Public Service Announcment

Older church ladies of the world...do not, under any circumstances, ask a younger church lady, "When are you due?" unless you are 100% certain she is actually pregnant.  How can you be 100% certain said younger church lady is pregnant, you ask?  When you hear the words from her own lips, "I am 100% certain I am pregnant."  In no other circumstance should you speculate and therefore ask the younger church lady outloud, "When are you due?" 

Yes.  This happened to me today.  I was the younger church lady.

I had this happen a few years back as well.  My response a few years back was to laugh nervously and say that I was still carrying baby weight and I was wearing an empire waste shirt, so it was easy to make that mistake (I never wore that shirt again, by the way!). 

This time, I maintained my dignity, composure and eye contact, and when asked, "When are you due?" said calmly, "I...am not."  The older church lady said, "Oh...well..." and slunk off.  Which is as it should be. 

Oddly enough, I had just read an article in an etiquette section of a magazine regarding this very issue.  The author encouraged the non-pregnant "younger church lady," when asked this horrifying question, to maintain eye contact, tell the offender she is not pregnant, and let all the awkwardness hang there without making excuses for yourself to make the other person feel better.  That way "the older church lady" bears the load of the awkwardness, hopefully being shamed into contrition and learning to never ask that dreaded question to anyone not in a hospital gown and pushing again.

So, to my fellow younger church ladies....you are welcome.  I may have saved you from one older church lady today.

Sophie's Rapunzel Party

We celebrated Sophie's 7th birthday today with a friend party.  It was a Rapunzel theme.  Thank goodness for my friend Laura who had done this for Lydia's birthday this past summer.  She lent us a bunch of stuff that made the party look cool.

This braid, for instance.  It trailed from the entryway back to the bedrooms.  We spent a 100 degree August day crafting it in her backyard last summer.  Good memories. 

 Another Laura addition.  Cute, huh?

 Sophie dressed as Rapunzel to greet her guests.

 She even had a Rapunzel braid in her hair.

 Another element borrowed from Laura...a pin the pan on Flynn Rider game.

 These were the little frying pans they had to hit him on the nose with. Cute!

 In Tangled, Rapunzel visits a pub called the Snuggly Duckling where she meets a lot of ruffians.

 

Our ruffians ate blue jello (lakes) with orange sailboats floating on top...

 ...and cinnamon/sugar braided breadsticks, hotdogs, Doritoes and fruit.

 When the girls arrived, they got to "paint the walls" like Rapunzel does in her tower.

 They took turns getting their hair braided and flowered by Laura--again, she was so helpful!  Couldn't have done it without her!

 The girls got to decorate their own floating lanterns.  This project did not go as well as I had planned--there was some frustration with keeping them open and un-crunched. 

 Then we played the pin the pan on Flynn Rider game.  Poor Flynn.

 Lunchtime!  One little guest told Greg, "I don't DO hotdogs," shortly after telling me, "Your house is small."  Thank you for sharing!  (don't worry anyone who actually reads this blog...it wasn't your kid!).

 Sophie received sweet notes from friends...

 ...lovely gifts...

 ...and even hand-decorated giftbags!

 Then, for a non-traditional birthday dessert we had rootbeer floats.  Fun!

 And as we waited for moms and dads to collect kids, we danced and sang to a little bit of music from the Tangled movie. 

It was a great time!

Mawy Twismas

We travelled to my parent's house for Christmas.  They actually had some snow there!  All the kids and Greg went sledding down the road to the lake on our 30-year old sleds.

 Aunt Cassie lead cookie baking and decorating in an orderly fashion.

 We had an in-house Christmas Eve service.  The kids' contribution was a choreographed dance to a Justin Bieber Christmas song...at least it was Little Drummer Boy.  Which lead to the quote of the weekend by my mom..."Just think of how good you could have been if you'd had more time to practice!"

Most memorable event of the weekend...my dad fighting a muskrat (almost) to the death and coming out the victor.  I'll probably have to tell this story in a separate post.

 Owen, Jozie, Adeline, Sophie, Aubrey

 The 5:30 a.m. calm before the present-opening-storm

 More sledding.  Uncle Gerrit got in on the fun this time.

 Addie's first sledding experience.

 The traditional family pics by the Christmas tree...
Cassie, Courtney & Me

 Cassie, Adeline & Gerrit

 Me, Owen, Sophie & Greg

 Paul, Jozie, Courtney & Aubrey

 This year's group gift...union suits in all sizes! 

 The adults all got these as well, but most were unwilling to even put a leg into theirs let alone get their picture taken in one.  All except for Greg.  That picture is on his phone, though.