The Christmas Stocking

A long, long time ago when I was just a youngun my amazing mother, who had six children, hand made Christmas stockings for all of us. They were beautiful and I can't imagine how long it took her to do them. I don't even know if she did them all at once, but it still amazes me. When we moved from Utah to Arizona back in 1984 three of the stockings, belonging to us three younguns, got lost in the move. It was SO sad because we all loved those stockings, they were all different and full of sparkles :) I'm glad that there are still three in existence.

Ignore the beautiful children at the forefront of these pictures (if you can) and take a gander at the stockings hanging from the mantle in the background. In the first picture there is mine, and I think Jenny's and possibly Aly's?


Mine is there on the left, next to John's in this picture.



When we were mostly grown up Aly got the crazy idea to make one for mom, then after she had Jaxson, she made him one as well. The funny thing about Jaxson's is that she didn't realize she had bought an extra large one and it took her FOREVER to finish it! I remember spending the weeks before two Christmases helping her work on it.

So after I had Mallina my mom called me up and asked me which stocking she should buy for her. I was kind of surprised considering Julie and Kristie never ventured into stocking making, it was just crazy Aly, so why should I be expected to do it too? But nevertheless the stocking came and I had it finished by Mallina's second Christmas. Here is my masterpiece:

Her crooked name will always crack me up. I do have an art degree but I find that I obsess over the imperfections of my handiwork, but I am trying to get over that and enjoy these stockings. So last year mom sent over a pattern for Eva's stocking. It was beautiful in the picture on the internet. It is a Mary Engelbreit design. I should have known better. It is so full of intricate embroidery that I am going insane. Mallina's stocking has so many cute and EASY sparkles on it and while it was still hard to do, I'm glad I did that one first instead of Eva's, otherwise all of my other children would be complaining that Mallina was the only one special enough to have mommy make her a stocking. So here is what I am spending my free time doing:

Yes, I realize Santa is headless, I'm still working on it. This is what the end product is supposed to look like:
I figure if I have hers done by her second Christmas, it will be all fair. But, yeah, that's in SIX days! This is definitely a labor of love and I have come to realize how much time and effort my mom must have put in to making SIX of these stockings. Thank you mom! I am so happy that you have helped me to carry on your tradition with my family. Some day I may even make one for myself and Ieli. There is this awesome sugar plum fairy design that is calling my name!

Merry Stinking Christmas

I am in a foul mood today. I have been beyond mean to my little heathens. I mean angels. Ieli was home last week (hooray) and we decided to move into a bigger apartment. I am very happy we moved because we really needed the space, however Ieli was only around to help us move to the new place, not unpack. Our new "play room" is filled with random items that didn't belong anywhere else and there are boxes everywhere and I have no motivation to unpack anything. We had already put up our tree in the old apartment so Ieli removed the ornaments and brought the tree over, but the ornaments are still in the box. The other day Mallina did this:



That's Eva's tiger and she was quite concerned. I have since rescued him since she can't sleep without him. I thought it was pretty hilarious myself and now I don't feel like I need to do anything else to the tree. Each day brings new items to the tree, like the fake snow from the Snow Village, a fishing pole, gum drops etc. It makes me laugh. But that just shows you how our Christmas is going so far. Thank goodness we will be spending the actual holiday in Utah with family (woohoo!) and Ieli will come back with us so he can help with this mess. The crappiest thing though is that I can't find the charger for my camera battery. I was able to take some cute christmas card pictures, but I can't get them off of the camera in order to print them, or even post new pictures on the blog. I am hoping tomorrow will be better. Sorry about the pathetic "woe-is-me" post and the lack of interesting stuff to see/read. :)

Little Ballerinas

It has been a long time since I got out my camera and did a photo shoot of the girls. They looked so cute on Sunday so I decided to try my luck. The sun isn't in the best spot, I waited too long in the day, but I think I got some great shots. The girls LOVE these outfits, they hate to take them off to put on their jammies! Thanks Grandma Judy! :)

*NOTE*sorry, this format is cutting Eva off in some of the pictures...grr! You can click on the picture to see the whole thing.

I LOVE Mallina's face in this one, too bad Eva is playing with her tongue.




Mallina is such a poser!
A lot of the time was spent jumping on the bed and laughing.








Fishy face!


These are the kind of shots I was getting at the end, I knew it was time to stop when Eva started sliding down the bed :)

Hahahahahaha!

Just a preview of some pictures to come :)

Blondes have more fun...

We were at Walmart yesterday and Mallina found a blonde wig in the clearance aisle of Halloween stuff. I put it on both of their heads and thought is was so funny! Here are my little blonde Rotumans :)

Snow White and Belle!

Here are my two little princesses :) Nichole invited us to go Trunk-or-Treat with their ward, we had so much fun! Here are some pictures of our night.

Mallina with our pumpkins


Snow White striking a pose. I love these flowers, they are full of butterflies!

Belle didn't want to pose with the pumpkins, she started to climb the stairs. She looks like she is in jail...

Mallina is so hot and cold when it comes to taking pictures, she either has the cheesiest smile, or looks so sad! But I love how Eva is looking at Mallina in this one :)


This picture cracks me up, she won those teeth playing some game.



After a fun night trick-or-treating :)



And finally our pumpkins that are no more...

Pumpkins!

We carved pumpkins yesterday, one small one and one big one. The girls didn't really help other than saying "eew gross!" When I pulled the "guts" out. The sad thing is I only did this yesterday, and last night someone stole our pumpkins and smashed them! I was so sad :( Stupid juvenile delinquents. So, here is a series of shots...I didn't get a picture of the big one carved until later.