Catching Up With Christmas Pt. 1: Lots And Lots of Ugly Sweaters

I'll have several short "Christmas catch-up" blog posts in the next several days, and here's the first entry. Appropriate, since I'll be writing about a party we attended on December first. Onward!

Our good friends, the Nielsens (pictured above), decided to throw an Ugly Sweater Party for Christmas this year. Ugly sweaters are an inadvertent tradition among many elderly and overly "festive" people, and ugly Christmas sweaters are in a gruesome category all their own. The only reason I don't see more ugly sweaters on the streets every Christmas is because I live in Arizona, where sweaters aren't needed all that often.

Nonetheless, it was surprisingly easy to find an ugly sweater...or two...plus an ugly sweater-vest (which are almost as plentiful as their heavier sweater brethren). The sweater I ended up wearing to the party was one I found at the local White Elephant second-hand store; sadly, it wasn't a Christmas sweater, but it was still breathtakingly ugly, and I couldn't resist buying it (for the towering sum of $3!). I had originally intended for Nathan to wear the sweater (since it was a man's sweater), but it ended up being too small for him. However, another friend of mine who had bought several extra sweaters ended up having more than she needed, so Nathan found a sweater among that pile that suited him (by which I mean, it fit him and it wasn't too ugly! He feels a bit self-conscious at "dress-up" parties).

See...Nate's sweater is pretty okay! His expression, not so much.

Anyway, we had a wonderful time at the Christmas party...in part because it was an adults-only party! This is no knock on my children (or children in general)...I also enjoy parties where whole families are invited. Sometimes, though, it is just nice to have complete grown-up conversations and sophisticated company...well, as "sophisticated" as you can get when everyone is wearing knitted holiday monstrosities, that is!

My buddy Lexi and her husband Lee, looking tacky!

The Robinsons were in charge of party games...they are quite the cut-ups

My buddy Tawnya, whose family just moved back to ID...we'll miss them!

The Allens and Brent Jackman, wearing sweaters in varying shades of ugly

Scott and Kelsey Tew wearing some excellent "old-person" sweaters

In more examples of "sophisticated" company, we played a few games at the party (including a "name that Christmas tune" contest). We also had a white elephant gift exchange; I managed to give away some plastic holiday trays festooned with colorful holly-berry designs (also purchased at the White Elephant store, natch). One of the hottest items of the gift exchange was (no lie) an inflatable tie that Nathan possessed for a short time, but ultimately had to relinquish to Scott, the party host. There were also several jars full of candy; guests needed to guess how many pieces of candy were in each jar. When there was a tie for one of the jars, the finalists held a "dance-off" (at my husband's suggestion, of all things!) to determine the winner:

Yes, these are adults wearing ugly sweaters, fighting over inflatable ties, and having dance-offs in living rooms. Maybe this did feel more like a party with "children" attending. But we had a wonderful time; it was so nice to know everyone at the party, and to feel comfortable and welcome there, despite being kind of weird people. The Nielsens papered up one of their walls with wrapping paper, so everyone could have a photo of themselves to take home in remembrance. It was a Christmas party I will remember fondly for a long time.

Here are the sweaters Nathan and I wore...together for one glorious night!

Several people at the party referred to my sweater as a "Bill Cosby" sweater...it's a definite candidate for being a sweater like his from the 80s or so! It was definitely ugly, whomever it belonged to! Better yet...it won me the "Ugliest Overall Sweater" award at the party! In the words of Yukon Cornelius, WA-HOOOOOO! I won some goodies and a Christmas DVD for the kids.

Funny epilogue: a few days after the party, I put both sweaters into the washer and dryer. My glorious ugly Bill Cosby sweater tragically unraveled in the spin cycle...the collar was hanging on by a few flimsy strands, and the waist was coming undone as well! I guess the poor old thing was clinging to dear life just long enough to win me the contest...then, it purpose accomplished, it gave up the ghost. Farewell, ugly sweater...and thanks! I hope I can find another sufficiently ugly sweater to be a contender next year!

A Very Carlin Thanksgiving, Pt. 2

Now that we are in the post-Christmas "slump," I'll have a little time to catch up on our holiday season. Right now I'll flash back to Thanksgiving, and the remainder of our family's visit...

Family portrait at the Desert Museum

While it was fun to lay around like slugs on Thanksgiving Day, both the Carlins and our family wanted to get out and get moving for the rest of the weekend. And we enjoyed ourselves quite a bit in the process!

We opened up our Black Friday by taking all the kids mini-golfing...

Note also Aurora's daring leap into the sand trap...

 ...and playing on the playground (it was a beautiful day!).

My cutie-pie niece Laura

Later that afternoon, the dads took all the kids (except for Aurora and Laura Carlin) to see Wreck-It Ralph, the Disney holiday movie that our family is currently crazy about. The main character is a video-game villain who is tired of being the bad guy. When he tries to "change the rules," chaos, hilarity, and heartwarming hijinks ensue. It's pretty great. Maybe I'll write a full review sometime.

Anyway, when they left for the movie theater, my sister Jocelyn and I took our "babies" (technically, Aurora is my baby, but she looks awfully big compared to Laura), and cruised around town. We spent time talking about life in general, visiting Trader Joe's (one of my favorite stores, and Jocelyn's first visit there!), eating lunch at El Guero Canelo (to introduce Jocelyn to the wonder that is the Sonoran hot dog), and doing some shopping!

Last year, I ventured out into the late evening cold of Black Friday, and found myself quite overwhelmed at Walmart. However, this time we snuck into a Target at about 2:30 pm, and guess what? It didn't seem like Black Friday at all. In fact, it felt like any other slightly busier-than-average retail day. The cashiers and my fellow customers were all relaxed and friendly. Best of all, I still managed to find a couple of nice deals...I got a new copy of Wii Sports Resort (Aurora had broken our copy several months earlier) for a better deal than anything I'd seen either online or in secondhand stores. Score! I also got a couple of cheap DVDs, thanked my lucky stars, and called it a day on the shopping front.

That night we relaxed and pretended it was July 4th by setting off the rest of our fireworks. They were a big hit--particularly with Aurora, as you can see by all the jumping around!!

 

 

Saturday was the last full day with our family, and we decided to take everyone to the Desert Museum, a favorite destination of ours (particularly in the fall/winter, since most of the museum is outdoors). This time, Nate's brother Ryan, his wife Judy, and their son Cameron went along. We made up quite the caravan!

Aurora really enjoyed petting this snake!

The family checking out all the creepy-crawlies...

...including all these cockroaches. Eewwww...gross!

Our kids' favorite place in the Desert Museum is crawling around in this artificial "cave"--very fun!

Lorelai relaxing next to some gem formations

Up close and personal with the Desert Museum's resident cougar

Uncle Ryan navigating the maze

The girls solving the Native American maze with Aunt Judy

Watching the bighorn sheep butt into each other...they were pretty testy that day!

After the Desert Museum, we all headed to a nearby Panda Express for lunch, then finally returned to Sahuarita for fun and games with the family. Really, that was what most of the Thanksgiving weekend entailed...quiet times and joking around with the family. I can't remember specific details of those conversations, but it is always nice to just relax and shoot the breeze with family you don't see too often.

The Barretts at the Desert Museum...Cameron was quite a fan!

Besides Simon trying to escape, the Desert Museum was a lovely day-trip for the Carlins

The next morning, both the Barrett and Carlin families packed up their things, climbed into their cars, and headed back home. We will miss them, but we were also grateful for the time we were able to spend with all of them. We hope to see everyone again at various points in 2013. Their departure marked the end of Thanksgiving weekend, but also the beginning of the Christmas season! Time to start pulling out the decorations...

Good Grief! It's Almost Christmas 2012

Well, as you can tell by the dateline of this article, I have been grossly negligent of the blog this month. The Christmas season will do that to a person. HOWEVER...our presents have been wrapped, our gifts have all been shipped, the treats have been delivered, the parties have been attended, and the kids have finished school for the year! Nathan and I are happily decompressing, and enjoying the relative quiet. All that remains is the wait until Christmas (granted, this wait is somewhat hard on the girls, but it's wonderful for us grown-ups!).

With a little luck, I will get caught up on our family blogging in the next week or two. This entry, though, will be our "family Christmas letter" to all our friends and family. I would like to send this out sooner than last year, just in case an unexpected computer virus wipes out our computer again and we're delayed by several weeks! And for those of you who will be receiving this letter via snail-mail...we apologize for the lateness!

The Barrett Family 2012 Christmas Message

Hello everyone! We hope this message finds you all happy, healthy, and safe alongside those you love. This has been a year of challenges, adventures, and joys for the Barrett household.

Sadly, this holiday season has been touched with tragedy. Last week, within 24 hours, a young husband and father in our LDS ward died unexpectedly of a heart attack...and a disturbed (and heavily armed) young man entered an elementary school in Connecticut and opened fire, killing 26 people (including 20 young children!). These sobering events have made for a more thoughtful, less boisterous holiday season. And while we have spent time grieving these untimely losses, we have been also reminded of the love of our Savior Jesus Christ, and how He can bring comfort to those in pain. Our family has spent this season counting our many blessings and realizing just how short, fragile, and precious our time on earth is, and how important it is to make our time on earth meaningful and filled with service. We have also spent lots of time holding our children close to us...because they can never have too many hugs! We are so grateful for the beautiful spirits the Lord has sent our way.

Nathan has had a busy year settling into his job at the Pima Association of Governments (he started the job in summer of 2011, so he celebrated his one-year anniversary with PAG this summer). He loves his job, and he really enjoys his new coworkers too. He recently took on some new responsibilities, including the tracking of all transportation dollars spent in the region.  He has a lot of "extracurricular" activities on his plate as well. Last spring and summer, he coached Lorelai's soccer team, and he was loved by the whole team! He also participates in two separate board-gaming groups each month; one with local church friends in Sahuarita, and one with his coworkers. He also attends a monthly Sahuarita Planning & Zoning Commission. 

Adrianne is kept busy at home, raising three little girls and trying to keep the house in good running order. She taught eight piano students this year, and added a ninth in the fall when she started teaching Lorelai (she's very excited to share her love of music with her daughters!). She has continued to serve as the Primary (children's organization) president in her local LDS congregation; she oversees more than 100 children and their teachers. It is a busy but rewarding job, and she is blessed to have many wonderful people serve alongside her and give her good advice. In her "spare" time, Adrianne cooks (she spends much of each fall doing her family's home canning), reads, exercises, blogs, listens to music, and watches television.

Lorelai turned seven years old this summer, and seems to get taller, skinnier, and more toothless all the time. In the last two months, she has lost three of her front teeth...the Tooth Fairy has been busy this holiday season! It makes her look like what she is...a growing-up girl. She is also our resident "tomboy," preferring to ride bikes and play video games with boys in the neighborhood, and not being too interested in looking pretty! Lorelai played soccer this spring and summer, and when second grade started in the fall, she joined an "author's club" after school, taught by Ms. Voorhees, her homeroom teacher. It has inspired her to write lots of stories, all of which are very creative and amusing...she has a dramatic flair as a storyteller. She also started piano lessons this fall with her mama, and she is enjoying the challenge of learning a musical instrument. She has a contagious laugh, and is always energetic, passionate, and full of love for her friends & family.

Celeste is somewhat the opposite of her older sister...she is a "girly girl" to the core! She has a soft spot for anything involving princesses, ballerinas, babies, or fairies (she was in heaven when we took her to the Disney On Ice show in October!). Sometimes her mama has to force her to wear pants, because left to her own devices, she would wear nothing but fancy dresses everywhere, including to the playground and hiking in the mountains! Celeste has been in two different preschools this year. The first was a co-op preschool that finished in the spring; in the fall, she enrolled at Smart Scholars preschool, taught by Ms. Nichole, who Celeste idolizes. She is picking up a little reading and a lot of math (much to her right-brained parents' surprise!). Celeste is very affectionate with her parents...she has promised to take care of Daddy when he gets old, and she always wants to help mama cook dinner. She just turned five a few weeks ago, and she is very excited for ballet classes and kindergarten in the coming year.

Aurora is our little "spitfire"; she has more energy than the rest of us combined. She loves to run more than almost anything else, and she's very good at it...in fact, she has often managed to run far far away from our family in various locations, only to be rescued by strangers and/or the police! It can be somewhat stressful trying to keep up with her. Her speaking continues to improve every week, and now she is very good at telling us what's on her mind. She's also gotten good at bossing around her older sisters! She is a very opinionated kid, but she is very affectionate and loving as well...especially towards her mama! She can charm people wherever she goes; she loves to crawl into laps, hold hands, and shower her loved ones with kisses and hugs. Next month, Aurora turns three years old, and it promises to be a whirlwind year as she continues to grow.

The newest member of our family is our dwarf hamster, Tuck. We inherited him from a family friend whose housecat was eyeing him as a possible meal! Tuck has settled nicely into our home, and the girls all love him. He is not the most talkative guy, but he loves to run around in his exercise wheel late every night, and he has fun running around the house in his plastic ball when we're cleaning out his cage. He is very cute and it has been fun for the girls to have a pet.

As a family, we have had several fun excursions. Biggest of all was a two-week trip to Colorado in the summer, where we visited lots of family members and saw a lot of beautiful sights. This fall, we managed to refinance our home, which will help us make ends meet in the coming years. We also managed to paint several rooms in our house, including all the small bedrooms upstairs, the downstairs bathroom, and our kitchen and living room. Hopefully next year we'll finish all the walls downstairs. We also hosted Thanksgiving again, and were happy to welcome many extended family members to join us.

Next year should be a good one for us; we have several big trips planned, beginning with a trip to San Diego in February. We'll also have two children in school beginning next fall, and we're planning many more fun activities for all our girls. We realize we have been very blessed and are so grateful for the many ways in which the Lord has sent us help, joy, and comfort. We hope to be good examples and good helpers to those in need; please let us know if there are any ways in which we can be better helpers and servants of Christ. We hope all of you have a wonderful, blessed 2013.

A Very Carlin Thanksgiving Pt. 1

I just can't believe November is ending already. What a month; never a slow moment! December may bring more of the same...we'll see how much blogging I get done. Lots to do in the next couple of weeks!

Our family was very excited for Thanksgiving this year; my sister Jocelyn decided to bring her whole family down to visit us...including her husband Paul. On the Barrett side, Nathan's oldest brother Ryan also came to visit, along with his wife Judy and their son Cameron. They didn't spend Thanksgiving Day with us because they were busy golfing, but we got to spend some time with them later in the weekend. I'll have some pictures of them in the next blog post.

We've been in Arizona for nine and a half years now, and this is the first time Paul Carlin has ever come to visit us! Jocelyn also brought her four cute kids: Abigail, who just turned twelve and just entered the Young Women's program at church (that makes Jocelyn and myself feel pretty old!); Elaine, who will soon be ten years old; Simon, six years old and the only male Nash-related grandchild (so far); and the newest member of the family, baby Laura (who was actually 14 months old at this visit, but that's a baby compared to the rest of them!). It was our first time meeting Laura, and I was very happy to see her. She has such big beautiful blue eyes and she keeps them wide open so as to take everything in.

The Carlins also brought a four-legged member of their family...their neurotic yet lovable mutt Zorro. As you can imagine, having a dog staying in our house made our kids much more excited than having other human beings staying in our house. Celeste and Aurora, in particular, were completely obsessed with Zorro (or "Zorry," as Aurora charmingly called him). They followed him everywhere--upstairs, downstairs, inside, outside. They offered him food and water at every possible opportunity. They talked to him, petted him, and generally showered him with affection.

At first, Zorro repaid my girls' love and affection by throwing up in one of our bedrooms and pooping on our stairs. Sigh. Poor guy; all the change was too much for him. As a result of his accidents, I kept him outside for all of Thanksgiving day. I guess I am not ready to be a dog owner, because I was not in a mood to be forgiving. Of course, I also had a lot of other things to worry about on Thanksgiving morning...

...like cooking!! Since Jocelyn and family arrived late Wednesday evening, I did all the pies by myself. We had four pies: the "usuals" (pumpkin, apple, and mixed berry), plus one other flavor. I got a lot of requests for cherry this year, so I grudgingly complied. I say "grudgingly" because last time I made a cherry pie, it bubbled over and permanently stained one of my stainless-steel baking sheets. Well, guess what? This time, the cherry pie bubbled over again, and this time the bubbly stuff burned right through my oven liner and spattered all over the floor of my oven. Tough stuff! As if to add insult to injury, I got two cherry pits in one bite of this pie! Perhaps cherry pies attack when they can smell fear... Anyway, everyone else enjoyed the cherry pie, so I am happy that they're happy. Besides, I was too busy greedily devouring the pumpkin pie to worry about the cherry too much!

I didn't take "before" pictures of my big turkey this year, since I prepared it pretty much the same way I did last year--I'm a sucker for tradition. However, tradition aside, I did try something slightly different this year...I cooked a second turkey, with a very different flavor!

I'd had a smallish (10 pound) turkey in my freezer for almost a year now; I knew it wasn't big enough to feed a large family, but I had a different recipe I wanted to try. And since my generous sister gifted us with a lovely new roasting pan, I decided to take the plunge and roast an additional turkey Thanksgiving night!

This turkey was scrubbed off, but not doused in butter and sage. Instead, we created a fancy, garlicky-lemony-zesty marinade (it also included half a can of frozen orange juice!). Here's what the marinade looked like:

To add to the lemony flavor, we stuffed the turkey with several halved lemons.

Then, we put the turkey in a bag and poured the marinade inside with it. We made sure to massage the turkey and re-coat it with the marinade several times throughout the day...the rest of the time it stayed in our fridge while we cooked everything else.


Speaking of everything else...here's our spread!!

I realize the effect was ruined somewhat by leaving the box of aluminum foil in the picture...oops! :) We had my favorite green bean casserole; a cheesy zucchini casserole; rolls; cranberry sauce; orange tapioca salad; sweet potato souffle; mashed potatoes; loads of gravy; and not one, but two types of stuffing. The bread stuffing was inside the bird, of course; however, we also made a sausage-filled cornbread stuffing that was cooked inside a pumpkin!

Sooo delicious! *drooool*


Our large turkey also turned out pretty well, if I do say so myself:

Everything was great! The adults ate everything in sight...and the kids mostly ate rolls. Oh well...someday they will come to appreciate the joy of Thanksgiving food. I ate heartily, then promptly fell into a Turkey Coma(TM) for a couple of hours.  After finally rousing myself (to the sound of kids running throughout the house), I decided to put the next turkey into the roaster.

I sadly didn't get a picture of the final result...but it tasted very different from your typical Thanksgiving turkey! The flesh was very tender from the marinade, and had a bright, almost sweet citrusy aftertaste. We really enjoyed it, and feasted upon its leftovers throughout the week.

As for the non-cooks (aka Nathan, Paul, and all the kiddos): they had some fun too. They spent much of the morning at the playground, and crashed by watching movies most of the afternoon. Right before we sat down to eat, Lorelai had an unexpected milestone: one of her two front teeth finally fell out!

I was so glad it had finally fallen out...it seems like her teeth have been loose forever, but nothing had changed for months! I have been calling her my "jack o' lantern daughter," because of her suddenly holey grin (she lost one of her bottom teeth the week before). It makes her look so grown-up.

That evening, the whole family gathered together and watched The Avengers--most of the Carlins hadn't seen it, and they all gave it an enthusiastic thumbs up! We went to bed tired but very satisfied with our busy day. I'll talk about the rest of the Carlin's visit next time around.