Away in the Manger

Nativity sets are a Christmas staple in the Christian world.  Heck, even Santa has visited baby Jesus in the creche.

This is very much like one my mom has.  Or had, we played with it a lot.

Everyone I know has at least one, if not many many more.  And they are, one and all, beautiful.  There are Crystal ones, and porcelain, wooden, both hand carved and machine.  There are flat ones, round ones, square ones, and 3D.

Many Groups celebrate our Saviors Birth, from:

Charlie Brown, to

 Precious moments, to

 Willow Tree, to

Random Bears.

I love all of them, and often stress over finding the right one for my house.  Until this year.  You see, I've actually had one for years, but in my immaturity I didn't think it was good enough.  Because I made it when I was between 12-16, and it was a craft project my amazing Aunt had creatively come up with.  I don't remember the circumstances under which they were created, because I am the only one in my family who has one. Which is ok.

Apparently they are somewhere very cold, hence the random ice cube.

I have put these little people out every year, along with my billions of snowflakes (I may not have that many for reals, but if you ever saw my bedroom in high school or my house this year, you'll know I have a LOT)

But always considered them my "stand in" nativity, just waiting for the real one.  My, Adult nativity, if you will.

But during my freak-out when I found the box they belong in and discovered them not in it, I realized how much they mean to me, and how much I love them.   

Sure, down the road I may buy another one, or even two. 

 But they are the real one, and will always be apart of my familys Christmas. 

Merry Christmas Everyone!

Nothing is wrong with a little "white trash"

But there is something totally wrong with kamikaze gingerbread men. So, very wrong.

That's why this year my tree is Barbies Christmas getaway, again:

There is nothing wrong with this picture, move along.

This season I'll be sharing other family traditions. The first one is a childhood tradition.

When we were all very little we had one tree, and it was festooned with all the glitz and glitter that we young'ins could put on it. It had no glass bulbs, nothing sharp, or accidentally edible, and nothing my mother didn't want destroyed.

Which left her with all the "beautiful" ornaments the public school system inevitably sent home with us excited Littles every year. The upside to this, is that even if it was edible, or destructible, because the we made it, it wasn't going anywhere. (unless a certain little has an ever littler little sibling that has no respect for all the time spent glitterfying that gingerbread mass that looks almost like a person.)

Our family tree grew with each additional year with more and more globby glittery goodness until the last of us was out of Elementary school, because ornament making didn't catch on in Jr. High and High School, not entirely sure why.

Somewhere in between those years the "pretty tree" showed up, the one we weren't allowed to touch. It was, alternating years, green and gold or red and gold, and it was my mothers pride and joy. As we were older we liked it too, and left the bulb breaking to our cat.

The only problem with this new "pretty tree" was that there was no room for our decorations!! The family stuff that we had poured our blood sweat and tears (literally) into. Even at our mature ages we still wanted to see our bulbs, our hand prints our STUFF. So, my mother set up two trees, and has ever since.

Last night I was privileged to join in the decorating of this tree, each time I held an ornament in my hand a million memories began to pour out of it... it took a long time to decorate the tree..

So for your viewing pleasure, I have picked a few of my favorites to show.

My parents got married in december, every christmas since then they have bought some type of christmas item.  Some ornament, or statue, but mostly awesome music box statuette things.

My mom made all of us one of these when we were really little, and we love them dearly still

It was my father who trapped this little guy in the stained glass house, it's a heavy sucker and has taken a nose dive or two, and yet it's still intact.

I don't know where this teddy came from but I remember him from way back and love him, the birds *there are more RUN FOR YOUR LIVES * I don't touch them, but they used to be on my grandmothers tree, so here they are now.

My mothers grandmother made this beautiful little angel. I love her and lay claim on her RIGHT NOW!

This is another dated ornament, they got this the year Lolligog was born :D he's one of my favorites.

Someday my tree will be as full of memories as this one, and I'll love to look at it for more than just it's beauty.

Throwing in the Blogspot Towel - EDIT

Ok seriously people this is getting ridiculous. I can't maneuver pictures around without ruining my entire blog, and for each picture I add, the spaces grow exponentially. So I have to go around deleting spaces with increasing frustration. Or I have to upload the pictures IN THE RIGHT ORDER (cause try moving them afterwards and you're in for a real treat.. not.) and then write my blog around them

I CAN"T TAKE IT ANYMORE!!!!!!

I know I've been here for around 3 years, but I can NOT stand it any longer, Blogspot has done something with their system and I don't like it.

Just letting you know, I'll be hopefully moving to a new address. Or doing SOMETHING to save my sanity.

If any of you know how to fix this, please let me know, cause I really don't want to go through the hassle of moving and changing everything.

Thanks.

EDIT -

Ok, thanks to my awesome Sister-Inlaw Angie (I owe you babysitting) I've updated my editor, and now it looks new and shinny and didn't add a billion spaces to this post just because I wanted to edit it.  So far so good, hopefully this means I can stay.  We'll see.

Truth is stranger than fiction

Here's a conversation I had with a my charming cohort, who basically keeps me sane while at work. Though from the convo below I don't think sane is the right word..

Susan: I always say god and jesus have senses of humor..just lookit the platypus

Amber: So true. Just imagining what went behind some of the creatures..like me playing with clay! I have this awesome idea and then... what they heck did I make? Oh well, we'll put it somewhere no one goes a lot.

Susan: roflmao

Amber: thats why all the freaky looking fish are at the very bottom of the ocean

Susan: omgosh ROFLMAO!!!!!! X A BILLIONTY

Escape - sounds better when Dory says it.

Do you usually have to deal with chicken nuggets in between the seats of your car, Mr. Radio ad man? Because I don’t.

Laser hair removal isn’t cool, it’s unnatural and probably will be the leading cause of the Zombie apocalypse.

The best-misused word ever is ‘duct’. And in the roofing industry it is misused a LOT, and from all the repair descriptions I’ve read, I’m pretty sure ducts (always spelled: ducks) shouldn’t be allowed on roofs anymore.

Is it possible to kill a whole state? Because Idaho has got to go. Cindy-sue and Bobo need to move as does his family so that I can kill Idaho.

Mottos work, dude. I have a sticky note that reminds me daily to "think before I freak out" and you know what? It WORKS! Motto’s – the new lifesaver. Yum! It’s probably all cinnamony and delicious..

Even when my hair is the longest it ever been, it’s still too short.

King of Perssia is the best name for a city EVER! Do they have a King? Cause they totally should. Maybe everyone is King there, you know like a title without authority, because an entire city full of kings with authority would suck. That way girls could actually be princesses. Yup, I am now moving to King of Perssia.

Just because I stop chewing the inside of my mouth doesn't mean I can start on my tongue. Seriously me, stop!!

Boys will be boys even when they are men.

"I must be butter, because I'm on a roll.. "*laughing my bum off * such a silly phrase, makes me giggle

You know, I actually don't like Elvis, or Michael Jackson. Nothing about them do I like.

I love Katty Perry's song Mannequin though. "I want to hit you just to see if you'd cry". Girl after my own heart.

Proof of why I think I'm being followed around a'la Truman Show: I was at work and just logged into Staples Link to make my monthly order. Just as my screen poped up the radio announcer said "When was the last time you bought anything at Staples? Never right! That's why they aren't doing so well, until now.. blah blah blah..." Ya I was totally making an order right NOW! Thank you very much. Seriously my company alone could keep them in business.

Enough with all the spacing Blogspot, for reals, there are blogs somewhere that don't have any spaces! Ever think of anyone besides yourself? Why not share the space, huh?

Does this blog remind anyone of Twitter?

10 things I like about Twix.

I think it’s time that I talk to you about my writing. I haven’t done that in, lets see…ten posts! And that was eight months ago. So being the surprising and inventive person that I am I tell you ten new things that I’ve done.

1: I have officially declared the first rough draft of my novel unfit for mammal, and some arachnids, consumption. And to those who did actually read it, I owe you so much you have no idea! I will do anything to make it up to you: give you money, baby-sit, clean your house spotless, repair your car, I draw the line at sexual favors though.

2. I have gleefully bounced around the house after a very productive editing session. Now, I get excited easily, but it takes a little bit more than just bubble wrap to get me to actually bounce. Something about finding the right words, spelling them right and putting it altogether and have it actually say something cool is just AWESOME!

3. Made us miss half of church because I wanted Grants opinion on a certain edit. In my defense I started asking him really early in the morning, so it wasn’t ten minutes to 11 o’clock when the whole editing started. It just took that long. Cause he had to fix a lot of thigns

4.Listened to Austin Land for the fortieth time and decided my novel doesn’t have enough spoken feelings in it.

5. Listened to this Alvin book Grant is listening to and decided my novel doesn’t need all the mushy feelings crap.

6. Realized I don’t have ten new things I’ve done with my novel.

7. Been editing random scenes (pick a number between 1 and 119) by isolating them, editing it until it turns blue (I literally change the font color*) and then slapping it back into the novel document. I’ve been doing this for the past two months.

8.A lot of things that have absolutely nothing to do with writing, which makes me feel guilty and I actually pine for my novel and to edit it. Or may be it’s just I want to write. I really do like my story.

9. Get depressed sometimes and wonder why the heck I’m even worrying about editing it, if it’s never going to be published.

10. Decided I’ll self publish like a dozen copies, then it’ll be rare and only closest friends and family will be able to read it. But then they will let other people borrow it because it’s soo awesome, and then those people will want it and ask where they can get one, but they can’t get one because there are only 12, and I have like 6 of them. But they don’t know that so they are at Barns and Noble asking, and Barns and Noble is getting all upset cause there are swarms of people asking for a book they have never heard of, so they start asking their vendors who ask their publishers who start seeing dollar signs so THEY COME TO ME, after going on an adventure very much like National Treasurer to find my whereabouts. And then they beg to publish my book and then TADA! I’m a published author and I didn’t even have to do anything.

Yup, that’s the plan, which is now trademarked and protected by dragons and swords and elves, so don’t even think about stealing it.

*the blue lets me know what I’ve edited and what I haven’t.

p.s I really like Twix, I even put them in the GoldFish jingle. Because they're so delicious.

Littles say the best things.

So this idea has been tickling my writers bug for a long time, and he finally called uncle and now I have to write it. (Little sell out)


So when I was a primary Teacher I learned many many things, most of them involving Spiderman. Some were vaguely Sunday school related, the rest complete and utter, wonderful, randomness.



I wrote a lot of them down, and was once going to publish it here, but decided I had other things to do.


Not anymore.

So if all goes as planned I'll have at least a monthly post about silly things Littles have said to me (I call children: Littles, because they're littler than me, even the ones that aren't)

I am going to keep all names and associations private, cause that's just plan nice.

Except this one, because it's written somewhere that sisters have to tease brothers.

This was eight years ago, so Budder-boy was around three, making me a charming and beautiful 18 ish.


I was driving home from picking Mr. Little up at his cousins house. As we drove I tried to make pleasant, fun conversation with him, the topic of choice not being about Spiderman, but of the return visit of my sister from her Nanny gig up in Boise Idaho. We talked about her taking care of the family of four boys, and what we were going to make her do when she finally got home.

Budder paused for a moment looking out the window and pondering in the way only three-ish year olds can. Finally stating, very convincingly, that:


When I grow up, I'm going to move to Girlsy, and babysit girls.

And you know what, it makes total sense. I hope he does some day.

Stuff that seems utterly pointless but is comical at the same time. Win win.

Just silly, random crap I’ve been thinking about lately:

I doubt anyone else has ever been asked to be a Hussy, by their Bishop. Was that like a calling? Who would I ask about this?

Does anyone else eat straight edibles (ie: baby carrots, Twix) by putting them in their mouth so they stick straight out and then casually nom on them until they are completely in their mouth and then chomp the rest?

Why is it that anything worth posting on Facebook is automatically cheapened because you posted it on Facebook? Facebook is just asking for the mindless, often cryptic, horribly misspelled, and truly inane comments it gets every single second of every single day.

This is why Twitter sucks even more, it has no redeeming feature such as: games and/or photo galleries.

Does anybody else have a billion names for their cat? Cause I swear I only use his real name once a month. I even made up a song all about Jelly Bean kitties and all their colors.. and I'll stop now.

I should really stop biting the inside of my mouth, it hurts a lot sometimes.

You are never alone in the world. Even if you do something that no one else could POSSIBLY do, not only has someone done it, they probably did it before you. It’s kinda depressing.

Having severe dyslexia and ADD is actually pretty interesting. It’s like being your own sudoku puzzle, you have to look at the sentence/word/phrase at many different angles and ways before you can figure out what you just read. And by that time your imagination has taken wing to everything you’ve thought you read and has started it’s own story, which is way more fun and will be killer cool when your Sims re-enact it later.

I'm still being followed around like Jim Carry in the Truman show, I'm not even joking, and there isn't a single thing you can say that will make me change my mind. Because, you know, that's what your supposed to say.

Writing a story is like talking to your imaginary friends. My friends are kinda mean and needy..

That’s all for now!!

Ok last one, does anyone else think Blogspot is being stupid? I cringe when I want to put pictures up and the whole double spacing war is a losing battle. Forever shall my posts be triple space and span the entire screen of your monitor.

Part 3: The Insanity!

(UPDATED: See below for updates)

Wow, part three. By a show of hands, who here is

A. Surprised I've stretched this story out this far.

B. Surprised I updated at all.

C. Surprised I have this much of a life to write about.

D. All of the above.

(Just in case you are wondering, I'd take all answers but A. )

On with my story: It was a dark and stormy prevning* in a month before July that I and my awesome friend who is awesomely still my friend, agreed to make a wedding cake for yet another awesome friends brothers wedding. (I'll give you a sec to re-read that)

The cake was darling and simple and I was excited to pull out my disposable piping bags again. This was before I had my surgery scheduled. But even when I was aware of the timing, everything still seemed to fit. Hurray.

And then another awesome friend needed a cake. This time for her own wedding, and I couldn't say NO! If one cake aroused the decorator in me then another could bed it back down and I wouldn't end up with pounds of random pointless cake at my house, again.

As Fate would have it, and Karma, and probably Ying and Yang mixed together with fung shui my Awesome-still-my-friend Friend was asked to make a cake!!

At this point, why the heck not, right?

Chaos looked something like this:

Surgery July 14

First cake July 30

Second Cake August 4th

Third Cake August 5th

And we aren't talking quick single layer cakes either. We're talking about WEDDING CAKES! These are important. These are the showcase, these get put in a place of honor so that they can shine and tell the world about it's bride and groom! Wedding ANYTHING is a big freaking deal, Brides complain about not finding the right color amongst a billion perfect colors, they aren't going to miss that you "accidentally" put an elephant on their cake and not roses.

I know I said it only took five days for me to get back on my feet, well I sorta kinda lied. Yes I was on my feet, but as anyone who saw me on my feet can attest, I shouldn't have been there. I have this thing about doing nothing, I hate it. It actually makes me feel worse to "relax". Sitting around and healing? Nah, that's for all those other people, I had to get up and be fabulous.

Was I in pain? You better believe it. Did I almost pass out more times then anyone really knows? You sure bet I did. Did I lift things behind peoples back just so I could prove I could? Righty-roo! Did I relapse a couple times? Darn toot'in I did.

Don't ask me why I did any of this to myself, because all this comes from the same mind that brought you:

If I just cut off/bit off/remove the hurting part of my body, I'll feel better.

(Grant has learned to ask me first how I got injured before he hears me complain. The rule in our house is if it's self inflicted on purpose, there shall be no whining)

Have you ever baked a cake? If you have, then you've undoubtedly covered your kitchen with batter and flour and chocolate, had a sink piled high with dishes, and had kids/pets running around? Ok, now imagine doing all that in my kitchen, which is about five times smaller than yours.

Ya, so you'll understand why we moved the whole party to my moms house. Whose kitchen is five times larger than a school cafeteria. (Ok not really, but compared to mine it is) With just as many ovens (this becomes important, stay tuned).

Even with the magical kitchen of Oz, Amazing Friend and I still prepared for a whole week to get things in order. And, believe it or not, all our anti-stress tactics worked!

Organization and planning, who knew?

Everything for all three cakes were made before hand, days in advance. By the time we hauled Cake and Company to my moms we were feeling good and ready to kick some cake. (no cakes were actually kicked .. that we know of)

Our first day rocked, however it was cut short because my mom had promised to throw a bridal shower that day, and it's kind of tacky to make one brides wedding cake in the midst of a another brides shower.

Everything was put away, and the party was a hit, not to mention clean and sans all cake except the Barbie Bride cake I made while I was supposed to be making another cake.. ya that sounds strange to me too.

Wedding cake number one resumed the next day, bright and early. If only we had known what laid in store for us. I would have had it recorded.

It was a Saturday so the entire household was in and out of the kitchen most of the day. Sometimes just passing through, sometimes helping or grabbing a piece of chocolate and running, but they never left with out commenting.

In those two days at my family's home Awesome-still-my-friend Friend found out more about me then she had in the 5 years we've lived by each other. To my intense embarrassment. One of the things she learned was where I get my quirky side from, and (I love you, don't hate me) my dim-wittedness.

Around lunch time everyone congregated in the kitchen, because ya know, that's where the food is. Everyone was laughing, and talking and making some sort of edible item, all of which involved ovens. Now at this point Wedding cake Ono was completely baked, frosted and fondanted leaving just the pretty bits to be placed and arranged.

So when I smelled smoke, as I was washing my hands (for literally the hundredth time) and asked "What's burning" and got the reply of "CAKE!!!" You can imagine my horror! Picture if you will a three layer round cake covered end to end in rolled out marshmallows, on fire**.

That picture lanced through my mind as I spun quickly to see that no, my cake was not on fire, but a quick look in the oven (that had been hastily opened by my brother) showed that Barbie was.

As was a platter of cookies that had been left in there to chill. What had caught fire was the dripping frosting from Barbies dress onto the heating coil at the bottom.

Honestly I wish I had my video recorder, everything went by so quickly and so humorously that I'm sure we could have won all the prizes on America's Funniest home Videos.

Simultaneously people started running around trying to douse the wee flames in the bottom of the top oven. Water was recommended of course, but we didn't let it stop there; a fire extinguisher materialized, (only to be put on the counter to watch the action) a moist towelette arrived , though a little confused and out of sorts and flour*** became a brief option until it was traded in favor of a mystery bottle from under the sink.

Awesome-still-my-friend Friend, Sissy-Inlaw and I watched on in comedic horror as my parents and brother tried to put the fire out. Apparently the threat of a fire wasn't enough to discourage us working on the cake, are we hard core or what?

Once the mystery bottle was unleashed, things really started to heat up. Literally, for while my dad vehemently attested to it's "watery-ness" when it was squirted onto the, maybe five inch flames, they shot up 200%, licking the upper cabinets.

Sound exploded out of the house in the form of yells, curses, laughter and maybe a whimper from my Friend. While everyone, including myself, tried to explain to my dad that "THAT IS NOT WATER!" my other self was looking at the fire extinguisher wondering if it was actually going to join the party soon, and if Me running for the back door with a million pound cake was going to happen.

It didn't, but what did happen was another test run of the mystery bottle, this time "washed out". Again flames licked the cabinets. Not a surprise to the rest of us, who were all, in our own way, telling my dad to put the bottle down and back away slowly.

The best part of all this was that we were all laughing, like fire was a stand up comedian or something, we loved it! After a few more power struggles, and an explanation that 'flour is flammable and baking soda was probably what they meant to say', wet and real water was used and the drama was over.

Well not completely, my dad had to try a last ditch attempt at proving that the mystery bottle was just water. He triumphantly squirted it into his mouth, and then ran for the sink.

I don't think we found out what truly was in the bottle, but my dad is fine, and I still love him to absolute pieces. As I do this cake, those coughcakepopscough next to it however I do not. Feel free to play the "guess what these look like" cake-pop game in the comment section. My family was getting pretty creative in their descriptions.

The following cakes were not nearly so fantastical in their creating, but were no less fun! Both were very close together so they didn't get the personalized treatment that Cake Un did. Even still I think they came out splendidly. All frosting and fondant was already made for them so again all we had to do was make the cakes and decorate.

It was these cakes that took me out of my comfort zone as far as decorating went. They required FLOWERS, and while I learned how to make several ie: royal icing pansy, roses, drop flowers ect. and fondant roses, I had never learned gum paste. They didn't offer those classes when I was taking them.

Luckily for me ASMF-Friend is the new Wilton instructor at the Bountiful Michaels, and she's a wizard when it comes to making gum paste flowers. She made the majority of them, but I learned quickly and they turned out amazing!!!!! (yes they need that many exclamation points)

Our final cakes did just what I wanted them to do: leave me with no desire left to make another cake for a very long time. I'm not saying I wasn't satisfied and awed by what can be achieved by over whelmed, post surgery and almost flambéed ladies, because those cakes looked AWESOME. But I am saying that the more cakes I make, the more I remember why I don't want to make cakes.

So Part 4 was going to be something, but now it's nothing because I can't remember what I was going to write.

So after this we will be going back to our irregularly scheduled blog postings.

Love ya'll

UPDATE!!
So I totally forgot to mention that my darling Sister-sue asked me to make a baby-shower cake for her the weekend before the cake chaos started. This is what she got:

*qouted from the best show EVER, name it and I"ll say something nice about you in my next post. I swear it.
** Actually that sounds pretty awesome, no really, do you think it'll puff up and get golden crispy??
***Yes it really did.. sadly.

Part 2.

Welcome back for Part 2 of Past Present and Future, I am Amber, and I am doing my best to spell all my words correctly.

First things first. I'm deciding if you all make me laugh, or cringe. Yes I was cryptic in my parting sentence, but I wasn't THAT cryptic.

What I said: I might be a mother yet
What everyone heard: I'M PREGNANT AND I"M TELLING THE INTERNET BEFORE I TELL MY CLOSEST RELATIONS AND POSSIBLY GRANT.

What I meant: It looks like everyones prayers and good luck paid off and I might actually be able to reach that lofty position which is motherhood some day.

Just so you know, I will never, EVER, announce anything important via a blog, or facebook*, or any type of social "convienence"that isn't face to face (or in some special cases phone to phone ,email to email) or in a large gathering of people I love.

* I did put this on facebook, but there were those that knew already.

Back to my regularly scheduled blog:

I know I left you on somewhat of a small cliff, hanging there, like a good friend. Thank you!!

That being said I’m going to back up just a tad.

For those who don’t know, Grant and I have been trying to start our family for a couple years. Three-Fourish to be exact and it just isn't happening. I’ve been to four different OB-GYNs all of them with glowing reputations, all of them big fat lairs. And if failing that trait, at the very least, lazy insulting women.

I’ve had cyst since High school, had one burst even (not something I would wish on an enemy) and I’ve been “medicated” to help with this numerous times. Every doctor I’ve ever been to has been appraised of my past, they have also been informed that my mother and aunts have had problems like mine and worse. My mother had endometriosis, as did an Aunt(s), they (the doctors) have been informed of this as well.

When Grant and I started trying for a baby, every doctor said I was fine, said that and I quote: “Women get pregnant in the backseat of cars all the time.” Apparently Grant and I don’t have the right car.

We started testing, we started drug taking, we started everything the doctors told us to do. Nothing. Again I bring up the fact that my mother had endo, but that was poo pooed. Even when going in for emergency ultrasound to see why the left side of my lower regions weren’t allowing me to sit, or stand, or eat, or ANYTHING because of the pain.

The good news: I have amazing tolerance for pain, all of that not standing sitting and stuff was done over Kimberlys wedding, and no one knew.
Bad news: The ultra sound showed that I had a very large cyst on my left ovary. And when I say large, I mean it was the SIZE of my ovary.
Good news: According to my doctor, this in no way affected me getting pregnant, and we were supposed to wait it out, because cysts this size are normal.. and they go away by themselves.
Bad News: I’m a veritable Pain God, I can stand anything.

Months went by, the cyst never did go down, but apparently, I’m still ok! At this point my OB decided we needed to pull out the big guns, because you know, it wasn’t that huge cyst on my ovary or endometriosis or anything. We were shooed to a Fertility Specialist.

Who, luckily, knew what the heck he was doing.

Eventually all secrets come out. Eventually you find out how unorganized and unstable your OBGYN’s office is and eventually you learn that YES you do have endometriosis, and holy heck no one spotted this before?

The Specialist was so sure that my problem was that huge lump of a cyst that is now bigger than my ovary, that he didn’t even take anymore tests. This was again reiterated when the surgeon who was going to do my Laperoscopy felt the cyst, FELT it, not internally either, and proclaimed that it was the largest he’s ever seen/flet in his 20+ years of doctoring.

So on July 14 I had surgery to remove extensive, advanced and very aggressive endometriosis. The Level 1 I should have had turned out to be level 4 (which is the highest). The surgury that should have taken 1.5 hours took 4, I missed beating his record by 30 mins. And the OBGYN I had is now only a spot in my review mirror. No one could tell me how long it had been growing, but everyone was pretty certain it didn’t grow over night.

Anyway, I’m doing well, if a little disgruntled towards the medical profession at large, but well non-the less. It only took me 5 days to get back on my feet, though it was still a few weeks more that I couldn’t wear anything tight or binding around my middle.

At my two-week appointment I found out that even though the surgery had many surprises everything went amazingly well. They didn’t have to take out any of the ovary, something they said was a possibility because of the size of the cyst, and everything else looked fine and healthy down below. And as soon as I felt up to it, Grant and I could start again on that good old fashion family activity.

And again I proved I’m a stud when it comes to handling pain! Ask me how I went about healing, having my first moon cycle after the surgery and making 3 wedding cakes only a week after having a bunch of disease scrapped from my insides. Without any pain killers! While my parents house almost caught on fire, and sometimes sans food…

Part 3: The insantiy!!!

Past, Present and Future Part. 1

Story time! Is everyone here? Good now, as my title has predicted I will be discussing events of the past, present and the future. I know I’ve been doing a lot of that lately, but this is different, I promise. Instead of tattle telling on little Amber, I’ll be gossiping about Big Amber.

That’s right, this time I will be talking about current events. These events are the very beings that have prohibited me from writing about them. It’s a relatively calm moment though, so I shall divulge a few snippits of stories.

Though, it should also be noted that this is part 1. I see your mouths hanging open, and indeed it is true, enough relevant and slightly important happenings have occurred that I wont be able to discuss them all in one go.

So let’s start.

Back in June I was put in as the Second Counseler of the Relief Society Pres. in my ward.

AHHHH!!!

If I didn't know the calling was inspired of the Lord, I would be greatly dubious of the judgement of my Bishop. I mean I've been in primary, wrangling four-year-olds for five years! And now they want me to be an adult?

So far so good, I guess, I haven't fallen asleep in Sunday School, or Relief Society yet, and that's without the aid of toys and/or candy. And I've already Conducted like a champ and given a lesson to people who can actually read and answer without first telling me all about their puppy and new bike and bad boo that now has a Spiderman band-aid on it, but it can come off, want to see?

I do miss my artistically challenged depictions of pretty much everything, and having the trump card of "You wont get a treat if you don't: sit/ stop climbing the wall /stop turning off the lights / stop hiding in the cave that is under the table” hidden up my sleeve. But at least the chance that any of the Relief Society ladies will lift their skirts over their head is really slim.

We are painting the ill-fated blue trim on our patio. If you think about it baby blue trim on a yellowish/redish brick house, doesn't work in the; not even the littlest bit! Lucky for us no one did think about it, just like they didn't think about running giant black screws every 5" into the baseboard without covering them up. Lucky, lucky us.

We planted a garden much like last year, though we held a funeral for my cucumbers a little too early, *sniff * they were so young! The investigation is on going, though we’ve decided the erstwhile pickles either committed suicide out of jealousy of the Zuke or the Zuke murdered it. I believe both sides, and not because I’m afraid the monster zucchini plant will come for me in the middle of the night either (although I am.).

Our darling Dagger is physcotic (sp?), any sound over a moderate yell, and she runs for cover. Often running straight for the outside world, in which she thinks will be safer then her own back yard. It usually isn't, but that doesn't stop her. She does this despite all the traps and treatments we've put into place to stop her from doing this. She is willing to inflict minor to moderate harm to herself (and others) just to escape the vacuum.

We went on the most awesome-est Bear Lake trip with my family ever!!. I shall not spoil the blog that is in the works although I will say this: Running Water.

The Big Bang Theory and Bleach discs have taken over our entertainment. But we're kinda ok with that.

And now finally for the last piece of show stopping information:

I may be a mother yet.

Stay tuned for the exciting sequel: Past Present and Future part 2.

Later!!

Seven is a Lucky Number

11 years, eight months and 16 days ago the youngest of my family was born.

(don’t do the math it wont add up)

Back then I was in Jr. High, and living my awkwardly-normal preteen little life. I was getting good grades, experimenting with make-up (a misunderstanding with blue eyeliner = blackmail photos for eternity), making some of the best friends I’ve ever had, joining track (another misunderstanding) and holding down a steady boyfriend. (as steady as a 13 year old can be.. seriously kids, don’t date in Jr. High. It only makes for body-shiver inducing memories.)

I was living something close to being the teenage dream, or I was until my life as I knew it was sent spinning into orbit, never to return.

Mothers day is pretty a big deal, as is Fathers day; but it was the later event my parents chose as the right moment in time to inform us (me and my sibs) of our growing family… via a scavenger hunt.

It was the scavenger hunt to end all scavenger hunts. And I really do mean “end”, I haven’t trusted one since. I mean the word ‘hunt’ does nothing except excite a young brain, right? Right! So, I was excited, I thought I was going to get a freaking pony! But all I got was a big slap to the ‘emergency stop only’ button and told I was going to have a baby sibling soon.

I guess running off to the nearest dark corner to grow mushrooms and endless amounts of self-pity, isn’t the reaction my parents expected from their first born. But, it was what they got. As all good parents do, faced with abnormal tween behavior, they ran for their lives.

No I’m just kidding, though the thought probably made a rather impressive bid for attention while they tried to console their upset, heartbroken and screaming for no apparent reason oldest daughter who was almost old enough to drive, and are now thinking that one bout of road rage will send her over a cliff. Ya, tell me moms and dads, how do you not lock your children up?

Anyway, I’m not going to lie, this may or may not have happened, but knowing my younger, slightly (read: moderately) aggressive self, I can’t imagine a whole a lot of consoling happened. For one thing, if it had, I wouldn’t have been back in my sulking, self-pity and mushroom cave at my grandmothers later that evening when my mother’s side was informed of our imminent family explosion.

If I remember right, I think everyone in a ten foot radius vowed to never say congratulations to me ever again.

And you all probably thought I was a cheerful, Saint like child huh? Fooled you.

Moving on, I shall further prove how Saint like mini-me could be. Teenagers usually are a little detached from family matters, but I mean who can blame them? Have parents never heard of “friends”? This being said, I wasn’t just detached I was actively kicking away from the family surface as fast as I could to get to the darker deeper water so that I could pretend I was a mermaid and live under the sea and make fishy friends! (why I thought being a mermaid would solve all my problems, I’ll never know. Maybe I didn’t quite understand the whole “fish –phobia of death” thing that I have..)

Ya, I didn’t look, touch or talk to my mother without some sort of emotional break down or body magnet, for weeks at a time. The day she went to the hospital, ya I was playing Mario on the Nintendo 64. I remember the day as if it were yesterday.

None of my siblings were home, or at least I assume they weren’t, because I was the one my parents told what was going on. Me, the girl who was not only the most unsupportive of this whole deal, but also the one being temporarily brainwashed by Nintendo and doing her best to keep Mario outta the freaking Lava so he could collect all those neat little blue coins in under a minute, so she could get a star that is absolutely worhtless.

They told me anyway, so that at nine pm later that evening I could tell my siblings why they weren’t home and why our uncle had just pulled up in the drive way to take us away:

“Seriously I have no idea! But I got that Lava Star! It only took me five tries, beat ya Geg :P”

Again that conversation may or may not have happened, what did happen was a fun sleep over at my grandmothers then a little ride to the hospital to meet the newest alien invader.

Seriously a worse picture could not have been taken.

After the birth of our darling Nicker-nack, I eased up a bit. I mean look at this face:

Who wouldn’t save his saucer-walker incased form from rolling down the stairs? (this happened a number of times, I think he thought with a good foot of hard plastic surrounding him that he was invincible.)

Modeling was his true calling, or at least we thought so. You may call it torture, we called him fabulous.

As he grew up, so did I, to my parents intense relief.

This didn’t stop me from making up names for him though, which I did with great cleverness and creativity. Not all of them were nice, even if they were said in loving tones, and I quickly learned which ones I couldn’t use ie: Mistake. Ya that one got me slapped and grounded. Rightly so.

I’m at the point where I think I need to explain myself. Finally, right?

Let’s see, why would a perfectly normal girl, who has never in her life been an only child suddenly freak out at the thought of a new family member? Was it the change in family status and life style that one gets used to after 10 years? Was it because her parents didn’t tell her until five months in? Was it that her parents didn’t discuss this with anyone but themselves? Was it the journal entry she found her mother writing about a new life she wanted with new children? Was it an unexpected change to her already strange and stressful new life as a teenage girl?

Who knows, but I think it was a little bit of everything.

mushed together with a whole lot of selfishness. I feel really bad about it, but I don’t regret it, it has made the relationship I have with him today.

Which is killer awesome. I love the little squirt more than anything, it is a joy to watch him grow and learn. He’s got one heck of a sense of humor, has more guns and the knowledge to use them than is right for his age, can effectively beat me in Halo, and still lets me cuddle him all I want.

Maybe it’s guilt for treating him so cruelly, but whatever it is, I’m glad of it.

Mess Maker

That would be me.

I don't need a Little running around my house to make it messy, I am well equiped with the skillz of causing chaos.

Observe:

The first one I had a little help with, if you can't tell it's a Halo battle on a bunch of crochet squares. I provided the squares Nick provided the Halo stuff. It was epic, I have so many pictures, someday I'll make a post.

As you can see I am perfectly capable of causing my own distress at having a cluttered house, as well as creating a slightly less filling breakfast.

I tell you what! Flipping eggs is like an Olympic sport!

Hidden Family Skills..

I can't remember which cousin it was that started the trend of wishing someone a 'happy happy' instead of a 'happy birthday' but it has stuck. Sure we're taking advantage of a childs mistake and/or innocence, but it is what it is and we wish it upon each other with great adoration and love.

Like wise I'm not sure where this next happy birthday tradition came from, in fact I doubt anyone in the family does. My grandmother especially wants to figure it out so she can go back in time and stop it from happening.

But it is the Isaacs family treasure. We LOVE it, and are almost proud of our unique'ness. You see when the candles are lit and the lights turned out and it's time for the celebratory "HAPPY BIRTHDAY" song, that's when my family truly shines.

And it goes something like this:



Brilliant no? If you listen, you might pick up some lyrics that don't even belong. I'd say it's like the Hogwarts song except everyone not only picks their tempo and tune, but also the volume, lyrics, happy birthday song (ie: primary songs or another language) and sometimes if your really lucky, jingle bells or whatever anyone has stuck in their head.

It has been like this for years, I honestly can't tell you when we've sung the song correctly. This isn't to say we haven't tried! My Grandmother laughs and us and shakes her head when we sing, so for her birthday we all agreed we'd sing it right. But none of us knew how, it was probably one of our closest attempts but by no means correct.

It's so ingrained that when I'm singing happy birthday outside of my Isaac clan I have to honestly FOCUS to do it right. It's weird, but we love it, and heaven help us if it stops.

Tasty!

There’s a saying: “It’s an acquired taste.” This is mostly used on bizarre food items, like pickled herring, blood sausage and Brussels sprouts.

Everyone “acquires” these tastes differently, some are duct tapped to a wall and force feed sauerkraut, some by necessity (tell me blood sausage wasn’t a necessity!) and some by choice.

As a child I was rather picky, not as picky as some *coughnickcough* but a rather ordinary purchase of my parents challenged my childish pride.

Every house has a junk drawer, I know you do! It has in its marvelous depths anything from quarters to bobby pins to the missing piece of several puzzles, and an earring always an earring. On one fateful day it had a bag of Cinnamon bears. Not just a little bag, but a bulk candy bag.

I had hit the jackpot.

I stuck the head of a little bear in my mouth, ready to party and then BAM! I was kicked in the senses by that tangy, bittery, sweet.. whateverness that is cinnamon. The point had come to spit it out or die. Since I’m writing this now lets say I spat it out.

Now a normal child would have stayed away and eventually forgotten the bears, but I circled that drawer for a week. The quantity of the Cina-bears didn’t diminish much because my brother and sisters had passed the “if it tastes bad and you don’t like it don’t eat it” childhood lesson. I had not.

During that week I kept trying the bears, apparently under the impression that they had changed flavors, my parents had replaced it with good candy or would this time they would be better.

They never were.

Finally the bears were moved, I suspected my mother did this because the bag wasn’t empty, and thus filled the entire drawer so it was hard to find that all important puzzle piece. They were gone for about a month before I started craving them. I craved the bears like bears crave honey (theoretically).

I wanted to ask for more but I never learned what they were called because I was fairly certain I wasn’t supposed to eat them. Yes I realize they were put in the junk drawer, but if you think about it, that’s more like a good hiding place. I mean who puts candy in a junk drawer?

Eventually I asked my mom about the red teddy bears in the junk drawer. I think she thought I had gotten into the “pop medicine” (that’s another story) I never did find out what they were. Not until I stumbled on them years later covered in chocolate!!

As you can imagine I am a serious advocate for cinnamon now, I’ll have it on pretty much anything I can, much to Grants displeasure.

And just to stop the questions before they start: NO this will not work on fish, or blood sausage. At least not for me.

The Author is in!

I'm being very liberal with the term "Author" I just write stories, anything I want to see played out. It's self gratification in a verbal, wordy form, really, if you think about it.

So! What am I writing now good question. I'll blurb out a few:

Working Title: Olympus Knight, or Breathing Underwater.


Once upon a time in a high school not unlike your own two students studied and learned all the things they need for the outside world.


Abby and Oliver: lovers at first sight, bonded soulmates, best friends forever, and all before they say the word hello. In fact their connection for each other is so strong that it lasts for months without them ever introducing themselves to each other. One can only imagine what happens, when they do.


It wouldn't be a high school romance novel without the obligitory love triangle, and token jealous people drama-lama, so of course they will make a grand apperance. Tragedy, Comedy, Romance, Suspense, Repitition, and Cliche's at their best folks. Or at MY best, in any case.



Working Title: Monsters


As far as Meg knows, her life is completley normal. She has a job, is going to school, and just rented her first appartment. Sure things could go wrong, but how bad could they be?


Well if you consider being attacked by an unknown creature bad, then her life could get worse. Worse being a brutal and bizzare death.


And yet she breaths still. With no pulse, no blood flow or body heat, she would be considered dead by anyones standards. Anyone not living in the world she now found herself in.


With the help of her new found friends she learns to embrace her future, and her past.

This is mostly Romance Drama, Comedy and if Grant had his way, World Domination. Maybe someother time..

Working Title: It doesn't have one, I just call it Dragon Hunt.

On his quest for the mythical Dragon of Destiney (uughh.. not the name I'll stick with ) Patrick Caffton faces many trials, including, but not limited to: finding (another) guide, starvation, sticker burs, huge thick forests, and the beasts that live in them, hired hit men, men that want him dead, really mean mages, and his ex-fiance and quest companion.

But this time he's gotten in to deep, and his wounds, both phyiscal and mental wont allow him the luxurary of independant traveling so he's forced to ask for help, and swallow his pride.

Aaaaannnd that's IT!

Well sort of. I have lots and lots of little idea snippits cluttering up my computer file space, but most of them are just that, ideas. A few wont ever see the light of day, and another select few will probably get mushed in together with another story. There are two other largers stories I could blurb, butI haven't worked on them for years. And of course there's my un-edited (almost) novel.. *sigh *

Forgive me for my vagueness but I don't want anyone thinking they can steal my ideas. What I have written isn't enough for anyone to steal my story from. Trust me, I left out all the good bits.

Well there you have it! That's what I've been doing lately.

Ideas...

Sorry folks, believe it or not I've written around a dozen blogs.. all in my head. They've all been more or less about the same stuff, writing, valentines day, life, baking bread, important stuff!

And yet none of them have made it to paper, or Mircosoft Word, or some type of recording device. On the bright side, I haven't forgotten the password to this blog, unlike some other blog I could name...

So lets get this party started! Wasn't Valentines day fun?? Grant, Kim, Brent, and I all went to Benni Hana for their all you can eat sushi. The boys took that as a challenge, which sucked later on but left more gellato for Kimmy and I. Stupid work schedules denied us the pleasure of Jake and Brooklyns company, they were sorely missed.

I've been trying to cook more, while playful banter about Grant being a better chef then I am is all fun, it does hurt my wifely pride. So one night, at great risk to her kitchen and sanity, Jen and I made bread! Usually anything attempted by the two of us after 6:30 pm ends up in a burnt unrecognizable lump at the bottom of her stove/sink/floor/oven/you really don't want to know. But the bread turned out AWESOME! And then I got snow plowed in.

Love was certainly being felt over the holiday weekend, and it materialized as two new Smartphones for Grant and I for absolutely FREE!! I'm still trying to cope with the change but Grants already gotten to like level 20 in Angry Birds. As soon as I learn how to turn on and off my phone I think I'll also pursue Angered Birds.. who actually shouldn't be mad, it's the pigs who are getting the short end of the stick.

So finally: My writing!! I've added more to my fanfic, which is actually getting pretty good reviews on the site I have it on, which makes me really happy. Being told I'm a good writer by people who don't have to love me is a great feeling!!

I've also added more to a little pet project of mine, as well as a short story I believe could actually go somewhere. I really like getting my ideas out and seeing them transform into a scene, and my characters turn into people. It's fun and frustrating at the same time; especially when you have two stories fighting for your love. It's not fair!!

I've decided I'm going to give you little blurbs about all the stories I have outlined and such, but I think I'll save it for another blog. Just so you know, cause knowing is fun even if it's something that will do you absolutely no good in the future.

Anyway it's late I better get going.
Bye!

Side Fluff

Howdy all, told you I'd start writing more if I combined my two favorite blogs. I know, poor you, don't worry there's cute at the end that's worth all my mindless rambling.

As you know, or you may not know but don't worry you're still cool, my newest favorite show/anime is Axis Powers Hetalia. Never, since 9th grade geography with Mr. Goody or when Hysteria was still on Kids WB have I enjoyed learning history more than with Hetalia. For instance I didn't know that the "Axis Powers" part of the title actually meant something or what it meant, now I do. I also know who the Allies are that fought against the Axis (I'll let you Wiki it yourself)

I also had no idea Prussia was no longer a country and how it became so, or that there's a small country called Belarus, who is psychotic and wants to marry Russia..

Anyway I said all that to bring you to this: I made another FANFICTION!! Bwahahahahaa.. It's actually rather short, only 600ish words, but it's super sweet and I loves it dearly. I'm still fairly new to the whole "fanfiction" and the "fandoms" that are created for beloved shows/books/etc so I'm still baffled by the whole "pairing" idea (this means fans put together characters they like best in romantic situations) but I'm warming up to it.

I've been in love with Hetalia for about two years, and never once have I paired anyone together, until monday night. I had no intention of writing anything cause I'm still working on my high school romance short (the one Allysen loves to pieces) but I wanted to see if there were some good fanfics for my pairing out in the great wide web. There aren't, but they gave me ideas for my own, which spontaneously combusted and now I have a new fanfic.

So there, I have Switzerland and Liechtenstein fanfiction. Odd pair huh? But their connection both fictionally and non-fictionally is sooo sweet I just had to. If you are interested let me know, but unless you've seen the show you really wont get it.

Ok here's the cute I promised. I love web comics, and Deviant art has lots of them. There's on in particular that I love best and I made a clay person from one of her designs. I'll link you to the comic but be warned it's Anime related. (Aunt Malayna Rachel would like it, it's Bleach)


Her name is Little Roo. And she is just the sweetest thing I've ever seen. She's been on my list of things to make for a long time now. I know I should have finished poor Uzera first, but I finished Roo in one night where as even on a good day Uzera would take at least 3.

She has a few things I need to fix with some paint and more clay, but she's more of less complete. And besides who knows when I'll fix her, thus the unfinished pictures.

The unfolding truth.

Did you know I have four different blogs? I'll give you a second to count. *hums.. *

You counted only two didn't you?

Yes I have four, or to be more accurate: I had four. As of today I only have three.

How did this happen? I'll try to explain without making you die of boredom. Up until a half hour ago I had a Personal Blog *You are Here* A Writing Blog *It's somewhere else* An Anime Reference Blog *look over in my blog list it's there * and a Work blog that me and a few co-admins are working on, it has yet to be unvaled.

The purpose of telling you this here is I would like to combine the writing blog with this one. My time is not able to handle so many blogs and keep them updated regularly, so even if I don't combine them the writting blog is gone. I just don't have time, and if I do I'd rather write somewhere else.

So hopefully I can update more here because I write.. a lot and I always have something to say about it.

Anyway, just a heads up.