Archive for the ‘ Lifestyle ’ Category

Toddler Magnets

Author: Erika

Dec 1

I really should have taken a picture of my Christmas tree before Aidan got to it. Here, let me paint you a textual picture:

A 7.5 foot tall Wesley pine tree, lush and full and dark green forever because it’s fake but the fakeitude is only obvious if you get too close to it. Looping across the width of the tree are strands of colored lights, glowing bright (but not too bright, because they’re not LEDs) in tandem with strands of silver and gold garland beads.

Dangling off the ends of the branches are red, silver, and white ornaments festooned with silver and gold glitter. Poking through these ornaments are family and heirloom ornaments, every one of which has a story, and for some extra flavor there are red and white candy canes here, there, and everywhere.

At the top, there’s a beautiful white star that lights up and shows off the gold swirls that are painted onto it.

This was before. It looked nice, really nice if I do say so.

And then Aidan got to it.

Now, the garlands are diagonal and uneven, the ornaments are grouped in weird places, and the lights are no longer strung straight but are, rather, pulled into random loops by tiny toddler fists.

I got sick of policing my freaking tree, so this morning I moved all the ornaments and garlands up high enough to keep them beyond Aidan’s reach. The tree looks half-finished, but it’s better than constantly telling Aidan not to touch the shiny, pretty things we placed so cruelly at eye level.

Even when we had a puppy, I can say with perfect certainty that Christmas has never been such a pain. My goodness, Christmas decorations are toddler magnets! And none of them are durable enough to be played with by my wrecking ball of a child.

I mean, unless I got rubber ornaments I doubt any decorations would be strong enough to withstand Aidan’s loving attention.

I look forward to future Christmases when my children are big enough to help me decorate the tree and are old enough to look with their eyes. While I understand Aidan’s pathos to experience Christmas, I wonder how many ornaments will survive it…

Post to Twitter Post to Digg Post to StumbleUpon

2 Comments
Filed under: Lifestyle | Tagged as:

A Night At The Opera

Author: Erika

Nov 28

I’m glad today’s finally the 28th of November, because it means I can finally tell you about the opera Wes took me to see on October 28th.

You see, I had pretty pictures on my camera after the opera, but I only download pictures to my computer about once a month, so the pictures stayed there long after they were relevant. I didn’t really want to write a post about going to the opera without including a picture, so I waited.

And then a week passed.

And then two weeks passed.

When three weeks had passed and my pictures were finally on my computer but too old to be any good to me, I decided to just wait a month and call it good.

So, that’s what I did. Or, rather, what I am doing.

Let me take you back. At the beginning of October, Wes said to me, out of the blue, “Anticipation.”

“Uh, what?” was my response.

He repeated himself, without any explanation save telling me he had a surprise for me but wouldn’t tell me what it was.

He really should have known better.

Picture a fly trapped in a jar. Ok, now give that fly a sugar high. And a full bladder that he’s unwilling to relieve in the confines of the jar.

That was me. I was FREAKING OUT trying to figure out what the surprise was. I LOVE surprises in that I hate them. I like surprises so long as I know what they are. All Wes would tell me was that he was planning a special evening for us, but that was it.

INFURIATING.

After three days of literally losing sleep over the whole thing, I gave up. I decided to try acting like an adult and just let me husband surprise me. Which was, of course, when he decided to relent and tell me.

He bought us opera tickets. To go see Carmen.

Carmen by Georges Bizet is my all-time favorite opera. It’s a dark story but my GOODNESS the music is incredible. I could listen to the music all day every day and if you have the right woman playing Carmen? PERFECTION.

Going to see it live has been on my bucket list for years. Wes, knowing that, heard that the Seattle Opera would be performing it and scooped up tickets for the show, with which he then surprised me.

He had the whole evening planned. First? Dinner at Benihana (I saw the restaurant on Mad Men and wanted to try it).

(Those are sampler glasses of Sake, for the record. Not photographic proof of how wasted I got. I didn’t get wasted.)

Next stop? The opera!

My sister in law straightened my hair for me, which is why I look like an entirely different person. I wore really high heels and a classic little black dress and I painted my nails and looked Oh So Stylish.

Though in Seattle you almost shouldn’t bother because no matter how classic your styling may be, odds are pretty good you’ll get seated next to some smart-aleck drama student who came to the opera dressed as a frigging bird. True story.

In sum, the opera was absolutely transcendent. The music was flawless, the acting and singing superb, and it was everything I’d always dreamed it would be. A night well worth waiting for.

Post to Twitter Post to Digg Post to StumbleUpon

2 Comments
Filed under: Fashion, Lifestyle | Tagged as:

The Promise of Christmas

Author: Erika

Nov 21

Friday is Christmas decorations day!!! I’m sure my focus should be on Thanksgiving and all, but I can’t seem to get jazzed about turkey because FRIDAY IS CHRISTMAS DECORATION DAY!!!

Wes and I were strolling through Target yesterday and it took every scrap of self-discipline I had not to buy ALL THE THINGS.

Ornaments, tinsel, Christmas lights. They’re all amazing and they all belong in my house! Right now!

The reason I love Christmas decorations so much is that I’m not normally very big on decorating my house. My house looks nice (in my opinion, at least) but decor is pretty low on my list of priorities.

Except on Christmas.

On Christmas, we have a tree, and trimmings, and lights, and sparkly things, and there’s color everywhere! Everywhere!

This probably doesn’t seem like a big deal to you, but here in Seattle it gets dark at 4 pm during the winter and you start feeling like maybe there isn’t any color left in the whole world. Like the world is swamped with shades of darkness and shadow, swabbed with a patina of frost.

But at Christmas? The frost is pretty. And the cold outside makes the Christmas lights shine brighter. And the world is all glitter, and gold, and firesides, and treats, and it’s all just the nicest way to celebrate Jesus, in my opinion.

So that’s why this week I’m all about Friday. Because turkey is awesome and all, but it’s nowhere near sparkly enough.

Post to Twitter Post to Digg Post to StumbleUpon

Comments Off
Filed under: Lifestyle

National Novel Writing (Quitter) Month

Author: Erika

Nov 15

Frick. My camera is all the way upstairs and I keep sitting down at my laptop and thinking, “This post could really use a picture” and then my camera is still upstairs because I was probably thinking about laundry or something when I walked downstairs last time when what I should have thinking about was what the heck I was supposed to remember!

And that? Is just about how my day has been going. Just one big brain cloud that follows me around wherever I go.

It’s not my fault, really. This has already been an incredible month, and it’s only half over. It started out with a project that I thought would preclude me from doing NaNoWriMo. Then, I finished that project early and started NaNo two days late. I was coasting along, really gaining momentum when BAM! ANOTHER PROJECT, this one even bigger than the first one and with little to no warning.

To add stress to projects, I hosted Thanksgiving at my house last weekend for my side of the family. Just me, a 19 lb turkey, 14 hungry mouths, and a small mountain of bread dough. It went really well (and by really well I mean the food was all hot and finished at the same time, everyone had enough to eat, and everyone got along) but I think I only sat down twice the whole evening.

In the midst of this maelstrom of cholesterol, my poor NaNo novel has been sitting on my hard drive, abandoned and stuck at a perpetual 14,843 words. I had finally caught up to where my word count was supposed to be when I got derailed by my GIGANTIC PROJECT.

I haven’t touched it in a week. As prolific as I can sometimes be, I doubt that even I can finish NaNo with a nine day deficit. It’s okay, this novel will get finished in December maybe. Or January. Heck, let’s go crazy and say maybe even February!

In the meantime, I’ll be over in the corner trying to console myself that I’m not a failure just because I didn’t finish NaNo this year. And yes, “console myself” is just code for eating chocolate. Talk therapy is cool and all, but chocolate is way cheaper.

Post to Twitter Post to Digg Post to StumbleUpon

7 Comments
Filed under: Lifestyle, NaNoWriMo

The Worst Spa of All Time

Author: Erika

Oct 10

If you could see me right now (I’m saying “if” because “You’d better not be staring at me right now because that would be creepy as h-e-doublehockeysticks” sounds a bit harsh) you’d see me wearing no makeup, snuggled under a blanket on the couch with my laptop on my lap and some extremely heavy eyelids.

The blanket is entirely my fault, the eyelids aren’t. My weekend was 100-miles-a-minute busy, and even though it was busy in a good way it was still busy and I fervently wish I had a weekend to recover from my weekend.

This is what my table looked like at the signing!

On Saturday I had my first book signing and I’d say it went swimmingly. I’d consider it a huge success, because I sold one book to someone I don’t know, and sold whole heaping bunches to friends and family members who came out to support me.

I’ve gotta say, there’s absolutely nothing in the whole world that makes a writer feel more loved than when someone takes time out from their weekend to stop by their book signing. I was positively beaming by the time I got home, even though I was hobbled by sore feet thanks to my unwise decision to wear high-heeled boots to said signing.

Then on Sunday I volunteered to watch a passel of toddlers in the Sunday school class for kids slightly older than my son, which meant I spent an hour and a half holding kids, breaking up squabbles, rousting trouble-makers, and changing diapers/taking children to the bathroom. After that, I helped set up for a baby shower, attended the shower, and then helped clean up afterward.

I. Am. So. Freaking. Tired.

It was a weekend filled with all things that are good, but I’m still exhausted from all the Being Nice and Chatting With People and Setting Up/Taking Down. I dream of a spa day, quiet and serene, where no one’s allowed to talk and my only job is to sit there and relax while people make my skin and nails happy.

My Monday so far is exactly like that if you consider chastising Aidan for ripping pages out of books to be quiet and serene, vacuuming the house to be sitting there and relaxing, and editing my book and answering emails the same as having people make my skin and nails happy.

Gosh, wouldn’t that just be the worst spa of all time?!

Post to Twitter Post to Digg Post to StumbleUpon

Comments Off
Filed under: Lifestyle
« Go Back — View more posts »