The daily grind in pictures

I've been inspired by one friend's Project 365 pictures. I may not be snapping photos every day (and then again, I might!) but I'm taking them a lot more often thanks to a camera that's always handy and some inspiration. So here are some random photos from my life this week.

Pictures I snapped of the sunrise one recent morning after I'd dropped Emma off at school. Looking south:

West:

North:

East:


Ethan (who was supposed to get dressed, make his bed, and clean his room) playing far away from his room in pajamas.


Kids playing Slap Jack, even Macklin:



Pillow fight in living room, broken picture, stern lecture from mom. "Who needs to get their butt kicked?"


Parents out with friends for the evening, Christian the babysitter asked Macklin where he wanted to sleep. Macklin just pulled up a piece of floor, lay down, and said, "Night, Tristian!"


This morning's bread. I bake 3-6 loaves of wheat bread every day.


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Now playing: Sia - Breathe Me
via FoxyTunes

Rest

Blaine's dad passed away Thursday 22 January. He had type II diabetes and his health had been steadily declining, and we thought he would soon be forced to retire from his job.

Blaine is the eldest son and has many responsibilities, which he's handling with great care. His earnest desire is to take care of all his siblings and to foster peace between them. Though many emotions have been and will continue to surface over the next few days, we are at peace. Blaine's dad pulled away from the family years ago, and we mourned him then; this is sort of the last page in a book we've mostly read.

The funeral will be on Friday.

*polishes nails*

I've already started dinner. *smug* This is a coup, since I usually start it at, oh, 5:00.

Actually, I meant to make it in the crock pot, which is why I started so early; turns out our crock pot, though I thought it quite large, is not big enough for the batch of soup I need to make to feed so many Ls. So it's now in my biggest pot, six hours early, bubbling away.

Bean with [baconless] soup, a knock-off of Campbell's <-(my favorite!!1!) that I've adjusted to be vegan. Smells pretty good. I merely hope for it to be edible; if it tastes like the canned soup I'd nearly be in heaven. Ten years without my favorite soup, people.

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Now playing: Harry Belafonte - Day-O (Banana Boat Song)
courtesy of Jackson's MP3 player

4:00 p.m. edit:
It's still at least two hours from dinnertime, but the soup's finished and in the fridge. It actually turned out reasonably like the canned version—not a dead ringer, but I might be able to remedy that over time.

Bean/Bacon Soup Recipe

But I'm probably the only person alive who loves Campell's Bean with Bacon so madly that I'd want to try it at home. The recipe has bacon, though my version doesn't.

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Now playing: Simple Minds - Let There Be Love
via FoxyTunes

Stand beside her, and guide her

I just have to say, swelling with patriotism as I am right now, that I really do love America. <3



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Now playing: the Inauguration on television

Where did that come from?!

Just mixed up some from-scratch cornbread for breakfast for the kids, and while I waited for the oven to preheat I did some cinnamon honey butter to spread on it.

When the oven was warm I...

...opened it to find three loaves of wheat bread I made yesterday and put in a slightly warm oven to let rise and forgot about and never baked and *headdesky headdesk*.

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Now playing: Radiohead - street spirit [fade out]
via FoxyTunes

Party ANIMALS

I really want to make the long breaks we take from school fun, instead of just lounging about doing nothing day after day (which is, alas, our usual M.O.). I think we've done pretty well this break. :) Of course we had the great trip to the cabin for Christmas, and last weekend we went ice skating at a rink in Provo (a 2002 Olympic hockey venue! *fanfare*). Last night we had Emma's local school friends—not the boarding students, who are still at home for the holiday—here for a night of games. It was nonstop laughter and soda and pizza and they had a great time. And today we're going to SLC to my sister's house to play with her kids, their Christmas presents, and their Wii. Tomorrow we'll go with sister's family to an indoor swim park, the kind that has a current pool and indoor water slides and all those things kids turn on and off and spray each other.

Next Tuesday it's back to the regularly scheduled program, but for now we're still living it up. And I think we've had a great vacation. :)

Emma's birthday was Monday. She had probably the best birthday a 15YO can possibly have. Her main (only?) gift was a new cell phone. It's way nicer than mine! And she loved it. Then later in the day her cute little used laptop that we bought used to try to get her through the school year finally, after several pricey repairs, had something go wrong we weren't willing to pay to fix, so we ordered her a brand spankin' new MacBook for school. It arrived yesterday. Can you imagine a 15YO girl more electronically blessed? Neither can I.

I'm off now to pack my little bag and drag my swimsuit out of the cobwebby corners of the bottom drawer, so I can have another adventure this weekend. *waves*

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Now playing: Sia - Breathe Me
via FoxyTunes

Favorites

To start off 2009 quirkily, I've decided to give you a list of some of my favorites. Just, you know, because.

Colors: pinks and browns

These are both things I actually own :-/
Car: if I could buy a car today, and if it didn't have to fit seven children, it would be a Jeep Wrangler Unlimited. And I would have it painted a lovely pastel pink, as long as I'm dreaming. And I'd go topless as many months of the year as I could.

Game: Couch of Power. Fun, fun, fun, and the more you play it (in a single sitting) the more difficult it gets. :)
Pizza toppings: onion, green pepper, pineapple, olives. Sometimes, I admit it, I miss pepperoni.
Restaurant: P.F. Chang's China Bistro. Could eat here every day. Vegetarian lettuce wraps! Ma po tofu! Yum.
Dessert: iced sugar cookies. Chocolate's good, but it is nothing to iced sugar cookies.

Vegetable: red bell pepper
Movies: While You Were Sleeping, Muppet Treasure Island, The Matrix, too many Jane Austen adaptations to list
Books I read last year: To Kill a Mockingbird, Stargirl
Thing to wear: A brown lawn shirt I got from Eddie Bauer for my 40th birthday.
Band: Muse. :) I know, what a surprise!

Song: at the moment, discounting my Muse favorites, Pride by Syntax. Afterglow by INXS is a close second.
Dream that might not come true: being able to take my children on vacation to Hawaii.
Thing I'm working on: getting out of debt. I can get so fired up on this, and also so bummed when we have to increase our debt for something really needful.
Television show: I watch Bones faithfully via hulu.com, but Firefly is still my favorite show of all time.
Season: summer
Wish list items: remodeling bathrooms, new kitchen floor, general prettying up the house. Seeing Muse live in concert. :)