Happy un-birthday!

....to my dreadlocks! Haha! they are 1 1/2 years old tomorrow. Little babies, just a little younger than my son. 

To celebrate, I bleached the crap out of them. Gave them a little make-over. 

They are coming along quite well, with almost no maintenance involved now (save for a good LUSH washing!).

I've always wanted them, but I didn't put much thought into them... I got so fed up with the post-baby-hairloss that I just sat down one day and started back-combing.

(brand new!!)

(8 months along.)

Then they grew. And grew. And grew. Which was awesome, but heavy and hot and cumbersome. And about halfway down my hair the dreads stopped and it was just fluffy, sticky hair. So we (my friend Megan and I) chopped them off.  Then I was sad.

(but not SO sad.)

But it was for the best, they locked right up and there's been no turning back! 

Until the last couple of weeks when I desperately needed to chop them ALL off. I don't know why. Thankfully I didn't and my hair angel found me and talked to me today and made up my mind to keep them .  

Now, they are starting to feel like me. I know we will go through phases, but this is something I really wanted to do and I'm super glad I did it. But, satisfied as I am with them, I still need change. Hence the blonde. Possibly pink and orange soon. We'll see. 

I'm thinking this is a good way to stop trying to define myself to other people, or to myself. I like punk music, hot pink hair and mohawks. I like swing music and retro clothing. I like Jimmi Hendrix and Led Zeppelin and dreadlocks. I like depression-era values, fine art AND tattoos. I like hiking and skating and swimming and reading. I love reading. Especially Little House on the Prairie and the Little Prince. I don't know why I've always felt all of this could not co-exist. It can, and strangely my hair is teaching me how to allow it. 

Anyway! Happy unbirthday dreddies! You've grown on me. (get it? har har...)

sickies.

Shaun the Sheep, noodle soup and orange juice. Again. Germany, I'll be glad to leave your winter funk behind....

(these photos were taken a little earlier in the year, these days we are all bundled up!)

Hooray Christmas!

Oh my word. I love Blogger. I wrote this and took a million hours uploading all the photos only to accidentally delete it (a second time!!)... but just now while writing it a third time I realized it was saving and so I rummaged around and found this as a draft! It's a Christmas miracle!!! Haha!! 

This Christmas was about 4,527x's better than it was last year, thankfully! Nothing bad happened last year, but nothing good either. It just. Was.  

This year we actually got out of the house and made it to the squadron party, so here's a more recent photo of Chris and I:

Gah, the difference between 24 and 30 is crazy. Haha..

We  made friends of ours come over and celebrate in Christmas morning. (But it wasn't hard to twist their arms, haha...) It makes our hearth much more cheerful!

I made all the stockings. Ours (Chris's, mine and J's) are from two years ago (here).

This year I crocheted one, and sewed three. Charla's was bright rainbow, Melissa's was Nepali inspired and Zak's was pray painted with a stormtrooper snowflake! Brenda's was really fun though, it was a black & white fabric I picked up at the craft store and colored with a set of markers I have laying around. I looooove it!

   

Is it weird to not do Santa but still do stockings? I really do love that tradition, so I doubt we will give it up!!

There are snowflakes all over the house, thanks to Zak and Erin! 

Our tree, in all it's gaudy tinseled glory:

The required Annalee elf (and Hans Solo!)..

This year I took the New England maple syrup my grandparents sent me and made maple sugar candy for the first time!! It was awesome, and just like the stuff we buy in New Hamoshire. Super life changing now that I know I can have it anywhere at any time! ;D

I also made vegan pumpkin cinnamon rolls morning of. With LOTS of icing.

We really cut back on gifts this year, and Johnny got good stuff. Like stocking booty... really, this kid was so thrilled to find a banana in his stocking!

A rad robot sweater from the Lalas!

German cookies... This was his 'want' gift. He's too young to tell me what he wants, but he asks for cookies first thing when he wakes up and about 65,000 times after that throughout the day. So it was a no-brainer. They came in a cool Hansel and Gretal tin that he will love playing with when they are finished, too.

Happy kid.

With one of the Lalas, passing out gifts.

And the big one. A wooden excavator that his dad made. A-freakin-mazing! He hasn't stopped playing with it and has asked to take it to bed, in the car and in the shower with him. He adores it, like whoa.

To top the day off (after a delicious Neatloaf Night) Melissa made us REAL Glühwein, flaming rum sugar and all!

Sigh.... It was a good last Christmas in Germany (sniff...sniff...). I love being surrounded by amazing people who help us make such nice memories!

Blarg, not blog....

Yea, the end of the year. My camera has not been charged in weeks, my groceries are spread all over the kitchen, my dishes are taking over, the house is slowly becoming more cluttered by the second (don't even ask about my craft 'areas') scratchy throats and sniffly noses prevail.
Same story, different year.
But somehow this year is very different, somehow I'm keeping my head above water, despite some old patterns falling back into place.
I am still managing to stay up too late, even during a personal FB silence.

I just bought new dishes and silverware, enough for four people, and that's it. Tomorrow I am packing up all the rest, including most of my pots and pans, mugs, glasses, bottles, utensils, ect. They will sit out of sight (in the garage) until they are out of mind and then they will be swept away to a new life (by the cleaner, my husband). I have a hard time getting rid of stuff... we have to take the bandages off slowly around here, no ripping for me :(

I wish I had a Christmas photo for you guys, but it will have to wait until next time. It was lovely. Simple and relaxing, just how I've always hoped it would be. And it included the most amazing cinnamon rolls you could possibly imagine, bonus!

For now, here's this... a photo from Christmas 5 (maybe 6?) years ago:

Yea, we were hot stuff. No biggie. ;}