The veleveteen woman

I have told my husband often over the years that he makes me real.

Much of my life I have felt like I would blow away, that my grasp of what it takes to exist, much less succeed was too shaky, too limited.

I wake up every day with a house and a car and a real life that never ceases to astonish me. 

Really?  He says to me, with limited patience for drama. 


I put one foot in front of the other and I fake it until, one day hopefully, I will make being feel totally normal. 

Cake

Meyerlemon cupcakes VEGAN for a work holiday party.  A friend sent me a giant box of lemons and I made lemoncake. 

Vegan devil's food bunt cake for the work party too.  I have one employee that likes this cake a lot, so I try to butter him up with it at least once a year, the least I can do, for a job well done.

Yule log roll, for Mark's family Christmas party today.  I am not fancy enough to make the meringue mushrooms the way you are supposed to, I just made some out of marzipan, like a lazybone. 

Another Saint

I had very little to do with it, but St. Lucia Day was celebrated. 
I had to be at work, so Rolf and his girlfriend did the saintly duty.  I provided the child and the tableware.
Freyja was delighted.
As far as I know there is no tradition of including poodles.

it doesn't make it alright

Listening to this

and this

 with Miss F.  She loves to get her dance on with some social justice on the side.

More Merry Merry

a wee little scene on top of the tv stand.

 hung on the mantel with care...

There really IS no accounting for taste.

I spent a good deal of the afternoon on the sofa feeling moderately heart broken over something that I shouldn't really care about. 

Someone was critical about a project that I had worked on and felt good about.  The comment was completely subjective, completely a matter of taste, no right, no wrong, just personal opinion, but it cut me deeply and I'm not sure why. 

Surely symbolic of something bigger, but why now, why today?

The worst part was that I allowed it to get my goat and became defensive. 

I am never clever when I am defensive and I regret not having a pithier come back prepared.

My mother would say

"why on earth do you care what those people think?"

and I would say that I have no idea, but I do, at least I do in the moment.  

Having spent most of my life walking around like an open wound, you would think I'd have learned to scab over.

A few weeks ago a dear friend brought me this trophy.  

It is a bird that we are pretending is a finch and she had it engraved just for me.  

I am placing it right next to me on the sofa this evening to bolster my spirits.

St Nicholas Day

Catermera

Apple cranberry tartlets with an acorn & Oak leaf motif

Hexhaus

Gretel, aka Freyja, the child that ate the roof off the haus, requiring a tootsie roll to be inserted to hide the damage, and create a chimney. 

I got my tall skinny Noble HA!

We awoke to find treats in our shoes... or some of us did, some of us found only lint.