Christmas Catchup

Christmas 2012 was different than any other Yuletide I've ever had the pleasure to know. Not all in all bad, but the Mister and I are on the outs, and it was the first holiday we tried to muddle through together. A lot of great things happened, but there were a lot of tears and heartache too. That, and Mr. Smith learned when if you say, "If you're so mad, why don't you hit me?" that hitting will occur. What was the lesson in it for me? That I can't hit. Just ask my bruised right hand. (Psst. I'm a lefty. Rookie mistake.)

A lot of folks advocated doing something learny to occupy my spare time. My sweet Mama in particular kept advocating that I "do healthy things" and kindly would drop whatever she was doing at the drop of a hat to go for a walk with me if I wanted to get out of the house. She kept after me to keep exercising and running, and to find productive projects to work on. Please take all of this into consideration when I say what this led me to do: I took a pottery class. Oy.

The first class my well-intentioned friend Amanda kept trying to coach me on how to keep clay on a wheel going 90 miles an hour. "Use your core strength," she kept urging. "I got core strength out the asshole!!!" I think is what I shrieked back whilst trying to wrangle a flailing two pound ball of mud. Sigh.

It did not go well to say the least - my clay was taken away from me on the first night. LeAnn the pottery teacher calmly stopped my wheel after about an hour, scraped the clay off and told me I was getting too frustrated and to please go take a break.

We had some success the night she reversed my wheel (see note re: lefty) but then I destroyed most of the sad little pots I managed to create when it came time to learn how to trim dried clay. I always got too greedy - I kept thinking, a little more... a little more... a little - GOOD GOD IN HEAVEN. And LeeAnn would go "Oh look! Megan made another planter!"

Sigh.

my terrible, terrible pots. i'm so sorry for everyone who got one for christmas. i was too distraught to buy real presents this year i'm afraid. if it's any consolation, these sad  little pots cost about $20 apiece.

On the plus side, it worked. I did have fun with the ladies in the class and did manage to learn the basics of wheel throwing. Biggest lesson? I have a lot more to learn.

amanda could make perfect pots. i made a perfect mess.

amanda, moni and me

mine are the lopsided ones. the nice ones are all amanda's.

But as for Christmas vacation itself, that was a darn good time. In the first place, my friend Pretty Princess Jacobs nee Landry arrived the first day of vacation. I knew we were going to have fun the moment I turned onto Alcoa Highway to pick her up from the airport - her plane nearly landed on my car (I mean that. Timing is everything.) We jumped in the car and drove up through Townsend to spend a couple of days in the mountains. Being a Gatlinburg newbie, Amanda and I had to introduce Rachel to the go-to epitome when visiting the Smoky Mountains.

boo-yah. the old timey photo.

I love the old timey photo sessions I DO (as evidenced here.) I think I'm sticking with gunslinger from here on out. I look bad-ass.

i asked for, and received, permission to take this photo.

i highlight this picture not to feature the random band but to feature the fabulous green infinity scarf crochet by one mama venable. i wear it everyday!

The next day we go hiking! I was terribly worried about a South Florida gal being in the park on such a cold day! My mother was too. She sent me to the mountains with about every article of clothing she had in the house. When I picked up Rachel and she wondered where she would put her actual luggage she made the comment that she bet everyone thought we were working for a coats for the cold roundup  outfit.

wearing everything mama sent for us

rachel, originally from upstate NY sees snow for the first time in twelve years. it also served to remind her why she moved to florida.  

It turns out, the cold wasn't the problem - it was the ICE.

holding on for dear life over a footbridge

rachel likes to live dangerously however

they like big trees and they cannot lie

at arch rock. the ice was very intimidating here (a woman on the way down panicked and pitched a fit until her son finally had to practically carry her down). it was kinda scary. 

that would be your ice to your right.

big ole icicles - we got to see some of them come falling down. again, a smidge intimidating. i imagine it's like the first time you see a bear outside of your car and you're like OH LOOK for a second and then you're like OH SHIT that could kill me. 

inspiration point being it's ole inspirational self. if scenery could brag, inspiration point would be all, i'm that and a bag of chips. *fabulous snaps*

here's some more inspiration for you

arch rock icicles

this is as far as i wanted to go. it was seriously icy.

We made it back down, safe and sound, and had a wonderful holiday together.

matching pjs were involved, need i add more?

My Christmas Eve tradition involves the ceremonial baking of sugar cookies, lovingly cut out and decorated one by one in a painstaking manner. This year? Screw it. God hath invented Pintrest for me between now and then so I pinned quick Christmas cookies and came up with - tube of sugar cookie dough + Rolo candy = goody goody yum yum. Without further ado (or instruction, pfft, who are you talking to) Rachel and I invented:

sugar cookie madness! we went with the ball technique: i cut circles, rachel balled up one rolo between two cookie slices. good stuff i gotta tell ya. can't really go wrong.

Fun Christmas, and good friends when I need friends the most. Thank you, thank you, more than I can say.

The rest of Christmas break, I redid some rooms of my house. Because that will change my life, right? RIGHT? 

I enlisted two sweet volunteers to come help me paint (Amber quit painting her own house to come out and help me paint SMOOCHES) and away we went. 

And by "away we went" I mean my alarm went off at 8 for a 9 AM arrival of the girls and I think I said something like "Screw this," (Christmas 2012 theme in case you were wondering) when the alarm went off and fell back asleep and awoke at 9:15 to timid rapping on the front door (because the side door said go to the front door cause the fridge was pulled out in preparation of painting). At least I had the foresight to prep, and was telling Amanda of my pre-prep-prowess as I frantically brushed my teeth that I HAD washed the walls the night before and she was all "who washes walls before painting" and I knew I was a painting failure of epic proportions. 

It was also when I pulled my jeans (for the second time) out of the dirty clothes that morning and pulled them on during morning three of no shower that I decided I needed to really make some changes in my life if things were going to get better for  me. So then I french braided my bangs out of my eyes and slapped the whole rest of the lot up in a pony tail. I figured the french braid said "don't worry about the stink, she's still got KLASS." And I pointed the french braid out to the guy at Lowe's that mixed my paint. And the guy at Big Lots where I bought my chair. And the guy at the mattress store who had the gall to point at my 20-year-old paint-ridden for ten years sweatshirt I was wearing and go "Hey! I was a Phi Delt!" 

To which I replied, "Hey, yah? I was a KD in my finer days!" Then I asked him to make note of the french braid. It's a game changer. I'm convinced. 

In any event. Amber and Amanda fancy up my kitchen. A lot of cussing was involved. 

i think at one point i said "i have moonshine!" and meant it seriously. or maybe i said it more than once? or words to that effect. or maybe i was drunk. who knows. i was painting, people. all bets are off. 

I may not be a genius when it comes to painting, but at least:

i was the only one in the house sans orange butt at the end of it

including polly. lord help me now....

I barbered a kitty cat last weekend. I'm adding that to my resume.

Although I overslept, I did prepare the day before and had lunch for my troupe of happy helpers. Since the kitchen was MIA due to DIY, I plugged the CrockPot of chili in the next obvious place:

it makes logical sense if you think about it

So now the kitchen is painted and I two pretty pretty pretty new rooms (guest room overhaul in addition to the kitchen - looks great!) The girls, my folks and I all busted our humps to get it all, but by the time New Year's Day ended we were all in good shape to get back to work. I was so dedicated that I spent NYE putting together one sweet-ass bedskirt for the guest room use and enjoyment. It was made with love. And two sets of old bedsheets.

And 2013 is .... well .... let's just go with 2013 has started. Don't know what it'll bring. That'll do for right now.  Over and out.