Our First and Last Christmas at Mom & Dad's in Tucson

Last night we opened our Christmas presents at Mom and Dad's house. With us moving to Alabama in January, it will likely be the one and only time we do Christmas at that house. In fact, I think it was the first and probably only time Mik went to that house when it was where they were living.

Opening presents before Christmas has been pretty traditional for us and continued this year with Mom and Dad going to Chicago for Christmas and Mik and I deciding to stay home to celebrate Christmas in Tucson for what may be the last time for awhile.

Mom and Dad ended up copying what Mik and I did a few years ago and got each other the same exact present. A few years ago Mik and I got each other the same Harry Potter movie on Blu-Ray and this year Mom and Dad got each other a 2013 runners calendar (they are both going to do the Chicago marathon next year).

Here is Mik getting nothing! He opened the card and thought he got nothing. He was expecting an iTunes card, which is all he asked for this year, and didn't read the tag inside that said good for an iTunes card from Mom. More importantly, though, the other tag in the card said good for tickets to the Lakers @ Suns game, so he will get to go to the game he has been wanting to see right before we move.

Strawberry in December

We left the strawberry plants alone when we replanted for the fall. I didn't really expect to get another strawberry, especially since we only got two or three this summer. This morning, though I found one ready to pick and it wasn't even from the plant that I had noticed was growing a few last week, so we might actually get as many or more strawberries in December as we got all summer.

What it took for Mik to decide to move

For over a month now Mik has refused to decide about moving to Huntsville until he at least saw the city.  After our house hunting trip this weekend was almost over and we even decided on a house, he still refused to commit to moving and actually was thinking of how he could get an apartment and stay by himself in Tucson.  Last night he said he would not talk about his decision again until Monday.


This morning, though, he finally decided he will move.  He still is not that interested in the city and the idea of moving, although he does like the house we are trying to get.  What made him commit was that Mom and Dad came back from checking out the Kroger with Pumpkin Pie Ice Cream.  This is a flavor he looks for every year and we had not found any in Tucson this year despite looking at many different grocery stores.

I've been to the top of that!

For years when driving between Tucson and Phoenix I always thought about climbing to the top of Picacho Peak and would say I want to go to the top of that sometimes when we went by. Back in 2010, I finally did it with Dad. Then began a tradition of me saying I've been to the top of that everytime I first spotted Picacho Peak when on the I-10. Now it has evolved into almost a competition of who says it first with Mom saying when we were on the way to the Case Grande Ruins the other weekend, have you been to the top of that when we first saw it?

Now on the way back from being in San Diego Dad was sure to say I've been to the top of that first. Mom had been listening to something with headphones and ten minutes later said you've been to the top of that because she didn't realize we had already done that whole thing.

Guess we're going to find some new thing to point out on road trips from Huntsville, since we won't be going by Picacho Peak often after we move in early 2013.

Pool Noodle Sorcerer Hat Craft

When I saw the Use-Your-Noodle Headboard project in the February 2012 Family Fun magazine, I instantly thought it would be awesome to make a pool noodle Sorcerer Hat wall hanging for my room.  First, I had to wait for pool noodles to be in stores in April and it then took a couple weeks to find the right color ones and enough of them.  By May, I had everything to make the project, but the stuff just ended up being stacked in my room for months because I was not sure I could cut through them straight enough.  Thus, from May until a couple weeks ago all I had done was traced the Sorcerer Hat design on poster board.



A couple weeks ago, I finally decided to just try to cut the pool noodles in half and the shape out of the poster board on my own.  I did not exactly get the noodles in half using a steak knife, but it ended up being close enough they look fine.  I was all ready to finish the project then or so I thought, but it turned out the glue sticks I got did not fit in the glue gun I had purchased.  Thus, I had to wait another week to get the right size ones.

I finally got the pool noodles glued to the poster board or at least partially on Monday.  Monday I also cut out the stars and moon and spray painted them with glow-in-the-dark paint.

Yesterday, I then had to go back to some of the longer noodles and reglue them on half at a time because they did not stick with the glue drying too fast to get them on.  I then added the stars and moon, so it is finally complete other than hanging it up, which I cannot decide if I want to do or not with a move possible in our near future.

Mik Keeps Talking About His New Fridge

Last month I finally got around to defrosting Mik's mini fridge in his room.  I noticed the seal was starting to wear out, but it seemed to still close if you made sure to push it all the way close.  However, just a few days later it was all frosted up again despite Mik being more aware and closing it every time.  Thus, we decided it was time for a new mini fridge.  We bought it a couple weeks ago, but Mik's room has been its usual disaster and it is supposed to be someone else's job to clean it up.  Dad finally found time to be able to put it in this Saturday and now Mik cannot stop talking about how awesome his new fridge is.


It is similar to his old one, but it is a bigger version.  He likes that it is silver, as it goes better with his room.  He also likes that he has more space in his room, since as part of putting in a new fridge we decided to clean out the closet to be only long term storage (i.e. stuff he only needs to take out once a year or less, mainly his Christmas village and empty video game cases) and put the fridge in the closet doorway.  He is still getting used to the door opening from the right instead of the left, but he totally loves everything about it and seems to have something to say about it every time I go in his room.

Garden Planted for Fall Season

We pulled up most of what was left in the garden back in mid-August and then began planting for the fall season.  The only plants we purposely kept were the Basil and Greek Oregano.  We also ended up with Chocolate Mint coming back up, which is good because we could not find any sort of mint to buy and replant like I wanted.  However, it is growing around the base of the oregano, so we kind of have an odd almost hybrid mint oregano plant (see below).

 

Today I planted the tomatoes and the stevia plants we bought as the final things to plant in our garden for the fall season.  The other things we planted from seed back in August.  We planted Snap Beans, Broccoli, Carrots, Cucumbers, Dill, and Sage.  Everything, except the Sage (planted from old seeds we had around and did not really expect them to grow), has already started coming up.