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Here’s something I wrote this morning:

Today is Flag Day. This morning some Boy Scouts were out putting a flag in our front lawn. When Jeffrey saw them, he got so excited that he ran outside to greet them. He then saluted them while marching in place and singing “God Bless America” at the top of his lungs.

I didn’t even know he could sing that song.

See?  Cute and concise, right?  I haven’t been blogging much in the last three much, but boy howdy have I discovered Facebook.

In the past, I was never much of a FB user (although I had an account); I considered a threat to my time-management skills.

But then my brother announced the end of his engagment via Facebook (without telling anybody in person) and I realized that this is a technology I ought to reluctantly embrace.

To tell the truth, I love the format of the statue update: it’s a great way to record anecdotes about funny things the kids do, or other big events in Casa Camisas land without going on and on forever.

Since it’s the only record I have of the last three months, I’m going to use it to write about everything I’ve missed.

Ready for a ride?

Since we had no money or vacation days to spend on a trip for spring break, we did the following instead:

• Two lunches with Grandma N. at McDonald’s
• One viewing of Mirror, Mirror with Grandma S. (Cute show, go see it)
• Seven viewings each of two bootlegged episodes of The Legend of Korra
• Innumerable poses in front of innumerable daffodils at Red Butte Gardens
• 
• ANNNNNND . . .
• One stroller slump
• 
• Two animal costumes at the Natural History Museum of Utah

• 
• Three kids in one fossil footprint

• Four kids in the dinosaur dig sandbox
• Three older siblings shouting “NO, KATIE!” whenever Katie put sand in her mouth
• Many, many laughing mothers whenever the above happened

• One dramatic pose in front of a mural (Eleanor requested that I take this photo of her.  She’s very much into “setting a scene”)

• Three kids on the zoo carousel.  (We didn’t see any animals at the zoo that day.  Just the carousel, the train, and the playground.  Eh, that’s why we have a zoo membership, right?)

• Three kids popping their heads up in the zoo’s prairie dog exhibit (Eleanor was nice enough to give William a boost so he could see out)

• One baby next to one giant spider

• Four adorable kids in an eggshell . . .

 

. . . and absolutely NO CHORES for the whole week (excepting piano and math practice).  Hooray and Happy Easter!

Due to popular demand, here is a picture of the advent calendar my mother and I made together:

VOILA!  It’s modeled after a calendar my mother made when I was little.  Her calendar uses stuffed ornaments that attach with Velcro; I liked the 2-D look better for my tree.  The background was sewn two years ago and sat in a paper sack in my basement until my mom twisted my arm to get it finished.  I designed and cut out the ornaments, and she sewed them together, using Pellon to stiffen them up.

Here are close-up views, in case you’re curious.  (My sister insisted I do this; if you’d like to see her equally cute calendar, go here.  My sister in law also made one .  It’s been interesting to see what variations each of us came up with.)

Here’s a gingerbread house, a reindeer, and a Scottie dog.  Remember, my mom did all the embroidery, not me.  That’s why it looks so amazing.

Candy cane, Santa, ice skate.  We used a paper clip for the blade; it’s based on a Christmas ornament a friend made for my parents long ago.

Mitten, cardinal, penguin.  There’s a tiny row of beads on that mitten.  The penguin was made at William’s request.

These characters from the “Nutcracker” were my design, and I’m really proud of them (look how my mom used sequins for the Nutcraker’s eyes!  So clever).  From left to right: Nutcracker, Clara, Sugar Plum Fairy, Mouse King (which is modeled on my mom’s ’70s calendar, that’s why he’s hot pink).  The flower-shaped piece of lace on the fairy is a snippet left over from my wedding dress.

Stockings for all four children.  I’ve put them in the order my mom sewed them, and as you can tell, she got more elaborate as she went on.  I’m so impressed with her skill.

Wreath, bell, angel.  The angel design is once again based on my mom’s calendar, only her angel is pink.

Snowman, pear, holly leaf.  And yes, that’s the bling-iest pear you’re ever going to see in your life.  PEAR FROM SPAAAAACE!

Finally, the star and a heart.  When I was a kid, my sibs and I agreed that the star should be put on last, and it should go on top.  And then we argued over it.  Guess what?  My kids are doing the same.  It’s funny to see history repeat itself.

When Eleanor was four, my mother-in-law took her in for a portrait sitting by with Lee Bennion Udall.  She’s considered by many to be Utah’ss most accomplished female artist.  I love her art; it has a vibrant folk-art quality that is poignant and appealing.  We thought Eleanor matched her style of painting, so we just asked Lee to do the painting any way she wanted.  Lee was so pleased with the results that when she was asked to submit a few paintings for an exhibit at the Springville Museum of Art, she chose the portrait of Eleanor!

We got to go see Eleanor in a museum!

WOW!

Ella’s been immortalized . . . as a four-year-old.  Nice, eh?  Randy and Kathryn own this painting, and it usually hangs in their kitchen/living room area.  Katie is always excited to see it; she often spends long periods of time waving her arms and babbling at it.  I can’t decide if she recognizes Eleanor, or just sees a human face and wants to interact.

Three weeks ago, my sister-in-law, Erica was married to a wonderful man named Jake.  My kids adore him, mainly because he lets them crawl all over him.  (He is the youngest of eight children and is used to being bombarded with nieces & nephews).

As part of the wedding luncheon, I put together this little video of my kids, asking them questions about weddings and marriage.  It’s a hoot — you’ll be pleasantly surprised to learn the real reason brides carry flowers at their weddings:




Eleanor has recently figured out how to whistle.  She’s very proud of it; it took her several weeks of practice to get to the stage where she is now — just barely tottering through “Hot Cross Buns” — and takes any opportunity to show off her new skill.

Whenever we arrive at a friend or family member’s house, she enters the front door whistling.  I usually have to point out what she’s doing in order to garner the appropriate level of appreciation.  (“Um, Eleanor’s whistling.  Not spitting at you.”)

Whenever I’m away from the family for an extended period of time, Eleanor always reminds me of her new skill within moments of my return.  “Mom, while you were gone at your thing, did you forget that I know how to whistle?”

Also, she’s always quick to remind me that, “if you ever are going through the house and need some music, Mom, just let me know and I’ll whistle for you.”

The other kids have tried picking this up, but without success.  Jeffrey just isn’t all that interested, while William often confuses whistling with high-pitched screaming.

“AAAAAAA!” he’ll yell, usually when I’m merging the car onto the freeway at rush hour.  “AAAAA!  Listen, Mom!  I whistling!  AAAAA!”

Crikey, my aching ears!

William is old enough that his personality quirks are beginning to show. Here are some of them:

He’s the first of my children to show a preference for a particular color, and the color for him is orange.  I first noticed it when he would always choose the orange paper and orange paint at his little community art class.  Then, when I found a rack of children’s t-shirts on sale at the store, he insisted I choose an orange one.

William now has four orange shirts.  He also likes having an orange plate, bowl, and cup at meals.  The last time I set out the crayon box for him, he spent ten minutes finding every single orange crayon, then holding them all in one hand while scribbling on an orange piece of construction paper.  I might be sick of it if it weren’t such a novelty.  Neither of the other kids give a hoot about what color anything is.

Wimmy’s speech patterns also provide a rich source of interest.  He frequently chops two-syllable words into three syllables: “blan-ka-let,” “cho-co-late,” and “neck-a-lace,” which makes him sound like a miniature Damon Runyan character (“I was on my way to Lindy’s with Nicely-Nicely for some cho-co-late cheesecake, when two goons asked me about the stolen neck-a-lace . . .”

He also makes wonderfully adorable mispronounciations: “wackaroni” for “macaroni,” and “quesadaah” for “quesadilla.”  But, once again unlike his siblings, he gets furious if Brian and I mispronounce the words back at him.  “No, I saying ‘QUESADAAAAH!'”  he insists, pounding his chubby fists on the kitchen table.

Although, I think “wackaroni” is a far more accurate term for what comes out of the Kraft box.

I’ve been keeping a mental list of all the delightful little tidbits that I’d like to write about, but unfortuantely they have all been pushed aside to make way for Ye Olde Fashioned Dreaded Colde Viruse. 

(“Now with extra vowels!”)

Most of my time has been spent making excellent use of Kleenex and water.  Nasal decongestants are placebos, right?  Because they never do anything for me.

The good news is that I was able to survive an outing yesterday to watch the “Mini Magic Flute” as part of the Utah Symphony’s Lollipops concert series.  My mother-in-law treated my whole family; it was wonderful.

The actors sang the most famous arias and choruses from the opera with translated English texts, and played the parts very, very broadly.  Mozart by way of Gilbert & Sullivan.  My favorite moment was simply seeing Eleanor’s eyes as we settled ourselves down in the concert hall.  Her eyes nearly popped off her little head as she gasped at the high-celinged chandeliers and goldleaf balconies. 

Aftewards, there was a “petting zoo” in the lobby where volunteers allowed children to touch and play instruments (violins, trumpets, clairinets, everything.)  Great program.  Heaps of antibacterial spray was sacrificed to the cause of art.

The only other thing that’s happening in my life is the continued plugging away at my book.  Draft #2 is coming along; the book recently passed its one year anniversary.  I’m scheduled to participate in a conference for writers and illustrators come June, so I have to have a chapter ready for submission by then.  I’m rather nervous about it and want to spend as much time breathing in and out of a paper bag as I do writing. 

As it is, 90% of my writing time is spent with me tugging on my hair and staring at the computer screen, and 10% actually typing out words to read. 

So the progress is slow.  Pass my that paper bag.

This year the children were well aware of what Christmas present I had chosen for Brian — I had inherited an old Nintendo Wii from my brother, and had to spend afternoons painstakingly removing his personal data (idiotic photos and Miis).  What’s amazing is that they managed to keep the secret, and even went so far as to purposely mislead their father.

“Daddy, do you know what you’re getting for Christmas?  A hot dog tree!”

“No, he’s not — he’s getting an eyeball machine!”

“No, a spaceship!”

“NO — a ROCKETSHIP!”

And then, because Jeffrey hasn’t learned to wink on his own, he would look at me and use his hand to manually close and open one of his eyelids.  Heh.

This is a snow elephant that Brian made about two weeks ago, with some neighborhood kids pitching in.  Note the baby elephant holding its mother’s tail!  It collapsed the very next day, but Brian says that’s just the perfect set-up for his next project: a snow lion feasting on the remains!

Every year Brian’s siblings try to spend one day during the Christmas season constructing some kind of structure out of gingerbread.  They never make houses, but instead try to think of some unusual thingamabob with lots of room for creativity and cleverness.  This year’s pick was a candy reenactment of the 1969 moon landing.  See the Earthrise in the background?  The tiny American flag made of strips of candy?  The row of chocolate aliens in the background?  Yeah, it’s not one of our finest.  (That prize goes to last year’s creation, a gingerbread White House that included a bowling alley and a movie theater with a tiny candy screen showing Super Fly.)

Brian’s mother cooked up the idea for a family holiday service project this year.  There is an LDS congregation here in Salt Lake that consists entirely of Burmese refugees.  We decided to throw the children a Christmas party.  In addition to serenading them with ukuleles and putting together a very, very two-bit puppet show, the kids dressed up for a nativity pageant.  Eleanor is the littlest angel (the one with the pink flower in her hair).

Brian, his brother Peter, and our brother-in-law Sven were drafted to be the Three Kings.  The costumes were found in some church closet, and I have to say they are, um, stunning in many ways.  Especially when Jeffrey decided at the last minute to join his father, making possibly the first King to ever bring along his own Mini Me.  In the picture he is seated at Brian’s feet; for some reason there were two bejeweled Pilgrim hats in the costume box.

Later that same evening, Brian’s grandmother hosted a big extended-family dinner at the Lion House, and Eleanor was thrilled to sit next to Sven, who is apparently now in the lead for the title of Favorite Uncle.

Jeffrey took the whole affair at the “fancy restaurant” quite seriously, putting his napkin on his lap, using the correct fork — using a fork at all! — and staying in his seat for a whole fifteen minutes before trying to take a walk around the room.

This post makes it seem like I didn’t do a thing with my family.  Not true; we had multiple Christmas parties with them as well.  I was usually just too busy enjoying myself to remember to take pictures — and also there were no opportunites to take a pic of my husband in a silly costume.  But my parents and two of my brothers came to my house for Christmas Eve dinner, and we cooked a big ham and played the Thimble Game.  And then we ate pie and cookies, couldn’t be better.

Here we are on Christmas morning!  The kids slept in, so I took the opportunity to shower and get dressed before we all went upstairs.

Eleanor was given a bicycle for Christmas, complete with what she calls “long shiny things coming down from the handles.”  Santa has recently discovered that bikes can be purchased for $5 at DI and then fixed up for presents.  She insisted on riding circles around the driveway the second she got dressed.

Santa also found a vintage Fisher Price piano at DI for William, which he plunked Schroeder-style for hours on his tummy.  After we were all dressed and fed with a pan of cinnamon rolls my mother had given us, we drove down to Provo to relax and spend more time with family.  What a great Christmas — what a wonderful family — a glorious time was had by all.