Being Prepared

I just found a great give-away of a superb emergency preparedness kit - check it out here to enter today! It's at the Totally Ready blog. Also, there is a TON of great info to check out.

Store Closing

By the way, Waldenbooks/Borders in the Palouse Mall is closing sometime soon. We went in today and EVERYTHING is at least 25% off, with some things up to 75%....if you are in the area you may want to check it out.

Snow

James built a wall behind our house out of the snow that was covering our patio - he was going to make a slide for Maiby, but it started raining the next day and the wall is disappearing. But this is what it looked like when we went out to play on it. Maiby really enjoyed walking in the snow. I thought she would get a little more upset about the cold and wet that happens when you use your hands to stand and your glove comes off and you end up with a handful of snow instead of standing...but she just rolled with the punches and had fun. We had to go inside for dinner after too long, but I'm sure there will be more snow fun to be had, especially if last year is any indication of this year's snow (still on the ground in May and snowing on my mom's June birthday).

Ok, so the pictures have to wait. I have tried 4 times to load them and they are not working. Sorry.

Basic Western Canon

This summer, my brother sent several people an email containing the Basic Western Canon and highlighted all of the books he has read throughout his life. He asked anyone interested to highlight the ones we have read and send him a copy back. I did, and it has been great going through the list and picking out more to read. There are many books there that I have wanted to read or heard about and sound good, and others that are just considered very important. Anyway, as the year was ending, I decided to update the list and send it back to him and figured why not post it here - not the list, just the ones I've read (the original list to choose from has more than 500 books).

Aesop's Fables, by Aesop
** Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott
** Emma, by Jane Austen
** Persuasion, by Jane Austen
Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen
** Sense and Sensibility, by Jane Austen
** Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Bronte
** My Antonia, by Willa Cather
** O Pioneers!, by Willa Cather
The Great Gatsby, by F Scott Fitzgerald
The Diary of Anne Frank, by Anne Frank
The Gift of the Magi, by O Henry
The Call of the Wild, by Jack London
Gone With the Wind, by Margaret Mitchell
Macbeth, by Shakespeare
Romeo and Juliet, by Shakespeare
The Merchant of Venice, by Shakespeare
A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court, by Mark Twain
The Time Machine, by H G Wells

** the starred books are the ones I have read off the list this year, and the rest are the ones I highlighted as soon as he sent it....BUT some of the other books I read this year that I really enjoyed were: Dracula (not as scary as I had anticipated), Les Miserables (learned more than I ever wanted to know about French history & most of it was pretty interesting....you don't even know a sewer system until you read that), The Historian (another vampire book, more exciting than Dracula), and of course the novels that I love by my favorite authors: Ann B Ross, Mary Higgins Clark, Jan Karon, and Joanne Fluke. Is anyone looking for clean and entertaining novels? I would recommend these 4 authors to anyone.

Waiting for the Baby Weight

Here I am, over a year later and still wishing* that the baby weight was gone. Wishing is the key word, here. I have tried several times, and actually came really close right before James got home - I was down to my last 7 pounds and then had a bad reaction to some medication and gained the 8 I had just lost in one weekend...needless to say, I wasn't happy and then James came home and I had excuses to not work out.

Anyway, I have started working out once again, and since James doesn't have school right now, we are both working out together in the mornings at home, and then once school starts I will be headed to the Student Rec Center to take some wellness classes. I am excited, not exactly for the weight, but because already I have noticed an increase in energy and feeling better, and especially I am excited to have more pants to wear soon...

Crafts

So there are so many craft ideas that I have found through blogs, and I am really excited to try them out. One of the ones that sound like a lot of fun is felt food - make a bunch of different food toys for Maiby to play with that are made of felt. There are great sites, and I wish I had made a big list when I was looking the other day, but I didn't. So I guess the next time we are back in Moscow and I go to the computer lab I will spend the first half hour or so looking for the patterns and then printing them all out (the free ones, of course).

And I found some great ideas for puppets. I would LOVE to have a ton of puppets - for each of the traditional stories that we tell kids (3 Bears, Little Red Riding Hood, 3 Pigs, etc), and I have been keeping my eyes open for some good ideas. I found some for sale at thelandofnod, but mainly I liked those because I think I can alter a pattern I have at home to make them look a little more like those than the ones on the pattern....but that project may be a ways off.

And of course I am excited to make vinyl signs and decor for holidays, but that definitely has to wait. We had some great ideas the last time that the ward had a craft day, but we had family coming into town and of course I was too spacy to realize that I could just but the stuff and do it on my own later...duh!!

Merry Christmas!

I hope everyone had a great Christmas. We have been down in Lewiston since Wednesday - I was pretty bummed that we weren't able to go to Carlee and Jonathan's big day in Spokane due to the snow, but I'm sure they enjoyed the temple with Mikenzy.

We had a great holiday and have enjoyed spending time with James' parents here; I have especially enjoyed having some time to surf the internet while Maiby naps and Jeff & Kathy are at work. I have found some great creative blogs and can't wait to try some of the projects I've come across. I tried to add some of the links to the side of this blog, but I forgot to hit the save button before I closed the mini window and don't feel like tracking them down right now.

I hope that you are all enjoying your winters and holidays. Have a great New Years!

PS- we have un-privatized our blog (just in time for your invite, Jade - heehee)