Volume X, issue xii, December 2014

d'Evegnees in One-derland

Thanks to my dear friend, Lori P., Eric and I discovered the one-derful world of onesies. At first we were prancing around in them to be silly, but little did we realize that we had found a new way of life. Comfortable, warm, relaxed life. Apparently onesies are all the rage with certain celebrity startlets, so that's why I'm wearing heels in the photo. Normally I just wear it with slippers and a vacant expression.

Eric now calls me his "Onesie and Only" and his "Onesie True Love." 

We wore them to deliver some Christmas presents to friends and tried our best to keep straight faces and failed miserably. They're surprisingly flattering, especially when you don't care at all what you look like. 

On our way home from delivering our special neighbor gifts, I realized we needed to pop into the store to grab something for one of the kids. We sheepishly walked into Walgreen's and tried to avoid eye contact with any of the normal twosie folks who were actually wearing pants. 

A fellow shopper spied me out of the corner of his eye and Eric saw him do a double take with a startled expression as he gave me a onesie once over. . . twice. Then the gentleman noticed Eric in his matching outfit and didn't even try to disguise his horror as he quickly vacated our onesie-fied aisle. It was onesie discrimination at its most pathetic!

At dinner one evening, Eric and I were lounging in our onesies (again) and Eric was teasing Holden about not being very mature. Holden grimaced, shook his head and replied, "Says the man-child in the onesie."

And if you were one-dering. . . yes, I am wearing my onesie right now as I type. It's cold everywhere but right here in my onesie. 

For Peter's December Pack Night for Scouts, he found himself in a rare pairing with his Dad and no one else. While basking in this one-on-one parental attention, he exclaimed gleefully, "This is just like a Boys' Night Out!"

Peter proudly harnessed every bit of his French/Belgian heritage and grinned his way through a presentation about Christmas traditions in France. We let the kids in Peter's class sample some fresh Liegoise waffles we had baked that morning and one of them said, "This is the best waffle I've ever had!" Well. . . bien sûr!

Do You Want to Save a Snowman?

I got a text from a neighbor, Camille, saying that she wanted to tell me how proud she was of our Eve. Camille just had her third baby boy in three years and we've developed a soft place in our heart for her familiar familial situation.

Camille reported to me how she and her little boys had spent several hours that day carefully constructing a snowman in their front yard. As the middle-school kids got off of the bus near their home, a group of boys started yelling and throwing snowballs at her boys' snowman, trying to make it fall down. Camille came to the front door to ask the boys to stop, and she heard a fierce little female voice saying, "You guys! Stop it!" Our fearless little Eve placed herself between the boys and the snowman like a protective maternal force of nature.

Camille told me how proud she was of Eve for "standing up for what's right." I was pretty proud of her myself.

Some of the Moms in our neighborhood organized a cute little preschool group with six of our three-year-olds. Every time its my week to be the teacher, you can bet that we figure out how we can make a party out of our assigned theme.

Neighbor Gifts
Each year we create some sort of handmade gift for our neighbors and friends in town. Little by little I've been integrating the kids into the process and this year our dining-room-turned-craft-room-for-the-holidays was transformed into a little Santa's Workshop as the kids and I cranked out over 50 wooden blocks. There's nothing quite as satisfying as a busy, organized assembly line!

As we snuggled together on our sectional in the basement watching A Christmas Story one evening this month, we couldn't get over how much our Peter looks like a brunette Ralphie.

The next day, Eric and I were dressed up for a Christmas costume party and I had drawn brown circles under my eyes as part of my costume. Charlie looked at me with concern and said, "You shoot your eye?"

In the past week, the dishes we've made have been rendered with culinary mastery, which means that they've all left piles of dirty pots and pans in their wake. As Ethan took his turn on dish-duty, I discovered him wearing the hat he crocheted himself, looking like a happy little kitchen elf.

We were able to spend a few days and nights with my parents and siblings after Christmas. My favorite part was playing Christmas duets with my Dad. Four-handed holiday bliss with Bach and my Renaissance man of a father.

That's right, we stopped in Salt Lake on the way back from my parents house and grabbed some Belgian food. My stunning niece, Sarah, met us there and made the whole experience even better (which we had thought would be impossible).

The woman working at the counter was about to throw away the remnants in a huge bucket of ice cream, but offered it to my sweet little vultures instead.

Happy New Spear!

After our New Year's Eve fondue party, Eric and I headed down to the junior high to be chaperone's for the multi-stake dance. I could almost hear the Ghosts of Hafens Past roaming the hallways.

Eric said it smelled like axe body spray and awkwardness. He told the kids we were going to supervise "Make-out Corner." They asked if there was such a thing and I replied, "When we get there there will be!" They were so grossed out that it was awesome.