As a mother you try to make everything as wonderous and magical for the children, to keep on old traditions and develop new ones. My Grandparents always had a magical village under the tree with a train that seemed to get lost some where then appear again on the other side. I remember spending hours playing with the ice skaters who would glide across the mirrored pond, and all the little people who where frozen in time waiting for my sister and I to bring them back to life. As I watched my daughters playing with their new dinosaurs in the nativity set it took me back there, to the magical time that I had forgotten.

I cant remember any of the gifts really, just the anticipation, the loooong midnight mass and the inability to fall asleep, just spending hours lying there looking out the window, dreaming of what would be waiting for me under the tree. After finally falling asleep I would get up so early, Christmas eve was definately the longest and shortest night of the year.

My Studio

Please be patient as I still learn the ins and outs of blogging and using pictures.

Well here is my new studio that we had built in the house. All for me and the girls too. A special place where we can create and make messes and glue and glitter like we girls love to do.

Alex, our builder suprised me with the 12" pine plank floor, he knew that was my dream floor. I wanted it throughout the house, but hubbie and Al said no its too soft so we put oak throughout, no carpet.

The sink is an vintage find pulled out of an old farmhouse here in NY. (Another great garage sale find), Luckily I showed it to Al while they were still framing because Al needed to put reinforcments in the frame to hold up the sink. The cabinet above was in the trash and was painted polyester pants lavender, so I repainted it.

The studio is still a work in progress. I know it will take years to get it to where I want it to be but its got great bones and right now there are other things we need, but I am so lucky to have a space that is mine. I am so lucky for everything in my life.

shhh...all is calm

I Love quiet winter mornings. The girls are still sleeping and Dan is off to work and it is quiet and I have a good cup of coffee and oh did I mention the girls are still sleeping? Lovely way to start the day.

We have a foot of beautiful white snow blanketing our world, and they're is a bit of a chill to the house, which somehow I find comforting because that's the way it should be living in New York. Yesterday I took the girls sledding down the driveway, we have a huge hill we prepared for the girls but its to steep for them to walk up or should I say pull them up, so we will stick to the driveway. Its a perfect sledding hill for them, long and a little curvy with a gentle decline, plus its packed down from driving on so you can actually get some speed. Addison (2 years) was chanting awesome, awesome, awesome when we reached the bottom and Kendall (3 1/2 years) was keeping up walking back up toting her own sled. Very proud of my little snow bunnies.

Christmas is almost here, we have been trying to downplay the gifts for the girls, my friend said that they only give their kids 3 gifts because that's how many baby Jesus got and we tried to follow her example, its tough but I really want to teach the girls that Christmas is not about all the material stuff. Its hard battling materialism, I find that myself, I feel that I am battling a shopping addiction. I have had to go out and buy all that it takes to furnish a house. Thank you Craiglist. Well once you start shopping with you get into a zone of buying what you want and not what you really need. Then what we are spending on groceries each week is astounding.

This year we planted a huge garden and I spent most of the summer in our shed-cottage pickling and canning and preserving from our bounty. We actually had 40+ quarts of tomatos, 20 pints of salsa, endless pickles, hot peppers, chutneys, beets then we 1/2 filled our upright freezer with all our veggies. We put together a root celler to store potatoes, onions, squash, sweet potatoes. It really was awesome. We gave quite alot away and there is plenty left, but next year we're going to blow it up and really try to pack alot in the garden.

The fruit trees didnt do so well and we decided never ever EVER to order from Gurney's. And we are digging up the vineyard to replace the grapes with ones that are more beetle resistant. That's what I really need to be doing, making my own wine. I think that might be asking for trouble.

My lastest purchase has been a soy milk maker. LOVE IT. The girls drink so much soy milk I looked into getting one of these babies. One pound of soy beans (99 c/lb) makes almost 1 gallon of milk. I buy 1 quart of soy milk for $4 = $8 a gallon. Although its a bit beanier and the girls wouldn't drink it straight I mixed it 1/2 and 1/2 with the regular stuff to transition them in to it. Plus I can make my own tofu now. Whoo hoo. I will try that this week.

I went vegetarian a little over a month ago. I dont feel any different, just a bit fartier, and I havent lost any weight. Last time I checked in at 181. That was in November after trying 2 doctor prescribed weight loss pills. The Phetermine I lost 10 lbs in about 2 weeks, but it made me mean and I mean Real Mean. So I went off that and he gave me Meridia, nothing there, so I seem to be at a stand still with my weight. No more drugs.

I just finished Valerie Bertinelli's book " Losing It". Inspiring. I always liked her and of course Van Halen. She lost 40 lbs about what I need to and she looks fabulous. I just cant seem to get myself to pay for those Jenny Craig meals though.

I'm looking to get a treadmill for the basement. We set it up for the girls to run aroung and play, ride their bikes and a big bouncy house but the problem is there is nothing for us to do down there and I get wicked bored and end up going upstairs after 10 minutes. I dont want to put a tv down there so I thought if I put a treadmill down there I have something productive, the girls get to play and everyone wins.

And here I am...

After learning to post (2X), wondering if I was divulging too much, wondering if it was any good, wondering and second guessing, I accidently deleted what took me about a month to get out there in one easy keystroke. Ahhh, story of my life. Anyhoo, lets get on with the next chapter.

So here I am, this is me and my family taking a nature walk on Thanksgiving morning after I put the turkey in the oven. Down at the frozen turtle pond we skidded sticks across the ice to see how far they would go. Besides the turkey being done 3 hours early dinner was a smashing success.

I can't believe its been a year almost since our house burned down... or should I say exploded. last year January 26, 2007 we had a propane explosion. Thankfully no one was in the house except our cat Wahoo, who we sadly miss. I can now truly appreciate what I do have and although this year has been tough my family is still here, safe and in tact and thats all I need to truly live. Plus we did end up getting our dream house.

We put in a geothermal as part of our trying to become more self-suffient. Mixed reviews on that. When it works its great but they have been here quite a bit (10x+) to fix the thing and I think they are now looking to replace the units. I understand that its all new but there's snow on the ground, as there ususally is in New York in December, and I dont want my babies being cold.

Hopefully this will all be resolved soon and they can fix this.