Saturday, December 23, 2017

Blurb Saves Christmas?


My Grandmother turned 90 last March. Over the past year she wrote fairy tale stories for her 6 great grandchildren with each of them as the main character. She writes all of her stories by longhand. 

In May I got the bright idea to type them all up to create a book as a Christmas gift for Grandmother. Additionally, I found a wonderful illustrator, Evalyn "Evie" German, to illustrate each kid as their fairy tale character.

Check out Evie's work here:

Whatevie website

@what.evie Instagram

As the illustrations came in from Evie, I loved them so much I started to think this was the best gift idea I'd ever come up with. If Christmas was a contest, I would win. Maybe I'd killed it this year and get a bye for next year. I'm out for 2018.


Malone


Harlowe


Rowan

Lola

Connor and Chloe 

I loved the illustrations so much, I thought it would complete the book if I had one with Grandmother and all the kids, so I asked Evie for one more.
Blurb, a site that helps you create professional, quality books, was recommended to me. I'm not a designer, so it took me awhile to get the book the way I wanted. I did a test mockup that needed some changes, but finally by December 2nd I finished the book and placed my order.

I got a notice that it shipped on Dec. 8th and should arrive by the 19th. Plenty early for a Christmas day celebration.

Then the 19th passed and I still didn't have Grandmother's book. On the 20th I emailed Blurb and they replied that they'd credit the $15 shipping charge and that I should check with my post office. I went to the post office and shared the tracking information, but they had no record of the package in their computer. I wasn't going to get the book.

I emailed my Blurb customer service contact, Miranda, early the morning of the 21st, shared the story about Grandmother's fairy tales and pleaded if there was any expedited solution. 

I checked the website to see if I could reorder with overnight shipping, but it requires 3 - 4 days just to produce the book. There was no way it would make it before Christmas.

Then Miranda got back to me. She rushed production and had the book overnighted to me. We had to be home in person on Saturday to accept delivery. Christmas is saved!

...but now it's 6pm on Saturday 12/23 and no package delivered.

I do have the mockup version, so I have something for Grandmother to open on Christmas day, but it's not the final version. I'm so frustrated. I don't know what I could have done differently to make this work.

I'm sad, but I think Grandmother will still love the book. I'll try to get a picture of her reaction to share.

Merry Christmas!!

If you'd like to see a copy of the book, you can find it on Blurb: Grandmother Cate's Fairy Tales.






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Monday, May 15, 2017

Wedding Weekend

Lovely morning on the Riverwalk before the wedding
We attended a family wedding last weekend for Jessica and Pranesh in San Antonio. It was the first wedding for the twins and it was so amazing. The bar is set pretty high for all future weddings.

Jessica is the daughter of my Aunt Annie (from my Dad's side) and Charlie Smith. Jessie is a world traveler and met the love of her life, Pranesh, in Hong Kong. Learn more about their charming story here.

The wedding was a happy occasion preceded by a sorrowful one. Jessie's mother, Annie had been battling cancer and lost her fight in early February, three months before the wedding the family had planned together. 

The wedding was beautiful and poignant, making me grateful for each moment I have with my family. This wedding is one of those experiences that will stay with us all. 

Chloe was excited about the wedding from the first time I mentioned it to her. I let her pick out her own dress and about once a day leading up she asked me how long until the wedding.

My Mom joined us for the trip to San Antonio and I'm always so grateful to have her with us for her fun spirit of adventure and her incredible maternal support. While we were getting ready, Mom did Chloe's hair and it was amazing, beautiful, feminine curls. Chloe and I both loved it. Thank you "hair by GiGi!"


GiGi even wrapped hair around the pony tail holder. I'm so sorry I didn't get an after shot, but Chloe's hair was so lovely for the wedding.
Everyone cleaned up nicely.

The ceremony was beautiful and I loved that my Uncle John officiated. Chloe was thrilled by Jessica's gorgeous dress and all the beautiful flowers. I loved that through out the ceremony friends and family read love poems that Jessica had sent to Pranesh during their long distance courtship.

My sweet girl kept checking on me during the ceremony because I teared up quite a bit. She didn't understand the significance of the Easter Lilies placed in loving memory of the Mother of the Bride. 
Jessica and Pranesh, newly man and wife.
I'm sorry to say that some of the boys in the family weren't as in to it as the girls. Connor fell asleep during the ceremony and when we all got up as the bride and groom left he asked, "Is that all?" 

The celebration after the ceremony is not one the twins will ever forget. We were at the beautiful St. Anthony hotel for a cocktail hour before an lovely seated dinner. 



My favorite part of this picture is Pranesh sweetly waiting for his bride in the background.
The twins laid down next to the dance floor to watch the Bride and Father dance. I hid behind a post and cried as I watched my babies watch Jessie with her Daddy. 

However, this was a celebration and the dance floor started to hop. Chloe was eager to dance, but Connor hung back. After awhile the whole family joined us on the dance floor. Connor and Chloe had some good moves, then I saw Chloe whisper a plan to her brother. I wish I had a picture or video of what a happened next as they both dropped to the floor for their version of the worm. So awesome!

Lovely family weekend with great memories! I'm so grateful.

Tuesday, December 20, 2016

2016 Holiday Season



I started at The Marketing Arm in June, and they really invest a lot in the agency culture. Yesterday we got to take advantage of one of the cool holiday activities, Cookie Day. The twins came with me to my office and over lunch we got to decorate cookies, color, cut out snowflakes, and eat pizza. They enjoyed decorating the cookies, but were excited when we headed back to my desk so they could share with everyone who worked around me.


A few weekends ago we went to a little Christmas party that had a Santa who read to the kids and let you take pictures. However, since it was at a friend's house, it wasn't a real photo set up and we had a little photo bomber in our pictures. Below is the un-cropped version.

Early in December Chloe had her nutcracker performance, this year as a Candy Cane. It is a big commitment and a lot of work for her, but she already told me she wants to do it again next year.
Cousins at the Nutcracker
Dancing Candy Cane
Heading out to take a bow
Last year after the holidays were over I bought a new tree on sale. Our ceilings in this house are higher than our last place and I thought a 9 foot tree would fill the space better than our original 7 foot tree. I think it turned out great!

Happy Holidays!


Monday, August 29, 2016

Getting in the Groove

So last Monday was the first day of a new school for the twins. Carl and I had been worried about the transition and it was a little bumpy at first, but I'm happy to report all is going really well. The new school is really amazing and I absolutely love the teachers. 
First day of school
As we are getting into the groove of our new school routine, we had a pretty busy and fun weekend too.

Chloe had both a ballet class and then an audition for the Nutcracker. She really enjoyed being in the production last year and wanted to do it again. We'll find out if she made it and in what role by the end of the week.


We plan ahead and Connor has decided he wants to be Kylo Ren for Halloween. The costume came in so we definitely had to try it out. Still waiting on the light saber.

Connor got a little special time with GiGi where I believe they conducted some sort of experiments that ultimately started with play-doh. Sorry about the mess Mom.


During summer field trips at Primrose, the kids got to visit the Children's Aquarium in Fair Park. They loved it so much they wanted to take us to see everything. It is a really great little aquarium. The best part was feeding and petting the stingrays. A really amazing experience!



Lovely weekend!


Saturday, August 13, 2016

Ready for a New School Year

This year the twins start 1st grade at a new school. Since we moved they have been going to a private kindergarten, but now they'll start going to the public school down the street. One of the main reasons we moved was for the good school district.

We're getting ready for the new school year. Carl and I registered the kids this week and "meet the teacher" is next Friday. Today I took the twins to get hair cuts.
Before hair cuts
Long hair from the back, before hair cuts































Bahama Buck's snow cones after hair cuts 
So getting a hair cut before school is one way to prepare, but I'm not really sure what else to do. We did buy some new backpacks that neither my Mom nor Carl approve of, but that's a story for another post.

I am worried about this transition to a new school. It will be the first time the twins will be separated into different classrooms and although it is what is right for the kids in the long run, I'm just not sure how they'll react. I didn't worry about the move and the transition to a new school last year and that was a total under estimate of the drama.
Starting at Primrose April 2015
This transition was so challenging we decided to keep them at Primrose for kindergarten to minimize the number of changes. 

They went to school for the first time when they were 3 years old. I think they were too young to worry about anything and, for me, I knew they had each other. First day at Baby Steps post link here.
First day at Baby Steps in April 2012
Hopefully these are just Mommy worries and it will be pretty smooth. My grandmother did say one of the sweetest things to the twins to help prepare for first grade. She told them when she sat down at her desk in first grade and met the girl next to her, Shirley, she became her friend for life. She still speaks to her once a week.





Monday, June 27, 2016

What They're Saying Now: June 2016



I haven't updated this series in awhile, but at 6 years old the twins still say amusing things.

For some reason Connor calls our dog Leo, "Lelo." We're not sure why. He's always done it and hasn't stopped. The rest of us, including Chloe, call him Leo. Maybe it's Connor's pet name for him.





At school the twins learned about the concept of infinity. At bedtime I now get, "I love you infinity." I love that!




Chloe has started using the term, "I'm a fan of..." We've heard the following:
"I'm a fan of nature"
"I'm not a fan of minecraft"

I don't know where she picked up this phrase, but I'm a fan.







If you'd like to catch up on the previous "What They're Saying Now" posts:
March 2012
January 2013
April 2014
July 2014
Summer 2014 with bonus video




Tuesday, June 21, 2016

Spring Dance Recital 2016

This was Chloe's first full year of ballet. This year's recital performance was the first act of Sleeping Beauty and Chloe's class were bluebirds.
Pretty adorable!

Thank you KiKi and Uncle Martin for coming to Chloe's performance.


Connor was not as excited about Chloe's recital. He did watch her, but fell asleep during the show and is a little grumpy in this shot.


Our little star!