7 Quick Takes Friday, #47

1. My girls were given the sweetest new shirts for Christmas, and I've been meaning to show them to you. However, on the first day the shirts were worn, they got good and stained and it's taken me this long to return them to wearability.

Cute, no? Even better is that they were gifts from my incredibly sweet and far-too-busy-to-be-making-gifts-for-her-blog-buddy friend, Lenae. Are you impressed with her craftiness and thoughtfulness?! I absolutely was. Thank you again, Lenae. I'd take you out for a milkshake and chat if I could.

2. Earlier this week, we were driving with the windows rolled down and the radio blasting the Beastie Boys. I sang (shouted?) along loudly, dancing the bucket-seat-dance while Justin eyed me suspiciously and the girls laughed from the backseat. We were fighting for our right to Paaaaaartay. Toss you outta this house if that's the clothes you're gonna WAY-er! I'll kick you outta my house if you don't CUT THAT HAIR! The lyrics are goofy and not something I really want my kids to listen to, but in the moment, we were rocking out and I had no worries. It had been years since I'd heard that song, but I was sure there weren't any bad words in it.

All was going well until... Man, livin at home is such a drag. Now your mom threw away your best p*rno mag!

Yikes! About the time they sang mom threw away, I remembered what came next. In my befuddled maternal way, I reached for somebody's mouth to cover up so the words couldn't be said, but...whose mouth can you cover when you're listening to the radio? Nobody's. I threw my hand out and waved it in front of the dashboard frantically, singing LALALALA! until the bad part was over.

Leave it to me in my panic to forget about turning the volume down, or better yet, pushing the OFF button. Sigh. Thankfully, my LALALALA's were distracting enough that the word wasn't heard by my innocent babies. Who won't be innocent for long if mama insists on rocking out in the car.

Do you have a guilty music-pleasure?

3. Do you remember when I canned my own tomatoes? It was quite the ordeal -- for me, anyway. I worked so hard and sweated and fussed....and only got 6 jars of garden tomatoes out of the deal. But man, was I proud. I stowed them in my pantry, vowing not to use them until the dead of winter was upon us and I'd be desperate for a taste of summertime freshness.

Now -- it's the dead of winter. But I'd been putting off using the tomatoes because...what if they were terrible? What if I worked so hard and it hadn't been successful in the end? What if they were poisoned by my lack of knowledge in canning, and would sicken us all?

Knowing deep down that the tomatoes would probably be fine, I gathered my courage and used a jar for a recipe last week. Or, I tried to. It took me a sweet eternity to figure out how to open the jar. First of all, the screw lid was, like, melded to the jar. I used elbow grease, jar grippers, core muscles, and entreaties to heaven, but the jars were NOT coming open. Eventually, I remembered an old-fashioned contraption stuck to the side of my fridge. Yep -- you guessed it -- the can opener. I stuck the pointy end under the lid and pried it all the way around the edge until the lid finally relinquished its grasp. It was off! Hooray! Next problem? The sealed inner lid. Before remembering the can opener again, I nearly flipped all of my nails backwards trying to peel off the lid. I'd never seen this done before! How was I to know!? (If you say common sense, I'll be mighty upset. You would, of course, be right. But still.)

Eventually, the jar was open, the contents were sniffed, the tomatoes were poured into the minestrone soup, the spoonful was carefully tasted (with eyes squinched shut), and the tomatoes were deemed...delicious.

And now I'm armed with another life lesson: How To Open A Home-Canned Jar Of Tomatoes. Be very, very proud.

4. I have an announcement to make: MY BROTHER STARTED HIS VERY OWN BLOG! He's the super talented and creative sort, and he's been working with leather and other materials to make custom knife sheaths. I know all of you lovely ladies probably won't be too interested in sheaths, but what about the men in your lives? My brother would love to make a custom knife sheath for them if they like that sort of thing, so send them over to take a look. And check it out yourselves to leave him some comment-encouragement!

5. Yesterday was a dull and dreary day at Heavenly House, and I had alot running through my head when I should have been paying attention to the kids in their after-lunch/pre-nap play time. To relieve the doldrums, I followed Lucy The Valiant's advice and Googled 'find Chuck Norris' (the 'I'm Feeling Lucky' way). It was so entertaining that I just stared at the screen and giggled for far too long. So long, in fact, that it took me a few minutes to realize the house was silent. Here's what happened while I Googled Chuck:

Marker up the nose. Sweet.

I'm blaming this on Lucy.

6. My Quick Takes have been so un-quick this week that I'm leaving number 6 with nothing. You're welcome.

7. And for the end, here's a sweet reminder to keep looking up:

Life is better when you're smiling.

Have a smile-filled weekend, friends, and stop by Conversion Diary for more Quick Takes!