What I Did On My Winter Vacation

Thanksgiving was great. This whole holiday has been great. I've become so re-acclimatised to the US that I almost called the holiday a 'vacation'. However, I am getting very antsy to see my husband again. I miss him something awful.

I have done so much shopping. Almost all of my Christmas shopping is now done, and I've gotten some lovely things for Fifi, Scott and myself. My favourite things are probably my fabrics I've bought for making clothes for Fifi. It's been great fun.

However, I've gotten very little work done. I brought my laptop so I could work on my reports, but I've only gotten in about an hour of work. Fifi has settled in but refuses to take any sort of long naps. This week is going to be a work week. I've got three Bori Buddies to make and two Bori Buddies to finish. As well as the rest of my handmade Christmas presents I'm supposed to leave here for Arkansas family members.

So, Thanksgiving. It was great. It was like old times, just like it. Waking up to the smell of turkey in the oven (I actually woke up at 5am to check on it, afraid Mom had forgotten to put it in.) My aunt arrived at 10, my brothers just after her, and the rest of the family after that. We stuffed ourselves silly on homemade rolls, turkey, stuffing, dressing, mashed potatoes, green bean casserole, green bean bundles, sweet potato souffle and three different kinds of pie (chocolate, pecan and pumpkin). Mmm!

We've been eating the said delicacies for three days straight. Nothing better than post-holiday, microwaved stuffing and turkey. And turkey salad sandwiches. And turkey everything else.

Friday, we put out all the Christmas decorations. It's tradition to put them out the day after Thanksgiving. Now the house is so wonderfully Christmasy. It feels really good, because now it feels like I got to spend two holidays with my family. This is the first time in four years that I've seen my parents' house decorated for Christmas. I love it.

Fifi loves it too. She is fascinated by my mom's snowman collection. And the tree? Well, you can imagine. She's been very well-behaved with the decorations, for the most part.

Last night, we had a 'reunion' of sorts for all my old high school friends. I had a huge group of friends in high school; only four of us showed up for the reunion. I suppose that's just how it is. But it's annoying to think that three of the four of us who showed up don't even live anywhere nearby anymore, but only one person who is still local came. Oh well, it was a lot of fun. We laughed a whole lot at the expense of our old classmates and really enjoyed catching up. Good to see you, Andrew, Sarah and Devon. Tonight, some old friends of the family are coming over.

(In her defense, Amanda desperatedly wanted to come visit, and she would've been there too had her car not broken down, leaving her to have Thanksgiving in Nashville. I miss you, Mandas. I hope you had a good one.)

The plan for this week (besides getting some reporting and sewing done for work) is more shopping (we haven't hit the Conway stores yet!) and playing on Mom's sewing machine. I'm halfway done with Fifi's dress and more than halfway done with an adorable pair of bloomers. I love sewing machines! They are incredible!

Well, Fifi is up from her nap. My dad turned out the lights so she can enjoy the Christmas tree in all its glory. I want to go enjoy it with her.

Cheerio!

Dancing, Speaking, Signing Baby

Untitled from superlori on Vimeo.

Fifi's Christmas...

If anyone is still trying to decide what to get Fifi for Christmas, a pair of these would do nicely.

(Candy Cane and Bumble Bee are my favourites, but she's open to suggestions.)

Arkansas

In case you didn't guess, I'm safely in Arkansas with my family. It has been a great trip so far. I've been shopping for three days in Branson, Missouri, and visiting with various family members and friends. I miss my husband though.

I know I should post lots and make everyone happy, but I'm too busy enjoying my family time. It is short so I'm going to join Mom, Dad and Fifi in the living room to watch the Andy Griffith Show and eat Velveeta cheese dip.

"its warm some days but still cold."

"these are my facts about scotland

1. scotland is cold.

2.its got big mountains.

3. aberdeen is a city in scotland.

4.its warm some days but still cold."


Best blog ever. Go.

High School of Glasgow Junior 6

Feeling All Right

Fifi has started taking two naps a day: a morning nap, usually about an hour, and an afternoon nap, about 1-2 hours. It is AWESOME.

Today's nap consisted of me tidying (a bit) the kitchen, tidying (a bit) the living room, FINALLY filing away that stack of bills, folding and hanging up laundry, running the dishwasher and the washing machine and reading a few pages about breastfeeding the the Ready Steady Baby book (to make sure the information was accurate, of course.)

Now I'm attempting to squeeze in a quick post before the munchkin wakes up. She's going on two hours.

I am so psyched about Thanksgiving. I keep thinking about how great it will be to see my family and for them to see Fifi; then, I remember that I'm also getting turkey, stuffing, pumpkin pie and sweet potato souffle out of the deal too! Brilliant!

My little business is flying out of my hands faster than I can control it. I've gotten two more orders for my Bori Buddies, which is fantastic. But of course, I'm leaving in a few days and won't be able to finish them before I go (unless I devote lots of time to it and ignore my daughter a fair bit). I've also got the most difficult Christmas card order to fill before I leave, and it's blowing my mind. It's always the simplest cards that are the hardest.

However, on the up side, I've already finished writing and addressing our own Christmas cards. They are ready to be stamped and shipped. I think I'll wait until December though to actually post them. You know.

Basically, today has been a nice, productive, if not quiet, day. Ran some errands in the AM, ate a frozen pizza for lunch, am now sucking up the joy of the last minutes of Fifi's nap with some blogging. And it's homemade soup for dinner, with a little Christmas present sewing after dark. Ah.

Getting Work Done

With only one week to go before my holiday in America (!), I've had SO MANY THINGS to mark off my to-do list. The biggie was to finish my Lori Borealis website, which I have done, even if most of the pages just say 'Coming soon'. At least they aren't broken or missing links. And I still don't actually have it under the actual domain name, but that will come in time. (Somehow I ended up purchasing a domain WITH hosting but the hosting doesn't allow you to upload your own website...???)

I've also been tidying up my business plan, tying up some loose financial ends, finishing Christmas cards (which I may never do with all the other bother I've got) and completing Christmas presents for the American-side of the family. I pulled out all the gifts I've made so far today during Fifi's nap and was mightily disappointed by it's sparsity. It doesn't seem to matter that I started Christmas present crafting in July. I don't have all my gifts finished yet. So that's this week's agenda. Along with everything else I've mentioned, of course, and more.

Like blogging everyday. Aye right.

Anyway, if I didn't have any other obligations, like child-rearing and whatnot, these are the projects I'd be working on:







I found them in an old, out-of-print embroidery book.

But alas, my other obligations far exceed my ablity to do things for myself.

Like read. Which, hey, by the way, I'm going to go do right now. In a bath. Screw ya'll for Christmas.

(Not really! You're gifts will be wrapped in love on Christmas morning!)

The End.

Oh Well

Not even the first week of November gone by, and I've already missed a day blogging. Sigh. Maybe next year.

Lovely Mail Day

Isn't it exciting when you get real mail? And isn't it exciting when you've ordered something, and it finally arrives?

Today was a lovely mail day. Over the past couple of weeks I have ordered several items and have been impatiently awaiting their arrivals. They all arrived today!

First was the snowman die cut I won on eBay.



Then the Moo cards I ordered for my business.



And also my prints of Fifi for Christmas cards from Tesco.



What great fun! I also got a catalog and some vouchers from The Body Shop, but unfortunately I have had to add them to my boycott list, as they recently sold themselves out to Nestle, whom I wholeheartedly and faithfully boycott.



I'm a happy girl today!

Packing Advice, plx.

Calling All Arkansans:

I am going to be packing our bags next week, but I have no idea how to pack for Fifi, seeing as I've been away for three winters and I've never dressed a baby there before. I need some advice. I want any Arkansans reading this (this includes you, Mom, Devon, Aunt Phyllis, Amanda (though you are ex-Arkansas), etc.) to leave a comment.

Will Fifi need to be...


or

(Bundled up or very bundled up?)

Are we talking...

or

(Jumper warm or Felicity sweater warm?)

Help, please.

*Thanks to my assistant, Sir Quackenbush, for modeling.

NaBloPoMo '07

It's that time of year again, Na(tional)Blo(g)Po(sting)Mo(nth). I can almost garuntee (how do you spell that?) that I will fail, but I'll give it another go.

Last night was the first Halloween in about ten years that I did not do anything. It kinda sucked. I was really looking forward to dressing Fifi up (we were going to be the Three Bears), but I never got around to making her costume (just couldn't think of how to do it), and besides, there was nothing going on anywhere. We had a Halloween party here last year, but this year there's no way we could've afforded throwing a party. There was also a kids' thing at FunWorld, but I also knew there was no way I'd be able to convince Scott to spend his evening in a room full of kids. So, we stayed in. Did nothing. Had two trick-or-treaters. Ate the rest of the chocolate eyeballs. Went to bed. I'm a bit down about that.

But oh well, there's always next year, right? And maybe I can get some children's costumes on sale at Tesco if there are still any in stock to get rid of.

I feel my quality of life has lessened just slightly by missing this most weirdest of holidays.

Ah, geez, it was Reformation Day too, and I did nothing for that either! (I told my friends that I go walking with that Halloween was also Reformation Day about two seconds before I remembered they are all Catholic...)

However, check out my cute niece Audrey in her costume: