Category Archives: Festivities

December Advent Acts of Kindness, Crafting With Cat Hair

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Yesterday was such a wonderful, beautiful day. I looked out the window at around 4:50 pm and the most beautiful sunset was happening; the sky was deep orange and pink and the snowy ground was glowing pink as well. I called the boys to come and look at it. I tried to take a picture but it just didn’t do it justice. We watched for a while, as the colours deepened and became almost neon, then darkened to a purplish black. Twenty minutes later it was all over and the sky was dark. I suddenly understood why people post inspirational sayings, and I was inspired to do the same:

Life moves pretty fast. If you don’t stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.

Well said, Ferris Bueller, well said.

One of my friends was ill yesterday, and in trying to cheer her up I searched modcloth.com for links to cat sweaters, because when your head is in the toilet and/ or on the bathroom floor tile, the most cheering thing in the world is a link to a sweater that is noted for it’s “cat-itude”.

http://www.modcloth.com/shop/pullovers-sweaters/positive-cat-itude-sweater
photo from modcloth.com

But what I found even more cheering? THIS BOOK:

 

http://www.modcloth.com/shop/books/crafting-with-cat-hair
photo from modcloth.com

Dear readers, a book about crafting with cat hair. CRAFTING WITH CAT HAIR. Why sweep up all that cat hair off the floor when you can make actual miniature kitties with it? Why indeed? I feel like a) this book would make a really great gift for certain people in our lives, and b) crafts made out of cat hair would be the ultimate gift for certain people in our lives. This is a win-win situation we have here. Here’s a little description from the book:

You’ll forget about fussing over the cat hair that’s clinging to your clothing or couch when you explore this ‘purr’-fectly precious guide to crafting with fur! ….While your favorite feline naps in a beam of sun in your studio, you can use its freshly brushed fluff, a few simple tools, and basic DIY skills to fashion a set of felted finger puppets, kitten-topped keepsake boxes, delightfully detailed badges, cute pincushions, or tote bags that boast darling appliques. 

TOTE BAGS. I am horrified, yet fascinated, by this book. This is way better than the Snuggie Sutra. Delightfully detailed badges! I wonder if you could make this hat out of cat hair:

http://www.modcloth.com/shop/hats/cat-nap-hat-in-black
photo from modcloth.com

Very meta. I also wonder if actual grown women a) purchase and b) wear this hat. Now of course, we all know I’m not a cat person, and so it should be no surprise that I think this is kind of funny:

http://www.modcloth.com/shop/graphic-tees/i-swear-to-dog-t-shirt
photo from modcloth.com

And if I could knit without fears of a nervous breakdown, hysteria, or becoming fatally tangled in a web of yarn, I would buy this book AND knit my own litter of puppies:

http://www.modcloth.com/shop/books/knit-your-own-dog-the-second-litter
photo from modcloth.com

So please don’t think I’m getting uppity or waging some sort of dog person/ cat person war, which is probably as egregious as a mommy war. Who wants to talk about dogs versus cats versus SAHM versus WAHM versus breastfeeding versus bottle feeding versus co-sleeping versus I DON’T KNOW WHAT ELSE. Certainly not me.

We’re going to put up the tree and decorations this weekend, which is always fun and exciting. I was thinking about Advent calendars, thanks to my friend Lynn, who last year inspired me to make a “holiday activity” Advent calendar. Here’s the thing, though: I am not gifted at coming up with holiday activity ideas. Generally, once the cookies and gingerbread house are made, and the decorations up, my ideas consist of a) watching Christmas specials on TV OR reading Christmas books, and b) going sledding. I’m not up to the pressure of having 24 different activities to put in the calendar. Today, though, I thought of a different idea, and I like it: kindness acts. I’m going to challenge the family to come up with a different kind idea every day in December, and write it down on a piece of paper to put in the Advent calendar. It doesn’t have to be a big thing; in fact, I think giving someone a compliment or letting someone go ahead of you in line might be just as kind and heart warming as buying someone’s coffee at Starbucks or shovelling our neighbour’s walk, or taking in donations to the food bank. I think this would nicely reinforce the festive idea of giving rather than receiving, don’t you think?

Nicole’s Favourite Things: Sears Wish Book Edition, Part 1

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Every year – generally, these days, in August – I receive my own hard copy of the Sears Wish Book and every year it brings me much joy and happiness. When I was a kid I would circle all the amazing things I wanted in the Wish Book in order to make my list for Santa; I was equally mesmerized by the extensive doll selection near the back and the “Gifts” section near the front. Flash forward a few decades and I’m still mesmerized by the “Gifts” section.

I actually really, really love the Sears catalogue – and not just the Wish Book, no – every year I order Sorel boots for the kids; they always have the sizes I need at good prices and I don’t have to drag the boys to every shoe store in the mall only to find they DON’T have any boots for boys except in size tiny and gigantic. I order flannel sheets from Sears and the very best pajamas in the world are from Sears:

 
SNOOPY!
 
Did you know there are only five weeks until Christmas?

Totally. And although I wanted to write this post back in August when I received the Sears Wish Book, I held off out of respect for you, dear reader. But I cannot hold out any longer. Here is Nicole’s Favourite Things: Sears Wish Book Edition, Part 1. Yes, dear reader, there will be more than one part. It’s a series! A series of Wish Book awesomeness. Let’s start with the “Gifts”, shall we?

Retro Gifts

I love these things. Didn’t we all have them when we were kids? I know I had that record player and the telephone. I clearly recall playing Clare de Lune over and over, and also having amazing pretend conversations on my chatter phone. However, I kind of think that if you’re looking to give these to your kids as gifts…well, let’s just say it might be more of a gift for yourself, you know? I’m not totally sure children would really love the chatter phone all that much, although, who knows? Maybe they like to pretend they’re living in the dark ages when we all had rotary phones. Actually I think my parents just got rid of their flesh coloured rotary phone recently. Not to mention my in-laws have my husband’s original TV radio and it still works; the kids used to listen to The Farmer in the Dell on it over and over when they were smaller. I’m not sure what I think of the $99 Coca Cola fridge. It seems a little bossy. Have a Coke – NOW. I don’t even like Coke. I haven’t had one in probably 30 years.

I don’t remember Hello Kitty being a thing when I was a kid. Everything on this page makes the practical side of me say this is landfill garbage; probably would break after one or two uses. The impractical, pink-deprived side of me says squeeeeee I need a Hello Kitty Cotton Candy Maker! Also, how cute is that dollhouse? Moving on.

 Dog Related Items


There is something amazing about a mug that says “I Like Big Mutts and I Cannot Lie”. Digression: if you had to have a theme song that would play every time you walked into a room – i.e., like Darth Vader – what would it be? Mine would be Baby Got Back. I think that would be epic.

Questionable Stocking Stuffers

Stocking stuffers for everyone on your list, says the caption, but I actually question this. Cake pop pans – MAYBE. But “Trendy Top” which is supposed to “Cover your waist, belly, and rear view” and then shows a picture of someone bending over and okay, there is probably a better way to tell someone that you can totally see their panties when they bend over and maybe they should cover up that belly, too, than putting such an item in their Christmas stocking. That said, I do think it’s a good idea, but maybe not for a gift? And do you see the white drill-like thing at the bottom? That’s an ear wax remover. Now, I just took Jake into the doctor to get his own severely impacted ear wax removed, and it was simultaneously revolting and fascinating, but I’m not sure that an Wax Vac Ear Cleaner would be well received as a present. Nor, maybe, an Expanding Hose and Hanger or a set of Sham-Wows. Or an Aaahh Bra, unless you knew that person very well and they requested it. I did buy one of those Hot Buns things from my hair salon, and it’s pretty cool, so maybe that would be a nice stocking stuffer.

Canadiana


A snowball maker and thrower, all in one! I haven’t really made snowballs in a long time but that seems fun, as does the Canada Beverage Survival Belt. I would totally buy one of those for my father-in-law; he would love it. The parrot corkscrew is kind of cute in a creepy-kitchy way.

File Under Hmmmm

For $29.99 a giant keyboard seems like a steal, although it’s lots smaller than the one from the FAO Schwartz in the movie Big. The tutu/ blanket set would be good although the sizing says “One Size Fits Most Girls”. That’s pretty gender specific, Sears. Hey, an Agent P clock radio! Say goodbye to your clock radio.

Probably Not

I have seen these hoodies on kids, and fine. Creepy, but fine. If I saw this on a grown man I’d dial 9-1- and then wait to be attacked. Sorry, grown men who are fans of skeleton hoodies that go over your face. These are not appropriate to wear while out and about unless you want people to profile you a certain unflattering way, the best case scenario being a guy who lives in his mom’s basement making youtube videos of his X-box cheat codes.

Say My Name!

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This weekend was a batten down the hatches, Pa, it’s a blizzard kind of weekend. We had tons of snow and since the winter tires are scheduled to be put on my van next weekend, I was pretty much trapped in the house. It had its upsides, of course, being that I pretty much spent all day Saturday cooking and washing dishes (hmmm…upside?) and all morning Sunday cleaning things, festively ordering holiday cards, doing online Christmas shopping, and creating calendars to give to the grandparents. I know that for a lot of people November is a very unpopular month, but I love it. It’s kind of cozy and has that nice pre-festive feeling to it.

To be honest, I’m glad that there was a ton of snow for another reason: death to all the moths. On Friday I was curled up on the couch with a glass of wine and a copy of Sense and Sensibility, when my husband brought the mail in. He picked up one of the magazines, and OUT FLEW A MOTH! I screamed and screamed, such that the dog scurried into his crate in terror and the boys came running upstairs to see who was ax-murdering their mother. The moth landed on a picture, and I screamed hysterically until my husband unceremoniously squished it. BRING ON THE SNOW, I SAY. I had to drink another three glasses of wine just to settle my nerves.

Fortunately the blizzard held off until after Halloween. I was pretty excited to have a very small Dalmatian darken my doorstep at 6:20, but mostly I just sat on the couch, bored, eating Rockets and staring at the dog. I had a grand total of seven trick-or-treaters, two of which gasped when I opened the door and exclaimed in awed tones It’s the book fair lady! I felt kind of Heisenberg-y. Say my name! You’re the book fair lady. You’re goddamn right.

But even with my book fair celebrity, we still had a ton of candy left over and the kids brought a ton of candy home, and so we are now a candy-full house. My sweet neighbour brought over some full sized chocolate bars and apologies for not being home; I forced Rockets on her. She tried to protest but I am indefatigable when it comes to forcing food on other people. I’m practicing for my future role as everyone’s benevolent grandmother. EAT, EAT. YOU ARE TOO SKINNY, EAT.

Speaking of grandmas, I made my grandma’s amazing, kind-of-like-crack gingersnaps this weekend. I only make them once a year, possibly because they are irresistable. They are a festive, wintry kind of cookie that I don’t seem to be able to bake during the summer. It’s not just the cookies and the snow that have got me feeling all Christmassy. I’m feeling especially festive since I am – wait for it – ALL DONE my Christmas shopping! I’m the goddamn book fair lady! Thanks to the miracle of online shopping plus a caffeine fueled 90 minutes at the mall this morning, I am FINISHED. My motivation for finishing early is the mall. Oh, how I loathe the mall during the holiday season. The thought of last minute shopping, or even December shopping, is enough to ruin my festive, happy feelings. The parking lot, for one thing, is the asphalt jungle of bitterness and resentment: sitting in traffic waiting for 20 minutes to turn into the parking lot, plus circling said parking lot just to find a spot, PLUS dealing with much rage and anger from other drivers all competing for the same spot. Not to mention the dry air of the mall which is chronically overheated from all the bad moods and outrage about long lineups. Shopping in November is just so much easier. While everyone else is stabbing each other over the last box of Godiva Holiday Truffles or the Hug Me Elmos (did you know Hug Me Elmo is a thing? Eeek.) I will be snuggled up on the couch with a big glass of wine, my copy of When Harry Met Sally, and a whole pile of endless Halloween candy.

Smell my feet!

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I do not know how this happened, but in addition to the box of 90 miniature Hershey’s bars that I purchased a few weeks ago, I somehow decided that this was a good idea:

Given that we average between five and ten trick-or-treaters a year, and, on a related note, since my kids are two of the very few that prowl our very unpopular street they are the recipients of massive neighbourly generosity, by tomorrow I predict that we will have approximately one thousand little candies in the house. I don’t know a) why I bought so much, or b) why I bought the one candy that I cannot leave alone – Rockets. Mmmm. Artificial dextrose-y goodness. They are also vegan. It should be part of their marketing slogan: vegan and gluten free! Really, the Rockets people should be calling me.

I was smart enough not to buy flats of chips, though. Those wouldn’t have even lasted the afternoon by the time I got through with them. Trick-or-treat! I’d answer the door, bloated, with chip crumbs all over my sweater.

And here it is, Halloween. I’m never on trick-or-treat duty, thankfully, so I can cozy up on the couch waiting for our five-to-ten visitors and calming the dog when said visitors ring the doorbell. My job will be done when I figure out how to get these costumes

over top of these coats.

And now you can see for yourself why I’m perfectly happy to curl up on the couch with a bag of Rockets. COLD. Also, kind of lazy.

I know it’s only Halloween, but my mind has gone straight from pumpkins to Christmas. Santa’s coming! In only 55 days! So of course my mind is on ordering Christmas cards and photo calendars to give as gifts, and my sister-in-law, god bless her, has sent me her children’s wish lists, complete with online shopping options. I love my sister-in-law. She gets me. A couple of glasses of wine, the laptop, and my shopping will be, by and large, done. Maybe I’ll even do my shopping tonight while waiting for little ghouls and goblins. Multitasking!

Speaking of multitasking, I spent yesterday afternoon at the hair salon, and while my colour was “processing”, as they say, I put 270 photos into an album. Apparently I’m the only person left on planet earth under the age of 70 who still prints photos and puts them in albums. Everyone is into photo books now, and that does seem like a more efficient solution, but what happens when I die and the kids want to give photos of their childhood to their respective offspring? Morbid, I know, but it is Halloween. Also, I like to send prints to various relatives and adhere them onto my refrigerator so I can look at some cuteness while I spend my endless days in the kitchen.

So it was a win all around; I have photos in album and I have nice hair now. A few days ago I was thinking I needed a wig, not because of Halloween, but because I truly loathed my hair. Here’s the before shot:

Those are my dad’s genetics, right there. Well, except for the forehead wrinkles, that seems to be my own special characteristic. Good thing my dad is so good about excavating dead mice from my house and being calm in the midst of my total hysteria, elsewise I might get cranky about being on a six-week colour cycle.

But here’s the after!

I gave my hair a little toss just to get that shampoo commercial feel. Although maybe I should have held off a couple of days AND bought fun packs of chips, just so I could scare small children at my door. THIS IS MY COSTUME, BAHAHAHAHA.

So eeeeeeevvillllllllll

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The Halloween Dance was all that anyone could hope it would be, and more. Well, except for the two women who showed up early, kids in tow, and complained bitterly that there was a charge. Even after my friend explained that the dance is, indeed, a fundraiser, they continued to complain about the $3 charge, the dollar that was charged per bake sale item, and the fact that there were minimum bids on items of a certain value at the silent auction. I tried to sweetly and gently explain the role of the Parent Association in our school – fundraising dollars going to classroom supplies and to sponsor certain clubs and committees – but the women refused to even look at me or acknowledge that I was speaking. It took some major self control to not put my face three inches away from theirs and say “LOOK AT ME WHEN I’M TALKING TO YOU.”

Other than those two, a good time was had by all. We raised lots of money – no thanks to Misses Crabby Pants who were also wearing total mom jeans, not that I’m being bitchy or anything, I’m just stating a fact, MOM JEANS – and the dance floor was packed all night long. Plus my kids were Luke Skywalker and Count Dracula, so that was fun.
 


Mark’s eyebrows are totally what mine would look like if I didn’t pluck them.

Do I look eeeeeeeevilllllllll?

It was beautifully warm on Saturday, followed by heavy snowfall on Sunday, which feels just right for October in Calgary. All of the shrubs that hadn’t yet lost all their leaves are now sadly bent over with the weight of the heavy, wet snow. It looks kind of pretty, even if it did wreck the nicest fall colours in recent memory.

We took advantage of the chilly day yesterday to carve pumpkins. Unfortunately one of them was kind of rotten, which meant that carving took a sudden gross turn. Normally I am the person in charge of gutting the pumpkins, and I normally save all the seeds for later roasting, but I was so disgusted by the rotting pumpkin flesh that we merely left all the seeds and goo inside. Well, they are frozen solid on our front step anyway, so what matter. Halloween is only a few days away!

They still look pretty cute though.

Do you notice anything strange about any of them? Anyone? First one to notice wins a prize. An eeeeevvvviiiillllll prize.

I Dreamed A Dream

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“Mom, do you have a dream?” Mark asked over breakfast the other day. I was only on my first cup of coffee so I wondered if he wanted to know what I dreamed about last night. I didn’t want to tell him I had a nightmare about a mouse crawling on the ceiling and then falling off into my bed, causing me to wake up with my sheets soaking wet with a freight train running through the middle of my head, or that I had a sexy dream about his father, and so I answered sort of vaguely. “No, I mean, do you have a DREAM. Like something you want.” He paused a moment, and then said quickly in a completely neutral voice “And please don’t say you want two awesome boys and wow, you already have them.” Jake chimed in, “Yeah! That’s what you always say.”

I told them that I always wanted a fluffy brown dog named Barkley, and they groaned. “Don’t you have a dream about doing something?” Mark asked. “Like, maybe making good caramel apples?”

That’s pretty rich coming from a kid whose attempt at making a bass guitar was a ripped kleenex box with a broken rubber band on it. On a related note, we had this conversation yesterday:

Mark: Guess who had the best social studies title page in the class?

Me: I’m guessing it wasn’t you.

Mark: You’re right. It wasn’t.

Jake: Me either! I suck at drawing.

Well, it’s good to have an accurate view of your strengths and weaknesses, no?

This has been a strange, very busy week. The kids had a PD day on Monday. Why, you may ask, why did they have the day off when the past Monday was Thanksgiving and why didn’t they have the PD day on the Friday before Thanksgiving the way they always do, why, why, why? Well, they did, and two four-day weeks in a row makes for a strange week. Besides, it’s the Halloween Family Dance tonight and it is, without a question of a doubt, the highlight of the school year for my kids. It’s all downhill from here, guys. I’ve been busy preparing for this as my girlfriend and I are coordinating a silent auction as a fundraiser, and in addition to the usual busyness that accompanies such an event, I’ve also been planning my costume. My friend and I are going as witches. But not like this:

Photo from partycity.com. This costume is on sale for FOURTEEN DOLLARS. A steal!


or this

Photo from partycity.com. This is the Sparkle Playboy Witch, which seems like an accurate name.

or even this.

Photo from partycity.com. Wear a good pair of panties if you wear this costume.

I’m not even sure that last one IS a witch. In any case, we will be regular mom-like witches tonight. At least for the dance…I’m thinking I might break out that $14 outfit for a little private Halloween party, if you know what I’m saying.

I kid. If I’m having a private Halloween party, I’m going to dress up like Fiona from Shrek.

Photo from partycity.com. I’m not kidding, you guys, this is Fiona from Shrek.
GO CHECK OUT THE PARTY CITY WEBSITE CLEARANCE SECTION. It’s a scream!

I love this time of year. It’s so much fun to look at costume websites and wonder just who is going to order them. They are almost always sold out of at least one size, so people ARE buying them. Clearly I don’t go to enough (or any, really) Halloween parties because I’m always amazed by the costumes. Can you imagine going to a party and seeing this?

Photo from partycity.com. This is $105!

MAYBE one might see this at a key party. Or hey, if you’re undecided this Marvin the Martian outfit is only $35!

Photo from partycity.com

Hilarious, yet kind of depressing, no? Go ahead and look at any costume website; the teen girl section is made up mostly of smaller versions of the skeezy looking women’s section. Whatever happened to getting your mom to make you a dress to look like Morticia Addams?

If I’m being totally honest, I would have totally worn some of those super short costumes when I was a teenager, if buying costumes was a thing back then and if I made more than $4/ hour working at Pizza Hut. I also would have probably given my father a heart attack, but then, that’s what teenage girls are for. Every single time my husband sees a teenage girl, he says “Somewhere, there is a dad going grey.”

Super Freekeh

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Today I was in the grocery store, and I noticed something in the grain/ cracker/ cookie/ ethnic food/ chocolate bar/ ice cream topping aisle. Does that seem like a strange combination of goods for one aisle in the grocery store? It does to me too. In any case, my friend and I were looking for quinoa, which is apparently an incredibly elusive ingredient for my old-people Co-Op, and I came across something called Freekeh. It’s super-freek-EH! I have had a loop of that song, plus Le Freak (or, Le FREEK) going through my head for the past couple of hours. I feel immense regret that I didn’t buy it, because although I do not know exactly how one prepares Freekeh, I feel I could have figured it out. What’s for dinner, Mom? Oh, we’re going to get a little FREEK-EH. The jokes could go on forever. Hilarity at the dinner table. Or, hilarity on my part. It’s probable that my children would be less than enthusiastic about my adventuresome culinary ideas.

It turns out that Freekeh is actually just a kind of toasted wheat, which is fairly anti-climatic.

Other semi-freekeh things:

1) Tonight is the first School Council/ Parent Association meeting of the year, and I have just taken my traditional offering of brownies out of the oven. CARAMEL brownies. I have never made such a thing before and possibly won’t ever again, but I have over a litre of caramel sauce in my fridge due to a small kitchen disaster yesterday, and I’m trying to find ways to use it up. This is a teaser for the full post which will be coming up next week over at the Yummy Mummy Club. Let’s just say that I now have more caramel than anyone really needs in their life, and that I keep finding small splotches of stickiness on the countertop, taps, cupboard handles, etc. I don’t even LIKE caramel.On another note, I have a cookbook giveaway going on – if you like baking, this is the book for you!

2) A few weeks ago, I put our decorative scarecrow family into the front garden, which is my traditional way of festively greeting autumn. Every single morning I pull open the living room drapes to let the sun shine in, and every single morning I gasp and have a little heart palpitation because someone is at the window.

If history is any indication, I will probably become used to my little ragged friend in the window once it’s time to take him down and put up the Christmas lights.

3) This is Rosie. She’s “my” scarecrow. The others are named Dummy Jimmy Too Tall, Idiot, and TV. I only named Rosie.

4) I bought a red sweater. I know. I bought it in a moment of passion and now it’s sitting in my drawer like a judgement.

5) After some discussion with my husband, I realized that I am not the romantic one in our relationship. This seems strange to me. And here I thought that not plucking one’s chin or upper lip in the presence of one’s husband was the ultimate in romanticism, but apparently that’s not enough. Well, he knew who I was when he married me, and that is someone who would much rather roll over and fall asleep immediately than engage in pillow talk for hours. Wham, bam, thank you sir.

6) Related: I think “boner” is the funniest word in the English language. If it was socially acceptable I would work it into every single conversation. Alas.

7) A yoga friend said to me the other morning that he wasn’t sure what I was doing on Sunday nights now that Breaking Bad is over. Nothing, Glenn. I am doing nothing. Mad Men doesn’t start up for months; I basically hate television now. Anyone want to recommend a show for me to become obsessed with? I hear House of Cards is good.