Okay, that’s a stretch. I’m basically ignoring the chocolate theme today, but this seemed more important. My favorite local pottery-painting studio, the one where I first painted six years ago, the one where dottery was born with this plate, is closing.

The owner doesn’t really want to close, but for various reasons (including her two young kids and the depressed economy) it’s the best thing for her to do right now. She’s still hoping that someone might buy the studio from her and re-open it, particularly because it’s the only pottery-painting studio in the area.

Today was the last day to paint. So we went and painted one last time. *sniff*

I thought it would be cool to have Elliora paint an ornament. I let her pick the paint colors and choose which ornament. Following her big sister’s example, she already has very definite, clear opinions about what she wants. (I don’t have a picture of E painting because I was too busy making sure she didn’t grab the ornament or palette and throw them onto the floor while simultaneously preventing her from smearing her painty hands all over her clothes, the table, the high chair…)

We sure will miss this place. I hope someone buys it soon and re-opens it.

For her photo today, Annalie posed in front of our Christmas tree with a chocolate-filled Advent calendar:

My mom let me eat the rest of the chocolate from Elliora’s Advent calendar to take my self-portrait. She doesn’t really eat the chocolate, anyway. She just gets a tiny bite and my mom and I eat the rest.

You know that life overload I wrote about a few days ago? All of those things are still true, but I’m feeling better about it all. I don’t know why, exactly. Maybe partly because Elliora likes to accessorize, which is adorable:

Elliora loves headbands for some reason. She’s forever picking up ones that Annalie has discarded around the house and attempting to put them on, usually just setting them on top of her head tiara-style. Today Annalie and I were both in the kitchen when Elliora came crawling in from the living room with this headband in place on her head. I asked Annalie if she’d helped her put it on, and Annalie said, “No, I was in here with you!” I guess that means Elliora managed to get it on all by herself. Not bad for a 1-year-old.

Also, I had a headache for three days on and off thanks to storms that were near us. Yesterday it finally rained here, and with the rain came relief from the headaches. And pretty Christmas-light reflections.

Helloooo! I think this is the first time in a year I’m genuinely excited about 7 Days. And (touch/knock on wood) it’s December and I’m not sick. It’s probably because I caved and got a flu shot this year. I was so sick all last fall and winter, and I didn’t want to repeat that.

So. Let’s do this thing!

I saw these jumbo ornaments hanging outside Trader Joe’s last week and instantly made a mental note to use them for a self-portrait. It was rather windy so it was tricky to get a shot that wasn’t blurry. But I persevered.

What Annalie had to say about her Day 1 photo, “secret surprise”:

Some of you looking at this photo are going to get a special surprise from us in the mail, so I can’t tell you what I’m mailing. But have you ever seen anybody mail a jar before? We mailed Easter eggs once, and my mom mailed a small package of jelly beans!

See the series 13 ounces or less at giverslog for more about this. I’ll blog the jars eventually, once they’ve reached their recipients.

This morning we went to the post office and the grocery store. We’ve been spending quite a few mornings running errands lately, doing Christmas-related things. Elliora and Annalie have both been troupers, taking multiple trips to the grocery store, post office, and Target in stride, with only the rare hunger- or exhaustion-induced tantrum. Now that Elliora is older and walking, she and Annalie have a lot of fun with each other and keeping each other entertained during otherwise dull moments. Apparently having a sister is awesome.

I was talking to Troy last night about how life just feels so…relentless lately. Of course having a toddler in the house, even one who (touchwoodfingerscrossedtwirlaroundthreetimesandclucklikeachicken) is mostly sleeping through the night, is a lot of work. Troy is still working long hours. I’m still homeschooling Annalie. And it’s the holidays, which means extra items on everyone’s to-do list. Especially with the days getting dark so early, it seems like I am constantly running behind, that I never reach the end of my list.

Troy suggested that maybe right now, just for a little while, I need to cut back on one or two things. I agreed that sounded good in theory. Then I realized: I’m two weeks behind on Flickring photos (which I do mainly for the grandparents, so I’m feeling bad about that). I hadn’t blogged in eight days. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d worked on any of the three big crocheting projects in progress. Aside from some Christmas treats, I’ve barely even cooked dinner in weeks.

Yes, I wrote backwards on my hand just to remind you. You’re welcome.

Now I’m thinking that part of my problem is that I have not been doing much of anything creative lately. Luckily, it’s almost time for 7 Days again. (Note that it starts in the middle of the week this time, this coming Wednesday, the 21st.) That always provides a much-needed jolt of creative energy, not to mention it’s like a quarterly reunion of old friends at this point.

Whatever. It’s life, sometimes it’s crazy, sometimes it’s CRAZY, and usually it’s fun. Christmas is only a week away, and (throwsaltovermyshoulderwishonastarwearsomegarlic) we’re all healthy. We’re not traveling this year so we’re avoiding that stress. Things will get better and I’ll crochet and blog and cook more again someday. This is only a season.

And hey, it’s a season with lots of pretty lights to enjoy.

Friday wrapped up another fantastic run of 7 Days. I wasn’t really in the mood on Day 1 last weekend. But as usual the week of taking self-portraits; viewing everyone else’s creative, silly, honest, fun shots; and commenting up a storm worked its magic and brought me right out of my funk. It’s a fact: 7 Dayers are the defunkifyingest group on Flickr. I’m already looking forward to the next one in December.

This was my alternate for Day 7. I felt left out of all the dottery photos, so I took a photo of me, drinking my tea, looking out at the rain. This photo has two 7 Days connections: I was with Lauren C. when I painted this mug, and the tea that I’m drinking is the PG Tips that Lauren H gave me when we met up with her last summer.

Just for kicks, here’s a short video I shot at the Ontario airport in California last month, right after Elliora learned to play peekaboo. It cracks me up how she doesn’t quite get that she needs to cover her face for this game to work, though she’s gotten better since then.

Part of the reason I’m randomly posting this second video now is because I was scrolling through old blog posts today, looking for one I was sure I’d written about our three-day power outage last January when my parents were here…and I didn’t find it because I never wrote it. I also never wrote about Elliora’s baptism and Rachel coming to visit! I can’t believe how many things have gone unblogged in the past year. Sheesh. I need to just start blogging things, even if the posts aren’t well-organized and the photos aren’t all edited and uploaded yet.

While we’re being random, we might as well end this post with an adorable photo of Elliora and Annalie driving a grocery cart at the store recently.

I’ve been planning to use these crazy bathroom mirrors at one of our favorite Indian restaurants for a 7 Days shot since the first time I saw them. They’re kind of hard to photograph, though, because of the way they’re laid out. So I decided a mosaic of the best shots was the way to go. (View largest size to see detail.)

I’ve been kind of grouchy lately since I’ve been sick. I wore this shirt today (purchased a long time ago at TeeFury) to remind myself that today is always a good day, with the right attitude.

And then we got Starbucks, and saw a pretty amazing sunset on the way home from dinner. Life does not suck.

p.s. I’ve had a fun new banner up for a little while but I keep forgetting to mention it. Thanks again, Brenda!

I had so many ideas for today’s theme (OUTSIDE), and almost none of them worked out. I took this one while we were at Annalie’s dance class, just messing around with one of the toys Elliora was playing with. And even though I took about ten more shots similar to this, the first one was by far the best.

And my giant rainbow umbrella. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to open the windows to get some fresh air in here, and have a cup of coffee. *happy sigh*

Without going into boring detail, I’ll just say that I had a frustrating morning. I was feeling pretty sorry for myself and was thinking of all the moody self-portraits I could take to represent my day. Then Annalie managed to say something so sweet and perceptive that it cheered me right up. She’s pretty smart, that Annalie. I’m lucky she’s my kid.

All together now: it’s bigger on the inside! Or more cashy, at least.

(If you’re totally lost, this is a Doctor Who reference. The TARDIS is the Doctor’s spaceship/time machine and it looks like a 1960′s British blue police box on the outside, but on the inside is huge.)

Today has been one of those days. It wasn’t horrible, but it wasn’t really good either.

I’m getting over a cold (aren’t I always?), the main symptom of which is an annoying cough.

Since I’m sick, I slept with Elliora during both her naps, which was doubtless good for me but as usual it made the whole day feel off-kilter.

I met a friend to paint pottery this evening, which was fun; but the 7 Days photo I’d planned to take at the studio didn’t happen because although I’d remembered to lug along my fancy camera, I’d forgotten to put the memory card back in it before I left.

(I did take this cameraphone picture of the mug I painted.)

When I got home, I half-heartedly attempted a few self-portraits only to be thwarted by a dead camera battery. So I plugged the battery in and decided I should eat something.

I asked Troy if there were any grapes left, and he said yes, and maybe he’d try one of the Ginger Gold apples we’d bought today.

That’s when it hit me. I knew what I needed to do to save the day. I needed to eat some apples and hummus. And I did, and they were delicious.

The ironic postscript is that when I uploaded the photos I’d taken of my day-saving apples and hummus (Ginger Gold apples go perfectly with hummus), something had corrupted the files. I was able to view the complete images in the preview window, but when I opened them in Photoshop half or more of each photo was missing. And then I couldn’t save the corrupted images. I ended up doing a screencap of the most-complete image, only to find I couldn’t even edit the screencap in Photoshop. So I uploaded to Flickr and used Picnik to edit it. Now I’m adding this to the 7 Days pool just minutes before midnight.

Dedication to 7 Days: I haz it.