Wednesday, December 26, 2012

Intestinal Sink and Lovely Christmas Eve, Maybe

It's raining again soft and sweet. Christmas Eve was absolutely beautiful with big puffy clouds and the fields everywhere are so green. It only takes a couple months from late July through the end of September that all of this area looks a bit like a desert.



We see pictures of lush green Utah, Colorado, Arkansas, and and so many other places family and friends live, during the summer...  and think can California be uglier? It seems we forget this renewal that comes with just a little rain. Our mountains look like the "Emerald City" in 3-D even in late December. The rain has been already been a special Christmas present.


Our family trekked over to my daughter's house in Fillmore for Christmas Eve dinner and celebration.


Her lovely and lively home has been an early present for their family. I never, ever thought one of my family would be living in Fillmore and uptown on Blaine, near "Pole Creek."

We put lights on our FJ but in Daylight They're pretty Dim

Fillmore Has a Beautiful Pink Moment, too. This is My Daughter's Yard
It was wonderful to see her beautiful decorating style and feel so cozy there. It's one of those houses that as anyone that walks-in, you can feel this home has been a happy place.


 There were only three other families that lived there and my daughter knows all about the first ones that built it in 1910 with all the boys, and personally knows the other two families. The best part of living in small Southern California town.

Is There Something Odd About This Nativity?
My daughter didn't want to leave her people out of the gathering at the stable. If you guessed she's Norwegian, that's from her dad and her sense of humor from her Grandpa Doug or Grandpa Gene.

We changed tradition on our usual Christmas menu of tamales and candies, and pie and had a small informal Italian meal with a sweet sugar cookie. The kids were busy playing quietly in the open room next to the large "great" room that all of us hung-out. No sweets were a great idea for children. The kids all played together without a whimper or one argument No one talked of presents and there weren't many under the tree. My Kiely's presents, the crocheted hats for all the children, were "The Hit!"

Close-up of The Owl Hat Below


The time spent visiting with each other and our two missing kids in other states was our best part of Christmas Eve. We used our phones via Tango and our other two kids talked to each other facing the phones to each other. Does that makes sense? Honest, I know this isn't new, but I'm still amazed.  I love this part of the new technology. The visit and pictures were great!

My Son is Missing, He's On Duty At The Fire Station

I know all of this may sound completely boring compared to my usual posts here on "Danger Ranch." Well, of course there was drama! Our son's very secret girlfriend came to my daughter's house for Christmas Eve. My son was on-duty at the station. She was so brave, and my son was probably freaking-out. She's so sweet and darling all of us were nervous. What if we acted even a bit normal, it would scare her off? I dressed-up in "church clothes" and thought if I should wear a thick rubber-band on my wrist so if I was even tempted to talk at all I would snap it hard without anyone noticing. That simple hard snap could prevent me to say something weird. I forgot to do that just as we got on the road and on our way. Uht-oh.

I was nervous, and my stomach started to hurt and for some crazy reason, I started getting sick. I told my husband and thought it was the gluten in the wheat bread. (Does gluten get blamed for every ill-effect?) Anyway, my whole mind was focused on my system. Except, it didn't stop me.

Honestly, what prompts this conversation?  I asked my son's super secret girlfriend, possibly the "love of his life" about her new house having a sink that unfortunately looks like a pile of intestines. Oh my gosh, I could've slapped myself. The picture of her new house and this particular sink is, I think, misleading, like a optical illusion. It's a sink in the kitchen that has the shape of grapes. I can only guess that maybe because of the granite or textured counter the sink has a real different color, like guts.

Intestinal Sink
Why did I mention that? It's a brand new house on the beach, on the water, and magnificent! I ask about her funny sink. Here's other pictures just so I don't give this wonderful house something to take away from it's absolute awesomeness.



It's Got Even a Huge Master Bedroom Fireplace!
Very Wonderful Place, House, and Yes! And, Her Dock For Her Big Boat
I had to add the pictures of her house because it is so nice!
I quit talking real fast because everyone wanted to know about the sink. She had to take-out pictures.

I was getting more nervous about being sick and we left at a normal time, but I was completely not myself. I didn't even thank my daughter and her husband for her wonderful dinner and having us all there. My husband, my daughter and son-in-law wanted to see the Christmas lights and we lasted only about 15 minutes until I was begging to get home. I had to go home, now.

I didn't have a gluten problem I was getting the flu. My husband has had it and was just getting over the flu, but I had "the flu shot."  How? It's Christmas Eve and I have a headache so bad, I can't be sick!

My Steve completely understood and gave me the sympathy I needed and I tried to have a normal Christmas morning I made my family  "eggie pancakes" and bacon, but in just a little while, I was back in bed. I slept through Christmas. My kids here couldn't understand and wanted me to get-up Christmas evening to go to the fire station to see my Steve. We all love Christmas at the fire station.

The station was full of tamales and lots of food and that included frozen yogurt and even better ... great friends and family were down there. No amount of bribing and guilt was going to move me. Steve even wanted me to come down, he said that all the firemen and family are getting over the flu, so it was all okay. One thing, I wasn't getting over was the flu. I, full-on had it.

I did see all the pictures of my grandchildren and their wonderful Christmas pictures. I'll have to post some tomorrow or the next day. We're going to watch the movie "Brave". This grand kid in Laramie, got a beard made by Kiely for Christmas. Jax loves it and he looks like he belongs on "Brave."


So my family let me sleep more and had a great time and after leaving the fire station, they ended-up at the movies.

I know they had a great time. I'm so glad I stayed in bed because I feel better today.  I do still have a headache and hurting shoulders but Tylenol has now fixed it.

Time for me today to just enjoy the season and my family here. I WILL go to the fire station today. Could it be some don't rest and the flu takes longer to get over?

I know I'll hear about the now famous sink debacle. (I've never written that particular word, but it fits)  I will be hoping and praying that I personally didn't damage my son's secret girlfriend's feelings and relationship.

Our visits with her probably will be limited for awhile. Maybe for a long while, like forever. No wonder, she's secret. My son has to know if she knows me, she'll really understand why my son is, who he is. He wanted to show me pictures of her new house but he showed me picture of  "the intestinal sink" first! And, he said, "Look at this cool sink, it looks like a pile of intestines." Only my son.

Monday, December 24, 2012

Wow! I'm Really Early For Christmas


Just listening to the lovely rain, at 2:30 am. I'm not usually awake. But I went to bed so early this evening because it was so dark and the house was cold. I had hoped our electric blanket had been able to resurrect itself and start working again. I changed the setting from high to "8" and it did work! I had my own little miracle and so grateful for a warm bed.

I was going to look at Twitter, read the news, check my children on Facebook, but our bed was so cozy, I fell right to sleep. And now, more than 8 hours later, I'm wide awake.

I'm enjoying soft, sweet music, listening to the rain, and thinking about what today will be like and Christmas Day.

I didn't put-up one single decoration for Christmas. Steve put the tree up and my grand daughter gave me the lovely wreath. I was really in the "mood" of Christmas. But, I was very, very much trying to make all the Christmas gifts... and what I couldn't make,  Kiely was helping by making cute and stylish hats. So fun working together and so blessed Kiely and Matt could come down and share Christmas with us.

My goal was to make each family a "Family Yahtzee" game. I ended-up being rushed because our saw didn't work, my Steve had to borrow one and ripped a 2x4 to make the blocks. Okay,  our sander is missing and we looked everywhere! Steve often goes to his mother's house and she said that she needed to give him his dad's sander.

Yay! He brought the sander home and it wasn't a day later we found-out that the sander belonged to our brother-in-law. Steve's nephew was working on something down at Steve's mother's house and left it there. Oops! I guess the sander Doug used so much, went away a long time ago. Steve jumped in the car and took the sander right back. Kinda' funny.

I sanded the blocks by hand, but all the blocks were still needing so much more. I decided to cover the slivery blocks with Mod-Podge and cute papers and then put the faces on each side corresponding with matching paper I picked for each person(s) or thing.


A couple family's don't have six children or not through completing their family ...  so I substituted the Temple, heart for love, etc. I made for each face or object 6 times and Mod-Podged it all together. Our weather has been really wet this year, so I had a long drying time. The paper background really helped me keep the pictures in order. I turned and pasted and turned and pasted, so every picture went on a certain paper.



I Liked The Black Grunge Frame Like Instagram Photos

The Fan Is On The Right Side To Help Drying


We made each  individual family their own score sheet and laminated one to keep with a bunch of paper copies. I just used a copy of a Yahtzee sheet and erased what didn't work and added the names in with the Photoshop. It wasn't easy, but it fit an 8x11 sheet of paper and we cut the excess on the sides off.

This is the Biggest I could Get The Game Scoresheet. Just use a Photo-editing program and add text to the points in both "Upper Section" and "How To Score"

I went back to the blocks and painted each side with "Triple Coat" Diamond Glaze. The blocks look like glass. I made some pedants for the girls and used "Enviro-Tech" resin glaze. Wish I had used that product on the blocks. They would be water-proof. It's okay.. The best part, if they have a baby and want to add more like another face on each of the blocks, the "Diamond Glaze" is only $3.50 a bottle and 40% off if you have a coupon. Just a matter of gluing a picture over the each side and adding a coat and wait 24 hours and add another coat for a glossy-look.I had the fan on the cubes because our humidity and cold house made the time longer to set the blocks coating to a completely dry touch. No tacky blocks here.

I bought bags cheaper than I could make them to hold each game. I did send two sets off already, but now I hope I separate all the families correctly. Hummm, should I mix them up a little so they think I'm losing it?

I know we still need to laminate a couple family's scorecards. Hope the business store's open today. Nothing could have changed the timing on my making these. I had to wait. I waited for the wood, I waited to see on families (more on that later), I waited on the computer to be fixed so I could layout the scorecards, and lastly, get each the latest family picture using the cute family Christmas cards.

I made the pendants last minute, too. I was trying to replace Kiely's graduation necklace because the magnet part was too heavy. I had the supplies, so she picked the little designs or pictures. I didn't want to throw-away any unused resin, so I just kept making pendants. That was fun! "Enviro Tech" has a You Tube video to do the pendants and they turned-out perfect. I think Diamond Glaze does too. I should've watched it.

Here's my daughter's present: Yahtzee and Pendants
The young men grandchildren are receiving a couple boxes of "Fruity Pebbles" cereal that is not given at home and quite the "junk" food cereal for breakfast. No worries for affecting schoolwork, they'll have the cereal gone before school starts-up again.

I gave a lot of scarves as gifts this Christmas. I've been knitting through-out this year and everyone actually needs warm around their necks, right now.  Go figure--no hot "East Wind" this year. We did have that only one East Windy day, but it was cold.  As years have gone by, the change has gone from almost 90• twelve years ago and Steve was always on fire calls to now, gradually an earlier rainy time.

It's still sweetly raining, I'm warm. We managed to skip all the money problems Christmas used to bring.

Our focus continues to be on the the birth of Our Savior. This morning my family will be out "in-force" giving-out baskets to the poor and needy. My Marnie spent yesterday's Sabbath afternoon giving blankets to the homeless in town. My heart is glad that she, and my sweet children are worried about the cold weather for others without judging. They're really looking forward to this morning's "Christmas Basket Run."
Rotary Christmas Baskets
Our family had the fire department flatbed and our FJ with a trailer. It was a very emotional experience with my family. I'm not sure of all the little ones, but the older and way older, touched my family in a way Christmas is suppose to be like with no-judging-love, kindness to all, and with examples from Jesus in the Scriptures. Giving is what The Savior would want us to do at Christmas. The "Spirit of Christmas" in my children is like no other gift I could ever receive. Merry Christmas!