Fra kakaka ka-kow

The fox song has been on infinite repeat since June, because my kids have to beat a thing into the ground before they are done with it. They bend over their homework with studious murmurings punctuated with CHACHACHOW. Our evening walks bring us under the moon with howls of AWOOOO-OOOH. It has the boys in its thrall, and us by extension. I am both repelled and excited by all the fox merchandise flooding the stores, just as I roll my eyes and then secretly try on all the mustache gimickry that is still going through its cultural death throes.

So when designing an ornament, I didn't have to think very hard to know where it was going.

This is the sort of thing that makes a person glad that Costco stocks gallons of eggnog and rum.

Christmas 2013

(As documented by doggedly poking my phone while putting the baby down for a nap.)

There is a score of crashes and breaking glass down in the kitchen, measured by the metronomic clacking of a kendama ball. A yelp, a smash, and now there are cries that the tree has fallen over. This is the sound of post-Christmas present implementation. An oven vent being installed, awkward-limbed children destroying the living room. I think I will just lay here a bit longer.

_ _ _

I missed Christmas morning. The baby pawed sleepily at me to nurse while the boys scrambled down the stairs at 5:30am, and by the time I gathered her up and crept downstairs the stockings were disgorged. Gavin had left a note for Santa requesting "magic sprinkled on everyone", so the boys looked as if they had been punched twice in the face with red glitter. Mike had glittery hand prints wiped on his pajama pants.

After coffee was secured, the usual frenzy of ripping began. 

The toy of the year is the kendama, which is just a fancy ball and cup. There has been a youthful backlash against electronic toys in these parts, and all the cool kids are playing with retro toys that do not use batteries and which can also be used as weapons if no adults are looking. The richer bullies can even buy cherry wood kendamas, if they've split their pine ones on the heads of second-graders.

There was loot. 

Among the toys, ornaments, oven vents, and books, there was a perfect small jar of honey from my aunt's own beehives in British Columbia. The idea of wearing a giant bee suit and commanding an army of bees makes my mother's run-away-and-buy-a-farm-in-Washington plan a bit more tempting.

Zenny was very bad at unwrapping, but very enthusiastic about the goods. Also about the Hershey kisses, which are just the right size to lodge in her esophagus. (As are the almonds. And gelt. And a lot of the bows. It's been an exciting time for me.)

My mother gave me AMAZING 5-piece 6-inch carbon-fiber double-pointed size-0 sock needles with dual-function yarn-knitting and hand-impaling action! (The steel knitting needles I had asked for.) This was the best picture Leif could take of me with the magic needles:

There were TINY WEINERS.

The boys were silent for 6 solid hours, assembling mini Minecraft worlds out of a billion squares of plastic. 

And MEAT PIE. 

There is an entire lamb roast and half a cow in there. With gravy, and carrots, and neeps. My crust would have been nicer, but the rolling pin I bought my mother to replace the one with the broken handle was smashed and broken in exactly the same way. The gift of a complicated Amazon merchandise return. 

The bottle of Braddah Kimo's Undrinkable Poison Rum we have used to set fire to our plum puddings for 10 years still had an inch of combustible liquid in it. Braddah Kimo's is an amazing accelerant and tastes very good once most of it is burned off, and is potentially a great murder weapon, if used as a hostess gift at a party you don't want to be at.

At nightfall we drank cherry wine, watched the Hogfather until the kids dropped off to sleep on our laps, and put them to bed by hedgehog light.

Twilight haaaaands.

Discovery of the year: Big Island Candies Mika passion fruit melty things. These have ousted Shmidt truffles as the sin of choice.

It was a good year.

The eve

The tree is reaching critical mass. It is time.

Merry Christmas, out there.

A preponderance of cat assholes

I just wanted to make chocolate mice. We did this every year back in Newfoundland; the little crispy peanut butter balls are part of my nostalgic landscape. As I was assembling ingredients and poking around the internet for recipes, one of my friends was trying to horrify someone by posting pictures of her cat's filthy ass on Facebook. Amidst the cries of, "NOOO, STOP, YOU ARE RUINING CHRISTMAS," other people started adding pictures of their cats' gross butt clumps. It escalated quickly. I rolled out the balls, made a mess with chocolate, and posted, "Look, I made cat assholes."

It was a very festive thread, really.

The kids came skidding out of nowhere. "What did you make??" I softened it to "Cat butts!" because I don't actually swear much in real life, but their eyes went bulgy-squinky and they backed away from the tray suspiciously. Now there are three containers of cat assholes in the fridge, and nobody will eat them.  

I have ruined a holiday tradition.

Well, I can't have any of that anyway. My knitting is white, and I am too lazy to get up and wash my fingers after every bite of chocolate.

Not eating a plate of cat assholes

Here is the recipe:

Chocolate mice (cat butts)

1/2 cup peanut butter
1/2 cup butter

1/2 cup powdered milk
1 1/2 -2 cups rice krispies
1 cup powdered sugar

about a cup of melted chocolate chips

Melt the butter and peanut butter together. Mix up all the dry ingredients. Dump the melty bits over the dry bits, stir until sticky, roll into balls. If it's not sticky enough, add more melted peanut butter/butter. Chill balls while melting the chocolate. Dip chilly balls into the chocolate. Put them on wax paper, pop them back into the fridge. Make your kids eat them. Don't get any on your knitting. 

11

The boy turned 11. It was a two-day melee of arcade games, hobbit-watching, and cake. I am so annoyed with Peter Jackson over that barrel scene. Too much time in the Prancing Pony, writers. Also, inventing a dwarf/elf romance in order to have a woman in the movie - it HAD to be romantic? She can't have just been a regular elf? Would they even have compatible pheromones? My fists keep flailing up and shaking. JACKSON. I am waiting for Studio Ghibli to re-do this all sensibly, without all the decapitation and assaults to barrel physics.

So yes, there was a birthday. We took him to a bar, because children are already good at being children; our job is to horrify them into becoming better adults than the ones at D&B.

Hose beast

The boys gave me a gift card on my birthday, and I'm turning it into kilt hose. 

John Anderson's kilt hose, in Cascade Heritage

I am knitting them on size 0 needles. If that sounds small to the non-knitter, be assured that it is. So small that my ham fingers bend them into little arches that threaten to snap with every stitch. I have petitioned Santa for carbon needles. Those will not snap - only impale you gruesomely when you flop onto the couch. Then you get amazing x-rays for the photo album. Win-win.

corpse turkey and wet bikers

I must say a thing about the Thanksgiving turkey, because it must never happen again.

We went to my aunt's, as I said, but my mother had a coupon for a free turkey, and decided we needed to roast our own back-up bird, because GRAVY. So we got a giant turkey, and it sat defrosting in the fridge, taking up all the space I would have liked to fill with pie. 

Now, the man works for the college, and the college decided that they were going to make kalua turkey for all the homeless people. This meant digging a big pit, setting it on fire, filling it with about a hundred turkeys, burying them, digging them up the next day, and then making homeless people eat them. Better than burying the homeless people. And we had the chance to add a body to the cairn! I am particularly fond of kalua pig (which is made the same way), and I was not particularly fond of spending all morning roasting a turkey when I could be drinking mimosas, so I decided we should chuck the bird into the pit with the homeless turkeys. My mother conceded by buying turkey gravy at Costco.

Except the turkey wasn't quite thawed, and the homeless turkeys went into the hole first, so what we got back on Thanksgiving morning was a half-raw turkey that smelled like it had been lit on fire. And I spent the rest of the morning roasting a turkey and not drinking mimosas anyway. Now we've been eating smoky turkey leftovers for half a week. I finally peeled the rest of the carcass apart last night for a soup, thinking about my days with the cadavers at the Tampa university morgue, which had a similar texture and aroma. My mother said, "Enjoy the soup, kids, because we won't be having kalua turkey again for a long time!" "Yes," I agreed, "Never, in fact."

And that is what I have to say about kalua turkey. 

So, on Sunday, the bikers suited up for the Toys for Tots run.

The moment they drove off, the skies opened up with roaring rain and crashing lightning, and they returned three hours later, drenched to the skin and shaking like whippets. Gavin's gloves had attempted to meld with his hands.

I was putting up the tree when they all started peeling off layers of leather and running for the shower. If they had been a pack of burly men, it would have been a holiday miracle. I really need to remember to be more specific.

So the tree is up. The chocolate liquors are open. The Lego advent calendar has three little figures assembled on it. The baby is crawling and standing up on furniture, readying herself for the run to the stockings in three weeks. The turkey is gone. It's a wonderful time of year.

Thanksgiving 2013

Usually, we host Thanksgiving. This year, we went to my aunt's place. Which is this place:

The building is not a pillar of festivity.

But my other aunt is living here now,  too, while working on her PhD and teaching at UH, and she subscribes to gourmet cooking magazines. It was excellent. Our only jobs were to drink cocktails and eat and float in the hot tub. Am officially a fan of eating at someone else's house for Thanksgiving.

The man wore a real shirt.

The sisters drank margaritas and tried to stalk old boyfriends on the internet, but got sidetracked by online book sales.

We had so much cheese.

Zenny ate with my grandmother's silver baby spoon.

PIE.

Food coma.

34

"Here, take a picture of me for my birthday, and make me look good."
"Move your head. Chin down. No, to the side more. Lean over a bit. Stand up. Angle your head just a bit -"
"OMG TAKE THE PICTURE."

click

Hey, not bad. I will have to yell at people for all my pictures.

The man and I hit the mall. We failed to find an interview blouse, because everything is lace cut-outs this season ("hired in the front, fired in the back"), and hit the Japanese bbq joint for lunch. 

I never remember to bring toys. Play with butt wipes until the rice comes, sweetie.

A pint of Gyu Kaku later, I had the brilliant idea to find a Doctor Who shirt for my interview outfit, which Hot Topic did not have, so I flailed at the sales girl about how nobody will hire me in My Little Pony - I'm a professional - and we went to see Hunger Games, instead.

Jennifer Lawrence's face in the elevator scene made the movie. The tweens in next row applauded.

Zenny found it all very relaxing.

When the family came home from school, we made a caravan for our favorite Chinese restaurant. I got to ride on the motorcycle. Pushed the visor up and smelled the trees and ocean and car exhaust. Did not get a bug in the eye.

Mongolian beef the second-best food there is.

So this was the first birthday I've enjoyed in a very long time. Take-home lesson for adult birthdays: find a co-conspirator, start early in the day, do all the things, don't feel bad about it.

First ornament

A tiny sweater with a fancy "Z".

This at the cost of one of my precious harmony needles, a victim of my negligent couch knitting and Leif's pointy needle-snapping butt. 

Hair overhaul

Competency surging. Brunettes are better at purchase orders, probably. 

Well, it is mostly brown. It does have random horizontal streaks of blonde that the man missed when he squirted the dye on wildly. But he dabbed the stains off my ears with such tenderness. I can show people my neat pink ears when they cringe and grab their own hair sympathetically.

Coming up - pencil skirts, hair repair, and interviews.

Also: baby in handknit sweater! 

Oh, this child. She's smart and sweet and on the move. 

Mittens

I made two of them. But you'll have to trust me on this, because when I put them on to take a picture, not only could I not get both my hands in the shot, I couldn't even turn my stupid phone on. It does not have auto-timer, like my camera does, and my camera is ALL THE WAY ACROSS THE ROOM.

So here they are.

based on Spring Foliage mitts

It is mandated by the Council of Hooded Figures that all knitters of mittens must present at least one shot in the "Twilight hands" pose. Acceptable substitutions for apples include snowballs, acorns, pinecones, fall leaves, and invisible adorable things. I had an apple, but I ate it while taking the first picture. And just the one hand. 

I have to wash and block them anyway, never fear, garbage-mitts recipient.

So, TA DA.

Next time I'm making finger flaps or sewing magic techno-thread into the finger pads.

update: see? All better.

the downside of being an unwitting bird rehabber

Bill Weasely died this morning. I uncovered the cage, and he had his head under his wing, refusing to get up. I poked him gingerly, because he bites, and he just rocked a bit and ignored me. He looked up when I picked him up and offered water, but after a bit of gasping and shaking, it was clear he was on his way out. I put him in a basket with a warming pad and took him outside to see the trees. He died looking at the sky.

He was old, and he was disabled, so it was the gentlest way out for him. He'll get a burial in a tissue instead of being chucked over the fence like the things the cats bring in.

Birds live as long as mammals, but they die pretty abruptly. If you want to teach your kids about the fragility of life and importance of death rituals, get a bird. Cats and dogs at least tend to make a big deal about dying, and have organs large enough to tape back together at the vet's. They are sturdy. Hercules and Xebo are 19 years old, and still peeling our eyelids open at 3am, hoping for an early breakfast. Hercules has a problem with salivation, and last night he sat on my pillow, scratched his chin with a hind leg, and scattered drool all over my face. If anyone is spraying drool or vomit or poop, it usually ends up on me. It is my special skill.

Unlike, say, bird rehabilitation.

Goodbye, Bill. You were a handsome redhead, and I hope you had lots of healthy babies in your youth.