My Cat My Conscious

She is lying on my desk ready to convey words of wisdom through her eyes.  When I walk in the room after grueling hours of school work with the kiddos she stands to greet me.

She has kept my laptop warm and managed to knock every pencil and my camera cord onto the floor.

She decides that sharing my work space is not an option and she jumps onto the bed and stares at the side of my face.  I hear her thoughts...

"Are you really going to play on that thing, rather than fold these clothes?  If it will help you to change your mind, I'll rub on them and toss them to the ground, too.  Then the dogs can run back and forth across them."

"Reading this book about the history of cotton would be a much better use of your time."

"Are you listening to me?  Or shall I push your ice tea off the desk?"

"I give up...you are impossible and I need a cat nap.  I hope you don't mind if I knead the pages of this book until I drift off."

Now that she has quit staring at me I'll get busy posting my new Chocolate Gingerbread Waffle Recipe.

Christmas Nostalgia

My grandmother had the patience of Job.  In addition to making porcelain dolls, all of their clothes and accessories, and ceramic figurines, she also created Christmas ornaments.  This was a year round activity and her attention to detail was incredible.  When I married I received a box of these beauties in the mail.

 This hobby gave her an unnatural attraction to bead stores.  My sister recalls indulging her with a trip to one, and it was quite painful to wait while Grandma spent hours (no joke) choosing the best beads to purchase that day.

Although, they are fraying and showing a bit of tarnish they are still beautiful to me.  And when we finished decorating the house this year I was feeling nostalgic and missing my Grandma.  After a long day of unpacking Christmas boxes, rearranging furniture, fighting cheap strings of lights, and vacuuming the floor free of all needle debris, I settled down on the couch with a cup of coffee to enjoy the Christmas scene. 

My first thought was, "Wow!  With the fire blazing this looks like a Norman Rockwell image, or one of these houses in the village I set up under the tree."

When I glanced at the children sitting in the room with me I knew that we'd never make the Rockwell-image cut.

My oldest daughter had her face buried in her laptop and my son was nodding his head to the beat of the music streaming from his ipod.  This got me to wondering.

A few days later on a trip to Savannah, I decided that the older image of the holidays, free of advanced technology, wasn't lost completely.

Wouldn't this scene fit in nicely under the tree with the rest of my Christmas village?

The Ginger Turns 18

Today is the birthday of my oldest daughter.  She has decided that she wants to be a pilot and as a birthday present she got to take a flight with a friend of a friend.  Here she is with her father moments before loading the plane.  Yep...they both look 18 years older than they did on December 8, 1993.

She learned how to get into the plane.

And then she grinned as though she was four years old again.

They were not quite as big as the jet behind them.

Ah...the smile (well enhanced by braces a few years ago) returns.  The orthodontist called her his greatest achievement.  I'd say it was well worth it.

And they were off...

Time sure does fly.  Could it be that my vampire baby (she never woke before midnight and was back asleep before the sun rose) is now an adult?

Much love to my sweet Ginger.  We are so proud of you.  Now I just need to figure out how many Hail Mary's I'll need to say, and how many cats I'll need to sacrifice in order to keep you safe as you pilot yourself through the air.

Trip to Savannah

So, I am in Savannah with Bloodhound.  The oldest girl is taking care of our wee kids so that we can get away for the day.

It is a beautiful day and Christmas is everywhere.  Ahh....a much needed break.  I am drinking a hot tea and sitting in a square, for which the city is famous.

And then I get a picture of the kids from the babysitter/sibling.

Followed by realizing that this is her Facebook status:


I told the kids to go outside and play while I did algebra, and things were very quiet... Too quite. Then I heard, "Put your helmet back on!" Curious, I looked outside to see my brother about to push his little sister (who was wearing a life jacket and a barbie helmet) over a home made ramp in a wagon. I yelled, "CHILD HAVE YOU LOST YOUR MIND?! She could break her neck!" To which I get, "but I didn't break my neck when I tried it!" .... Maybe this is natural selection, but not on my watch. Remind me not to have kids.


Do you think I should go home?

How Long Until Christmas Break?

We are reading the 2nd book in the Chronicles of Narnia, "Prince Caspian" as a family.  There are many aspects of this series, which begins with "The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe," that I have enjoyed since reading all seven books in the 8th grade.  Reading C.S. Lewis' description of the magical talking trees has really intrigued me and I asked my oldest daughter to choose a tree from our woods and give it a human personality as a writing assignment.


She chose this tree.

Meet Norm:

Norm is old, hunched, and unattractive with no trace of youth.

He spends most of his time in the yard working with pinecones

and other yard debris and constantly reminding the youngsters

who drive by to slow down. He doesn't like kids very much, his

patience for them has come and gone--they stress him out too

much now.

His friends know better, by now, than to ask him if he'd like

assistance decorating for the holidays, and four legged

creatures feel more fondly towards him than he'll ever

feel back.

For the most part, Norm just wants to live the rest of his

oaky life watching the rest of the world go by, at 15mph...

With no dust.

If you look at Norm from this direction you can see that he is nearly dead, as the bulk of his trunk is hollow.  One small branch that extends out toward the marsh is all that is living.

I laughed about her anthropomorphic story and we stopped school work in order to eat lunch.  As I scrubbed the potatoes my mind wondered and suddenly this spud started to take on manatee like characteristics.  With the addition of a few well placed cloves and a little whisker carving, this oddly shaped potato now looks like Spudly the Manatee.

The kids' reaction, although they thought this was funny, indicated that I had fallen off the cliff to insanity.  The good news?  Only ten more days of school until the Christmas break.

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