What is your name?

Annalie.

How old are you?

Seven and a half years old.

Where do you live?

Washington, D.C.

Do you have any pets?

Yes. They are two cats. One’s Katy, and one’s Lily.

Who do you like to play with?

My little sister.

What’s your favorite cereal?

Uh…Lucky Charms. I also like Reese’s Puffs.

What’s your favorite vegetable?

I don’t really know. No, wait—it’s corn. That’s my favorite vegetable.

You know corn is actually a grain.

Oh. Heh. Whoops.

Do you have a favorite vegetable?

I especially like broccoli cheese soup. I know what fruit is my favorite, though. It is an APPLE.

I’d say you probably eat at least one apple every day, don’t you?

Uh-huh. Maybe more!

What’s your favorite drink?

My favorite drink is…fruit punch. Because it’s combined with a few fruits and berries. It’s really good. But I also like root beer. I actually have quite a few favorite drinks, like apple juice, Diet Rite, Sierra Mist, ginger ale.

What’s your favorite snack?

I have to say my favorite snack is perhaps maybe apples and peanut butter. No, just apples. I also really like Lunchables! I guess I have quite a few snacks I like.

What’s your favorite toy?

My Little Ponies.

What’s your favorite book?

Right now, my favorite books are the Gladiators book and the Underwear book.

What’s your favorite TV Show?

Pokemon.

What’s your favorite movie?

Have I ever seen Mr. Popper’s Penguins?

No, we read the book.

Oh yeah. My favorite movie is…I like that movie about Pompeii we watched on Netflix. Also, Dolphin Tale.

What’s your favorite game?

Animal Adoption. It’s a game where you can play with two people or more. You see, each person takes a turn being the person who’s going to adopt an animal. And the other person pretends to be a dog or cat or something. And you adopt them! Each person has to get a turn being a pet and the person. Usually I play this game with Bug.

What’s your favorite restaurant?

Wheatfields, because I love their cheese fondue, a doodle-a-doo!

What’s your favorite holiday?

Valentine’s Day, because you can make crafts and you get to make cookies, and it’s just fun.

What’s your favorite animal?

Cheetah and whale shark. I also like certain species of turtles, and dolphins.

If you could change your name, what name would you choose?

Grace. It’s majestic and beautiful.

What do you love about each person in our family?

I love Katy because she is very strong-willed and she can take Elliora grabbing at her. I like Lily because she’s very calm and like a queen.

I love Elliora because she’s so cute and she’s FEARLESS, not afraid of anything.

I love Mama because she can make me blankets and other stuff, and I love to bake with her and her cooking’s really good. I love Dad because he does stuff a lot with me and he plays video games with me and he’s silly and makes me laugh. That’s it.

I love that I am very good at dancing and my sense of humor.

Where would you like to go on vacation this year?

Hawaii.

Guess what. We ARE going to Hawaii this summer, to meet up with Lauren.

Yay!

What are some of your wishes for this year?

I wanna learn how to swim and dive better.

Thanks for the interview, Annalie!

Uh-huh. Bye!

Annalie’s self-portrait, age 7, and a portrait of Elliora, age 8 months

Inspiration for this interview originally came from New Year’s Interview for Kids at Blissfully Domestic (via The Crafty Crow).

I did this interview in 2009, 2010, and 2011 too.

Elliora was so teeny nine months ago. Wow.

Anyway…does anyone remember this photo, and how I asked y’all to help me think of a funny caption, and then I did a poll to see who should win?

I’d say we have a clear winner:

Congratulations, kc! Your caption is especially appropriate because I just read all seven Harry Potter novels for the first time the week after New Year’s. I’d like to paint you a mug or bowl or something as a prize. Email me and we’ll talk details!

Another tooth! Last night she bit into a piece of pizza and came running to me, demanding that I pull the tooth out. So I did. Ta-daa!

My good friend Jen turned 40 a couple of months ago. I wanted to give her something special, but what? Jen knits and crochets beautiful things for money and for fun, so I didn’t feel the need to crochet her something. She and her husband already own several dottery mugs and things I’ve painted for them over the years. They live across the country from me, and they’re moving next summer so Jen has been in the process of paring down her family’s belongings for a while. I wanted to send something that she would really enjoy, something that wouldn’t be just one more thing she’d be annoyed to pack next summer.

I was pondering my options when I remembered the photo messages I used to send to far-away friends when I was a kid. My mom would take photos of me holding up a series of signs, each sign with a word or phrase on it. Put together, all the photos would make a complete message. I used to really have fun with it, dressing in different crazy outfits and posing in silly places. I’d send the photos one at a time over the course of a couple of weeks.

And then I had my brilliant idea. I would send Jen 40 pieces of mail for her birthday! Who doesn’t love getting mail? Who doesn’t feel that little thrill when they see an envelope in the mailbox that’s not a bill or a mailer advertising the new carpet-cleaning company? I could send postcards, letters, even the occasional small care package. It wouldn’t break the bank since stamps are relatively cheap, and I already own tons of rarely-used stationery. I would be extending the birthday joy for more than a month—almost two months, as it turned out. And Jen wouldn’t have a fragile or unwieldy new thing to pack (or to feel guilty about getting rid of). Win-win-win!

I didn’t tell Jen what I was doing. I just started sending her numbered mail. It only took her about three days to figure it out. She sent me an email (subject: “Stinker!”) that read:

You’ve been up to something, haven’t you?…It all started to make sense today as my mail started piling up. It was like the ending of an M. Night Shyamalan movie.

I think she meant one of the good M. Night Shyamalan movies. At least, I hope she did.

I sent homemade cookies.

Annalie helped out with a couple of drawings and a bookmark.

I sent a few postcards.

Well, lots of postcards, actually.

Lots and lots of postcards.

I helped Jen face her fear of glitter, because I’m a good friend like that.

I sent her a copy of the soundtrack to Scrubs: My Musical, so that the next time she’s stuck in traffic on the 805 with me and Sonja for four hours and we insist on singing “Everything Comes Down to Poo,” she’ll be able to sing along.

A dime bag of Canadian Smarties. (Inside joke. I told Jen I would send her a box of the Smarties that Jen Wilson had sent me, and Jen said she didn’t need a whole box, that I should just send her a little bag. I said I’d send her a dime bag. It…isn’t really that funny, I guess. But it was hilarious to us.)

A Nebraska care package, when I was visiting Omaha.

A little bag of jelly beans. This is one of those 13-ounces-or-less things, where I just stuck an address label and postage right on the package and dropped it in the mail.

We mailed a little bit of autumn.

I slowed down a lot towards the end. Several days went by between each of the last three or four pieces of mail I sent. I was a little sad it was coming to an end. I had a lot of fun with this project, even more fun than I expected. I think I’ll have to do something like this again sometime.

Finally, six weeks after Jen’s actual birthday, I was sending #40. And what else could possibly be good enough for the final piece of birthday mail except some really, really ridiculously good apricot cookies?

Happy birthday, Jen!

All the mail I sent is in the Flickr photoset 40 pieces of mail.

Annalie drew these teeny portraits of our family on something, and I knew immediately I would use them for return-address labels on our Christmas cards. She draws stuff like this all the time that surprises and delights me. It’s fairly awesome.

You know what else is fairly awesome? You guys are. Thank you for sticking with me and continuing to read through the past year of baby-induced blog neglect; supporting me and saying kind things when I am frustrated or troubled; cheering me up with your funny stories when I need to laugh; and just generally being some of the nicest people on the internets. I wish each and every one of you a happy, healthy new year full of good things. May 2012 be the year you learn to tango, go on your dream vacation, see your kids succeed wildly, eat more vegetables, own your beauty, read life-changing books, find a new favorite drink, or whatever it is you think about when you wish upon a star.

View large.

p.s. New-old banner, by Brenda as always.

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 could easily make a list of my favorite hundred children’s books. But instead I’m going with the first one that leapt to mind.

The Saturdays, by Elizabeth Enright.

This book was so important to me as a kid that I can still remember coming across it on the shelf in my elementary-school library. I remember which bookcase it was on, and that I had to reach up to pull the book down. I remember reading the copy on the book jacket and having my interest piqued by the idea of a family of four kids—aspiring actress Mona, 13; mischeivous, piano-playing Rush, 12; dreamy artist and dancer Randy, 10; and solid, unflappable Oliver, 6—forming their own club. (I only have one brother, and although we love each other, we’re different enough that as kids we spent more time bickering and annoying each other than playing together. I could only barely imagine a family where your best friends were your siblings.) Then I opened the book and read the first page, and was immediately charmed by the description of these kids sitting in their attic, listening to the rain hissing and sizzling as it came down the chimney and complaining about how bored they were. I could relate to that! Also, I loved rain even back then, so that was guaranteed to pull me in.

Then I kept reading, as they discussed and rejected ways to relieve their boredom. They decided, at Randy’s suggestion, to pool their weekly allowances and take turns using the whole amount to have an adventure each Saturday afternoon. They came up with a clever name for their club: the Independent Saturday Afternoon Adventure Club, which they could airily refer to as “I.S.A.A.C.” around others. I goggled even back then in 1982 at the amount: adding up each of the older kids’ allowance of fifty cents each and Oliver’s ten cents, they would “have an adventure” every Saturday with the grand sum of $1.60. One dollar. And sixty cents. I don’t think any economics lesson could have taught me more memorably and clearly about inflation since 1941 (the year the book was published).

The adventures they had were fantastic to my seven-year-old Midwestern self, too. Randy went to the art museum and wound up having tea and petit fours (the first time I’d heard of those) at the cafe with a slightly mysterious old lady who’d known their father as a boy, and hearing all about the time she ran away with the circus when she was a girl in Paris. Rush took the bus to the Met to see an opera (a 12-year-old boy, voluntarily going to an opera!?) and ended up rescuing a bedraggled stray dog whom they adopted and named (natch) Isaac. Mona went to a beauty salon and recklessly decided to cut off her waist-length braids, accidentally winding up with a scandalous blood-red manicure which eventually had to be removed at home with perfume (you better believe I tried that a time or two). Oliver hoarded up the dimes the other kids gave him and calmly went to the circus all by himself one day, causing a panic at home when they realized it. After that they decided to go on their adventures as a group, for safety.

This book used to make me long to live in New York in 1941, when I would have been allowed to go operas and museums by myself at the age of 10 or 11. I still re-read The Saturdays and the other Melendy family books every year or so, and they still kind of make me feel that way. What strikes me most about them now, though, are two things in particular: (1) these children in 1941 aren’t really that different from kids now—they bickered and played with their siblings, complained about eating vegetables and doing their chores, swam in the summer and ate ice cream till their stomachs ached; and (2) they didn’t have a television. Sometimes I think my slight disdain for television might stem from reading these books about all the amazing things they did back when they didn’t have TV. I doubt I.S.A.A.C. would ever have been invented if there had been a little black-and-white television in their attic playroom that first rainy Saturday.

I’ve been waiting for seven and a half years for Annalie to be old enough for me to read The Saturdays out loud to her. I think 2012 might be the year. I can hardly wait.

I’m taking part in a blogging group called Reverb Broads that will be suggesting daily blogging prompts this December. I won’t do it every day, but I’ll be using them occasionally throughout the month as they tickle my fancy. If you want to join in, feel free! Go here or here to learn more.

I realized, after I did that last post about the newly-listed items in my Etsy shop (several of which have already been purchased, thank you very much!), that I have not blogged about pottery I’ve painted for a long time. The last post I could find that had more than a fleeting mention of dottery in it was way back in April! So let me catch you up, if you’re interested.

The little blue ‘be happy’ bowl up there is one that I painted for no particular reason or recipient. I ended up sending it to Leah as an apology for taking so long to send her my half of our flip-flop swap.

I painted this bowl for my friend Laura, with a slightly inaccurate Big Bang Theory quote on it. I don’t have a picture of it fired because Laura picked it up from the pottery shop when it was done.

The things I do for my friends. Kassie was inspired to ask me to paint this for her after reading about the “first: kindness; then: F*** AUTHORITY” mug I painted for Elaine. And because I love her, I did it. I’ll even admit it was kinda fun. But I don’t plan on painting another one. This was a limited edition mug. I don’t have a picture of this one fired either. (You can read Kassie’s hilarious account of watching me paint it here.)

She looks so innocent, doesn’t she? Not like a person who would ever ask a friend to paint a lovely dottery mug with her five favorite curse words on it.

I painted this geek dottery mug as a gift for the lovely Bex. It has two Firefly/Serenity quotes on it: “a little whimsical in the brainpan,” said by Mal in reference to the mentally-unstable River Tam; and, “Also, I can kill you with my brain,” a line said by a very calm River to a very spooked Jayne. The moral here is, never assume that just because someone’s whimsical that she is not also deadly when the situation calls for it.

I had a lot of fun painting this mug, particularly the little whimsical bits.

These annoying smudges are not fun, however. I took photos of this mug with my phone before it was fired, so I know these smudges weren’t there when I finished painting it. That means someone at the pottery studio wasn’t handling my pieces carefully. I’ve had this happen to at least three or four pieces I’ve painted at that studio. Rather disappointing because it’s only 10 minutes from my house.

Brenda had asked me to paint her a round dottery mug a while back, when her cool blue coral mug broke and she missed having a round mug. When I was in California and Brenda had the summer fiesta in our honor, she said that she needed to remember how much fun it is for her when she throws parties. So I painted her this mug as a reminder to be festive.

A little ‘be happy’ dottery vase I painted for Madge, at her request.

This cunning mug was a custom order for my Etsy shop, a dotty mug with Jayne Cobb’s hat on the front and a Firefly quote on the back. I was a bit nervous about painting the hat, but I think it turned out pretty well.

“Dear Diary, Today I was pompous and my sister was crazy…it was the best day ever.”

Shiny.

Annalie painted this Azurill plate the same day that I painted Katie’s NO WHINING sign. She pored over her Pokemon book, and picked the cutest one she thought she could paint. This was almost a disaster because she accidentally spilled a big blotch of black paint on the right ear and was very upset. I convinced her to leave the plate overnight and let it dry, and we’d come back the next day to fix it. We scraped the mistake off, and fixed the blue and pink, and now you can’t even tell the black blotch was there.

Remember those ‘internet friends FTW!’ mugs that Rainbow and I painted while I was in Omaha? Bad news.

It got broken during shipping. I was fairly bummed about this. I really liked those colors, and now Rainbow’s mug will be lonely.

I couldn’t even superglue it together and use it to hold pens, because there was a big ol’ U-shaped crack all across one side. Of all the mugs and bowls and things I’ve shipped, this is the first one I’m aware of that has broken. So it’s possible there was some flaw in the bisque that made it more prone to breaking.

At least I still have the memories. And an excuse to drag Rainbow to paint pottery with me again next time I’m in Omaha.

I actually got to paint pottery twice when we were in Omaha. The second time, I went with my mom, my girls, and Aurora. We did a handprint plate for my my mom with all three of her granddaughters’ handprints on it.

My mom wasn’t planning for Aurora to paint anything, but when she saw Annalie gathering paint and brushes, she said, “I paint? I paint too?” I helped her pick a plate and paint colors, and she painted the heck out of that plate.

Elliora didn’t paint. She hung out in the stroller, played with my mom’s keys.

She had her first lollipop, which she kept rubbing on her hair, then putting back in her mouth with an “Mmmmm!” Crazy baby.

Annalie fingerpainted this butter dish for my parents. I wrote the word ‘Butter’ on it just in case they couldn’t remember what they were supposed to use it for. (This is a photo of it unfired; my mom didn’t get to pick it up till after we left.)

Annalie also painted this plate for me, using my favorite colors. Isn’t she sweet?

Elliora did paint this plate, sort of. I helped her put handprints all over it one day when we were at our favorite pottery studio in Maryland. I think it turned out kinda cute, no?

I think it’s pretty clear that I do what I love, or this post wouldn’t have been nearly this long.

This afternoon I was telling some friends in an email about the difficult morning we’d had with Annalie and how seven is going to kill me ded when I realized: she’s seven and a half.

We’ve been here before, with Annalie testing her boundaries at this time of year. The halves always seem to be a challenge. I know of no research or developmental theory to back this up, just anecdotal evidence. I’ve discussed with friends many times how it always seems like kids go through something developmental around their half-birthdays that turns them temporarily insane. Realizing this made me feel immediately better. Not only am I not imagining it, but there is an end in sight. Also, Madge and Bonnie both assured me that eight has been one of their favorite ages so far with their kids.

Thanks to all of you who commented on my last post about your own woes. It makes me feel better to know I’m not the only one who finds life overwhelming from time to time. I hope we all get a break soon!