So Much December!

We started off this very festive month with...  Colton getting braces!!!  He went from this:

to this:

(For those of you paying attention, this means we now have THREE kids in braces all at the same time!  The good news is that we already finished paying for Camille's, the bad news is that I feel like all I do is take kids to see the orthodontist...  At least their office is very close to our house and two of the three schools my kids attend!)

With the holidays already under way, Craig began his usual task of taking each kid Christmas shopping!  This mostly involves them ordering something off Amazon and getting a treat (it's really an excuse to spend time one-on-one with Dad as much as anything).  Camille got to go first and she seems to have had a good time!

Eating a (Crumbl) cookie at Panera!

And we had band concerts to attend!  Colton's was first--

It was his first time playing his saxophone since getting his braces on the day before, but I think he did fine?  At least, any errors that I heard did NOT come from his section!  So good job, Colton!  Not an easy task at all!

Kendra was next with an a capella performance!  We took video of all of her group's songs, but no still shots, so I'll see if my computer can handle uploading that.  But if it can't, rest assured that they sounded very good!  

And then that night we got three inches of snow!!!

The chickens were NOT fans

That effectively canceled school and seminary, which was SUCH a relief for me.  My co-teacher was still out of town, and I had been stressing about a myriad of other things and not sleeping well, and having an evening and morning without any of that to worry about was so helpful.  And then the roads cleared up pretty quickly, so I was able to take Colton and Camille to our friends the Bowes' house so they could sled with their friends while I hung out with the moms, so that was pretty great!  They also spent time before and after that with Sydney and Beth, sledding outside, drinking hot cocoa (a snow day tradition going back many years now!), and then going to see Zootopia 2, so they had a pretty fantastic day of it!

That night Craig and I also did our annual Christmas tradition of going on a date night to Panera to do most of our Christmas shopping!  We were a little more haphazard than we like to be, but at least we made a good start of things that night!

When we got home, the belt for my broken dryer had arrived, so Craig was able to fix it that night and I think I started doing laundry almost immediately.  (I had managed to go to Sarah's house and do three loads in the middle of the week-- thank goodness for awesome friends!  I realized that you can't just ask anyone to do laundry at their house!  That's next-level friendship right there!!!)  It was such a relief to not have clothes piling up all over my house any more!!!

Sunday was stake conference, and Kendra and I were singing with our ward women's choir, and I thought we were dressed up so cute, (and festive) I made Craig take our picture:

And then, at stake conference, Craig was sustained as the second counselor in the Stake Young Men's presidency.  So that should keep him busy!  He's already had MANY zoom meetings trying to figure out a bunch of changes they're making to camp next summer.  Better him than me, I say!  Craig and Kendra also gave a talk together.  It made for a different experience, trying to plan a talk together, but I think they enjoyed getting to do that, and they did a great job.  Adam (who was zooming it from Arizona) sent me this screenshot of them:

My people!

Less fun, was when I was trying to send the zoom link to my mom, and I couldn't find the link so I very carefully turned off my volume and opened the meeting on my phone and-- it started echoing the speaker's words right back at her very loudly and then of course I couldn't manage to hit the "End Meeting" button and it was SO embarrassing.  So embarrassing.  I'm still dying thinking about it.

I'd been hoping to go to the Cville Band's Christmas Concert that afternoon, but it was cold and Craig really wanted to watch Elf as a family, so I decided I was allowed to spend an afternoon at home, snuggled up on the couch.  Craig mostly slept through it, but I had a lovely afternoon laughing with my kids!

That night it snowed AGAIN, so school (and seminary!) was canceled and I slept in AGAIN.  I don't think we've ever gotten this much snow in early December before!  It was so crazy!!!  We used our free time very wisely by watching Home Alone, and then that evening the kids all went sledding at the Snow's farm, and Craig and I went to Costco to get pizza and do some shopping.

😂

In the back, Jason, Daniel, McKinley, Ryder, in front, Jadyn, Kendra, Camille, Colton

McKinley used to wear that moose hat to literally EVERYTHING, so it was kind of fun to see it again (and to realize just how much she's grown up in the last couple years)!

Poor Kendra got a bit stuck on the Snow's driveway when she was heading home, but a neighbor came out with his tractor and pulled her free.  I had to go do a mini-choir concert and rehearsal at the Colonnades, but the roads were getting worse, so Michael let us out an hour early (unheard of, for him!).  Even then, when Leah was driving me back to my car, we slid around a bit and I was very nervous the whole way home!  I hate driving in the snow!  

Colton got his shopping with Dad time-- looks like he got a cookie sandwich at Wegman's?

The bad roads meant we got yet another snow day on Tuesday! 

I enjoyed a relaxing day at home just puttering around tidying, and then that evening we took all the kids (because their Tuesday night activities were also canceled) to UVA's Messiah Sing-in!

Soprano section!

And my basses!

It was a fun night, as always.  I was only sad that we didn't get to sing more!  My sister Rachael sang in her town's Messiah concert, and next year they're planning on singing the entire thing and I'm so jealous!!!  I don't think I can drive five hours just for that... can I?

Meanwhile in Seattle, Tracy and Adam took Bentley to the temple's nativity display and I got this amazing picture from them:

How fun are they???

Wednesday was yet another two-hour delay, and then Amy was back and ready to teach seminary, so I'd gotten through my ordeal of not having a partner by barely having to teach at all!  😂  I guess God knew how much I could (and couldn't!) handle!  (I also went to the temple that week with my friend Megan, but apparently I didn't take any pictures of us.  Does it even count then?)

Saturday Craig took the boys to help out with the school's Toy Lift-- they have a great time doing it, and Camille is beyond excited to be old enough to participate next year!

And things were festive at Ace Hardware for Bentley, too:

(Apparently this coworker is usually kind of grumpy, but you wouldn't know it from this picture!)

We had our ward Christmas party and Craig wasn't in charge of anything!  He really enjoyed that!  AndI got to hold my friend Chloe's baby so I was a happy camper.  We got this cute picture of Colton and Clifford wearing matching flannels

Costco for the win!

and our family picture with Santa:

Craig was the only one brave enough to sit on Santa's lap, and that was just fine with me!  (Also, we have Camille's friend Olive joining us, in case you wondered who that extra kid was!)

And Camille got to be a shepherd in the very improvised primary nativity!

Sunday was the Stake Joy to the World concert!  Usually I sing with it, but I just couldn't find the time this winter to go to the practices (which are held Sunday evenings a half hour away), so this time I just enjoyed being in the audience.  Craig and I were ushering, so we got there early and saved a pew for our family.  But we didn't factor in that the side pews in this building are WAY smaller than the ones at our church, and our family did NOT fit on that pew!  But right as we realized this, I found Sarah, who was just as happy sitting in the back of the cultural hall, so I joined her and we had a lovely time enjoying the music and whispering about what we both had going on in our lives.  Everything works out!

This makes me laugh

The seminary students all got little crocheted vegetables?  I honestly don't know why, but they were very cute!

Kendra has peas, Sawyer got a pear, and Ryder got a carrot!  (Unfortunately Gideon left to go to Spain for Thanksgiving, and then just stayed hanging around various countries in Europe and didn't return until Christmas Day, so we missed him.  That was not anything I was expecting!  But I did save a very cute purple onion for him!)

And Kendra has made great progress on her EMT training and got her uniform so she can start helping out officially!  Look at this girl!!!

She looks so tough and competent!  I would totally let her into my house to fix whatever medical emergency I was having!

The Life of a Showgirl

Writing about my Spotify Wrapped made me realize that I never got around to reviewing Taylor's newest album, The Life of a Showgirl!!!  You all must be so mad at me, waiting so long to hear my thoughts about this!  Apologies all around!  Let's get to it!

So-- first things first-- I kinda complained that her last album (The Tortured Poets Department) was too long.  But since then, I've been surprised at the staying power of a lot of the songs on that album.  I may have judged it too harshly.  Regardless, she overcorrected and this album felt a bit short!  (Poor Taylor can't win!)  She sort of tried to make up for it later, by releasing the album again with a bunch of the songs re-recorded as acoustic versions, but really, that feels like cheating (even when I quite like a lot them reworked as acoustic songs)!  So, there's that.

Hearing the hype before the release, I was worried that this album would be a lot of Taylor Swift complaining about how hard her life is, so I was quite relieved when that really isn't what it's about at all.  Phew!  Thank you for not subjecting us to that, Taylor!  (Or at least, not very much of that!)  Also, I should point out that all my reviews are about the cleaned up versions.  I don't bother with the dirtier lyrics.  So-- without further ado, here are the songs, in order:

The Fate of Ophelia:  This is a really great, catchy song!  I'm excited that Taylor's references to Ophelia might get people reading Hamlet, so that's a nice bonus.  And the music video that goes with it is well done.  Nice, strong start, Taylor!

Elizabeth Taylor:  Ooh, I like this one, too!  I'm not entirely sure why we're talking about Elizabeth Taylor.  I mean, yes, I know she was super famous and an icon for beauty and glamour and whatnot, but there have been plenty of icons, why her?  I mean, I can't help but think that it's mostly because her last name is Taylor.  I can't really think of anything else she and Taylor Swift have in common?  I guess the other obvious answer is that both have been unlucky in love and the media and fans seem to eat their sorrows like it's actual food.  That must feel lousy.  Regardless, it's a surprisingly fun song!  I approve!

Opalite:  Ooh, this one is almost the definition of a bop!  It's catchy, it's fun.  Sure, it's a bit pithy and I'll probably be sick of it soon, but once you've heard it, it WILL get stuck in your head for a day or two!  Beware!  But I like it.

Father Figure:  Another winner.  Unlike the first three songs, this one has a darker (I guess more minor) sound to it, so that's different.  It also has a fun little revenge feel to it with a nice dash of triumph at the end.  I wonder who she's talking about here?  (Ah-- a quick google search says it's probably about either Scott Borchetta or Scooter Braun, in case you were curious.)  I like this one, too.

Eldest Daughter:  This one is fine and decently catchy, but it's not one of my favorites.  My children inform me that her use of the phrases such as "Savage" and not being the baddest (cleaned up) are super cringy.  That doesn't bother me because a) I'm too old to care if Taylor is cringe, and b) I actually think that's sort of the point?  I don't know, I could be wrong there.  When she talks about how she learned cautious discretion after breaking her arm falling off a trampoline, I feel like maybe she's milking this minor incident a little too much, acting like her life has been so difficult.  Not a good look, Taylor!  Also, the idea behind this, that every eldest daughter is so put upon...  All these other oldest daughter TikTokers are acting like she's stated this universal truth about how hard that role is, but I'm not buying it.  I mean, I'm sure sometimes it feels that way, but I think the nature of childhood is that EVERY kid feels put upon at times.  Because being a powerless kid sometimes sort of sucks!  Your life has not been that hard, Taylor.  I do like the repeating theme that she's never gonna break that vow, I assume to look out for her little brother?  That's nice.  

And.  I LOVE the line where she admits, "When I said I don't believe in marriage, that was a lie."  Thank you for finally being honest about that one, Taylor!  Our society needs to get back to admitting that most of us want to get married.  That's not a bad thing!  This song is fine.  But if it gets skipped, I don't really care.  

Ruin the Friendship:  This is another one that is perfectly catchy, but if it gets skipped, I won't really complain.  And it's surprisingly sad at the very end, which I did not see coming on my first listen!  Why, Taylor???  And what happened to the guy????  (Okay, I just googled this one, too, and apparently it was about her good friend Jeff Lang.  No info on why he died so young, but speculation that the song "Forever Winter" might also have been about him, so he probably had mental health problems, which is just so sad.)

I also really agree with the message here that it's better to take the risk and find out if someone likes you back than to never ask because you don't want to risk ruining your friendship.  One of my biggest pet peeves is people who refuse to date someone they have chemistry with because they're don't want to mess up their friendship.  I mean, do you honestly think you're going to stay buddies after one of you marries someone else?  Yeah, it's not gonna happen.  That friendship is doomed no matter what, so you might as well take the risk!

I'm glad Taylor agrees with me on this!  

Actually Romantic:  This one is complicated.  I originally quite liked the song, but as I learned more about what (and who) it's actually all about, it kind of soured for me.  I don't care enough to write it all out here (if you're actually curious, you can read all about it here), but basically, Charli XCX wrote a song about how she feels inferior to Taylor Swift and hates feeling that way, and as punishment for that Taylor decided to come out swinging.  And it just sort of seems mean.  And this is also one where knowing the not-cleaned-up version sort of ruins the song for me.  So, yes, if it's playing, I'll probably be singing along, but I don't really like it.  

Wi$h Li$t:  This one has gotten all this bad press from Taylor's TikTok fans for being "MAGA-coded" which frankly shocked me because I thought this song was so funny!  Oops?  I guess?  (Not really.  I refuse to apologize for the things I like!)  I'm sorry, if wanting to get married and have kids is MAGA-coded, then the left is in for a world of trouble.  The line making fun of people with "three dogs that they call their kids" is hilarious, as is the rest of the song.  I love that she's praying, "Please, God, bring me a best friend who I think is hot"-- isn't that what everyone wants?  This song is great.

Wood:  The dirtiest song Taylor's ever written, and (even cleaned up) it's hard for me to get past that.  It's also just kind of dumb.  I usually just skip it because I'm too embarrassed to be seen listening to it.

CANCELLED!:  Ooo, I like this song a lot.  It's got the same fun, dark, witchy vibe as "Look What You Made Me Do."  Supposedly it's about Blake Lively, which I don't love, since I'm pretty sure she's evil.  But I still can't resist this one.  (Update-- I guess the same people who say Wi$h Li$t was another MAGA song are saying this one might be about Brittany Mahones, so who knows?)

Honey:  This one is sweet (ha!), but kind of boring.  I usually skip it.

The Life of a Showgirl:  Argh, the song here is catchy, but the lyrics and story it's telling is totally dumb!  I never know what to do with a song like this!  She and Sabrina Carpenter sound nice to each other, and they're little "Thanks for coming to the show" banter at the end is kind of a fun reminder of the Eras Tour.  But the actual "story" about some girl meeting the main girl showgirl after a show and being so impressed and wanting to become one?  I just don't care!  And the idea of having the keys to the city-- I mean, maybe I just don't know anything about this, but I can't name a single famous showgirl.  Actresses, yes.  Singers, yes.  But I just don't think being a showgirl is that exciting or interesting or, I don't know, history-making?  They all get forgotten.  I just think Taylor latched onto the idea of being a showgirl (which she isn't, but whatever) and had to write a song about it, but this isn't really that great.  But unfortunately, it is catchy enough that if the song comes on the radio, I'll probably be singing along to it, even as I'm annoyed by it.  Grr.  

Taylor also released a bunch of pictures to go with the album, and they're...  pretty weird?  

I mean, this is fine and showgirl-esque

But this is...  Taylor as Spider-man?  Why is she climbing over the chairs in her heels and fishnets?

Taylor cosplaying Marilyn Monroe...

I guess this is showgirl-y...

But this is just weird.  Why is she green?  Why is she posing like that?

This is me every time I eat spaghetti.  I swear she's just copying me.

And, as I said, she released a bunch of acoustic versions of the songs a couple weeks later, and they're pretty fun-- I generally like those!-- but not different enough for me to write more about them.  

So, to sum up, I like the album, but I'm not head over heels in love with it.  It's a bit short and it's not particularly deep or heartbreaking like most of her stuff tends to be.  But releasing a fun and catchy album is not the worst thing in the world.  Maybe happy-in-love Taylor doesn't have it in her to rip her heart out just to produce music with all the feels, and that's okay.  

Post-Thanksgiving!

First thing Saturday morning, we dragged the Houston Smiths out the door with us to get our Christmas tree!   This involves us running all over the tree farm, leaving kids behind to "guard" every tree we like until we finally choose The One.  This year (just like last) we ended up choosing a tree that Kendra found-- she has a good eye, that one!  Camille quickly dubbed it "Fat Derek," and not only is it lovely and full, but it also was the closest to the parking lot of all our chosen trees, so that was nice!

Fat Derek!

One of the runners up!

And I got to let Jason help with set up!

We're so festive!

I swear, once we put on lights and ornaments the branches settled down a bit and our tree got even fatter!  It's awesome!!!

The Houston Smiths were all set to leave around 3pm that day, but about an hour beforehand, they all started getting notifications that their flights were delayed (which of course meant that they'd be missing their connecting flights, too).  The good news was that they hadn't left yet, so they just got to stay longer!  Craig and I had been planning on getting a few Christmas things, so we also grabbed some groceries, and I was able to make fried ramen for everyone (this was what Ryder had requested for his birthday dinner).  I even figured out how to make it gluten-free for Jeni, so I was proud of myself for that.  (Although I didn't actually taste it, so who knows how it really turned out?  If it was terrible, Jeni was definitely too polite to say so!)

And then we got to sit around playing "That Escalated Quickly" and laughing and having a great time together, so that was really wonderful.  We said our goodbyes and went to bed, and they left twelve hours later than originally planned, at 3am instead of 3pm.  (Gross!  Why is traveling always so hard?)  But they did get home safely and without further incident.

As soon as church was over, I began washing all the towels and bedding from having so much company, only to have my dryer break after the first load.  😫  Not gonna lie, that was a real bummer.  Craig was able to fix it, but not until the part came in the mail, which ended up being Friday.  So now I'm forever thankful to have a working dryer again!  And I'm thankful that we had such a wonderful time and that the joy of the Christmas season is in full swing!

Spotify Wrapped

I do enjoy seeing my year summarized by Spotify Wrapped-- that's where they break down all the stats of what you've listened to the most.  I even got the little videos from Taylor Swift and Joe Rogan thanking me for being a *fan!

However, based on my top songs, I might just be certifiable.

Seriously. I don't usually feel the need to apologize for the things I love, but even I look at this and think, What a weirdo!

What's especially funny is that "august" isn't really one of my favorite Taylor Swift songs ("How Did it End?" and "Maroon" definitely ARE, though!), but for whatever reason it's just one that plays a lot when I have my playlists on shuffle and I'm usually too lazy to skip it.  (Craig is more cynical than I am, and he would tell you that it's probably cheaper for Spotify to play that one.  He's probably right...)  If I were to rank all my favorite songs by Taylor, it wouldn't even be in the top twenty!  I DEFINITELY love Bach's B Minor Mass, though, so that was (dare I say?) spot on!

Here's to more great music in 2026!

*I actually dropped in my Taylor Swift rankings-- last year I was in the top .05% of listeners, this year I'm just top 1%.  Sorry, Taylor!  And Joe Rogan must send his video to anyone who's ever listened to his podcast, because I didn't think I'd listened to him at all since last year's election!  Who knew?

Ryder is Fifteen!!!

The day after Thanksgiving was Ryder's birthday!!!  It's also the day we begin decorating for Christmas, so that was busy!  (It's also a day I get to be lazy and not cook at all.  Hallelujah for getting a chance to catch my breath!)

Who doesn't love a Christmas beardie?

Ryder swore up and down that we had promised him he could spray whipped cream right into his mouth on his birthday.  Craig and I have no memory of this, but we decided to let him go for it.  Actually-- Craig sprayed the whipped cream into Ryder's mouth and we made him hold it there while we all sang (progressively slower!!!) to him.  It ended up being a LOT of whipped cream, but Ryder didn't seem to mind at all!  

Tom and Donna were going to come and take us all to Five Guys for Ryder's birthday dinner, but they were having car troubles, so we ended up going to Culpeper, which also has a Five Guys, so it all worked out!

We had a a bit of a snafu with the present we got him-- a game called "Bad Therapy," which, I realized when I went to wrap it, was labeled for Ages 17+ with a big Explicit Content Warning!  OOPS!!!  I had no way of knowing what exactly that meant without opening the game, so we opted to just return it and get him something else.  So we handed him a present as we explained that he wasn't going to get to keep it!  Poor Ryder!  (We did replace it very quickly!)

And then the next day I made his dinner and dessert of choice (fried ramen and red velvet s'more brownies)-- which was still a lot more cooking than I normally do so quickly after Thanksgiving!  He also got trick candles on his brownies, something he said he always wanted and probably regretted as soon as he actually tried to blow them out.  We all tried to not think about how much spit ended up all over our dessert...!  😂

Anyway, A very happy birthday to my favorite middle child, Ryder!!!  It's so fun watching him growing up so quickly and turning into such a fine young man!!!  My friend Samara commented that Ryder looks just like Craig, but with my coloring, and I think she nailed it-- that's our boy!!!