Gingerbread House

Steve’s mother was kind enough to give all her grandkids gingerbread houses to build and decorate. Aware of our interest in the project in years past, she got one for Steve and me as well. We were going to decorate it at their house, but ended up getting busy with other projects and brought the gingerbread house back to Santa Cruz.

We decided to go with a California Christmas theme, so we did not do snow or icicles or anything of that sort. The only nod to a white Christmas was the snowman we placed on the roof after we ran out of chocolate chips for roofing tiles. We imagine that he’s one of those giant inflatable sort and just couldn’t fit in the front yard due to these poor homeowners’ tiny lot size.

Steve assembling chimney:

Roofing tiles in progress:

Completed front:

Completed back:

Completed left side:

Completed right side:

We attempted a few new things this year, including grinding up candy and mixing it with icing to make “paint” (before you ask, no, we don’t have any food coloring… that would have been much easier, but we didn’t want to go out and buy it just for this). The blue “paint” on the doors looked nice, I thought, but the yellow on the windows to give the appearance that lights were on inside the gingerbread house was a little too runny and didn’t quite work. But I think it turned out nice all the same. Not a bad way to kill an afternoon.

Kuipo

This morning at around 9:30 am, Kuipo passed away in my arms. We felt it was kindest to euthanize her after her health began failing dramatically yesterday. I’m not going to discuss the details, but she had been sick for a long time and we knew this day was coming.


Kuipo was the most remarkable rabbit I have ever known. Steve and I have owned seven rabbits and fostered more than twenty. Kuipo was without a doubt the most personable, amusing, sweet and intelligent rabbit I have ever dealt with. She would lick your hands, loved to be petted and would jump into your lap to get attention.


Kuipo is a misspelled Hawaiian word meaning “sweetheart” and it was certainly appropriate. She came into the animal shelter emaciated and weak. At the time, the shelter was overflowing with rabbits and I was a volunteer there. The rabbit rescue I worked with was pulling as many rabbits on the euthanasia list as they could, but we couldn’t pull them all. One day as I was wrapping up my work with the rabbits, I was told that Kuipo (who at the time didn’t have a name) was going to be euthanized at the end of the day if she was not adopted. Something about her told me that she was exceptional and I informed the director of the rescue that I was taking her home myself.

I took Kuipo to the next adoption fair, which is where she got her name. Tired of the more generic rabbit names, the rescue director was asking around for more creative ones. The Hawaiian manager of the PetsMart (where the fair was held) suggested Kuipo. It seemed perfect for her. And after talking to potential adopters all day, I decided that the best place for Kuipo was with us. So, she became bunny #4 (we had Buster, SweetPea and Demetri at the time).

She was an amazing part of our lives for around five years (I don’t know exactly when we got her… I have her adoption paperwork somewhere, but I can’t seem to find it right now) but it felt like we’d had her forever (in a very good way). It’s pretty devastating to look at the empty place where her cage used to be, and I find myself more affected by her passing than that of any of the previous three rabbits who died in our care.

Now, we have four rabbits: Buster, Demetri, Johnny & Lola. While I know four is a much more reasonable number of bunnies in a household than our peak of six, our home feels a little bit empty now.

Family Pictures

Steve’s family all got together for Thanksgiving and were able to get some updated family pictures. They were taken at Cal State Long Beach, which ended up being a very nice venue. Briefly, here are my favorites:

The whole family (my apologies to my sister-in-law Natalie and nephew Tim who have their eyes closed in this one, and nephew Josh hidden from view, but this one was the best of me and Steve ;-)

Steve with his parents and siblings

Steve and me (it was windy, so don't be too critical about my hair!)

It was (and continues to be) quite a shock going from my traditional family gatherings of 6 (my parents, grandparents, brother and me) to gatherings of 29 (Steve’s parents, 5 siblings and their spouses, 15 nieces and nephews, Steve & me). But they’re all welcoming people and while I don’t always handle the large gatherings with grace, they are always entertaining.

Keychain Lamp Project

Steve and I both are serious collectors of stuff. I have been trying to get away from just storing stuff and actually displaying collections (or getting rid of them). I have been collecting keychains for many years and have amassed quite a collection. I had a thought that it might be interesting to make them into a chandelier of some sort but had just been sitting on the idea for awhile.

On a trip to Target, Steve and I came across these lamps significantly on sale.

It’s easy to see why they were on sale. They were pretty darn ugly. But we both saw the potential in the structure and took two of them home.

I started by removing the outer layer of shiny copper discs.

And once the inner layer was removed, I was left with a blank slate.

Using the rings that held the copper discs together as well as Christmas ornament hooks, I strung my collection onto the frames.

For a side-by-side comparison:

The finished lamps:


Of course, as soon as I finished the lamps and was satisfied with them, I found half a dozen more keychains in a box. Oh well. I’ve at least corralled most of them. The lamps now sit on my desk and I am enjoying the admittedly bizarre and eclectic look of them.

Lamps lit up: