Priceless Holiday Moments

Ah, the holidays have come and gone, with relatively (pun intended) little friction, which is a rarity for both sides of the family, so it was a blessing indeed. I haven't been in to post much of anything because we have been on the run for the last week; we held two dinner parties, went to several family gatherings here, and finished off with a run up to Richmond for Christmas with the inlaws. Whew! I need a vacation from the vacation! I did get a new camera for Christmas/Birthday from my darling husband, so I spent lots of time breaking it in (thank you honey!)

While we were at my mother's house, the boys got into a little scuffle over a ridiculous inflatable hammer. Evidently, the Bohemian used the large hammer to exact a little sibling adjustment on his older brother, the Professor, who really has been teetering dangerously on the edge of teendom, as far as his attitude goes. Ever the champion of the underdog, I let him work his older brother over, while I took pictures!

The conflict is underway at this point, and is about to enter the porch, much to the amusement of the rest of the family. Notice how the Bohemian is in full swing here, while the Professor gauges whether he can come in and kill his brother without censure. hmmm..

Why is he covering his eyes? To make it look like he is an innocent bystander perhaps? I don't know, but I love this picture! It speaks volumes about these two. (notice that the Bohemian is winding up for the swing..."make my day, baby!")
This show of agression by a younger brother is obviously pushing the Professor over the edge of caution. He feels compelled to enter the fray and put the offender in his place. The Bohemian is still jubliant; cocky even, as he is still holding the hammer at the ready. Watch out Big brother!
Oops! Too late, the Bohemian realizes he should have kept his brother from entering the porch. He tries to force the Professor back to the door, but alas! The Professor is inside now and the Bohemian is in big trouble. (Can you believe they were going on like this while I was shooting it? Hello!!! Your mother is watching AND taking footage to condemn you both with. Obviously they are in the throes of passion at this point - "Camera, Schmamera, I'm going to kick your a**!) Ah! The Professor gets the Bohemian into a headlock and exacts his revenge. (and he's never even watched wrestling - what a natural, eh?) I love the blind rage pictured here - the sheer, unadulterated anger of an eldest child who has been publicly thwacked by his younger brother. Oh the indignity! Oh the injustice! Oh are they going to be in trouble!
At this point I had to go separate them, so as to avoid any trips to the hospital. (I was kind of worried they were going to pop the hammer too, and it wasn't theirs to pop, so...)

The sweet moments of Christmas - Joy and Goodwill to all men, except when there's a blow-up hammer to wreak some vengeance with. Good times!

There were other moments that were more idyllic; ie, they weren't monsters ALL the time! Actually the hammer incident was the only real fight they had, and it was so much fun to photograph, how could I intervene right away?

But look: here is proof they were good some of the time:

The Bohemian scrunches down to give me a better shot of him with his new RC truck. I especially love the "Penny Brite" look in his eyes. Such a mischeivous child, but at least he's not dull, right?

The Professor contemplates a composition of his own making, wearing his signature black sweat hoodie. Inexpressibly cool at all times, it is very difficult for him to be seen with the rest of us (and he's only 10, for crying out loud!)
All right, that is the end of the holiday picture posts. Now that its January, and a new year is upon us, I am moving along.

Of course, I still need to take down the tree and move all the furniture back to its normal places, but with all that still ahead of me, I'm bound to come up with some good postings - anything to extend the season of procrastination, I say!

It could be a dark month ahead; I turn 45 this Friday (sigh). Most of the time I don't feel like I'm even 40, but there is always that time of yearly reckoning, called Birthday, where all rational bets are off. I might just have to wallow a teeny bit, in order to make the adjustment. There might be a need for a box of fine chocolates, a little bubbly, and a Pride and Predjudice marathon, in order to realign my planets and whatnot. There definitely needs to be a tube of burnt umber in my near future - I am twitching mentally, wanting to get back to the painting, and its always good for my mental state, to be painting, but my burnt umber was a dried rock of a tube, and its been one thing and another, up to now, keeping me from getting a tube, much less, even having the time to paint. But no more! I am vowing to be done with Christmas clean-up and ready for the January Hunker-down, with my easel, by next week. So there, you grumpy January blues - see where that leaves you!

Making A List, Checking It Twice

I made a few lists the other day, in an effort to be more organized. One list was the Christmas cookies I'm going make. Now, in true procrastinator-fashion, I'm trying to whittle it down to making less cookies. So here they are, in order of what has to be made first:

1) Nutmeg Logs (labor intensive)

2) Peppermint Party Cookies (easy-peasy)

3) Sugar Cookies (the cut-out and frosted kind)

4) Liebkuchen (a pain in the ass, but I gotta have them)

5) Cornflake Balls (really easy, and killer)

And these, which I'm waffling on:

6) Molasses Crinkles or

7) Ginger Creams

Both are ginger/molasses based, but while the crinkles are work before you make them, the creams have to be frosted afterwards (they might need shaping too - its been a hunded years since I made them). So I'm debating which is less work, versus which one I just have to make. I'm also toying with a few others like:

8) Mock Baby Ruth Bars (easy, but I'm bored with them)

9) Gumdrop Bars (I've never made them)

10) Springerle (No one but Bea and I will eat these little german rocks)

In a perfect world, I would make all of them, and still have time to greet my husband at the door with a casserole in my hands, backdropped by an immaculate house and smiling, well-groomed children. (Ok, maybe not even in a perfect world, but in a Disney-esque fantasy world, it could happen!) But I digress...

We now return you to our previous program....!

Honestly, I think I'll just stick to the first 5 and call it a day - I have "Red Suit" duties to perform, as well as a dinner party to throw on the 22nd, and its not like any mice or a fairy godmother are going to pop up, sing a song, and Bibbity Bobbity Boo all my chores away.

Sigh...you just can't find good rodent help anymore. I wonder how hard it would be to train the cats to clean house? It can't be any harder than getting two boys to clean house, right?

I did plan the menu for the Solstice Party, so I'll know what to buy, and what to delegate; and we did get the tree up today, so there's a couple of things I can cross off already.

Alla ka zoola, mitcha ka boola, bibbity bobbity boo -

What the hell does that song mean?

It's Just Another Day

Well, the Bohemian (pictured below as a bubble blowing pirate - oh, just go with it!) is home sick, again, with the creeping crud that's going around school. Kind of cuts into my ability to be Ho-Ho-Ho-ing, but that's OK - I stayed up late making lists of the stuff I need to do, so I'm ahead of the game...for now. I think we're going to go get the tree tonight, since its going to warm up by the weekend, which can make for a sappy, drippy tree trunk - not in my trunk, baby!

I had promised to show a few pieces of pottery from Moore County, after looking at my pictures and realizing that there were precious few examples in them. No one has ever said "don't take pictures of the pottery", but it seems kind of tacky to be shooting pictures inside their gallery. So, I'll show you some of what I've collected over the years, since its almost all from that area.

What you're looking at below, is (from left to right) vintage A.R.Cole, two Ben Owen III melon vases, and a Waymon Cole, also vintage artware. The little bowl is vintage ceramic, Homer Laughlin's Orange Tree pattern. This is also the oh-so-groovy, New Age section of my books - well one portion of them , anyway. The books and the pottery fight for every square inch of shelf space in this house. Horrid shelving - I want to rip it out one day and put in real cabinetry.

This bookcase is all Ben Owen III ash glazed pieces, except for the Jugtown Fox crock; called that for the incised rings around it - a trademark of a 19th c. pottery family by the name of Fox. You will note that the books are also fighting for space here too - these are part of my antique book collection -as you can tell, I don't decorate with much Target/Pottery Barn/Crate and Barrel kind of stuff. What can I say? I want to live in a museum.
And there ya go - yet another peep into my sanctuary - don't say I never gave you anything! I'll be back tomorrow with more of the normally scheduled angst and mayhem; unless the Bohemian is still a poor, sickly little thing (Hah! Did you see that kid?!) and I have to hover near his side for his gasped instructions: "Mom,...gasp...can...you...gasp...make...me...gasp...some...soup...gasp!" And the sad part is; this is exactly the way his father sounds when he's sick - don't even ask what its like if I get sick - didn't you know? Mothers are not allowed to be ill...ever. But that is a rant for another day - probably some time January.

Ho Ho Hum

There is just no getting around it, try as I might; Christmas is in three weeks and I haven't done doodly-squat to get ready for it. I'm just not feeling the love for baking a dozen different kinds of cookies, festooning my house with stuff that the cats can, rip down, play with, eat and take a trip to the vets for, and horrors of all horrors...shopping.

What's up with that, you might ask?

Ambivilence thou art the Tapdancer!

It could be that it is a colossal, all-weekend job to get all of us to put our crap away, so there's room to put up the holiday schmaltz, and I hate cleaning house anyway (is there really some woman out there who just lives to tidy up after the hordes? If yes, honey, we need to talk!)

It could be that having bought a new heating/cooling system, Christmas is going to be kind of tight - how do you explain that to kids who still believe in Santa? Its not that I think they need a boatload of plastic shit to break/lose/leave around on the floor for me to find and scream about, but yeah, I do love the look on their faces when they see the tree on Christmas morning. I've worked very hard to keep the magic alive, but its harder on a tight budget.

It could be that the idea of baking all those cookies, while I'm trying to not gain weight (pshhhh! because to try to diet during December is Few-Tile chile!) is also daunting enough to put it off, though in all fairness, I can't begin baking until this weekend, or stuff just isn't fresh enough to cut it for the holidays (I really hate stale cookies - they're right up there with ...ulp...fruitcake...mmulp...I think I just puked in my mouth thinking of fruit-...IT).

I also sent out notice that we would be having our Solstice Party this year, so tack that on as extra work in all the departments - cooking, cleaning, decorating, shopping. I do want to have the party - it was so un-festive last year, when my younger brother hosted it - it seemed more like a Superbowl party, which is fine, but it isn't what we dream of nostalgically when we look back through the mist of years and remember what made Christmas special. THAT is my personal mantra, when it comes to the holidays - how are my kids going to remember this?

We have also been pinned down for the visit to the inlaws during the Christmas week already, which always depresses me. I love my husband, but over the 20 years we have been together, my tolerance for his Fundie parents has gone clean away. I think the breaking point for me was when my mother-in-law told my oldest child that he was going to grow up and become a terrorist, and that his parents (us) were unfit to parent. Nice, huh? All because they lost control of a situation with the kids and my oldest son wrote a letter to an imaginary person to vent his rage, calling his grandparents (in the letter only, not to their faces) "Butt-kiss God Lovers", which of course they found and freaked out over. We were not there, being in Wales at the time, so our welcome home gift was this story, told from my mother-in-law's favorite place - atop her soapbox.

I know, how can I be so unfair to them? Personally, I love the term "Butt-kiss God Lovers" - I think it sums it all up quite succinctly.

But it does make visiting them quite stressful, to say the least. It didn't help that the hubby really didn't confront them in a timely or decided manner - he kind of let it slide, while just not talking to them at all (are all men this good at communication? Oy! I shudder to think...). I see them once a year, at Christmas; I think I'm going to need sedatives or maybe a straight jacket, to keep myself contained, but in the meantime, here I am, ambivilent and procrastinating.

After that pile of fecal matter, my family's Christmas looks tame. There is always the question of who my mother will choose from among her children to be The Reviled One, as we like to term it. We're not sure why she feels compelled to do this; maybe its how she deals with her stress, but every year she picks one of us (well, one of us that isn't my younger brother - he is exempt - don'tcha love favoritism?) and makes our life hell. One year she told me, two days before Christmas, that she didn't get me anything, it was just too much of a hassle - I know - WTF? I think it was last year that my sister was the RO - her special diet needs were too much to accomodate, and nothing she could do was good enough. I think there was also an altercation on the actual Christmas Day (we get together at the end of the week after), at my sister's house, involving my mother and the other guests. My older brother too, has been the not-so-lucky recipient, with endless drunk phone calls and criticisms of his cooking, his kids (who are great, btw!), his life, etc... And OMG, the drunk dialing...sometimes when she gets on a roll, we call each other and send out the warning: don't answer your phone - Mom's on the loose! But let's not lose sight of the other parent...my father and the deep dark abyss he falls into at Christmas (that no one can talk to him about - sigh )- he morphs in frickin Eeyore this time of year, sighing and moping; bah-humbugging at every occasion - if ever there was a good excuse to get someone drunk, he is that excuse - he is nothing, if not a merry drunk, which is far preferable to my mother's version of tipping it back - it might have been a story she was telling you, but its been 15 minutes and the point is nowhere in sight. You try to go to the bathroom, and she follows you in, still talking...!!!!

But see? That is so much tamer then the potential crisis of Faith we will have to endure with the in-laws. It almost puts me in the mood for the holidays,...almost.

Turkey Tapdance

Later this week we will all be assembling for one of these:

For some of us, this is the bi-yearly conflagration - where the idea of having to go home and co-mingle with the objects of our disfunction, is enough to produce a stomach ache, raging insomnia, and a self-introspection with our closest friends that amounts to either ranting about WHY we don't want to go home, or just the pre-game mantra of "I don't want to go".

That could all be said to be true of my own family (and maybe yours?), but in the past couple of years, we (the siblings) have undertaken to rotate the hosting of the dreaded Turkey Day, in an effort to keep the stress down, as well as eliminate those last minute phone calls from my mother (when it was at her house), asking you to pick up beer, soda, clementine tangerines, bakery-fresh bread, your grandmother from the airport; you name it - the more ludicrous, the more difficult it is to find, the more likely she would be to ask for it.

This year we're all going to my sister's house, so I am totally relaxed - YeeHaaa! There had been talk of a deep-fried turkey this year at her house, but the aforementioned High Maintenance Mom (HMM) threw a little (for her) tantrum about it. So now, its the roasted variant. My poor sister - she is a far nicer person than I am, although I suppose, we all take the hit in the different ways.

When we had Thanksgiving at my house, two years ago, my mother insisted on coming over early in the morning to prepare and put the turkey in the oven - evidently I am not to be trusted with the job of roasting a turkey - so she was in our Kool-aid bright and early that year. Nothing that can't be remedied with copious imbibing. Weird thing-I hardly ever drink more than a beer, or a margarita, except at family functions, (guess what kind of dysfunction we are!!!) where it is imperative to begin anesthesia upon arrival.

If this seems strange, you should watch the movie Home For The Holidays - other than the gay brother, they have us pegged. (Random random fact about me - I love movies and quoting them. Don't get me started, it can get ugly.)