The Light Returns

Today the Son/Sun is reborn, turning at last from his long slow descent into darkness to face the light & return. The Goddess is reunited with her Son. They reminds us that all dark times do end, though the journey to warmth and full light may take some time, the promise of it is clear. Summer will come, but first there are the storms of February to get through. The Light is there though, showing us the way, growing stronger day by day.

The Light shows us, that even in the darkest of nights there is the promise of dawn, in the frozen earth, there lie the seeds of life feeling the slowly rising warmth. There is hope, no matter how bad things seem. It is the joy of boundless hope which comes from Mother Earth and her Sun.

The birth and rebirth of all nature,
The passing of winter and spring,
We share with the life universal,
Rejoice in the magical ring.    

~ from the Witches’ Creed by Doreen Valiente

We’ll be celebrating the Light’s return tonight with a candlit dinner in a house that is otherwise in total darkness. During dinner there is small ritual where we decide what traits in ourselves we wish to grow with the Light this season. After that we light a fire in the woodstove & the boys get to run through the house turning on every light we own and shouting “Welcome Sun!” at the top of their lungs.

The bonfire waits until New Year’s Eve when more people can join us.

Merry Yuletide & Blessed Solstice to everyone!

Holiday Card Photos–take 2

When last we left our heroine she was struggling with how to make this holiday card more festive.

It needed something. There was a decided lack of…holiday spirit.

I know!

It needs bounty hunters

Because nothing says ‘peace love & joy’ quite like bounty hunters.

Except maybe… bounty hunters with candy canes!

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Ok, yeah. Candy canes. They are festive holiday things right?

Let’s get everyone together for a group shot shall we?

Enough with the sulking Rex, turn around & face the camera. You WILL play nicely with the bounty hunters for the next 5 minutes.

That goes for you too Bane!

And someone make sure Greenie doesn’t choke on that candy cane will you?

I went to get a couple more candy canes & came back to this.

Honestly you guys! Can’t leave you alone for a second. Fett is unarmed & not a threat to you. Put down the gun Cody & let go of the candy cane Rex.

Everyone get back in position

Oh my god Rex! That’s it! You are on time out!

And you can join him Bane if you don’t knock it off

There will be peace love & joy in this photo if I have to beat it out of all of you!

Cody, you and Bane act like you can be civil for a few a moments. Put your arms around each other.

And perhaps not look so annoyed by it Cody.

Better but I *know* I told you to put the gun down earlier.

And I never said you could pick it back up again, did I?

See, it’s not that difficult, nobody’s picked up any bounty hunter cooties or clone cooties either.

Now all together as a group & everyone better play nice or there will be NO hot chocolate afterward.

I have all day people.

We can just sit here until bedtime if that’s what it takes.

Bane: She won’t really keep us here all day will she?

Cody : Oh that’s right. You weren’t here for last year’s card. She’ll keep us here as long as it takes. Best to just humor her.

Greenie: She’s not kidding about the hot chocolate either. And I WANT hot chocolate, so listen to her already or I’ll bite your head off.

Enough chatter! Line up people! and dinos!

Better.

But geez…

BANE!

You all are really pushing my buttons today.

One last try everyone

Finally!

(This post aided and abetted by Havoc & Mayhem who were blessed with Xmas break starting two days early due to 2.5 inches of snow & leaving me no time to take these photos unassisted)

Weekly Winners

Holiday décor.

These guys were playing with the lights

We’ve got ninjas.

They have candy canes

and coffee mugs

Been playing some board games

and there was a huge traffic pile up behind the snow plows

For more weekly winners, please visit Lotus at Sarcastic Mom

Thanks for stopping by!

Scrapbook Saturday

I’ve been busy this week. I scrapped 16 layouts!

16 layouts people!

That more than I scrapped in all of November & October combined!

13 of them were 365 layouts. Here are some of them

And some of them were actually Journal Your Christmas layouts! I now have 7.65 layouts done out of 17 prompts. Woohoo!

and here is the updated Day 5 with the newest advent items

Holiday card photos–take 1

I had plans for this photo.

Big plans.

But they involved me crocheting a bunch of small dino & clone sized santa hats at some point in the last 11 months and well…that never happened.

So I thought – why not bokeh? why not wrap everyone in colored lights in the dark and bokeh away?

Well…because this is me we’re talking about & while I understand the concept of bokeh & even from time to time manage to produce it, this particular idea was really beyond my abilities.

Not that that stopped me from trying.

First I set up in the bathroom, because that is the only place I am guaranteed undisturbed darkness.

Then I thought it would be neat to wrap Nigel Marvin in lights & have the Clones & smaller dinos holding the light strings.

Nigel Marvin is the large stuffed dino for those of you without a scorecard at home.

ok so far so good, lets turn out the lights

yeah… not really what I had in mind. Not dark enough, the little guys are too hard to see….

Slightly better but it looks like an American Idol set now. Or maybe Burning Man.

Maybe we should leave Nigel Marvin out of this & just focus on the smaller guys

The dark background should help right?

Seems sort of disco now… Not bad really but not what I was looking for, more like a rave. Perhaps another angle.

This is like something out of a rock concert.

“And now..Preeeeeesenting….T-REX AND THE CLONES!!!!”

Kinda cool but doesn’t really scream Christmas to me.

Perhaps it is time to admit defeat on the dramatic lighting and go back to what I know.

Ok. Everyone is in focus, everyone is looking at the camera, the tree lights are all bokeh-y (if that is the word) but it too just doesn’t say Christmas to me.

It needs something.

Possibly crocheted Santa hats.

I’ll have to think about it.

it is COLD!

It is really really cold!

Oh sure, if you are in Canada (hi SciFi!) or Wisconsin (hey Sherri!) or other northern regions I am probably warmer than you. But for the mid Atlantic region, it’s freaking COLD out!

We don’t see daily temps in the low 20s until Jan or Feb. Normally we are busy complaining that 40 degrees and rainy sucks for holiday weather but for the past 6-8 days we’ve all been ranting on about the COLD.

My heat pump has not stopped running except maybe for a few hours on Sunday when it reached 33 outside.

There is a draft. I cannot track down the draft. I’ve blocked off every window & door, even inside doors, with beach towels and there is a still cold breeze blowing around my ankles in the kitchen & living room.

Plus if you get within 2 feet of any of the sliding glass doors you can feel the chill coming off 64 square feet of freezing glass, despite the heavy curtains.

We have a woodstove in the living room & when a fire is lit that room gets WARM. Like take your sweater off & go find some shorts warm.

But keep that sweater and possibly some long johns, mittens and a hat handy in case you want to go into any other room in the house. Because that 2 foot cinder block wall not only blocks wifi signal, it traps heat as well.

And the thermostat is in the living room. With the wood stove.

Oh we turn the fan on the heat pump on, and the air return is in the living room to suck up the hot air & blow it through the house. But it’s in the opposite corner of the room (damn hippy stoner builders) & is surrounded by my desk. We’ve discussed putting one closer to the woodstove & blocking this one but 13 years into living here, it’s still just a conversation we have on cold days.

So practically no warm air from the stove reaches other parts of the house, though a few strategically placed box fans do force some of it into the kitchen where it encounters those cold slate tiles & disappears.

That is assuming the fans remain by the door.

Havoc & Mayhem have discovered that you can throw paper airplanes over the fan and the air will carry them great distances. So the fans get aimed at whatever clone or dino group are the bad guys and then planes bombard them.

Meaning no heat ever leaves the living room & because it’s now 88 in the living room, the heat pump doesn’t run and it quickly gets very cold in other rooms. Due to the soil insulation it never gets lower than about 55-60 but while that is fine outside in the fall, it’s biting cold inside in winter when you need to pee.

You shouldn’t need to wear a parka to go pee in your own home.

Basically we only have a fire for a short time on weekends because none of the bathrooms are anywhere near the living room.

I’m off to Lowes to look at space heaters today. A couple well placed ones might make having the wood stove running long term a viable option. Or at least one for the bathroom

Wordless HA!

The problem with having Star Wars ornaments on the tree is that they very often are off the tree and part of whatever adventure the Clone Troopers are having.

What I did instead of what I ought to have done

Ok, so we are up to what? Prompt 13 I think today?

And I have what? 4.35 layouts done?

That is further behind than I intended to be by this point.

I sat down at this computer Saturday morning determined to use Rinda’s suggestion about prompt 9 and then do prompt 11 because I know exactly what I want it to be. Plus I‘d have time to tackle the boys about prompt 4 & at least get it started. Then I figured Sunday I’d work on prompt 10 & whatever prompt 12 was.

I ended up doing 3 complete layouts and have 8 others in various stages of completion from 50% to 90%.

But none of them were Journal Your Christmas layouts.

I sat down intending to them. Really I did. But then…the spirit moved me…and one thing I have learned is that if the spirit has a topic in mind there is no use trying to channel it to another topic, just go with it.

The spirit moved me to get caught up on my 365 Project layouts and since I last did a few back in April I had a lot of catching up to do. I am doing a layout for each of the 16 topics I photograph every month and then a two page spread of the remaining 13-15 photos. I’d set up about 5 of the topics and non of the months back in April. This weekend I set up another 7 of the topics, completed them with photos through November or December, but not all the journaling, picked a style for the remaining 4 (which are the photos of each of us) and 3 styles to rotate through the 12 months. I also managed nearly all of one page of January before 9pm Sunday when I called it quits. 

All I can say is thank god for year in review templates.

This is what I have completed so far:

The colors black

blue

and green

I’ve nearly finished the clones

and the books

and just have to add the text to the first page of january

This is very different from the last two photo books I have done. All the photos are scrapped this time. I’d initially intended to just scrap the themes & then photobook the rest but I think this will look more cohesive.

And since it’s only going to be 40 pages I can afford the blurb 12x12 hardback book

But man it is going to seem skinny beside the other 2.

I’m hoping the spirit will be satisfied with my progress on this soon & move me to get back to the JYC layouts.

Weekly Winners

some from my 365 collection

Heath Bar brownies

Decorating the tree

First fire of the season

The tree all lit up.

For more Weekly Winners please visit Lotus at Sarcastic Mom.

Thanks for stopping by!

JYC layouts

I’m behind as usual, but not as behind as I could be.

I’m still waiting on some weather besides ‘cold’ for prompt 2, though I am inclined to start a layout for it because it doesn’t look like much else is coming our way anytime soon.

Prompt 4 is still hanging out there waiting for inspiration.

I had a great idea for prompt 6 last night, but failed to make a note of it and now can’t recall what it was.

My idea for prompt 9 requires input from the boys & getting them to focus on non-Pokemon things is a challenge, unless it’s Star Wars Monopoly, their new favorite game.

I’ve covered prompt 10 fairly well in my past 2 albums so I’m considering the other suggestions & have a half page done about how I procrastinate wrapping because I really don’t enjoy it.

But having done a page on how I don’t sent out cards because they stress me out I worry about this becoming a “Why I don’t like the holidays” album, so I am not sure about that page.

Here are two I have completed

Prompt 7

and prompt 8

I had to do a page about my beloved Star Wars ornaments. I have one in each of the previous albums as well. Fortunately I have enough of them they don’t seem repetitive…well, to me anyway.

And the progress on prompt 5

Still to do

It’s taken me a few  days to decide what I want to put on my ‘to do’ list. There are plenty of things for me to do but I’m not going to do them all & deciding what to pitch & what to keep is challenging.

Lights or cookies?

Gift bags or gift wrap?

Make teacher gifts or buy teacher gifts?

Which cookies?

What lights?

Xmas crafts for the boys?

Work on layouts or read books?

Shop for stocking stuffers or just grab some Pokemon card packs?

I’d like to at least have holiday lights in the living room but due to topography it isn’t up to me. Oh I can say “please hang up the lights honey” but the hanging is on him & if he doesn’t get to it… he doesn’t get to it.

Last year I made 5 different kinds of cookie, 4 chocolate & one sugar. So far this year I have made none. I want to make cookies, it’s just the idea of a house full of cookies makes me gain 4lbs just thinking about it. I’d like to wait until close to Christmas when we might have more company visiting to eat the cookies, but the kids’ last day of school is the 17th & I like making cookies in a leisurely fashion that is impossible with boys around.

I have fabric bags I made when I was pregnant with Mayhem & it was much easier to sit & sew some rectangles & then stuff things in them than try & wrap gifts. We use them every year with personal gifts but gifts to others require something disposable. Bags are more expensive. But oh I hate wrapping gifts.

Last year I made crochet snowman ornaments for the teachers. This year I cannot find the pattern I used, not to mention the focused time to work on them. I have a glove sitting on my desk since we got back from Florida that needs the last 7 rounds finished & I just haven’t been able to get around to it.

We have stuff to make wooden letter ornaments for the kids’ friends. I just need to find the Mod Podge for the glitter layer.

I’d like to browse for stocking stuffers but it’s Dec 9 and getting parking within a quarter mile of Target or Wal Mart should prove nearly impossible, even at 10am on a Thursday. But I think one of the grocery stores has Pokemon cards.

I also need to find some new ornament storage containers, which means Wal Mart or Target as well because we spatially challenged people cannot buy containers over the web. They always end up the wrong size.

Then there are the gifts I still have to buy. I have 4 card games, a Lego game and a boxed book set on the wish list still at Amazon & every day I check their prices & buy them as they go on sale. I have a Prime membership so I get free 2 day shipping & could conceivably still be ordering gifts as late as Dec 22. But realistically I have to order or buy in person everything by Dec 17th so they can be hidden while the kids are not around.

And I have to think of a gift for DH. I have no idea what he wants. He interest lately has been on economic history & I am thinking of buying him some lectures from the Great Courses. Odd Xmas gift to be sure but he spent all of Thanksgiving break staying up late reading about economic theory and practice in the early twentieth century so I think it would get used.

So how is your to do list looking? Done all your shopping? Your decorating?