Trees! Breakfast! Fun!

I totally forgot to blog yesterday...I was engrossed in reading a really wonderful fantasy...

There's this girl...Iolanthe...who has amazing magical powers. She is wanted by a powerful Mage and a lovely Prince...Titus...saves her. But...she has to go to an all boy prep school in London and be disguised as a boy! This book is captivating!

The fascinating thing about this book is that the author immigrated to this country from China when she was 13 and taught herself English by reading romance novels.






The tree...so far...no one has even looked at it but it's still bare. I don't even think Roxie knows there is a tree in the living room...neither does Lucy.






But...Lucy is obsessed with fake greenery. See that Santa way up high...he is holding the teensiest fake tree...Lucy is jumping and pacing and crying because she wants it! I had to let her see each tree and Santa up close to calm her down!





And this guy has his arms filled with fake greens and she doesn't even bother with him!





Tree decorating power breakfast...homemade blueberry pancakes and pancake sausages...our butcher makes them just go with pancakes and waffles!





Of all of the handmade amazing Santas and snowmen I have...this little Walmart snowman is one of my favorites...I hope you can see why!

Happy Everything!

Tree Day!

We are off to Glen Willow to get our tree! So excited...a lovely Frazier Fir! We are putting it in the living room this year. Roxie Blue's behavior is an "unknown" around trees...so we are opting for treasured ornaments landing on padded carpeting as opposed to tile...hopefully our strategy works. We are also going to let the tree just live in the living room in its stand with no tempting lights or ornaments until Saturday to see what Roxie Blue will do...

Hmmm...

Lucy always ignores the live tree but hunts out any tiny speck of fake greenery she can find...so we are sure Roxie will ignore the fake and be fascinated by the real tree. Climbing it and going after all the shiny stuff...sigh!

One thing I have learned? You can't win with a Tonk...

A tree in the house? Hanging things? Branches to climb? Oh boy!








Starting this...Dystopian tale of a world without water...reserving judgement...



Reading this at night...when I wake up at two...on my Kindle...and it's so good...amazing premise about a caste system based on colors...red being the lowest one...golds and silvers way high up there...it's YA and Dystopian...Darrow is the underdog/hero...

I really want to be free to read it all of the time...I think I am waking up in the middle of the night just to read it! And it will be a trilogy!




I hate everything that happens in Dystopian novels...the unfairness, the scary stuff, the punishments and yet they are my favorites!

Happy Reading!

Finally! Santas! Happy! Sort Of!

There are too many bins in our house...I used to love bins but now...hmmm...not so much love for my bins...I am forever unpacking them and packing them...they used to be sort of color coded...but any more I can open up a red and green bin and find much more than Christmas inside...sigh!

My goal for this coming year is to go through every bin...one or two or three a week...and cleanse our basement of bins! Plus...after crawling around the crawlspace yesterday...I am sick of the crawlspace!

I can't get the bins out of it on my own...it's too high and the dreaded bins are too heavy...so...with just a few bins out of the crawlspace I ended up going up and down the basement stairs with arm loads of Christmas...at least fifty times today!

Whew!

So...where does the happy come in! Now! There is a mantel filled with Santas and more to come! Lol!







This guy is my fave because it was my mom's! I see this Santa everywhere but I still love him best!



Still reading this...there is just way too much going on to read! Shopping, sending cards, watching it snow, tree trimming...oh my! This is the slowest I have read all year!

But it's really good...I loved the Fallen series which was also written by this author. In this one Eureka can't cry...ever...if she does? Her tears have the power to raise up the lost continent of Atlantis.




Off to unbin more Christmas!

Happy Decorating!

More Snow And Then Even More Snow!

It's a dream come true...if you love snow...and I do! It's amazing! Schools are closed...Den didn't drive in to work...he is working from his study...and the snow just keeps falling!

It's beautiful! See? And we are getting even more on Saturday! I am deliriously happy when it snows! I love snow! If the geese on the pond would only move I might be able to skate soon!







There is only one sad thing...we are almost out of this moist yummy chocolate cake!

Den and I will be fighting over it later...it would not come out of the pan so I had to sort of piece it back together and glue it with icing. The weird thing about Den and Patty and cake...is this...all of the ingredients in the cake are organic...but the only icing I can eat is the one my mom always used...the chemically laden one in a can! I am hoping that all the good stuff balances out the chemicals...what do you think? Lol!

This recipe makes one layer...and uses no eggs and no butter...but the cake is so moist and rich...I will never understand it!








Just got these...yummy! Thank you, Edelweiss!









Happy Reading!

Slushy Wet Cold Monday!

Everything was so lovely yesterday but today we have a rainy slushy melty goopy kind of day. It is an awesome day to stay inside and do more organizing! And that is just what I did. I redid a bookshelf in the study, I cleaned out the entryway closet, I organized the back hall closet, I organized tablecloths in a wicker chest in the sunroom, I redid the little shelf in the study that houses the printer and our laptops, I categorized the books I took off of Den's shelf so that he can look through them quickly, I established a spot for printer paper that was not unsightly and I cleared off my desk in the kitchen.

Now I can't move!

Den has to look through these when he comes home or we can't have dinner!

I call that motivation!




Reading these this week! This is a YA kind of week!













Happy Organizing!

Being Organized...Not Always A a Good Thing! And It's Snowing!

Snow prints courtesy of Roxie Blue!





Ok...so...today...in spite of being incredibly organized...I have bouts of wondering/worrying where certain things are. Today I was obsessed with finding my red snow sign...made from Pennsylvania barn wood...because it wasn't where I put it...I also wanted my primitive painted snowman...it also wasn't where I put it...so...after searching for an hour Den told me that he moved them to a "better" place! Sigh!

Both signs are still in the basement...too tired to hang them...and the dreaded bins are there, too!











I also spent part of today looking for my mom's Audubon bird prints, a window light, a painting we bought in New Orleans but never framed, some little prints we bought in Maine and never framed, and my Tommy Tunes signed by Tommy Tunes print that was framed but Lucy knocked it from the wall and it's now unframed. I also had to find Roxie Blue's yellow fuzzy mouse for her because she is obsessed with it...she knocked it under the basement door. She had both paws under the door and her little kitty face pressed against the door trying to reach it.

I think all this "finding stuff" comes from moving furniture yesterday...there was a bigger desk upstairs that we moved to Den's study/Lucy's room. He had an antique desk in his study that was from a Catholic girl's school in St. Louis. It was sweet but small...I have no clue why we didn't change out the desks years ago. So we moved that one to a guest room otherwise known as the room where I keep my overflow stuff...

So we had to go through drawers and toss stuff and...somehow I started to wonder about the prints...and...sigh...I am sort of over it all now! But I am still looking for the Maine prints...sigh!



Den's desk...




Patty's desk/TV stand...lol...



Snow! Lovely snow...it's snowing right now! There is actually about 4 inches on the deck railing now! We already had hot chocolate with three marshmallows! Each!
This has been one heck of a day!






Reading this...really good!




Happy Sunday!