Another finished project! I spotted this idea from caprimaize on flickr and wanted to do something similar. Unfortunately the letters she used in hers were from Anthropologie--I love the store but can only shop there when their clearance is on clearance. Their letters were going for $18 a pop. Ouch. So that kind of ruled that out for me at this point and I managed to find some decent substitutes at Hobby Lobby for about a buck each. The typography isn't as stylish, but it's modern and simple enough, and for the savings it was the way to go!
I've been working hard trying to get the house straightened up. I'm still unpacking and rearranging from the move, and then throw in Christmas decorations to the mix. Between Evie, Choky, and Justin, (okay, and me too) it's as if entropy exists here at a rate unparalleled anywhere else in the universe.
I finally gave up tonight, moved as much clutter as possible out of the living room and took pictures as if this is how the place actually looks.
It should be fun navigating the way down the hall in the dark tonight without waking Evie.
So for being really excited for 2009, I seem to somehow be stuck around Christmas. I have taken all the decorations down (not that I put them all up this year, but we did manage the tree). I've been trying to clean up a bit, and part of that process has been to go through a stack of magazines, pulling bits of inspiration before tossing them. I came across these lovely plates from Rosanna and, upon seeing they were on sale, had to treat myself to them.
I was browsing around today and stumbled upon this awesome paper Christmas wreath tutorial. Now of course, you don't need a Christmas wreath for another 11 months, but with different paper, it could be a Valentine's Day Wreath or Easter, or the 4th of July...
Friday, January 2, 2009
Posted by
screamy mimi
I've been meaning to post these pictures for over a week now. Kellen was home on leave over the holidays and he and Julia came over one afternoon to meet Evie and exchange Christmas presents. Chokydar was THRILLED to have them over and could scarcely contain her enthusiasm.
Julia gave me the BEST present. Way back--I forget how long ago now, time passes so oddly...I posted about the trip, Julia and I went to K-town to eat Thai food and visited H&M. While we were walking around the shopping area that day we passed a shop. It had already closed for the day, but displayed in the window was the most awesome cuckoo clock. It's somewhat a tradition to get a cuckoo clock while stationed in Germany, but the really ornate traditional ones aren't quite my style. When I saw this one I fell in love and mused out loud to Julia that I'd have to come back and get it. Of course, I hadn't yet gone back and she remembered me liking it and picked it up for my Christmas present. She's the best.
...As an aside, you can sort of see the progress of my Christmas stockings in the background of picture with Kellen and Julia. They weren't finished in time for Christmas, but I wasn't really in any hurry to have them done this year. I have them pieced together and am working on quilting them now. Probably sometime in July I'll have them done and can show you the results!
Most likely only Justin and Jake get that title. It's a reference to very corny (but VERY wonderful) science fiction, but in this case is basically it's my introduction for even more Christmas pictures of Evelyn. I took tons of them and so many of them are even quite similar, but I love each of them because they've captured slightly different looks. A moment. A precious moment.
I was just musing on this and realized how grateful I am for the technology that makes this possible. Before digital cameras, every picture you snapped counted, and you had no idea how they might have turned out. You were limited by the amount of film in your camera and subject to the cost of developing the roll if you wanted to view the resulting images. I just know I wouldn't be taking anywhere near the number of pictures I am were it not for the ease of the whole digital process. As it is now, I know immediately if I've gotten a good shot, and am almost instantly able to pull them up on the computer and share them with loved ones literally around the world. Amazing.
Even more amazing is to think that Evelyn will never know life before this level of technology...digital cameras, the internet, blogs...and I'm sure SO much more yet to come. I'm reminded of a conversation with an elementary school student when I was working in the library on post. Somehow the idea of a card catalog came up, and I struggled to explain the concept in a way that this child could grasp.
"Instead of all the information being on the computer, you had index cards with all the data written on them. The author's name, the title, all of it."
"Didn't that take up a lot of space??"
"Yeah, I suppose a bit of space. Much more than in a computer."
"But how could you find what you're looking for?"
"Well, they were organized alphabetically, so you could find things because they were in a specific order."
"But...that would take FOREVER!"
I was totally amused and taken aback by the reality that this child could scarcely imagine a world before search engines.
Anyway, all that to say, I'm really glad that the number of images from Evelyn's childhood I can capture are only limited by how quickly she moves, how fast she grows, and the size of my hard drive.
Merry Christmas--even though here it's now the 26th. Just got the girl to sleep...well, in her crib that is. She was sleeping on my lap while I watched "It's A Wonderful Life." That movie gets me every time, and now it fits in with the growing list of things that are hitting me harder now that Evie is around.
This is just the first batch of many more pictures to come. We played around last night and some today taking some "official" first Christmas pictures. Evelyn's been getting better everyday at sitting on her own, or with very little assistance, and so when she had herself propped up tripod style--using her arms to keep sitting upright--I backed a little further away than I should to try and take the picture. She didn't realize that her arms needed to stay in place to keep her face from having an impromptu date with the floor, and thus, down she went--face first into the carpet.
She was really alright, but the shock was definitely jarring and I felt awful because it happened while I was busy trying to take her picture. She cried for a few minutes until I was able to calm her down. Although it was the first, I know it won't be the last time she takes a nose dive, and it's something I'm going to have to work on dealing with. My tendency--I think it is so with many mothers--is to try and save her from any pain, any frustration, any failure. And while, of course, some protection is good and even necessary, I must let her live outside my little bubble of safety, or I will be doing far much more harm than good. Anyway, it seemed noteworthy that it happened for the first time, and we both came through it unscathed.
Justin was able to watch us open presents on Skype. Evie enjoyed the wrapping paper and thought it looked tasty. We got lots of fun things--new music, books, and even a pair of thick woolen socks (yay!). It certainly wasn't the same not having Justin here in person, but all things considered, it was as nice of a Christmas as I imagine it could have been. Evie and I hooked up with the family back in Texas, again via Skype, later in the afternoon which was fun.
Chokydar got a new bone, but hasn't quite figured out what to do with it yet because it doesn't appear to have any stuffing to pull out.
Here is the last set of pictures from our past December trips while in Germany. These are from Nurnberg, which we visited in 2006 right before Christmas:
These are from the small village of Rothenburg ob der Tauber, in which we stopped on the way back from Nurnberg that same day.
And these are from Strasbourg, France. We visited Strasbourg last year--the only Christmas market we made it to last year for some reason or other...I think the weather was especially yucky on the weekends and we didn't venture out. Even on the day when we did drive down to Strasbourg, the weather was nasty. It rained full out while we tried to enjoy the market and I had left the umbrella at home. Chokydar was soaked by the time we got back to the car.
