Here's my first quilt ever.


I did a fairly terrible job. I measured the squares by eyeballing only and I ripped the fabric into pieces instead of cutting. The lady at the craft store was very disapproving when I told her I wasn't going to use a frame to tie it. She gave me an earful of advice I decided to ignore. See, I have no patience for quilting, all the painstaking measuring and ironing, moving at a snail's pace. I like to create shortcuts wherever possible. With help from mom on the telephone, this came together rather quickly.

And I don't care if it's perfectly smooth and aligned. It's warm and it's Star Wars!

(We had to leave church early because Ben felt a migraine coming. He's napping upstairs now while I post these pictures and enjoy a snack of crackers and goat cheese with mineral water and craisins. For some reason I find that funny.)

Friday I finally painted our bedroom! I haven't hung much art yet, but here's a look at it so far:



We also replaced the ugly faucets with something more appropriate for a pedestal sink.

I love being a homeowner.

The pictures really say it all, so there won't be too much commentary. More pictures from family members posted here.


We stayed in the Animal Kingdom Lodge.


It had Japanese TV with Sumo every night. This is a puppet show of a blood vessel (we think).


These animals are right outside our room balcony.


The following safari pics are from the Animal Kingdom park.





Onto Epcot!










And the Magic Kingdom!


I maxed out the score on Buzz Lightyear. Andy and Ben were uber jealous, then accused me of cheating.



Who's that guy in the skirt? Oh right, my uncle :-)


Hey look! A line!


Jungle Cruise



And now MGM Studios.



I love this one of me and Ben.


And this one is to be sure you all check out my sweet sweet fanny pack




Dinner in the Sci-Fi cafe, where you eat in cars and watch a reel of old movie promos and ads. Very fun!




Honey I shrunk the kids playground set


Back to Magic Kingdom on the last night.



And Downtown to kill time before our flight.




It was a Fantastic vacation. Thanks Mom and Dad!

I've let my blogging duties slide, and now I pay the consequences: you sneak in with pictures from a Merchant Ivory film production in China. Well I ain't got no China. But I have lots of pictures and crafts and stuff going on that's been piling up. Now that I've got a fire under me, expect a few more posts this weekend.

And finally pictures to show you what a great holiday break it was!
** means be sure to click on the pictures for glorious enlarged details.

On the second day of the big blizzard we said "to heck with this!, " chained up the car, drugged up the cat, and skirted off to Grand Junction to jumpstart vacation.

**the small red sign say "No Parking, snow storage area, you will be towed or buried"

Dad and Amanda made two kinds of nut brittle


Mom and I painted the study


Andy did his mac thing


This brittle was devine


Christmas eve carols


and cat picture outtakes! I love that only me and Amanda are looking in the same direction out of all six of us.


We kids got dad a rc airplane. After a couple days the snow melted enough to give it a whirl


And dad loved Andy's wii almost as much as Andy. He got his own recently - and so did we! I mean wii!

Dad whaled Andy on both tennis and boxing





Addison is getting cuter everyday! Read about Kristin's family on her site.

All three Waterhouse kids teethed on this Sesame Street finger puppet.

There was a bonfire party at the Graves house. Ben was in heaven with their dogs


Later in the trip we were able to give the plane a proper run. I think it took two trips to the hobby shop to replace parts, but we had a great time flying.





**Love mom's face in this shot




**zoom in to see Dad watch his plane take a nose dive! This was a hilarious lucky shot.


Mom and dad have a fantastic aquarium in their office. These shrimp are fun to watch


At the end we had a beautiful drive back over the mountains.

We left later than planned because of more snow on the front range. I was spoiled with presents, got to see a lot of friends and family, and came back thoroughly relaxed. Merry Christmas.

How did there ever become a show that has fart jokes for Ben and musical references for me? I'm not sure, but I'm so glad Family Guy is still on the air! Last night in the Road to Rupert episode, they gave 2 1/2 minutes (10% of the show really!) to a musical gag. They took the footage from Anchors Aweigh and put Stewie in for Jerry the mouse. Stewie and Gene Kelly dancing together! I almost fainted :-) Here's the clip in case you missed it:

My friends in Brooklyn have made a splash on Myspace with a music video:

We have no idea how this happened, but the "Earth Versus the World" music video has reached the top of the MySpace.com video section today, reaching almost 8000 hits as of this writing. Here's a link to the MySpace page just so you can see it in all it's glory.

Congratulations!

Sigh. My life is so suburban I could puke.

View them here.

My thoughts:

Abigail Breslin is up for best supporting actor?? She's 7! And she didn't do anything remarkable in the film but act like a 7 year old!

The art direction category is really interesting. Diverse films.

I hope An Inconvenient Truth wins best documentary just so Gore can run his campaigns with the tag "Academy Award winner Al Gore . . ."

How did Volver get skipped for best foreign? I thought it was sure to be a standoff between it and Pan's Labyrinth?

If Dreamgirls doesn't win best song it will be truly sad (only because they hold 3 out of the 5 nominee spots).

Click? Click is up for Best Make-up???!!!! Give me a break!

A lot of variety overall, good. It's boring when the same 5-7 films fill every category. I'm pleasantly surprised The Prestige is up for a few things. Even Borat squeezes in. I'm sad to see Marie Antionette only up for Costumes.

according to this article. As a budding expert on depression, I recommend a hearty dose of cat videos (at least that's how I spent my lunch hour). May I suggest:

Soothing cat


Do I laugh or cry cat


Unusual cat


Biscuit making cat


Circus cat


Clever cat


Acrobatic cat


Kind cat


Deliver cat

Feel better now?