tollipop

it is with the utmost gratitude...

 

When I was a child, my mother never made me write thank you notes.  But then I grew up in the Canadian wilderness and ran with wolves, dear reader.  You can hardly expect to call upon the same exemption! 

With that in mind, it is time to sharpen your quills and begin composing prose of the most flowery, appreciative sort!  And it will be such fun with these little Tollipop thank you notes!  You'll simply be astonished at the pretty manners which flow from your pen!

And when Mr. Darcy thunders by on his panting steed and requests shelter for the night, won't he be impressed by your little stack of epistles and won't he think to himself, "Elizabeth who?!," once he looks into your eyes and realizes there is no more fair nor literate damsel in all the world than the one who stands before him at this very moment?! 

Heaven and earth, dear reader, what are you waiting for?  Go and fetch the India ink, and be quick about it!

Thank you notes available for your whim and pleasure right here:  Thank you 2008

happy house

Shall we take a peek inside?

 

Shhh...someone's sleeping!

 

I think.

 

There's lots of helping.

 

And hugging.

 

And music.

   

And laughter.

And many good things to eat.

   

How I wish everyone could live in such a happy little house!

making marshmallows: a kid friendly project once the marshmallows are actually made

Inspired by the lovely Emily, the girls and I thought how delightful it would be to make our very own marshmallows.  Who ever dreamed of such a notion as homemade marshmallows?  Such daring!  Such frontier spirit! 

Of course, once we settled down to the actual process and I realized tough guys like candy thermometers and extreme heat would be involved, I basically made the girls watch from a distance.  Which is ironic, considering my mother sent me and my brother out to hunt caribou with our Fisher Price bows and arrows on a regular basis. 

Why do I hover so?

I must say, apart from the risk of spontaneous combustion, making marshmallows is quite a simple and fascinating process.  Gelatin, you've been holding out on me!  Who knew you were capable of such mystery, such intrigue?! 

The next day, the girls were not to be denied their moment in the kitchen.  The great delight of having one's children reach a certain age, I'm finding, is how interested and capable they are in participating in each step of the creative process.  It's like having three little girlfriends to play with, and everything is just keen up until the moment I make them clean their rooms. 

   

We discovered this delightful MS kit of goody boxes at Michael's and bid our time until the right coupon came along.  I was silently dreading a major assembly fiasco (I'm terrible at such things), but the girls commandeered the situation and as it turned out, the boxes practically popped into shape. 

 

After that, we hopped into a pink, hollowed out sweet and sailed on a chocolate river to the marshmallow room.  The marshmallow room!  The marshmallow room!  Was there ever such a lovely place?!  It was filled with industrious little helpers, clouds of powdered sugar, and all the happiness and joy that comes with free rein over such marvelous treats!

 

I'm not sure about the odds of genetic engineering but as it happens, together we are four girls in this house and we all take great pleasure in the presentation of a pretty package!  The marshmallows themselves are also delightful and melt so beautifully in a steaming mug of hot chocolate. 

 

And now I wish you all a sweet and merry time with your loved ones.  I know this is a significant time of year for many people of different backgrounds and I do hope it is filled with peace and happiness for you, dear reader.  I will be taking a little break from Tollipop over the next few days, though I shall likely pop in from time to time to share a picture of our festivities. 

Thank you for visiting this blog.  It has been a lovely place for me to come as well this year and I do so enjoy your company! 

week of a thousand recitals: check.

We had such a lovely weekend...filled with recitals, concerts, and a birthday!  Sophie was the birthday girl and alas, I do not have a picture of our celebration, mainly because we had a quick and early breakfast together and then she was whisked away by her grandparents for the day while Roger and I took the other girls to their recitals.  As it happened, this was a delightful arrangement for everyone involved and it is not the first time I've been grateful Roger's family lives nearby. 

 

Never was Rigadoon played with such intensity, nor with such a preposterous rose atop one's head!

 

My, but how nicely you passepied!  Do you suppose Mr. Darcy will be at the ball tonight?!

 

Watch out for Miss Izzy when she gets her hands on this violin.  Her ladylike manners quite go out the window!  It's a shocking transformation to be sure, one that must be seen to be believed, but anyone acquainted with this timid, demure girl will be forced to adjust his pince-nez and reach for the fire extinguisher upon hearing her play!

Thank goodness her chaperone hovers nearby at such occassions, cautioning decorum and a reasonable tempo!

and the winner is...

 

Mary!  Congratulations, dear Mary!  And to be specific, Mary from California who wished for snow on Christmas Day as a gift to her midwestern husband.  Take it from me, Mary--it could happen!  At any rate, you are the winner of the Tollipop holiday ornament giveaway!  Isn't that lovely?  We must get in touch to discuss details, addresses, weather patterns, and the like.

I see that you made your way here via Amanda, which I believe is the first time in the history of Tollipop giveaways that the winner came here through someone else.  So congratulations to you as well, dear Amanda, and be on the lookout for a sweet little package to arrive on your doorstep!

To everyone else, thank you so much for visiting and playing along!  As always, I wish you such marvelous consolation prizes!  Consolation prizes that are so consoling as to make you forget the original cause of your disappointment!  Delightful coincidences, such as showing up to prom and noting that your dance card has been mysteriously claimed by one Fitzwilliam Darcy...such as discovering a secret room full of your favorite books, a cozy chair, a fireplace and, of course, a view...such as the ability to make peppermint bark appear with the snap of your fingers.  I do wish you all these things and more! 

Well, the holidays are nearly upon us.  Caroline is home from school and the other two girls will arrive shortly.  We have such plans!  Homemade marshmallows, Alicia's thumbprint cookies, sugar cookies, a gingerbread house, and of course, my monumental chocolate project (which is really only monumental in my mind).  In addition, there are gifts to be finished, wrapped, and delivered.  Judging by the ratio of scarf to yarn, I haven't a moment to lose!

 

All these plans and more are set to launch tomorrow evening (along with the birthday of a very special girl), after the last of our holiday recitals marathon has been completed.  I hope you have a lovely weekend, dear reader.  Much warmth, peace, and happiness to you.

catching snowflakes: it's all fun and games until someone loses an eye

 

First of all, a warm welcome to those of you visiting from Soulemama.  It's perfectly lovely having you here! 

 

We are practically in a state of hysteria around these parts--two snowfalls in the period of three days is, well, I'm sure there are bookies in this town who could givr you the odds on such an occurrence.  It's rare, to say the least.  And even though the snow has since turned to rain, I'm still delighted, because it's rain!  We consider moisture in general to be cause for celebration.

 

In other news, we are in the midst of the week of a thousand recitals chez Tollipop.  Just how many venues can one find oneself listening to a pack of Santa-capped cellists play "Jolly Old St. Nicholas"?  Oh, more than you might suppose, dear reader.  More than you might suppose. 

 

Still, there's no denying the pleasure of such occasions--I find them relaxing and familiar, amusing, touching.  It's good to be in the audience, good to visit with other parents, wonderful to see the connection between my girls as they share this delightfully grown up moment together. 

Finally, I must remind you that the great Tollipop ornament giveaway is still going on, and that you are welcome to enter simply by leaving a comment on this post.  On Friday afternoon we will draw and announce the winner in a ceremony conducted by Caroline with the utmost of solemnity.  Then she will don her Santa cap and play "Good King Wenceslas" for good measure...a piece she can perform with a title she cannot pronounce.  Nor can I, with any degree of confidence. 

winter wonderland

 

Okay, how does this work again?  You stick your tongue out and what happens?

 

This pair didn't much care to play in the snow.  "We'll spoil our pretty dancing slippers!," they cried, making a fuss and carrying on until it was finally decided everyone would be better off if the dollies just stayed inside and admired themselves. 

 

"What I wouldn't give for a chance to fly south," sighed the old brown bird.  "Pooh, you're nothing but a sparrow!," sniffed the dollies, "A cast iron sparrow with painted wings!" 

Such a paucity of good manners!  Oh, but those dollies were due a comeuppance, and I know just the bad mice for the job!

 

A standoff against the neighborhood boys.  Who will throw the first unnegotiated snowball and shatter the détente?  Why, Izzy, of course!

 

Come inside, dearie, where it's nice and warm!  Ah, but is anyone allowed?

 

                                    Just as I thought: redheads only!

                                                        ***********

Oh, dear reader, I cannot begin to express how elated I was to see tiny wet flakes hurrying to the ground this morning!  I even let Izzy quit practising her violin a full ten minutes early!  Who can slave over Mozart when there is dancing and singing and spinning around the house to be accomplished?!  And by the time I'd taken the girls to school, the flakes were bigger, fluffier, more aimless and prolific, and they just continued on their lazy, meandering way until nightfall.  It was beautiful, magical, and I am altogether charmed by its spell! 

This evening, under the cloak of darkness, I stared out the window at our snowy grass (such a rare sight!), and felt as though I could almost see back to my childhood--to a wintery, moonlit view overlooking a huge backyard that led to pillowy pastures, sloping up a hill where perched a little house (whose occupant, I felt certain at the time, was a witch) on the edge of a ghostly forest and the mountains beyond.  

Do you have pictures like that in your mind?

these are a few of my favorite things

Happy Monday, everyone!  I hope you had a nice weekend.  It was lovely chez Tollipop, owing to a delightful moment of family togetherness at our favorite Thai restaurant wherein I practically bathed myself in green curry, a Saturday morning at the park with the girls, much listening to Christmas carols and practising a few of our own, and the promise that snow, yes snow, is coming to Las Vegas!

Does it get any better than this?! 

Incidentally, I am glossing over the rough patches wherein girls sulked at being told to wear socks, uprisings occurred over household chores, tempers flared at perceived injustices (not mine, darling!), and I dreamed briefly of myself as a mysterious, unfathomable artist living in Paris... 

Just because I choose to dwell on the prettier moments doesn't mean we don't have our mutinies, our coup d'états, our dreaded piles of laundry!

At any rate, I wanted to offer something pretty to you, dear reader.  This is not an original idea by any means, but I made a few Tollipop gift tags for you to download and use at your leisure.  A carefully wrapped package has always been a source of delight to me, and although I feel somewhat pressed for time these days, I hope to spend a few relaxing moments before the 25th surrounded by paper and string.

   

The gift tags are available to download and print right here:  Christmas gift tags 2008   

Enjoy!

p.s.  the Tollipop ornament giveaway is still in full swing!  To enter, simply leave a comment on the December 11th post.

warning: so sweet your teeth will hurt...a tollipop giveaway!

 

Did I mention how much fun I'm having with these ornaments?  Like, kid in a candy store fun.  Kid at Christmas fun.  Kid and a pony fun.  It's like I'm reliving the best part of kindergarten, but this time with grown up scissors.   

I really am excited for school to let out.  This year, for the first time ever, I'm going to attempt making my mom's famous chocolates.  All by myself.  Et pourquoi pas?!  I have the secret recipe, I have enough slabs of Belgian chocolate to beat off a pack of wild coyotes, I have eager helpers somewhat the size of Oompa Loompas, I have a certain amount of fear and trepidation--I think we're good to go!

 

But I digress.  Listen, these ornaments are just too darling not to share.  So I'm giving one away!  Simply leave a comment below, dear reader, and let's say on Friday the 19th we will draw and announce a winner.  As always, if you care to mention this giveaway on your blog or by word of mouth and happen to send the winner my way, then you too shall receive one of these precious trinkets!  Sound like fun?!

As for comments, a courteous hello is always in good taste.  But I would also enjoy hearing what you would really, really like to receive this holiday season.  Something perhaps not even realistic, as in: I'm hoping for a British nanny who will read me stories.  What?  I am.   

And speaking of giveaways, I am intrigued to no end by what Gabrielle has up her sleeve over at Designmom.  I don't think you want to miss out on this!

Wishing you a lovely, exciting, magical weekend! 

get ready for cute in 5...4...3...2...1...

 

I can't tell you how happy it made me to create these ornaments, dear reader!  Talk about assembling some of my favorite culprits:  a sweet, bundled Tollipop with striped winter woolens, scissors and paste, a mesmerizing blue, a fantastic pink, sparkly glitter, and miles of pretty string!  Just whispering that list aloud practically caused me to swoon off my chair! 

 

I thought I would offer a few for sale in my shop, though I can't say I'm terribly anxious to send them out into the world.  They fall, for me, under that indiscriminate category of things I can't justify but desperately need. 

 

I suppose one might describe them as Christmas ornaments, though I could see myself leaving them up for the entire year.  But then, I'd probably do that with all my Christmas decorations if my husband didn't stipulate to a strict deadline of everything down by Valentine's Day.  You see how we compromise?

 

And typically I don't mind making these little concessions.  But I hope he knows I may have a problem  removing this sweet reminder of winter anytime within the duration I find myself living smack dab in the middle of the desert.    

In other news, you simply must go visit Erin of Fairie Moon!  She is participating in the Tollipop One Hundred Somethings project with awe-inspiring zeal.  I don't want to give her plans away because you really have to see this for yourself.  All I know is if I was invited over to Erin's house to play, no one could ever entice me to leave.  That doll house delights me to no end.  And Miss Hitty Dauphine's outfits!  How I love and can lose myself in the exquisite realm of a miniature world.