Last Year's New Year's Resolutions....?

Do you make them? I made two last year, on the insistence of my father-in-law. And guess what? I accomplished both!

1 - Lose all the baby weight from Lucy. And I did. I lost thirty pounds from January 2010 to July 2010, when I discovered I was pregnant with baby number two. So yay for me!!!!

2 - Learn how to sew something, ANYTHING. Granted, I waited until the last minute - the week after Christmas - but I still learned how to sew a baby blanket in 2010!

This makes me feel hopeful about next year and more encouraged about making goals. I need to start making a list.....

Sewing! And Other Crafts.

I'm so excited! About three weeks ago, my grandmother said she was going to teach my 14 year old sister how to sew a quilt. I asked if I could join the lessons and just do a simple baby blanket. Last week we started and I LOVE IT. I'm actually a little frustrated it took me this long to try - I always thought it'd be really hard - but it's fun and not at all difficult. I started talking more about how much I wanted to learn and get better at it and make really cool things.... And then, for Christmas, I got the best gift ever!

My mother-in-law and grandmother-in-law went in together and got me a SEWING MACHINE. I was not expecting it at all! It was the last present I opened on Christmas and by far the biggest surprise!

I can't let such a lovely piece of equipment go to waste, so I'll be working nice and hard on developing this new skill. Hopefully, I'll turn it in to a talent!

I also finally unveiled my decoupage boxes to my in-laws, as their Christmas gifts, and they LOVED them. Said they were beautiful, well done, and they spent a lot of time examining my handiwork. It made me feel good - I'm glad they were so kind and appreciative. It was my first effort and they made me want to keep at it! I've got great in-laws. :-)

Between modge-podge and sewing, maybe I'll actually get good at something and can have a more productive hobby than reading!

Elder Parr - Adventures in Montana: We did it because we love you.

Elder Parr - Adventures in Montana: We did it because we love you.: "Monday December 20, 2010 One story: We were going to go to someone's house Saturday morning and help a man chop wood for his family ..."

My cousin is on his mission "Somewhere in Montana." And he is absolutely awesome. Read his Paul Bunyan experience and enjoy. :-)

Pin Curls

Now I might actually be able to manage this one...and with family pictures coming up I'm going to have to start practicing....

She makes it look so easy!!!!

A Charlie Brown Christmas

Christmas is over-commercialized. I think we can all agree on that. But it's this very obvious fact that makes Christmas such a hard time of year for struggling families. If it was just another day, we wouldn't care so much that we have so little. Because it's a day we have been conditioned to think of as something huge - trees, feasts, presents, gatherings - it feels worse to struggle at this time of the year than any other.

I love Christmas. I always have. My family has traditions I love. And I'm just talking about the "material" side of Christmas - it's a lot of fun. But I really wish we celebrated Christmas more like we celebrate Easter - on a smaller scale. Maybe just stockings instead of all the other stuff - after all, we don't have an Easter tree or exchange wrapped packages on that day. We might get a new Sunday outfit and a basket of candy. Why can't Christmas be the same way?

This year, we're struggling. So are Skye's parents and my mother's family. Skye and I aren't buying each other presents - we're just writing each other letters. We bought a $20 gift for Lucy that she'll love and she's got new crayons and a coloring book in her stocking. I'm glad she's too young to know what all the TV shows, commercials, and Santa are trying to tell her.

I haven't been listening to Christmas music - I find it a little depressing. I've been putting off wrapping Lucy's gift. I'm not really in the Christmas mood. It's just too hard to get there this year.

But tomorrow I get to teach my primary class about the prophecies of Christ's birth - and that has lifted my spirits considerably. This is the only reason I'm getting through the season: I'm focusing my own thoughts more on Jesus Christ. As an expectant mother, I'm also thinking a lot about Mary and all she went through as the mother of the Messiah. Because of these thoughts, and the scriptures, I am sincerely grateful for all that I have. I'm grateful for the home I live in, for my husband and daughter, for the new baby coming in just a couple of months, for the food on the table, that we all have clean and warm clothing, and most especially for the birth of the Savior over 2,000 years ago.

29 Weeks Pregnant, and Entering Terrible Twos

Butternut squash. That's what the email I got today compared my baby to - in size. :-) I'm excited. I actually know what a butternut squash is, for one thing, and for another...that means I could have only 11 weeks left in my pregnancy!!!

That's less than three months.

That means I'm more than two-thirds of the way through.

I am so excited! Especially to have a little boy after having a girl. I can't wait to see how different they are, because of their gender and because of their personalities. Each child comes to the earth with their own, individual talents, personalities, and missions. :-) We plan on having a large family which means we'll be seeing a lot of variety.

Lucy is about to enter the terrible twos, as they are called. Today she made it through the first hour of Church - which is the Priesthood/Relief Society hour in our stake (SO backward. Don't even get me started.) - in nursery. Then she had a melt down so her daddy took her during Sunday School. Once we got to Sacrament Meeting, Lucy was in and out of the chapel. She threw food, screamed at people, and hit mommy with a pencil in the face. The first two times, Daddy took control. The third time, Mommy took her out. She KNEW she was in for it.

As I walked out with her to the foyer - my intention only to stand there with her until she calmed down - she announced to the other people sitting out there (from the other ward): "TROUBLE! Oooohhh.... Trouble!" One of the older women I know laughed and said, "You're in trouble? Uh oh!" Lucy then said: "Spanking!"

I was aghast. I mean, she does get the occasional swat, but she hadn't been even threatened with one today. I didn't even tell her that she was IN trouble, but she instinctively knew and put trouble with spanking. It was really weird to see my little parrot come up with her own words to describe her situation and what she thought was going to happen next. Clever, aren't they?

The Clash of the Christmas Traditions

When you get married, you begin to discover there are a lot of things you didn't talk about beforehand that would have been good to know. For some, these can be major things like how many kids you want. For others, it can be little things like whose job it is to take out the garbage or do other household chores. I, being the brilliant woman I am, discussed most of these things with Skye pre-marriage. Children, chores, the role of a father, the role of a mother, et cetera.

One of the things we didn't really discuss - though it came up pretty quickly - were Christmas traditions. Here's where some of our traditions differed as we were raised:

Santa:

• He brought Skye presents faithfully every year and even (gasp) showed up at the house on Christmas morning! He was the Christmas Spirit personified.
• Sally was told from a very early age there's no such thing as Santa, he's a made up person, presents come from parents, AND (here's the kicker) Santa completely destroys the true reason for the season, the birth of Christ.

Presents:

• Skye got all the BIG things he'd been wanting, and a plethora of packages. LOTS of stuff. This was the time of year to get everything you'd wanted the REST of the year.
• We got one gift for the group to share - when we were younger it was a mini-kitchen and a couple of years ago it was a Wii - and then everyone got maybe one $20 gift and candy in stockings. We got the stuff we really wanted usually when we wanted it, earning it with chores or paying for it out of money we got elsewhere. We also had about five years where everything we got came from the Angel Tree in our ward. Not to be ungrateful, but the angel tree gifts were usually pretty lame. I never got anything other than bath stuff.

Christmas Eve:

• Skye's family prepped for the big day and watched a family movie - usually A Christmas Carol.
• This is our day of celebration at my mother's house. This was the day for the presents, the big feast, looking at Christmas lights, and everything!

Christmas Day:

• Skye's family marched down the stairs, early in the morning, IN BIRTH ORDER, to the tree. They opened gifts, stockings, had Santa, lazed around until the big meal, and this was Christmas!
• We woke up whenever the heck we felt like it and didn't have to wait for anyone to open our last two things - stockings, and a very special letter left in the tree by our mother in the night, one addressed to each of us. The rest of the day was spent being together, doing nothing. 

Opening of the Gifts:

• Everyone takes a turn, one at a time, one present at a time. This makes opening presents last about three times as long as necessary. Especially with the running commentary on each gift.
• One...two...three...GO!!!! Flurry of ripping paper, laughter, exclamations of delight, and done in less then twenty minutes!!! Then we thank mother, show off the gifts, and commence complimenting one another. This makes everything very loud, but very fun. Then we grab a big garbage bag and put all the wrapping inside and...done!

You could see where these "minor" differences could lead to clashes between my husband and I. We haven't argued over a single thing so far. What's nice is that we're still a small enough family that we spend the holidays with our parents AND we live close enough to both that we go to my mom's on Christmas Eve and his family's on Christmas Day. So far, both sets of traditions are being observed. It will be interesting to see what happens if we ever move away, and what will happen when we have our own traditions.

Tangled - A More Coherent Movie Review

Absolutely wonderful movie - hearkens back somewhat to the days of the Disney Renaissance, reminding one of stories like Beauty and the Beast, Little Mermaid, and Aladdin. There are a lot of traditional Disney elements at play here - first, it's a fairy tale story told with a more traditional setting than Princess and the Frog - castles, fantastic landscapes, and characters wearing peasant-style clothing abound. Second, the characters SING. Nothing over the top or cheesy, just short and sweet songs or (in the case of the villain) diabolically clever little ditties.

They also did a great job of including some original elements from the Grimms' version of the story - this is the story based upon Rapunzel - with a unique Disney twist that makes it more marketable to families and children and less graphic/violent.

For those unfamiliar with the storyline, it involves the theft of a small child to satisfy the selfishness of a wicked witch, the child being locked in a tower and being led to believe the witch is her mother, someone stumbling upon the tower and finding the girl-now-grown-up... Then the Disney twist kicks in and the girl abandons the tower to follow her dream. But (and you'll see what I mean) the very end of the movie includes one more homage to the original story.

Rapunzel is spunky, cheerful, bright, and torn between being a dutiful daughter and following her heart (Ariel, anyone?). All she wants is one day of freedom to see what the world has to offer, and what she gets is a hodge-podge of friends and an adventure that takes her through the kingdom and (slowly) finds out the truth about her life. 

I cried at the beginning and at the end, and I LOVED the whole movie. We will be buying this one as soon as it's out on DVD. It was FANTASTIC. The romance wasn't ridiculous - no "love at first sight" here - and the comedy was present on several levels. We laughed a LOT. There's also enough ACTION/ADVENTURE that a boy could sit through it and REALLY enjoy it.

Warning: Scary scenes for younger children may include the kidnapping of the heroine as a small child, an intense chase scene, a character being wounded, and a death scene.

Subjects to talk about with children: Kidnapping, REAL parental love, verbal abuse of a child ("mother" says various unkind things to "daughter."). 

Oh - and we saw it in 3D. Maybe worth the extra bucks for older people, but I'm betting 2D would've been just as good if we'd had younger children with us. There are a few scenes that do make the 3D worthwhile.

All in all - 5/5 stars from me!

Yeah, I Cry During Disney Movies

The first one I remember crying during was Beauty and the Beast - which also happens to be my favorite classic. There I was, about eight years old, watching this wonderful movie (featuring a brunette Disney princess, which I loved), and then the Beast was KILLED. Watching it now, it's a pretty corny moment, but as a little kid I was sure the world was coming to an end and that the movie I was watching was really stupid if they were going to end it that way.

I cried when Tarzan's parents were killed, to the tune of a Phil Collins song.

I cried through the first few minutes of Up. Very melancholy beginning, that one.

I cried at the end of Toy Story 3, but that was a really happy cry, a warm-fuzzy cry.

But, taking the cake so far, is the newest Disney film - Tangled. I found myself tearing up at the beginning and whispering to my husband, "How terrible! How awful!" When you who are parents go and see it, you'll understand. Especially if you happen to be pregnant like I am.

I teared up again in the middle and leaned my head on my husband's shoulder to say, "I'm so glad they showed that." You'll know what I mean. It's a tender moment between a married couple.

And I cried during the last few minutes - again, the warm-fuzzy kind of cry.

I. Hate. Crying. Especially over silly movies made for children. I'm worse when I'm pregnant - I can't even watch certain commercials without getting all weepy. But I think, pregnant or not, I would have been touched by Tangled. It's one of the most amazing films Disney has done, probably my favorite from the past TWENTY years. It was beautiful in terms of artwork. I need to do a better review of this, I'm sure, but I have to say that it was wonderful and I would recommend it to EVERYONE. Go see it. See it in theaters, it will be better that way. And if you can spare the extra bucks, go ahead and see it in 3D. There are a couple of scenes that really make that worthwhile.

I have to go chase my daughter and nephew now.

GO. SEE. TANGLED. And take a tissue, too. Just in case.