Another Photo Shoot

While we were spending time with Anton's family for his father's funeral, his mom expressed the desire to have some updated photos of Anton's brother Jakob. He lives in New Zealand and had come up for the funeral. So while he was here I kindly volunteered my camera and my shutter-clicking finger. We managed to get outside right as the sun was setting and had some great picture-taking light. I snapped all sorts of mediocre pictures and managed to end up with 3 pretty good ones. That's my method of getting good photos: the more you take the better odds you have of getting a good one.

It's hard to decide which of these is my favorite.

I like the casual attitude here. This is entirely Jakob.

His mom really wanted a head shot, so I obliged.


See the huge gauges in his ears? I wonder what those will look like when he's 50 years old?

And though I like those other two, I really think this next is my absolute favorite:

The background is delish! And the red at the top is the actual color of the wood, not the sunset. Love it! We printed them out and framed one and gave them to Anton's mom for her birthday on Saturday. We also gave Anton's other brother Kyle and his family a photo shoot for Christmas, so eventually I'll get to take pictures of them too. Such fun!

Funny of The Day

I took Ella to Wal-Mart with me today to go buy a crochet hook I needed for Christmas presents I'm making. And you know how busy Wal-Mart is at this time of year with all the Christmas shoppers. Well, we're walking along towards the craft section, which happens to be in the back corner of the store, when Ella YELLS out:

"Mom, where are the hookers?"

Umm, I don't think they sell those in Wal-Mart. It took me a second to realize she was talking about the crochet hooks. But no matter how many times I corrected her, she kept calling them hookers.

"Mom, can I hold the hookers?"

"Mom, I want to carry the hookers."

Over and over again, all through the store. I couldn't help but laugh, and I'm sure the people who heard must have wondered what kind of a family we are. Oh well!

Sick Day

Why couldn't the snow day and the sick day coincide? This afternoon both Anton and I started feeling yucky. By evening it was worse. We both met our breakfasts and lunches again. The only blessing of this all was that the kids seemed just fine. As I sit here trying to recover while watching Pride and Prejudice, I hear a whimper from the kids' room. "Mommy, my tummy hurts." I think it's going to be a long night.

Snow Day

The kids have been waiting very impatiently for it to finally snow, and last night it did! It's the first time we've been in snow in two years.


See how much there is? A whole 2 inches! There was so much snow that they called us this morning to say they'd canceled church!

These sort of blizzard white-out conditions certainly warrant the cancellation of church. We wouldn't want to be out wandering and get lost.


Anton claims it's because they have no snow removal equipment here and the roads are all ice. But, oh well. Either way, I didn't have to go to church, and that's fine with me.

And I knew that since the kids have been waiting so long to play in the snow, it would happen to be on a Sunday so they couldn't go play in it. However, we had a package to pick up in the office, so we bundled the kids up for a long, short walk over there.

The first thing both the kids figured out was throwing snowballs.


And yes, Ella is in a dress in the snow. She refused to put pants on.


Alex is chasing me with a snowball in his hand. He thinks it's super fun to throw them at mommy and daddy. While Alex was having all sorts of fun,

Ella was busy freezing.


We grabbed our package (it was the Playfoam finally, Harmony!!!) and went back to our apartment. Ella and I made hot chocolate for everyone while daddy helped Alex build his first snowman. It was little and cute and I didn't get a picture.

So hooray for snow and canceled church and kids who love to play in the snow!!

Want some FREE toffee?

** Giveaway Over **

Okay, so here's the deal. If you are willing to put a link to the English Toffee Anytime website on your blog or website and leave it there for six months, then you can get a free 1 lb. box of toffee. All you have to do is put this logo


(right click and "save as" to your computer then upload to your blog) in your sidebar or somewhere else appropriate on your website and link it to: http://englishtoffeeanytime.com. Then write a blog post with a link to English Toffee Anytime. Then you need to email ron@englishtoffeeanytime.com with the following information:

1. Your name and mailing address (which will not be used for anything else)
2. A link to your website
3. And what flavor of toffee you would like (milk chocolate, dark chocolate, white chocolate).

The first 40 people from my and my sister's blog will get a free box of toffee. This is only available to continental US residents (to save on shipping costs). And that's it!! Free toffee in exchange for free advertising. Yum!!

Mossy

We went hiking the other day and I couldn't believe how cool all the trees looked.


They are all coated in thick layers of fuzzy moss. My dad kept joking before we moved out here that we better be careful not to get lost in the woods because the moss grows on all sides of the trees, not just the north. Well, he sure wasn't kidding.


In some places, branches were falling off the trees because of the weight of the moss. We all had lots of fun and the kids all found all sorts of cool stuff from snail shells to mushrooms to a woodpecker that almost pooped on our heads. Good fun!

Thomas the Train Cake Pattern

Here are the instructions for the Thomas the Train cake I posted about recently.


Items needed:
1 - 11x15 inch sheet cake
1 - 6 inch round
Buttercream Icing
Fondant in blue, black, red, light gray, dark gray, white, yellow

Level the 11x15 inch sheet cake (keeping the roundy top) and cut where all the black lines are on the image below:

The gray area becomes your main cake base. Frost the base and cover in blue fondant.

Piece No. 1: I took a piece of the rounded cut off top and cut it the same size as the piece to make it a bit taller and to give it a rounded shape. This is optional. Whichever you choose, frost the piece and cover in red fondant.

Piece No. 2 (2): Cut both No. 2's with a round on one side to match the curvature of the 6 inch round. Frost both pieces and cover each one in blue fondant. I left the side that would be touching the round without fondant.

Piece No. 3 (2): Frost and cover each with blue fondant.

Piece No. 4: Cut the ends into rounds (see image below) and cut the piece on an angle so it is taller on the side that will butt up against Piece 1 and shorter on the side towards the round. I actually cheated on this one too and ended up just using another piece of the roundy cut off top. It had the perfect slope already. Frost and cover in light gray fondant. I left the side that was aginst Piece 1 without fondant.

Piece No. 5 (2): Glue both No. 5's together vertically with frosting. Cut the bottom end to match the curvature of the 6 inch round. Frost and cover with black fondant. I left the rounded end fondant free.

Piece No. 6 (2): Frost and cover each with dark gray fondant.

6 Inch Round: Level off. Frost and cover with black fondant. Place circle of light gray fondant on top. If you are really skilled, you could cover the round in light gray fondant and wrap a band of black fondant around the outside. I'm just not that good.

Assembling the cake: Place the pieces as indicated on the diagram below.


Add accents as in picture below.

The 4 on the smoke stack is the age of the birthday boy and not necessary. I actually placed the piece of black fondant between the round and Piece 4 before I placed those pieces on the cake. I used random rounds lids I had to cut out the various circles. I freehanded the mouth and eyebrows and used small, rolled pieces of black fondant to make the face. You could pipe it as well, but again, I'm just not that good.

I'm pretty sure you could also use a 9x13 sheet cake and a smaller round (just cut down a bigger round if needed). You would just have to cut everything smaller. Frosting and fondanting all the little pieces was a bit of a pain. If you have the time to freeze the pieces first, it would make it much easier.

And that's it! Piece of cake!

Packing Peanut Fun

I got my first Christmas present the other day (which deserves a post of its own) and it came in a box full of packing peanuts. Now, being the indulgent mother that I am, I gave the box to the kids and told them to have fun. I sat down at the computer and proceeded to ignore them. After a while, I looked over, and what did I behold?

A big peanutty mess. I did expect there to be a bit of a mess from them playing with them, but they had them spread into every room of the apartment.


Alex had gotten out his play mop to try and clean them up. Though I ended up sending them to their room while I cleaned it all up since they kept getting more back out after I picked them up.


And let me just tell you, leather and packing peanuts do not mix. Let's just say static electricity. To this day, every time we sit on the couch more peanuts come poofing out of it. Oh well. The kids had fun and I got a Christmas present!!

Saying Goodbye.

On Sunday night, Anton's dad passed away after a year and a half long battle with cancer. Everyone was really sad to see him go, but he had been suffering so much that it was also a relief to see him finally free of pain.


I have only known Anton's dad for 5 years, the time that we've been married, but in that time I've been able to see what kind of man he was. I asked Anton what he loved best about his dad, and he said that he was always wanting to go on some adventure. But not only did he dream about adventures, he was always planning and going on them too. He wasn't the type of man to sit idly by dreaming. He was a doer. Just in the time I've known him he has ridden his bike across the country to benefit the American Lung Association.

Ironically, while riding to raise money for lung cancer, what he didn't know was that he had lung cancer himself.

His next adventure was to hike the Pacific Crest Trail from Mexico to Canada. This is something he and Anton had planned to do together. When Anton and I got married, his dad told me that I was ruining all his fun. I'd taken away his adventure partner. So instead of bemoaning it, he just went on the hike himself. Sadly, he got really sick just a couple weeks into the hike and had to come home, but he would've gone back and tried again in hearbeat.

Anton's dad was an avid listener of oldtime radio and the Paul Harvey show. He did lots of family history and was an active participant in Clan Little. He would eat waffles or pancakes for breakfast almost every day. He was a great harmonica player.

Here he is just after we caught him in the dark at Fort Casey playing his harmonica so it would echo through the empty cement bunkers.

He leaves behind his beloved wife.

She will miss him greatly. And so will his 5 children, 5 children-in-law, 6 grandchildren, and many, many more extended family and friends.


He was not afraid to live and follow his own beat, and I know he will continue to do so from up above.