10 things to do with a paper towel roll

More specifically, things that toddlers love.

1. Decorate it and use it as a princess/prince scepter.
2. Blow through it like a trumpet.
3. Use it as a spyglass while playing pirates.
4. Use it as a tunnel for toy cars.
5. Use it as the center pole of a doll's tent.
6. Put a Dixie cup on the end and take turns blowing it off.
7. Use it as the towers of a cardboard castle.
8. Race marbles through it.
9. Use it as a baton and have a parade.
10. Tape 2 together and make googly-eyed goggles.

Merry Christmas!

Today is Christmas day, and we are having a blast! We are in Tulsa visiting our families, relaxing, and stuffing ourselves with delicious food! Last night was the annual O'Dell Christmas Eve Grandkids party, which was a huge hit! Expect lots of pictures soon!
I love today! Not because we get to open presents and eat a fabulous turkey dinner, even though those things are wonderfully fun. I love today because it is the day we celebrate Christ's birth.
I love the story of the birth of our Lord, I think it's one of my favorites. There's something so beautiful about the Savior of the world bring born in a stable while angels sing in the heavens. I am grateful that I live in a country that allows me to celebrate this day with my family.

The Church has released some great new videos about the birth of Christ, this one is my favorite. They are found at www.lds.org

Oh, Harry.

I'm watching Harry Potter and Deathly Hallows part 2 for the second time.

Best. Movie. Ever.

Monday Night Fever

Stayin' Alive from kathleen rawlinson on Vimeo.

a conversation

Portia to me:

"I'm Dora.

You're Boots."

possessed

When I was little, I had a problem taking pictures. I always had some weird look on my face. See for yourself:

My family called that one my possessed face.

(nice Pocahontas shirt Carrie)

Unfortunately, it still happens every now and again.

Eeesh.

Sadly, when I was looking for pictures for this post, I found probably 200. And these are not the worst ones. By any means.

things I'm lovin today

1. The smell of this soup cooking in my kitchen. Yum-o!

2. A large vanilla Dr. Pepper from Sonic. Happy hour baby!

3. The sweet sultry tones of a Mr. Freddie Mercury.

4. The fact that America's Next Top Model is in tonight, and I heard rumors that Lisa gets the boot! (at this point, I don't even care if you think I'm lame)

5. Blanket forts.

6. Listening to Portia tell stories to herself in her blanket fort about Baby Jesus and his jammies.

7. The awesome 10 pairs of jeans my Jeannine-sister gave me!

8. And of course, these babies!
It's awesome to be me!

Merry Christmas, Bedford Falls!!

I love Christmas; it's one of my favorite holidays!
I love hot apple cider and pie. I love "It's a Wonderful Life" and "Charlie Brown Christmas" and "Elf". I love listening to Nat King Cole and Bing Crosby, especially when he's dueting with David Bowie.
We put up our Christmas tree the other night, it's beautiful!It's white. We used to have a cheap green one, then my sister gave us a gorgeous, pre-lit, huge tree, so we got rid of the green one. Then we moved to a new apartment with significantly less storage space and had no room for the big one, so we gave it to my parents. So now we got a white one!

Portia and Margot love the tree! Portia has been decorating and re-decorating it all day, and Margot loves to sit underneath it and stare at the lights. Sweet girls.

For your viewing pleasure:

Merry Christmas!

Thanksgiving

Today I am very thankful for my Carrie-sister. Today is her birthday!
23 years ago today was one of best days of my life, my best friend was born. We are only 18 months apart, so a lot of the time, it feels like we were the same age. And we have the same likes, dislikes, sense of humor, so it feels like we as the same person.
Carrie is hilarious. She makes me laugh all the time, and laugh so hard that my abs hurt the next day.
Carrie is quirky. As I type this, she is drying her freshly washed face on my shins. Thanks dude.
Carrie is smart. She is much smarter than me. She learns very quickly, particularly from my mistakes.
Carrie is courageous. She stands for what she believes in. It may frighten her to do so, but she still always does it. She is one of the best examples of goodness and virtue in my life.
I loce you, Larry. You are one choice piece of real estate.
Love, Herman.

ps. Did I mention how pretty she is? DANG!

Cabin Fever, aaaah!

How did this:

become this:

Were sailors nuts?!?

I suppose it's a good thing she's so smart

We have a really heavy duty baby gate at our house:

The picture is kinda fuzzy, but the gate is really tall, and has a latch and swings open. It was quite the investment, but we wanted something that would keep our girls out of the kitchen and laundry room for a long time.

It isn't easy to open. We have to explain how to open it to every adult who comes to our house.

Portia learned how to open it.

I can hear $80 saying goodbye as it swirls down the drain.

I know I should have gone to Zumba this morning

but the only moving my body wanted to do was a slow grow-into-the-couch motion.

So that's what I did.

happy hour

I could really go for one of these right now:

Vanilla Dr. Pepper please.

Something I never thought I'd say until I became a mother

"Please don't eat my hairties!"

Being a mom is awkward.

Today I had a totally awkward experience in the land of mommyhood. It happens to every mom sometime or another: random strangers asking to hold your baby. Eeesh. Here's the story, my morning glories.
I breastfeed my children. I'm a firm believer in it. It's very healthy for both mom and babe, and it provides a sweet emotional bond. But I understand that breastfeeding makes many people uncomfortable. Especially public breastfeeding. Heck, it makes me uncomfortable.
Which is why, when the kid's gotta eat, I try to keep it as low-key as possible. I try to go to a secluded area, like a nursing lounge or another low-traffic spot, and I always bring a nursing cover. My worst fear when it comes to nursing is being like the woman who came into my hair school and proceeded to disgust us all with her pda: public displays of a-breasts.
So today, as Margot fussed her head off in the library, I knew the time had come. I discreetly pulled out my nursing cover, no sooner had I begun to feed her, a 9 or 10 year old girl ran up.
"Can I hold your baby?" she asked way too loudly. I was stunned. Whose kid is this? C'mon folks, control your young! I could understand if she were a 3 year old, but really? 10? She doesn't know it's inappropriate to ask strangers to hold their babies? At 10? And while I'm breastfeeding? Really?
After a pause, I told her "no, sorry" and she ran off to bother someone else.
You never get used to these moments guys.

are you ready for some football?!?!

I'm not a huge fan of watching football on TV. It tends to make me real bored. But there are some things I enjoy:

1. The bands. They dance while playing, which is difficult. Also, they get to play "Crazy Train" and "Star Wars". Sweet!

2. Making fun of the fans. Dude, they're crazy. My favorite part is when they show footage of the fans of the losing team. They always look like their lives are over, like they just saw the grim reaper coming to take them away. The other day, there was a guy weeping in the stands. Weeping. Comedic gold.

3. Watching Brandon watch football. He gets so excited and charged up. It's cute.

4. Footage of players accidentally tackling refs. I don't know why it makes me laugh so hard, but I accept it.

kicks and giggles

I finally got some shots of Margot smiling this morning! Enjoy!

my morning babies

Margot's blessing day

This weekend we went up to Broken Arrow to bless Margot! Here are the pics:

Me and my girls!


All the grandkids:
Portia and her cousin Dahlia.

Tootsie Roll Pops have a new flavor: pomegranate.

That's right, I'm getting my antioxidants from Portia's halloween candy.

For your entertaiment:

Am I the only one?

Dude, the McRib is disgusting.

Why in the world does everyone else love it?

Halloween times

Ok folks. I want you to take a moment to prepare yourself for a lot of cuteness.

Ready? Here we go.

I love Halloween!! I love costumes, trick-or-treating, eating candy, the whole shebang! And since I am a bit old for dressing up and going door to door, I get to live vicariously through my kids! Hooray!!

This year, we attended several Halloween parties! First, we went to a Halloween play group. It was so fun! Portia was a cowgirl, complete with boots and hat. Margot didn't dress up, she actually slept through the entire activity. The kids played games, listened to stories, ate treats (of course), and decorated pumpkins:

Portia is pretty creative. She did the whole thing by herself, I just helped with the glue.

Next, we visited the Tulsa area, and went to the Claremore ward's trunk-or-treat. This time Portia was a princess.

And Grammy was a spooky vampire:

Margot still didn't dress up, and still slept through a large chunk of the evening.

They had the trunk-or-treat inside the church, and decorated lots of different rooms to hand out candy from. There was a little room filled with lit-up pumpkins. It was Portia's favorite, mostly because there were purple ribbon streamers hanging from the door.



Tonight, we went to a trunk-or-treat in Norman. Portia was a cowgirl again, and Margot dressed up as well.

Cutest kitten ever:

This time, the trunk-or-treat was outdoors, and Daddy helped Portia go around to all the cars while Mommy and Margot handed out candy.

Checking out her loot.

beautiful girl

Margot slept through the whole thing. (I'm beginning to see a pattern here)

After the trunk-or-treat ended, we drove to a nearby neighborhood and went door to door for some more action.
Portia was a bit scared because it was so dark, but she said "trick-or-treat" and "thank you" at every door!

Now we are home. Portia is in bed dreaming of dum-dums and snickers and skittles, and Daddy and Margot are snoozing on the couch. And I am sitting here drinking some homeade warm apple cider. It was a great night.

Happy Halloween!

partake in the partay

My wonderful Daisy-sister had a birthday today. Yeah, on Halloween. Cool huh?

She decided that what she wanted to do to celebrate was have a sleepover with her sisters and mom. So, we had a party! It was awesome.

We arrived in Joplin on Friday night, to Daisy's beautiful historic house. Seriously, it's the coolest house ever. Its over 100 years old, and huge, and she and her hubby have been renovating it. The kitchen makes me drool. Heated tile floors. Need I say more?

Anyways, Daisy opened presents; she got scarves, nail polish, cool halloweeny candle holder/candles, a skull pillow, and a mug and hot chocolate. You can kinda see a few of the gifts in the photo, along with Daisy and Jeannine.

By the time the presents were opened, we were all famished. None of us had eaten much all day, because we knew the food would be incredible. You see, Daisy's husband, Tim, is a superb cook. Superb. Superb. We knew that he would make something to die for. We weren't wrong.

He made Tai food: cilantro lime rice, noodles in a limey peanuty sauce with peppers and more cilantro, and breaded shrimp that was literally the best thing I have ever eaten ever. There was also red curry soup that I didn't take a picture of, because by that point I was lost in delicious-land.

If your eyes had taste buds, you would be crying with joy right now.

Yes, Carrie. Yes.

The beautiful birthday gal:

After we died and went to heaven, we came back to life and decided to run and get ice cream. We had a little trouble getting Mom's car out of the driveway, but after we called Dad and learned the inner-most secrets of Volkswagens, we were on our way.

We came home and did what all girls do at sleepovers: nails!! Carrie gave Daisy a mani with her new polish, and we proceeded to laugh and giggle like we always do when we're together. We told ghost stories; guess whose 100-year-old mansion is a little bit haunted? Daisy's!! I got legitimately freaked out; it was awesome!

After giggling and talking till 2 am, we finally headed to bed, where I did not sleep on account of imagining basement ghosts standing over my air-mattress.

The next morning, Tim made eggs, bacon, and pancakes (again, delish!) and I cut and colored some hair.

After the hair was all done and the car all packed, we headed home. It was the most fun I've had in a while. I love when my sisters and mom and I all get together, we have a blast every time. We are seriously some of the funniest people on the planet when we're together. I got a little ab workout from laughing that night.

I lobby that we do this every year for Daisy's birthday.

little monkeys

Get it? Monkeys? Cause we went to the zoo!

Look at my beautiful babies!

Maybe I'm biased, but seriously, they are so cute.

Check out Margot's concerned face, and Portia's cheeser grin.

Look how big she is. She looks like a kid, not a baby!

Snugging her mama

The zoo was super crowded because there are new tiger cubs.

That's right, I said tiger cubs.

Cute much?

Portia was a little afraid of the tigers, but she still got as close as she could. Looks like she inherited her mother's love of being scared.

Aaaaand for your viewing pleasure:

Only in Oklahoma do you see a wagon of kids attached to a power chair at the zoo.

Classic.