Peace and other dreams

Like many schools across the country, the school that my kids attend has been busy this week working on all kinds of projects to honor the life and work of Dr. Martin Luther King. K brought this particular project home today & I thought I'd share it with you...

Dr. King had a dream... Peace

My dream... is to pet a unicorn.

Clearly our dreams aren't as lofty as Dr. King's...

Hopefully we may someday fully realize his dream (I don't think K has much of a shot at achieving hers though).

Holiday recap

Happy New Year! I know I've been absent from the blog for awhile, but honestly I've been way too busy hanging out in my PJ's until 2:00 every afternoon to write anything. Now that the kiddos are back in school and Mr. Crackers has returned to work, I figured it was about time to get back in the saddle again.

We had a wonderful and relaxing Christmas. We got to spend lots of time with my parents, my Grandma, and uncles, aunts & cousins on both sides of the family.


As predicted, the lights on the Christmas tree continued to go dark until we were left with a single glowing strand on the very top of the tree by Christmas morning.

It didn't seem to dampen the children's enthusiasm though...





We've built a lot of Lego sets,

we've played a lot of Wii,

(and I managed to show my family how bad dancer I really am...and to think I used to go dancing a few times a week in my younger days. Thank goodness that was long before the days of smart phones and youtube!)

we've played lots of board games,

we celebrated C's 8th birthday (Wow! How is it possible that he is 8 years old?!)

we even managed to get out of our PJ's a few times and leave the house to go see the movie Tangled (which we all loved) and visit our local Children's Museum.

And the whole family actually stayed up until midnight on New Year's Eve to welcome in 2011 (even though I think Mr. Crackers & I would have happily gone to bed long before the ball dropped - the kids were wide awake). I fear that Dick Clark's countdown proved to be a little anti-climatic. I think the kids were expecting something a little more dramatic for all the hoopla associated with the holiday. Perhaps next year they'll decide they don't need to stay up quite so late (a girl can dream, right?!)

But all good things must come to an end. So this morning we all woke up at our "normal time", dressed by 7:30 (bye, bye comfy PJ's) and got back into the swing of things. Here's hoping 2011 proves to be just as wonderful as the year we left behind.

7 years ago

I thought it was time to share one of my favorite pictures with you again.

I will forever love this photo. It was taken seven years ago (wow!). We were a little surprised at his reaction since C was one of those babies who happily went to anyone. He'd let anybody hold him without becoming even the slightest bit bothered. When we first put him on Santa's lap he seemed fine, he was his normal smiley self. I think it was our backing away that elicited the scream seen in the picture above. My favorite part of the picture is the perfect smile on Santa's face despite the obvious distress of the wee child sitting on his lap. I remember seeing the pictures and wondering if we should order them - but they were so funny, we couldn't resist.

Clearly the experience did not scar my son. This picture with Santa was taken at the Christmas festival held at our church a couple of weeks ago. As you can see, C has definitely gotten over his Santa anxiety. In fact, he wore the red shirt, vest and hat with the express purpose of looking like the big guy. They chatted for quite some time.

We don't have any screaming pictures of K on Santa's lap because she wouldn't even let us get close to him until she was 2. After some coaxing and a chocolate candy bribe this Santa was actually able to touch her hand - but that was as close as she would come. There was absolutely no lap sitting.


This year all it looks like all of our Santa jitters are a thing of the past. In fact, I think this Santa was afraid my kids were never going to leave. This year the candy bribe was used to usher them off the stage so the next kids in line could have their turn. It's amazing what a few years will do.

A Christmas tour

I've noticed that this time of year that a lot of blogs I read take their readers on a holiday tour of their Christmas decorations. They all seem to link back to other blogs and everyone's pictures look to me like they came straight out of a design magazine.

My home clearly doesn't look like a designer had a hand in any of the decorating, but it is a pretty good reflection of our family. And while I have no plans to link my blog to any of those other ones, I kind of like the idea of logging my decorations here so that I can remember what I do from year to year. I have a terrible memory & every year when we break out the Christmas decorations I wander around & try to remember where everything goes. Those people with skill at home decoration may view this memory lapse as a chance to mix things up a bit, but for those of us without that particular talent it's like reinventing the wheel every year.

I figured if I actually record what I did this year, it'll help jog my memory a bit for next year. So if the thought of looking at Christmas decorations bores the pants right off of you, please feel free to skip this post & return another day. You won't hurt my feelings, honest.


So with all that in mind, let's being the tour ...


Our good friend KK sent us this nativity set a few years ago. We all love it & it sits in our entry way every year. It's really the only Christmas decoration that you see when you first enter the house. It's small and very simple and is after all what the season is all about. I love it.

Our dining room is really the first room that is really decked out for the holidays that you see when you come to the house.

I think last year I hung a bunch of ornaments from the dining room chandelier. I couldn't really remember which ornaments I hung last year or even how I did it, so this year I scaled back (or maybe I was just lazy) and decided to just hang one ornament. It's working for me though.

The bowl of ornaments on the dining room table. These may or may not be the ornaments that hung from the chandelier last year. In a bout of confusion I decided just to place them in a bowl this year. Festive and lazy yet simple. It seems to be my theme this year.

My parents bought the kids the advent calendar gingerbread house and the train from Kohl's this year. They are a big hit. What's not to love? They are adorable and behind every door is a chocolate surprise.

In the past I always bought those cardboard calendars from Trader Joe's and after the first few days of Advent we'd start forgetting to open the doors each evening. I think there have been years where we threw away the calendars after Christmas and there would still be chocolate inside them. With these new calendars that is not a problem at all. They wake up and immediately want to know if they can have a chocolate. It's all I can do to hold off them off until after lunch.

This is perhaps my kids' favorite Christmas decoration...the nutcracker. He is played with constantly during the season. It may be the best $15.00 I ever spent at Target. Yesterday I had to rescue a small Calico Critters bunny from his mouth. K assured me that the nutcracker wasn't trying to eat the bunny, the bunny was just tired and needed a place to sleep.

One of our favorite holiday traditions is making gingerbread houses. My parents buy the kits every year and my kiddos along with my sister's children spend an evening after Thanksgiving decorating the houses.

Not surprisingly, the kids love eating the decorations as much as they like making the houses. It's the one time of year they have unlimited access to so many sugary items. All of the kids kept looking at us with wonder as we allowed them to eat whatever candy they wanted as long as they continued to work on the houses.

My sister finally had to cut my niece off. All of the other kids had finished their houses and had gone off to play but she had figured out that the longer she decorated the more candy she could eat. Once my sister saw that every ounce of house had been covered with candy my niece was finally cut off from her sugar supply and dismissed to the other room.

It's become our annual kick off to the holidays and we all look forward to it every year.

This is my favorite nativity scene. It was made by C two years ago when he was in Kindergarten. It's just 3 small pots, some wooden beads and three pieces of cloth. Simple. Beautiful.

I probably should have taken this shot when we had an actual fire in the fireplace. It would have looked a bit more festive. The lights on the wreath were the only lights that worked as soon as we plugged them in this year. (Of course now that I think about it, I replaced the light strand on the wreath last year.)

If you are wondering what is up with the piece of wood blocking the fireplace opening, let me introduce you to one of Mr. Crackers' latest inventions. He made it last year. It is a piece of pink foam insulation that is attached to a piece of wood to appease his wife who hated the concept of pink foam as a focal point in the family room. Add a couple of handles so it can be easily removed and ta da... you have a something that is both practical and attractive. It may not look as warm as a fire, but it sure keeps out all those cold drafts when we don't have a fire blazing.

I love these 3 little snowmen on the mantle. My Mom found them in a catalog. So whimsical. They make me smile. Their hats seem to be "wiggled wildly with excitement" (to borrow a line from the Rob Scotten book Splat the Cat).

This picture contains the favorite ornaments of both Mr. Crackers & myself. Mr. Crackers' favorite are the white doves. He found the white "love birds" at Target a couple of years ago. He always puts them toward the top of the tree right next to each other. "These birds are Mommy & Daddy" he told the kids as he put them on the tree. How could I not love this guy?

One of my favorite ornaments is the Christmas moose in the top corner of the picture. He reminds me of the felt ornaments my Mom made that used to decorate our Christmas tree when I was a kid. Well, except for this moose is a bit more goofy. He makes me smile. I'm not sure what it says about us as a couple that our favorite ornaments are so very different. It kind of gives you a glimpse into our lives doesn't it? Poor Mr. Crackers.

All goofiness aside, I also love this ornament. The colors and glitter look beautiful against the twinkling lights of the Christmas tree. And speaking of lights...

Our tree...it actually looks better in the daylight than it does at night. The dark mid-section isn't quite as noticeable. Mr. Crackers and I keep waiting for the bottom strand to burn out too. It hasn't happened yet, but I feel certain it will soon. The only new strand on the tree is on the top and I feel confident it will be the only one still glowing on Christmas morning.

A giant snowman and his many minions. The more I look at this picture the more disturbing I find it. They kind of look like a terrifyingly cheery snow army... I didn't even remember that we had a Christmas salt and pepper collection. I'm not sure how this collection even came into being, but the kids love it, so it's staying.

For the last item on our tour, I need to give you a little bit of a back story. Last year at Sunday school K made a nativity banner. It was made from just 4 pieces of felt on a white background. It very simply conveyed the meaning of Christmas & I loved it. I think though that K found the banner to be a little too simple. So, she corrected the problem this year with a Sharpie she found on the kitchen counter.

I like the smiles on Joseph and Mary's faces. Jesus looks a little bit toothy for a newborn to my eye though. But what do I know? I wasn't there now, was I?

And that (for anyone who actually made it to then end of this post) concludes our tour of the House of Crackers. You'll be happy to know that now that I've done it once, you won't be forced to go on this tour again next year. Since I've taken pictures of where all the decorations go, it will hopefully look about the same from year to year. So we'll all be spared from going through this again. See everyone wins!

O Tannenbaum - the update

It appears as though we've lost yet another strand of lights on the tree. Oh well. We now have a tree that has gone completely dark around the middle but is still very brightly lit at the top and has one sad and lonely light strand at the very bottom. Not quite a Charlie Brown Christmas tree yet, but give us another week and we may get there. Seriously, someone needs to remind me to buy new lights next year.

In other news, we went on our annual Christmas decoration scavenger hunt this evening & had a great time. We stole the idea from a man that Mr. Crackers works with and it's become an annual tradition around here. There are a few items we never can seem to find, but it's still fun to try.

Here's our list if you want to go on a scavenger hunt of your own:

Santa Claus
Mrs. Claus
Rudolph
Reindeer
Elf
Snowman
Penguin
Polar Bear
Charlie Brown
Snoopy
Grinch
Tigger
Winnie the Pooh
Mickey Mouse
Angel
Ice Skater (we've never found one...maybe you will have better luck)
Sleigh
Car
Motorcycle
Train
Snow Globe
Sled
Star
Christmas Tree
Ornament
Wreath
Bow
Candle
Bell
Present
Candy Cane
Manger
Hanukah Lights
Icicle Lights
Palm Tree
Cross
Nutcracker
Snowflake

Hope you have as much fun hunting for decorations as we do.

O Tannenbaum

Last Thursday we headed out to get our Christmas tree.

Every year I imagine our whole family driving out to a local farm to pick our own Christmas tree. I dream of us looking around at all the beautiful trees around us and settling on one that catches our collective eye. It is beautiful and full and fragrant.... And then we chop it down, strap it to the top of our minivan and haul it home where it will spend the rest of its short life decorated with white lights and sparkly ornaments.

But then as December comes, reality sets in. I look at our busy calendar and remember how cold December in Ohio can be. So instead of driving out to a farm, we head to our local home improvement super store to pick a tree.

Once at the store, a yearly pattern emerges. Mr. Crackers holds up a tree & says "What do you think?". Our son C is usually not even in the same row with us. He's typically running around, so hopped on Christmas tree fever that he can't even stand still long enough to look at any tree for more than 1.2 seconds. Meanwhile K is bundled up in her winter coat with her hat covering most of her eyes & the collar of her coat up over her nose. You can't really even see her face as she continually complains, "I'm cold!".

Once Mr. Crackers has the tree in his hands, I keep asking both kids, "What do think guys? Is this the one?" From the next aisle over C shouts "Yep, that's the one Mom". While K gives me a muffled, "I'm still cold! Can we go home?"

I try and give the tree a critical look while shouting "C, please come over here. Stay where I can see you please! Stop running around like a maniac!" Finally I say, "I feel like we should look at another one, before making our decision."

This goes on for about 15 minutes as Mr. Crackers continues to patiently hold up tree after tree while C runs around the store, K whines about the cold and I say, "Hmmm...I'm not sure this is the one. Maybe just one more."

Finally I reach a point where the whining and running start to wear on my patience and I decide that whatever tree Mr. Crackers is holding is the tree we are buying. Not necessarily because it is the prettiest or the most full. Simply because he is holding that particular tree when I decide it's time to go.

Thankfully, most of the time we've gotten pretty lucky. I mean, once you put lights and ornaments on a tree it typically looks really good, even if it isn't very full and has huge gaps that are missing branches. Put enough ornaments and lights on it, and usually looks just like every other Christmas tree we've ever had.

Once we bring the tree home, it is my job to put the lights on it each year. I am a crazy person about lights. I like a lot of lights on the tree, but I don't like to see the wires. I go nuts when I can see too many wires (insert Mommy Dearest joke here). Because of this lunacy it takes me a bit of time to get the lights on the tree. I blame this problem on my Dad who was afflicted with this same issue in my childhood. I remember waiting and waiting for what seemed like hours for him to get all of the lights on the tree. I also remember complaining about how long it took him to get the lights up.

So in a twist of irony and fate, I now do the same thing to my kids. Kind of... Since according to Mr. Crackers it is "EXTREMELY PAINFUL" to watch me put lights on the tree, I try to get the lights on when no one is around. That way, I get to take my time and be a true maniac about wrapping the strands of lights around each branch I come to. And the kids and Mr. Crackers don't have to watch me do it while continually asking, "are you done yet?" See, everybody wins!

Usually, putting the lights on the tree takes me a couple of hours. But since I am listening to Christmas music and am thoroughly wrapped up in the task, the time usually goes pretty quickly. This year though for some reason EVERY STRAND OF LIGHTS THAT WE OWN STOPPED WORKING! I know that sometimes I am prone to exaggeration, but I am telling you the truth. It was both incredibly frustrating and really odd. So, a job that normally takes 2 hours, took me ALL DAY!

Thankfully though last year we bought this tool:

O Light Keeper Pro Bulb Tester and Repair Tool, how I love thee!

Although it took quite a bit of time, my handy light repair tool and I finally got all but one of the strands working again. Admittedly there were quite a few bulbs out on each of the newly repaired strands, but since each strand had about 200 lights, they still glowed brightly. And honestly, I was just happy that I got the strands to work again. Now I know most normal people upon finding that their strands of lights were no longer working would just truck their hiney over to their local Target to buy new strands of lights, but as you now from reading this blog I am not normal.

So it was with a sense of pride (and also a bit of leftover frustration) that I finally announced to my family late in the afternoon that the lights were on and tree was ready to decorate.

We spent a really nice Friday evening decorating the tree and looking at all of our ornaments. While picking the tree may not have been a warm family moment, decorating the tree definitely falls into that category. Once we are done decorating, everyone shares with the family their favorite ornament and I think everyone's favorite changes every year. Decorating the tree is always one of my favorite things to do during the Christmas season. Maybe that is why I am such a lunatic about the lights.

As I came down the stairs the next morning, Mr. Crackers looked at me and said, "I have to tell you something. But first I want you to look me in the eye and take a deep calming breath. Are you calm?"

"Well, I was a moment ago before you started freaking me out What is going on?!"

"I just need you to be calm. Are you calm?"

"Holy cow! Just tell me what is happening! Is everyone OK?"

"Look at me. Just promise me you won't freak out."

"WHAT. IS. IT!"

" OK. Here it is. A strand of lights just went out on the Christmas tree".

"Oh. Is that all?! Geez, you had me really freaked out there for a second. I thought something awful had happened. A strand of lights huh? That's OK. Geez."

And it was. I'm not sure if that was his plan or not, but in terms of all of the terrible things that could have happened, the darkening of a strand of lights on the Christmas tree wasn't even a blip on my radar screen. So I may be a lunatic, but at least I have my priorities in order. Whew, dodged a bullet on that one.

Then two nights ago another strand blew out. Oh well. Our tree may be getting a bit darker, but it's still really beautiful.

Just remind me next year to get new lights.

simple color

Ta-da!

Here's a preview of this year's Christmas card.

I took the picture when we were outside decorating the big tree & Mr. Crackers & I liked it so much that we decided to go with it as our card this year. And as an added bonus Mr. Crackers & I (and even more importantly our family photograper -- also known as my Dad) all get to take a year off trying to get all 4 of us to look in the right direction while smiling. A task that often took few glasses of wine to recover from.

In Living Color Christmas Card

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View the entire collection of cards.

I even managed to get it ordered before December (by the skin of my teeth). Now I just need to get them in the mail...

Thankful

Today I am thankful for more than I can possibly say. The older I get, the more I realize how truly blessed I am. I am grateful for my health, the smiles and laughter of my children, the love of my husband, the strength of my family, and the friendships of those whom I see everyday as well as those that are separated from me by miles.

I am thankful for friends who have come home safely to their families after bravely serving their country overseas and grateful to all those I don't know who are still serving so far away from their loved ones.

I am thankful that I live in a country that celebrates the freedom of its citizens and sets aside a day each year so that we can remember how truly blessed we are.

Happy Thanksgiving from the House of Crackers!

A change in personal style

I feel as though we've turned a corner sometime over the past couple weeks here at the House of Crackers. I've started noticing that the closer we get to K's 5th birthday, the more she seems to be moving away from her fascination with princesses and all things pink and sparkly.

My first clue that things were changing came a little more than a week and a half ago. After getting at least 2 years of wear, I decided it was finally time to suck it up and purchase a new winter coat for K this year ( 3/4 length sleeves just didn't seem like they'd work to well for playing in the snow). One of my favorite retailers was having a pre-season sale & I happened to have a gift certificate for this particular store burning a hole in my wallet, so we decided to go ahead and purchase her new coat now instead of waiting until the weather actually dropped below 70 degrees.

I gave her two of options to choose from but both of the coats I had picked were pink. As long as I can remember pink has been her favorite color. When given a choice between pink and any other color, K always picks pink. Imagine then my surprise when she asked to see one of the coats in blue. When I showed it to her I was sure she'd decide that pink was the way to go, but instead she said that she wanted the blue one. "Are you sure?" I asked. "Yep. I like the blue. It's pretty" she said.

Then she surprised me again by picking blue snow boots (I know it's early...but seriously once I started to pick out the winter gear I couldn't stop myself).

The coat came in the mail today, and I tell you she was just as excited about the blue today as she was when she picked it out last week. What is happening here?

My final hint that things are a changin' was this week when she finally selected her Halloween costume. Ever since the Halloween catalogs started arriving in our house back in early July she's picked a different costume for herself every day. And all of them have either been sparkly or fairy themed or included a skirt made from boatloads of of tulle (I should also add that most of her favorite costumes have also been priced well above $60.00, which is a lot more than her mother is willing to spend on any item of clothing for either of her children) .

But this week she made her final costume decision and she didn't change her mind no matter how many times I asked her what she wanted to be for Halloween. Instead of the princesses or the pink sparkly costumes she formerly dreamed of, she instead picked out this costume...





Holy black vinyl Batman! If that's not a dramatic shift in personal style than I don't know what is. Hmm. I have decided to focus on the fact that Batgirl is a strong and powerful female crime fighter rather than the fact she wears a relatively short skirt made of shiny black vinyl.

I am hoping that perhaps this change in preference may be somewhat influenced by my son C. A couple of weeks ago he had decided that he wanted to be a superhero for Halloween because he liked the fact that all of those costumes came with lots of padding to simulate muscles. He had been bouncing between Superman, The Flash and Spiderman for the past few days, but once K made her decision, he finally settled the matter...



So, fear not, the streets of Gotham will be safe this Halloween (until around 7:30). You can rest assured that both kids will be carrying flashlights and wearing glow necklaces this year while they make their rounds collecting candy. Nothing says responsible parenting quite like sending both of your young kids out trick-or-treating in black costumes.

Weekend update with Mrs. Crackers

Before I get too far, I wanted to give you an update on the status of all the summertime household projects that I mentioned in a previous post. If I had the time on Saturday morning to do a little blogging, I would have told you that I finally finished painting all of the shutters and that I had high hopes that by the time Mr. Crackers returned to work Tuesday morning that I would have the back door completed too.

A few short hours later it became clear that my painting karma had gone terribly awry and I'd end the weekend without a single painting project crossed off my to-do list. The first bit of bad news came as Mr. Crackers was getting ready re-hanging the last two shutters on the house (#3 on his to do list for the weekend, right after re-shingling the playhouse...Mr. Crackers is no slouch when it comes to project completion unlike yours truly).


What I should probably mention here is that when Mr. Crackers was removing the shutters from the house so I could paint them, one broke (I would have probably broken all of them if I had been taking them down...I was very happy that we only lost one in the whole removal process which was very tricky and involved using sharp tools while on an extension ladder). So, I ordered a pair of replacement shutters online (apparently you can't buy just 1 shutter) and painted them just like I painted all of the other shutters.

They all looked really good with the new paint on them. That is, they all looked really good until Mr. Crackers uncovered a problem with the new shutters (thankfully) before he hung them on the house. He had stacked them on top of one another so that he could drill holes to mount them, and as he pulled them apart from one another lots of paint began peeling off the shutters. So much paint was peeling that in about a minute and a half we had peeled half of the paint on one of the shutters using only our hands. Clearly something had gone terribly wrong. As I looked more closely at the new shutters now back to their original unpainted status, I realized that I had forgotten to prime them ....duh!


So, if you happen to drive by the house today (and let's be honest it'll look the same if you drive by the house next week too.) this is what you'll see. A nice house with freshly painted shutters on most of the windows...








Oh well...




I also tried to finish painting the backdoor, with different yet similarly troubled results. I spent a lot of time sanding and priming the door before I began painting it. Between kids and dogs, the door had seen quite a bit of damage done to it over the past 6 years, so I knew it needed a bit of TLC before painting. After a few hours on Saturday afternoon, I got it nice and smooth & took Mr. Crackers up on his offer to take it off it's hinges for the first coat of paint.

What I didn't think about was that the strong sun and accompanying heat wave that had hit us in the Midwest made painting the door in direct sunlight where we placed it on the patio a really dumb idea...Really. Dumb. Of course, I began thinking about it in earnest as the paint began drying almost as quickly as I was applying it so that I managed to immediately botch the smoothing technique I had completed only hours before...

At that point I put the brush down and just walked away. It seemed the best course of action after such a dissapointing day. Once I could face it again, I came back and finished the first coat of paint on the door (in the shade). Even though it's not as smooth as it could have been if I had been paying a little more attention to my surroundings, I think I still like color. And hopefully no one else will notice that the paint is a bit lumpy in places...(or if they notice maybe they won't mention it to me).







Oh well...



The good news is that the rest of the weekend (the non-project portion) went really well.

We did all of those things that make a Fourth of July weekend typically American. We got to go swimming, attend a cook-out, watch an local Americana parade, and of course get to see some fireworks.


We even went to a local amusement park for an afternoon of fun




We rode our favorite rides





And visited our favorite characters

We even managed to meet up with some friends and cool off a bit on the log flume ride.

Despite all the painting setbacks, I still consider the weekend a success.

2009 - The year in pictures...

Last year I did recap of the year in pictures. Since I can't really think of anything better to do this year, I've gone ahead and done it again. Here is the year in pictures from the House of Crackers.

January - Fun in the snow!

February - Family goes on a Disney Cruise...pictures go missing from Mrs. Crackers' hard drive. Imagine cute (yet mischevious) children smiling in front of blue carribean skies. (I think I know what I will be doing this afternoon. Something tells me I will be trying to recover files from my recycling bin. oops!)

March - Finally a warm day! C celebrates by wearing cones on his head.

April - A perfect day at the zoo.

May - A Mother's Day weekend shopping trip!




June - K playing in the sand on family vacation in Hilton Head.

July - A visit with cousins...Mia & Aidan come for a week of fun.

August - C plays soccer... season seems to last 6 years.

September - K is finally old enough to take ballet lessons...there is much rejoicing!

October - A visit from our good friend Karen

November - A great smile from K on a beautiful fall day.

December - A holiday hug that warms a Mom's heart. For a moment all is quiet in the House of Crackers until C decides to grab K's new present from her for a closer look.

Happy New Year from the House of Crackers. May 2010 bring you health, peace & happiness!