What a great day! The gingerbread houses were awesome. My counter is overflowing with them, and I suppose they'll be a fixture there for the season now. The royal icing wasn't all that super today--I don't think I did anything wrong, but it just wasn't holding as well as the leftover icing from the sugar skulls last month. I think I need to tweak that aspect of the project for the future--more squirtable frosting, especially for the vertical surfaces.

We also made these adorable snow globes (for some reason I can't type that word and kept writing "bloge" and "glove"). Frances and Walter spontaneously made one a few days ago that had a sculpey bear in it, and Hilary hyped it up a bit with a tree and some snowmen and santas and reindeer and these trees with stars and tiny candy canes on them.


We are so thick with boys. Poor Lainey and Frances were nowhere to be seen most of the time. 10 boys and 2 girls = imbalance. This is the way it always used to be, and I shouldn't be surprised that little has changed. I was talking with a friend from Massachusetts this morning, and she was saying that she wants to know where all the 7-9 year old boys are because the groups she's in don't have enough of them. Of course, I could say that 8-11 year old boys are in my homeschool group or at my house, but the truth is, it seems like groups or neighborhoods or other congregations of children grow in fits and starts. At one moment, they're full of one age or gender, and then you turn around, and suddenly the tide has turned to something else. At any rate, we do have a lot of boys, and there's no arguing with that!


Robin's house. As usual, the adults were still at the table and decorating long after the kids were swatting each other and racing through the house with weapons.


These festive scenes just warm my heart. This is what I hope I'll remember most about our schooling days. Lots of good friends, lots of kids, and happy, messy projects.

That's the good of today. The bad, verging on truly ugly is that Kerry was in a pretty bad car accident. His car was totaled, one of the other cars he hit was totaled, and another car had some damage. We were not really planning to buy another car at this time, and though we've been thinking about what kind of car he might get when he replaces my old van for quite a while, fantasizing and planning for the future are quite different than having to choose something right away, especially in this economy. Especially when we already have a car payment that we hadn't intended to keep as a car payment.

What's sort of fascinating about the choice is that we now have to take into account that whatever we are buying now will likely be passed down to driving children in 6 or so years. It's a humbling realization. Ollie has suggested a Ferrari, a Mustang, a Hummer, a Rav-4, or a Jeep Wrangler. Hmmm. Though we really should probably look for something used, we are thinking about a Prius (no longer any tax credits) or...well, we just really don't know. Because we don't really have the money for it now, none of it feels all that exciting. And gas prices are down at the moment, but who wants to pay more than they have to. On the other hand, we have six people in our family, and it's important to have a vehicle that will hold at least five of us because sometimes someone has all of the kids at once, and five seating positions are absolutely required. Obviously, something that held all of us would be even more practical, but you really pay for that in fuel efficiency. It's all overwhelming. Tomorrow will be spent getting a rental car, clearing out the dead van, and possibly seeing a doctor for any lingering soreness (the airbag did not deploy).

I still haven't decided what Frances is getting for Christmas. I have a stash of Calico Critters and other small things for her, but she has said she wants an aquarium and an American Girl doll. Up until now, she hasn't been much of a doll kid, so $100 or more for a doll really seems excessive. She tends to draw on her dolls, do interesting things to their hair, give them spontaneous baths, or leave them places to be tortured by her brothers. Also, up until just a month or so ago, she declared that American Girls were "creepy looking." I don't quite see that--they look fine to me--but I'm still not sure what the big turnaround is all about. I'd really prefer fish myself ;)

The trouble with fish, though, is that they are expensive. And now we're buying a car, hoping we're not going to get sued, and who knows what might happen with the economy and Kerry's job. Fish, however, could be quite soothing to look at if life totally tanked. I have been weighing the virtues of column tanks versus ones that are slightly deeper and higher than your typical rectangular tank versus the standard and least expensive shape. Bow front? I hate making decisions...hate it.

Last night, Frances went to the open gym session at her gym, where she was able to get a private lesson on back handsprings. I am getting worried that the rest of her class is going to move forward and Frances is going to have to stay behind because she seems resistant to learning the steps in the process of the handspring. She thinks it looks goofy to put her arms up next to her ears when she comes out of a roundoff, and it has been near impossible to get her to suck in her belly in the way they teach them for the back handsprings. But it sounds like she was able to master the skill of roundoff to back handspring on the tumble track, and then she was able to execute it non-continuously onto the "fluffy," but after practice tonight, she said that she is "awesome" on handsprings now and that she can easily do them on my bed. I hope she doesn't hit that fan :)

Here was her cutest comment today. We were in the Lowe's parking lot because I was getting some more lights for our house, and she said, "I love Rutledge. He's awesome." I asked her what was so awesome about him, and she said, "He's just awesome because he speaks a different language and he's so cute and cuddly and so chubby." I just love that she thinks he's super-cool. I hope he always stays really cute and special to her.



I just love this picture of Frances and her new friend, Gabi. This was from the sleepover in Lynchburg two weekends ago. She has been making artwork for Gabi and has gotten them identical silver bracelets that she is planning to send for Christmas. Frances is so adaptable and finds friends everywhere. I don't know if this is a girl trait or just her personality, but it's so neat for her to be able to find a fit almost anywhere and to connect so easily with other people of all ages. I really envy her that facility in interpersonal relationships.

Oh shit. This is what I get for staying up too late. Hanna Andersson has all their sweaters on sale for $19. I just got an email. I am practically salivating at these adorable sweaters that would be so cute for the Christmas picture I haven't taken this year. And Kerry would kill me. But he doesn't have to know, does he?