Baby Duck...

I was a little bummed when my strong silent mysterious man didn't want to go to our town's night Christmas parade.

But I got over it really quick when our Duck friends called and asked if we would watch their littlest duck while they went to the parade?  Uh YES!!!

We were pretty excited to have a little foot in our house.  It's been a while!

She wasn't quite sure what to think at first.

So brainiac decided to try and get her to do her new fuchy face.

You can tell by the look on her face, she wasn't impressed and not in the mood.  Shortly thereafter followed by a full blown cry!

Way to go, big guy!

She got over it and we were entertained by a very content and happy baby!  Those are the best kinds.

Well except for maybe the sleeping ones :)

Ward Christmas Breakfast 2011...

This morning was our annual Ward Christmas Breakfast...

So I was trying to remember to get photos to send to the missionary.

And I was doing pretty good until I used up my entire card recording the now famous and most requested musical rendition of the Twelve Days of Christmas.

But I managed to get a few shots... I am hoping others will donate their photos to the cause so I can send them to him to enjoy.

 It was a cute hat day for the babies :)

 Jacob loves the babies...

But most of all, he will LOVE this one... It's total a Kodak moment!

We will call this materpiece... "Christmas Oranges"!

It's actually the title to one of the missionaries favorite books... his Aunt Patsy used to send him a Christmas book every year and he has quite a collection now for when he has a family.  

Christmas Cheer...

This is just for journaling purposes to remember where I put all the Christmas joy.  It makes for easier decorating in the years to come.

 Jim commented on how much he likes the shelves NOT cluttered with a bunch of stuff.  He likes just one or two things on a shelf.

Interesting concept, because he is the one who empties his pockets when he comes home and puts keys on one shelf, sun glasses on another, pocket knife on yet another shelf, and change in a decorative bowl, with scraps of metal and screws on another shelf.

It's just how he rolls I guess.

The non-clutter comment... interesting.

The  back of this reindeer says Jacob Dayley 1st Grade... it's his foot and hand traced.  I am hoping the extremely large foot size is caused from tracing with shoes ON, or his lack of cutting skills.

♫ Oh Christmas Tree ♫

For some reason Friday nights are hard for me.  It's the only night of the week I am not buried with things to do, meetings, responsibilities etc.  

And while I look forward to the occasional date night, it just seems like the farthest night away from the missionary's last letter home, and not quit close enough to get excited for the next.

This week as I struggled with the old lights that probably just need to be replaced, I finally got the tree half way lit and was running out of momentum.

The missionaries came by and asked if I needed help with the tree?

 Oh boy did I!!

 The teenager always reached the high stuff for me.

 They did a perfect job!

 When I offered them a drink, they even picked Jacob's favorite, it was almost like having him here.

(almost)

When I opened the chocolate I found this huge scoop inside.  I am not sure, but I don't think this comes with it (we had some extra in a drawer)... this is how he likes his chocolate milk... one big scoop please :)

It made me smile, I love my missionary!

Teenagers...

This week the 16-17 yrs in the church youth group raked leaves.

It's a fun way to provide service and help someone.

It's even better if you really miss having a teenager at home.

Did I just use miss and teenager in the same sentence?

Looking back at blog posts when my teenager was at home, I can't believe it... but it's true.  You really miss their crazy ways when they leave home.

After the work was over, we hyped 'em up on donuts and hot chocolate and sent them home :)

A good time was had by all!

The tale of the table...

One year when my Mom was here helping me to decorate and including the guitar "collection", we painted and had such a great time fixing up my living room.  

But I didn't have much money to put into the project, so after buying paint and lights, that was the end of my budget. 

So for a table we took one of my FAVORITE crates Jim's Aunt Mary gave us and we put a piece of plexiglass on top and wala`!

I loved it, it had character.

I LOVED the crate and wanted to see it... it was adorably perfect.

I think you should have things around you that you love... not just decorate for the sake of decorating (hence my modge podge of decorations... aka things I LOVE).

But it also had character flaws... if you set your drink down, be sure it's in the center or the table will tip.

It was NOT kid friendly at all, so I was always a nervous wreck when little ones came over.

Not a trait you ever look for in your furniture.

And then there is the mission slat table... it has skinny 70's legs, love them!  But they were wobbly... nothing a little Gorilla glue won't fix. wala' more seating, a bench slash table!

Did I mention my mother is brilliant at fixin' up a house!!

I loved this table.

Jim got it at an auction when we lived in Buckley Wa. and it was painted several layers of white and green.

I had taken some time to strip the paint off and it was beautiful wood underneath, but it sat in the garage waiting for a little more TLC. 

Well we had been looking for a "real" end table.

We looked online, at furniture stores, ebay, craigslist, thrift stores.

We looked at allot of end tables.

My strong silent mysterious man kept telling me "you get what you pay for".

And the more I looked, the more rickety cheap furniture I found.

At new furniture stores, we couldn't find anything we both liked, that we could agree on.

We kind of have totally different tastes in furniture... not a deal breaker, but it makes for lots of compromising when decorating.  Lots!!!

Well we saw this one at a furniture store.

Jim fell in love with the exotic wood.

It had a coffee table to match, that we were NOT looking for.

But I liked the coffee table better than the end table... even though they were a match.

The end table just looked very masculine to me... but the coffee table, I could see lots of room on top to tie it into our room.  But we weren't looking for one of those.  Hmmmm.

We left and looked another couple of weeks at everything under the sun.

That beautiful wood did keep coming back to my mind.

And it was the only thing my strong silent mysterious man seemed to fall in love with, he is not really a furniture faller in lover.  But he really really loved this piece.

So on Black Friday we looked at it again and it was on sale, a big sale... so out with the old and in with the new.  (well not really all the way out, I have a new home for the crate and I am saving my favorite mission table for the missionary in case he likes it and needs some furniture when he comes home... sadly just guessing he will get a life that will not include living at home)

What a difference.... at first I was not sure?

It looked really dark.

But after we agreed on a some future flooring (something like these)... I knew I would love it!

 I think this is kind of what we were looking at but the wide planks and it's really textured like the tables, so it won't show nicks and digs (or doggie paw wear).

But has the light and dark wood to tie our dark tables and light oak built in bookcases... 

like we did it all on purpose :)

It's ours now, and I do love it.  I love that he loves it.

It's super study, you can walk through without tipping it over and you can set a cup right on the edge (if you wanted, but I just dare you to).

I like that it holds all my cool wooden bowl... it's kind of turned into a collection now.

Of course if you have ever had to listen to me while dusting... you know it took me an hour to clean out all the junk (aka guitar picks, golf tee's keys, screws etc.) out of them, so I could actually use them on display.  If your at my house, ask me about my bowls, some really talented people made them for me!

And I have the perfect coasters already... leather carved from Ecuador, they really go with the exotic wood now... ask me about those too!

We sent a picture to the missionary, we hope he likes it too!

I only have three bruises to the shins on day two (not used to running into a table that doesn' t move), so I think they will really like their new home :)h