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    boring Tuesday in the life of

    a storm of tissues

    Life is quiet out here in the sticks outside of my incessant sneezing. The cold rages on as you can see. Thankfully even wadded up used tissues look better with a 50mm lens.

    new winter-time bed arrangement

    In other news, I rearranged my bedroom. Huzzah! I love it that I can rearrange furniture whenever I please. This new arrangement is not for beauty or any kind of bren* shui though. It’s purely because I got tired of the drafts from the window wafting down on me in the night. It gets cold out here at night!

    My little Parisian Apartment (cough cough)

    I think I’ll move the bed back under the window in the summer because then drafts are quite nice. For now though this is much cozier and it only hampers our path to the bathroom by a few steps. We don’t use that bathroom much anyway so it’s no big deal to have to walk all the way around the bed to get to it. In Bug and Holly’s case, you can just lumber right over the top of the bed and save yourself five steps.

    new winter-time bed arrangement

    Since we’re doing a “home tour” I might as well show you Bug’s fairies. She draws them (with some help from me) and then tapes them around the house. Look right below the red poppies painting and you’ll see this little guy:

    the Brenda Fairy

    I think this is me as a “mom fairy.” She watches over me when I sleep or maybe this is just here so I know where my bed is. Who knows. If you give your kid paper and things to draw with and access to scissors and tape, you never know what you are going to find randomly taped around the house. Right now as I type this, I see there is a colorful Easter egg taped to the living room window. She’s very proactive with her seasonal decorating.

    Holly has a fairy too but it was too dark when I took that photo and it was too blurry. (You can see it in the window shot, just really really small. That’s where Holly’s dog bed usually is.)

    Bug's Bulletin Board

    This is Bug’s fairy. I drew this one (per her instruction) and she colored it.

    Maybe she needs more shoes...

    While I’m in Bug’s room I might as well show you her giant shoe collection. Do you think this kid has enough shoes? (Most of them are hand-me-downs or gifts.) You’d think she does but there is aways some outfit that doesn’t match with any of these. Good thing kid-fashion is pretty carefree. She wears the craziest combos and nobody even blinks an eye anymore. I think she also has a giant shoe collection because her feet never grow. She’s been a size 7/8 for a whole year now. She’s just like me with tiny feet.

    Also, the vacuum cleaner lives in her closet. I do feel a bit bad about that but there is no room anywhere else and it’s almost like that shelf was built just for vacuum cleaners. Thankfully Bug doesn’t know any better and thinks it’s totally normal to have a vacuum cleaner in your closet.

    official rock concert papers

    These are some very important rock star concert documents. Can’t you tell? The one on the right is a contract that I had to sign and on the left is some sheet music I presume. Bug made this really long movie describing them all and what they are for, (the card is for zoom-zooming in the zoom zoom machine) but then after she was done and I was watching the movie, I noticed my shirt was gaping wide open sideways showing some armpit/boob action so I deleted that movie. Sorry Bug. I’ll have to have her do it again. It was all very funny of course as most doomed things are.

    Fairy Breakfast

    And that concludes my boring Tuesday in the life of Brenda post!

    *Bren shui is my own form of feng shui that has no system of aesthetics other than my gut feeling of where things should be.

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  • 15 minute posts,  Bug,  easy on the words,  Family Matters,  heavy on photos,  I forgot to tell you this earlier,  Moody Blues,  Super Dad,  Tis the Season

    Some shots from Christmas past

    I started this post ages ago and now it seems old and moldy. I’m tempted not to even post it but I figure if I put this much effort into it, I might as well finish it.

    Christmas Eve traffic

    I’m one of those commuters now. I took this shot on our way to Toby’s on Christmas Eve. Holiday traffic is the pits. Good thing when you’re driving west, there’s usually a sunset to watch while you sit.

    Deb

    Bug spent Christmas Eve with Toby having spaghetti dinner. I spent Christmas Eve with my friend Deb down the street. She and her husband Eric always take care of me. They didn’t even mind me crashing their intimate evening. I love them.

    I chopped off her head!

    While Deb cooked up something gluten free (and no she didn’t mind that I chopped off her head when I took this photo), her husband Erik played guitar and I tried to sing a few Mazzy Star songs. Tried being the key word. I love to sing but sometimes the melodies elude me.

    singing with Deb's husband, Erik

    Nothing like Mazzy to kick the holiday blues!

    merry christmas! elf

    The next morning I was up bright and early and shivering on my old porch waiting to be let in. I somehow lost my key during the move and don’t feel it’s proper to ask for another one. I didn’t want to miss the early morning present opening so shiver away I did! Who knew they’d sleep in until NINE! My kid never sleeps past six when she’s with me. It must be all that late night Harry Potter watching.

    Yes, Toby lets her watch Harry Potter much to my chagrin. I was so steamed about it when it first happened but apparently she loves it. They both do. I don’t even know which movie it is, it’s not the first one. I bought it on sale years ago and then left it behind when I moved out. Now it’s the only “kid” movie Toby owns and they watch it religiously every time Bug spends the night. I’ve since made a point to leave behind a few other movies but I guess it’s their thing they like to do together now so I’m not going to mess with that.

    Anyway when they finally rolled out of bed, they let me in and the present opening commenced!

    PINK stuff!

    Woo hoo! Pink stuff for the pink obsessed kid! Thank you, Grandma—who doesn’t even celebrate Christmas but somehow populated half of our tree with festively wrapped presents. Gotta love my mom!

    skooter girl somebody needs a bath

    And lots of other fun stuff. This kid is not deprived.

    watching the Nutcracker

    Some Nutcracker viewing…I can’t wait until Bug gets to see this in real life. Toby says he’s going to take her next year. I really hope he keeps his word on that.

    Toby and Bug

    me and Bug

    And of course lots of hugs.

    hotel room pose

    Then we were off to the bible conference I attend with my family every year. Which is really just a great excuse to stay in a really nice hotel! Just kidding. It’s more than the hotel of course. But the hotel part is really fun.

    kickin' it

    pillow head

    me and my girl

    us

    boof!

    pillow fight

    jump!

    Especially the pillow fighting and bed jumping part!