The robe

For birthdays and Christmas the kiddos write out wish lists. Parker and Mimi's lists are SHORT! Yoda's lists are usually LONG! A few days after all lists were done, Yoda called out during dinner, "OH NO! I forgot to add a rode to my wish list!" I couldn't help myself and found him one for his birthday.

Christmas Music

If you would like to see our kiddos playing some Christmas music, here are a couple of links.  The other players are super dedicated, practice a ton and arranged the music for this performance.  Our kiddos were along for the ride because they are good sports.

Away in a Manger

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9PQIF0puiLM 

God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zeVunBEM3Tg

 

All the Mugs

 

A while ago it hit me that our mug collection doesn't accurately reflect how colorful we are as a family.  We quickly fixed that.  We collected, made some at the pottery place, or got some as gifts!  Then we needed to display them nicely too, so I built this little shelf.  Now we may need another shelf, but I'm ok with that :)

If you're curious here's our mugs, from top to bottom and left to right: 

On the very top is Yoda's brand new Among Us mug or A-Mug-Us.

The "Val" mug that I got when I was in elementary school or middle school from a friend.

Parker's Lefty mug.  (There's a small dribble hole on the other side and you will spill on yourself if you hold it with your right hand. 

Parker's mug from seeing Kelly Live back in 2017.  His nice aunt bought it for him. 

Owl mug that Mimi made a while back.  

My "No Drama Llama", that's me!

Star Wars light saber mug, it lights up when you fill it with hot water! (from Sonya)

Spiderman mug that Yoda made.

A family photo on a mug.

My yellow mug I made.

The Notorious RBG mug I just got for Christmas! (from Sonya)

A crafty mug I got last year when our mug adventure had just began. (another one from Sonya!)

A tiny Peter Rabbit tea cup I got in England 20+years ago.

Thanks for going on our mug tour! 

Merry Christmas!

 

Wrestling

Greg flipped Yoda over his head and onto the couch while wrestling.  Yoda was fine.

Me, "What's that move?  Does it have like a real name?"

Greg, "It's just a body slam."

Me, "Oh, duh"

 

Silver award

 Mimi is working on her Girl Scout Silver Award.  One part is to post a video on-line to explain her award to the world.  To keep it somewhat anonymous she made a drawing of herself to post with the video...

Thanksgiving Weekend

 We kept it pretty simple and yummy.

Yoda made apple pie, Mimi made chocolate meringue pie, and Parker made 2 kinds of cranberry sauce. 

Greg made the turkey in our countertop turkey roaster, it's great because it frees up the oven!  We have it sitting here at Yoda's remote learning desk.  Greg did a fresh, local, fancy turkey, with a wet brine.   I made or assisted making the sides, we split the work on the gravy and I bought the rolls.  At the last minute Greg saw the white potatoes that I bought on a whim and he went for it. 

Happy Thanksgiving, a little more guitar

 

Among the many things we're thankful for is guitar lessons! Can you see Yoda 2nd from the left? 

Greg and Yoda 10+ years ago.

Greg and Yoda today!

All the Legos, all the masks

The kiddos have received many Lego sets over the years and each child plays with them so differently!

Parker liked the mini-figures, Mimi prefers to have a set to put together, leave it alone or take it apart and put it together again, but Yoda is crazy-town, he is constantly taking pieces from different sets and taking them all over the house.  After a while I stopped cleaning them up and just let him go nuts without me chasing after him.

BUT since 2020 has been a total pain and we are inside so much, Mimi would like different sets to work on.  Getting new sets is out of the question, so I decided that I would recreate a few sets for her to keep in her room, untouched by her little brother. 

This is just a taste of what we've been doing...

 

 

And here's some of our masks...  I like our funny little clothes line to air-dry them sometimes.  I've made a bunch, and bought a few.  None feel perfect, but some are better than others. 

And here's our latest way to keep them sorted.  Up high is fresh/clean masks, ready to go, 5 hooks for 5 people. 

And below that is a few hooks for a mask that was only worn for a few minutes or an hour or something and can be worn again.  I can't for this nightmare to be over and I'm gonna burn them all.  That vaccine can't come soon enough. 

I wanna Shasta!

This was a total impulse buy.  

But I thought we had bad weather moving in, so we'd need something to do to stop from going crazy.  But... then it's been amazing outside, so I thought this would never get finished.  But... it was one of the quickest puzzles yet!  And so funny to look up old soda commercials on the internet.  

Voting/photo booth

 This made me laugh

Happy belated Halloween / UPDATED a little

Mimi was a YouTube personality (below on the left), Yoda was a classic Ninja, and Parker was a character from Avatar the Last Airbender (below on the right)

Later on we added a few more bits of yellow to make his costume a little better.

.   

I handed out candy dressed as Ruth Bader Ginsburg.  I set up a slide on top of a table, I'd grab some candy with tongs and send the candy down the slide.  I wish I had taken a picture.