyone went skiing except for me.  I stayed home to blog.  They had a good time and Brian is the only who fell I hear.  Isaac has been skiing a lot, but for Brian, Ana, William, and Henry it was their first time.  Isaac showed the trails and taught everyone what to do.  I just wish they would have remembered to take pictures.

Our Christmas card 2013

Last year for our Christmas card we made the naughty list and had mug shots so this year I thought for our Christmas card, since we went to Disney World, we'd pretend we had to go to Santa's version of "rehab".  I think Disney World would be good Santa "rehab" and we get turned into Disney characters.  I drew my best "Disney" style cartoon of each of us and then a group family picture showing our personalities a bit since I wasn't doing a letter. 

Brian= white shirt and tie because he works so much at church and work ;-) and crown because he's king of course.
Michele= here's a test of your attention to Disney detail- can you guess which character inspired my outfit?  The boots and hat are because it's cold and snowy here in Minnesota, the gold skirt is reference to a cream and gold dress I actually wear sometimes, and blue top with its billowy sleeves and the color purple are a tribute to one of my all time favorite Disney characters since I was a kid- the Fairy Godmother in Cinderella.  Mother-me being the mom of the family-I thought it went together.
Ana=Always a big fan of princess stuff and the only girl in the family, I thought it would be fitting to give her the ultimate princess dress consisting of a section of each Disney princess (except Pocahontas) plus a magic wand and Tinkerbell wings since she was Tinkerbell for Halloween this year.  Orange bodice because that's her favorite color (along with yellow and bright pink and neon colors), and pink Converse because she loves those sneakers and has a few pair.
Isaac=the smile (got his braces off this fall!), wink, muscles, sense of humor, and slight over confidence of every Disney Prince; a light saber rather than a regular sword just to show he's still a fan (and works since Star Wars is now Disney too), the Scout bandeau since he's still working on that, a Maple Leaf he received at the Cross Country Banquet this fall because he lettered, and a snow shovel...just because it's Minnesota.  I thought about skis since he is also on the Nordic (cross country) Ski team, but artistically I felt like the snow shovel would better balance the picture.
William=Was not Peter Pan this year for Halloween even though he has green pants, a green shirt, and a green hat with a red feather from the time he had a Robin Hood party when he was 6, and he has the ''red" hair to look like Peter Pan.  He also is turning 10 in January and seems to have that creative, inventive, adventurous, slightly mischievious, classic personality of 10 year old boy Peter Pan is so much a symbol of.  He also really rocks those green skinny jeans so I'm sure he could pull off wearing tights too.
Henry=Still loves stuffed animals and snuggling.  Until he saw it drawn and now he insists he doesn't.  Every Disney movie has cute and friendly animals and characters who befriend them and that goes well with Henry.    Being seven almost eight, it's also the last year I thought I could get away with drawing him cute, well, actually, it turns out last year was.  He isn't happy I drew him covered in cute animals.  And with Mickey Mouse ears.  "WILLIAM was Steamboat Willie for Halloween not me!"  The owl, squirrel, rabbit, and panda are just generic animals- there are many Disney films with owls, squirrels, and rabbits; and we just like pandas.  The rest are Disney characters so impress me with your Disney knowledge and name them :D.

*Ana's dress in order left to right:  Snow White, Aurora, Cinderella, Ariel, Belle, Jasmine, Mulan, Tiana, Rapunzel,  Merida, Anna
Henry's animals:  Abu, Dumbo, Gus, Prince Naveen in frog form, Pascal, Mushu

Merry Christmas!

The Christmas tree on Christmas Eve

Christmas Eve dinner (we had ham, cheese potatoes, & salad +the missionaries came over for dinner)

 This year we decided that since we went to Disney World this fall we would do less at Christmas.  Any money we received from grandparents went "towards" our Disney trip, and all our gifts this year would be homemade.  It went really well and everyone was very happy with their gifts. :-)  We did get a little gift with our usual stocking treats from Santa- since Santa and his elves make everything anyway...It was really nice to not be caught up in the hours of shopping, and the sales, and the commercial hypes of the season. For full disclosure, most of our ideas we found on pinterest and tweaked to our supplies/needs.
The gifts we made relatives:

Henry with his gifts:

William with his gifts:

Henry made a gift for William at school

happy just to get a box ;-)

blank cassette tapes!  William is going to convert his mp3's to cassette for his walkman he bought in the summer

Yes, those are more Rainbow Loom rubber bands

"That present is huge!" quick gasp "is it for me?"

Isaac with his gifts:

Muse concert dvd

Star Wars Matroyshka dolls hand painted by each of us (except Isaac of course)

the National Geographic calendar from Grandpa Glenn the kids look forward to every year

Ana with her gifts:

Ana is obsessed with Frozen right now (she's seen it 4 times and almost immediately downloaded the soundtrack), but that isn't on dvd yet soooo we got her last year's favorite.

Harry Potter inspired room accessories/decor

owl key chain designed by William and Henry, sewn by mom and William

Where Ana is most likely to be found- reading.  Or the band hallway.  William and Henry made this for Ana.  Unknown to me they all ended up being Harry Potter related in some way so when people ask what she got she says, "oh, Harry Potter stuff."

Me and my gifts:

The kids and Brian started to make me Christmas ornaments, but they ran out of string and say they will finish them this break.

A very awesome phone case ;D

Brian and his gifts:

pictures for Brian's office- our family "photo" original, Brian as Jedi killing sith, Arthur, Brian becoming Hulk, numbers & abacus & beans w/numbers "bean counter" & "sticks and circles" math and some other equations & a number batman mask & a guy with a head full of numbers picking up McDonald's.

Brian wrote puppet show on his Christmas wish list...

The Christmas mice book from Brian's sister

The family gift Brian and I made:

checkers!

ninjas!

pirates!  (3 girl pirates- we had to be ratio accurate- 1 girl and 3 boys = 3 girl pirates and 9 boy pirates)

We had a great day being lazy and cooking and cleaning it up after so the house stayed clean and playing with our gifts and skyping family.  You know, I'll be honest, sometimes I wonder how it's gonna go talking and spending time with extended family (my side and in-laws) because we aren't the same as when we were little or teenagers and since we live so far away from each other we don't really know each other that well anymore...but, it's always great.  We all still laugh together.  It's interesting how we can meet up and fall right back into place like we never left.  Thank you family.
So I mentioned cooking and this year we had some yummy food, not healthy, but very yummy.

 

For breakfast we had caramelized apple German pancakes and bacon on the side.  I doubled the recipe thinking 1 pan wouldn't be enough for 6 people, but we could have gotten away with one.  For lunch we kind of just snacked on stuff like the oranges and candy from our stockings (breakfast was very filling and no one was very hungry).  For dinner we had chicken noodle soup and fava bean farro salad?.  For the salad I took a few liberties and changed the recipe. It really is more of a meal than a salad.  Especially served with a hearty whole grain artisan loaf of bread.
Here's the recipe the way I changed it:
1 C barley
2C chicken stock or broth
6 Jennie-O sweet italian turkey sausauges
1 can drained green lima beans
1 pommegranate (seeds)
fennel fronds and chevril for topping/mix in last

Cook the barley in the chicken stock according to pkg directions.  Cut sausage and cook sausage links in (T) olive oil in frying pan.  Mix cooked barley, cooked sausages, and lima beans in a large bowl.  Stir in pommegranate seeds, chevril and some of the fennel fronds.  garnish with more fennel fronds.

Chicken Noodle Soup
Put frozen chicken breasts in crockpot (however long until you want to eat-4hrs to 10-I've had my frozen chicken cook all the way on on any).  Add carrots, celery (this time used the fennel bulb from our fennel fronds recipe above), and half a pkg wide egg noodles.  Pour in enough broth or chicken stock to cover the ingredients (add water if you don't have enough broth).  Season with pepper or I used Penzey's Greek seasoning this time (maybe a couple T?  I just pour some in until it smells good and then stir it up).  When the chicken is cooked through pull it apart with a fork.

An Atheist Walks into a School With a Christmas Tree...

Ana and her band friends building a snowman

Sounds like the start or punch line of a bad joke right?  I thought it would make a good title.  My second choice for a title for this post is "Tales From the Band Hallway".  This is more Ana's story, but I thought it was a good one worth sharing.  Ana hangs out with the band kids.  She relates very well to the main character in John Green's Paper Towns.  Doesn't play a band instrument, but sits in the hallway to the music classrooms waiting for them to show up because she is early.  For seminary; that part's not similar to the book.  Seminary is at the high school, but ends about half an hour before school starts.  And for some weird reason the band kids show up early to hang out in the band room or the band hallway.
Anyway, on to the story.
 One December morning Ana is sitting outside the band room with some friends when the drum line section leader walks in with a large box.  A box that looks familiarly like a Christmas tree box. 
Ana-"Hey Tim, why do you have a Christmas tree?"  in a teasing, it can't really be a Christmas tree way. 
Tim-"shh.  Come here." 
Ana and Tim and a couple other friends sneak into a classroom and Tim unveils his Christmas tree.  Tim-"Be quiet and help me set this up".  They get it all set up when the band teacher(Buller) walks in: 
Buller-"WOAH!  WHAT IS THAT? IS THAT A CHRISTMAS TREE?  THAT'S A CHRISTMAS TREE!  GET THAT OUT OF MY CLASSROOM NOW!  I WILL GET IN SO MUCH TROUBLE FOR THIS!  I CAN'T HAVE THIS IN HERE.  I SERIOUSLY WILL BE IN A LOT OF TROUBLE. GET. IT. OUT. NOW."
Tim-"It's not a Christmas tree.  It's my Xmas tree.  Not a Christmas tree."
Ana-"pine tree"
Ali-"decorative pine tree"
All three-"yep it is definitely a decorative pine tree"
 Buller-"IT'S A CHRISTMAS TREE! MOST DEFINITELY A CHRISTMAS TREE.  AND IT CANNOT BE HERE. I WILL BE IN TROUBLE FOR THIS NOT YOU GUYS SO TAKE IT DOWN. IT NEEDS TO BE GONE BEFORE CLASS STARTS."
Tim-"fine Buller take a picture of us so we can remember this horrible moment forever." 
Then the teacher took 130 photos. ;-)
 *sigh* high school.  A brief moment of excitement to the typical daily grind and routine.  I suppose that's something, oh, kind of admirable, about teenagers.  When things get mundane and repetitious they don't really put up with it the way we adults do.  Sometimes I've noticed it's almost really comforting to me to have "less to think about" and stick to a routine and eat the same thing everyday.  But for teenagers at first it's just a little twitch, then a fidget, then a wiggle, then an out right explosion sometimes of rebellion against the routine.  As long it's a creative burst and not anything physically or emotionally harmful I'm completely fine with that.

Treasures In My Tree

Yesterday Henry was playing with his Legos.  He found some great places to build and keep them.  It was kind of interesting:  I kept asking them to do their homework. quickly because it was our computer/video game day*.  I reminded them it was video game day* so they might want to keep that in mind and hurry and get all their stuff done and by not getting done they are choosing to do these other things instead of video games.  Henry claimed his was all done and William said, "Well, actually I think I'm going to choose this instead, I mean look at this!  Look at what Henry made!  I'm going to get my homework done and help Henry."  He did for a little and played a couple of games too, but Henry worked on his Lego creations instead.  I love it when they know they only get one day for computer games and they choose other things instead.  I also love this tree house in the Christmas tree.  :-)

 This is some Christmas cheer I needed.  I'm having kind of a "bi-polar" December I think.  I think my last post I mentioned being irritated and then happy?  Anyway, Friday I was pretty upset and I have a feeling most people would validate it.  I will blog about it another day though. It's kind of funny really, so I will blog about it-- but I'm waiting until all of us can laugh about it.  I'll just give you a little hint:  It involves a storm trooper (or is it clone trooper?) helmet.  Someday my friends, someday, I will tell you. ;-)


*I have heard people actually gasp when I tell about this.  It is drastic for some people, but just works so well for us.  I allow screen time 1 day of the week- except Saturday we watch a movie as a family and if they need the computer for homework they are allowed to use it.  Oh, and if they have a friend over (or go to a friend's) we don't usually see everyday I will make exceptions to the rule, but there has to be outside play or no screen play too.  They have to get all chores, homework, showers, etc. done first and they can play as long as they want.  It has actually worked really well for us.  We were having too many arguments about "just let me finish this level..." when we tried setting a time limit.  I was also noticing a few addictive behaviors that I wanted nipped in the bud.  And even though we don't have any overly violent games my kids were more aggressive, easily irritated, and whiny after screen time.  I haven't noticed that near as much.  Or at least it's only on Tuesdays and not on any other day of the week.  Oh, they might still get frustrated with each other, but it's different.  Limiting screen time to one day of the week has has been a good thing for our family.  Yes, my teenage son does think it's cruel and unusual punishment and his friends think we are crazy mean/strict but I do think our kids are emotionally, physically, and mentally healthier than they were before our 1 day a week rule.  A lot of people set time limits and ratios of outside to screen time which is great too.  We just ran into too many conflicts and arguments of enforcing and abusing privileges and having a day set aside eliminated those.  Also, instead of kids getting frustrated because they had no control over when and how long they could play because of so many variables from day to day; this way they know the "schedule" or routine and can feel more in control of scheduling their own time.  Hope that makes some sense.  My kids are fairly independent thinkers and would like to run their own life and plan their own schedule and do things their way.  That doesn't always work  for kids or for people in a family of more than one person.  Even though it might seem like I'm controlling by saying "one day only" it actually is less frustrating because it's a constant they can plan on and around.  I've also noticed now that we've had this in place a couple of years, my kids don't mind missing screen time as much when other things come up and sometimes choose to play outside instead or with Legos on their own without me nagging about it.

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas!

Yay!  I'm kind of getting excited for Christmas.  :-)  It snowed yesterday!  Now there is a nice blanket of white on everything.  I love first snows, when it looks so pretty, and the sun sparkles off of it.  Ana's bus got stuck in the snow and she had to walk home.  I think she kind of enjoyed it. ;-)
Her Facebook update:

My bus got stuck in the snow...
I still love the snow 

 

  

All the activities after school were cancelled so we could shovel and enjoy the afternoon playing in the snow and then come in, eat dinner, and do homework.  It was a perfect day for playing too.  We had temps in the 20's. Unfortunately we had a couple of teenagers with teenage moments who although super excited to play in the snow when they first got home, by the time I picked up William and Henry, they were quite grumpy.  I forced them to play outside.  Kinda pathetic, but it happens. Usually they are awesome, but every once in awhile those rough school days make for some whiny afternoons.  The weather was too perfect to ignore and I knew it was going to get drastically colder so yes, we MUST play outside.  They'll thank me someday, right?

Today it's supposedly -13 with the wind chill.  Our doors on our van almost didn't open because they were frozen shut.  I went to a meeting to plan upcoming Relief Society activities and when I left I had to scrape the ice off the windows on the inside of my van.  I did get an awesome picture while stopped at a stoplight on my way to the post office before the meeting:

It was super exciting for me.  I've never seen that before.   It's called a sun dog.  It made my day and helped me get excited for Christmas. Again.  After having grumpy kids yesterday.  I'm also excited because we decided as a family to make each other gifts this year and it's fun to see the kids excited about what they are going to make.  Since we just went to Disney World we decided that any money gifts would be considered as going towards that and that we didn't really need anything additional.  We have plenty of toys and stuff, but Brian nixed the idea of not doing anything at all ;-) so we settled on making our gifts this time.  I'll let you see when Christmas is over.