Miscellaneous Things

This is my MIL's potato salad. It's always a work of art - one year she cut a radish into the shape of a rosebud for the centerpiece. She's Japanese and can also do origami...without a book of instructions.



And I was delayed driving to work yesterday. I dropped Lucas off at my mom's and had to go by Municipal Park with the big lake.

The ducks (or geese or whatever they are) were crossing VERY SLOWLY to the golf course, but then they froze for some reason and wouldn't move. It took somebody honking their horn to get them to turn around and SLOWLY walk back to the lake. (Cool fog on the water, too!)


When I passed the golf course, there were about fifty geese already there. The ones in the street were grumbling about not reserving a tee time or something.

Back From Costa Rica!

Well, Merry Christmas everybody! We went to Costa Rica the week before Christmas, and I'm back with pictures. So to jump right in - this is Playa Potrero on the Pacific side of Costa Rica - Guanacaste for those familiar. These can speak for themselves.





Now the rest of these are from the Arenal volcano area of La Fortuna - see the toucan on that branch? (Yes, they nailed bananas to the tree to attract birds.)






This last one has a little story. Our hotel had an animal rescue operation and they gave us a tour of the jungle cats they've rescued - that's a puma above. Below is an ocelot. As soon as Lucas stepped up for a picture, this cat stuck his paw out and grabbed Lucas's shirt, then looked at us like, "Can I keep him?" Luckily there were no scratches, but the lesson here is: just because the guy in charge reaches in and scratches their ears doesn't mean your kid should get next to one!



And here are some videos of zip-lining, mainly for my family to see how brave we were. This first one is me coming in hot with legs a-flailing - watch out now!



Next is Drew in a much more controlled fashion.



And Lucas was so light they started him out with a guide to be sure he'd make it all the way across.



But at the end they let him try one by himself. This one was a half-mile long and went through a tunnel of trees where a monkey was sitting - too cool!



Okay, wasn't I working on some skinny jeans a few weeks ago? Back to work!

Colorful Pictures (Jacket and a Tree)

Thank you ladies for the nice comments on the jacket! Lucas is practicing his sad face for this one, but probably because I made him put the Nerf gun down. (And I learned my lesson about being lazy with zippers. I didn't want to cut one off so I used a shorter one - won't do that again.)


He wants something like "Make mine decaf" embroidered on it. Don't know where that came from.


And God waved at me today while I was going in the house. Very stormy-looking sky, but a ray of sunshine came out and found this tree - cool! More striking than the iPhone suggests - even the boys thought it was something.

Got Lucas's Jacket Going...

I have actually almost accomplished something. Almost...


Remember that Lucas picked out the fabric and color combinations himself. I tried to force a blue or green zipper on him, but relented and let him have red. It is very colorful. But one problem - that 22" sport zipper said in very small print "non-separating." Bastards!


I had to go rip this one out and go to the store, where I read every word written on the package to be sure I had the right one, but that put me behind schedule so I didn't get it totally finished last night. Just have to fix one cuff and topstitch. He still wanted to wear it to Scouts last night.

In fact, he asked if he could brag a little and tell people how cool his jacket was and that his mom made it. I said not to brag, and he said if anybody commented on his jacket, could he THEN come out and tell them I made it. God bless that child!

He also has the Elf on the Shelf going (I bowed to pressure after 2 years). After I put every stuffed animal in his room into a big box and staged it like Billy the Elf is reading to them, Lucas wondered if Billy dragged them there or if they all came alive at night like Billy. He's thinking about leaving a note for them and asking.

My child still believes in his mommy and magic stuffed animals! Pre-teen years are so awesome!

The Christmas Card...and a Look Back

Some of you may be getting one in the mail, but here's a preview. The caption is "Drew got his learner's permit, so watch out for the Mobile Hillbillies!" Get it? Drew is Jethro. Well, I forget how Dean made that connection when we were brainstorming for ideas, but there was obviously beer involved. (There're a couple of smaller better pictures too, so maybe Mimi will put this one on the refrigerator this year - DOH!)


The photoshoppage provided by Drew was a little rougher than last year - maybe we should've worked a little harder on head sizes. Here's a reminder of last year's card wishing you a tarball-free Christmas.


Oh heck, let's see all of them, so when the hard drive crashes I can still come here to see some pictures.






Oh jeez, maybe I should get a Kleenex. They grow up fast - even the dog!

Where Has All the Mojo Gone?

I have no idea what's happened to it. I had to pack up my sewing room for Drew's overnighter, and then my brother and SIL slept over at Thanksgiving, so I have just now unpacked some stuff. And wouldn't ya' know it - I can't find my tracing wheel! Anyway, Lucas wants a fleece jacket like everybody else in the family, so that takes priority over skinny jeans and cloning a top. Plus I've made this thing 4 times already so there's no futzing around with the pattern. That's a relief, because the last thing I did on the jeans was add to CF after a tissue fitting, and then I was beset by doubts about whether the fly will turn out or not, so I just quit.

So I actually worked for about 2 hours on this jacket - woohoo! But look what fun the "rip-stop flag material" is - it came out of the washer like this. Needless to say, I began by serging all raw edges.


I tried to talk him out of this blue overlay, because the fleece is green. (Doesn't that make you think of 1983 when all the cool girls wore blue and green together? Except this isn't 1983.) And when he wanted a red zipper down the front, I put my foot down till he chose blue. Then he told me later that isn't this supposed to be is HIS special jacket, and I realized he's right and it can't get any worse, so I got a red zipper for that baby yesterday.

Now this is more exciting - Drew got his driver's permit Thursday!


Okay, off to watch a movie with the kids. And speaking of movies, has anybody seen Horrible Bosses? Now if you can overlook the language and most of Jennifer Anniston's lines, that is one hilarious movie, but what were they thinking giving it a PG-13?! How many F-bombs does it take to get an R, not to mention the other words and scenarios described by said words.

Okay, I got that off my chest.