Gnomengarten

I have what I would consider a reasonable amount of gnomes. My brother gave me these julenisse, which are gnome-adjacaent, I think.

And I have these guys.

And these.

So that's it! All fairly straightforward. I also have three little Fall gnomes, which I had out for Thanksgiving. And while I had them out…Clementine learned what they were called. (NOMES.) And she started asking for them. And trying to take them with her to bed at night. And jumping up and down and squealing with excitement when she saw them. And saying conversationally every five minutes to everyone she met, " 'member NOMES?" (To which the only accepted answer was "I do remember gnomes.")

When I got out the Christmas gnomes she just lost her little mind! She was asking us to get them down for her all the time, saying in great earnestness (while taking them), "these Mommy's nomes," and then carrying them all over the house. So one day I saw a little soft gnome ornament at Walmart, I thought, "I should get that for Clementine so she will stop taking my gnomes." And I did.

When I gave it to her it was like she had been reunited with a long-lost sister. She hugged it rapturously and said, without prompting, "That TEMentine's Gnomie!"

And just like that…our entire family developed an absolute mania for gnomes. We can't help it! We love them! We exclaim at them when we see them in yards or in stores. We point out "BIG gnomies!" and "Tiny gnomies!" We draw gnomes. We call Santa hats "gnomie hats." We have gnomes on the mind and in the heart. You could probably sell me a rattlesnake if it had a gnome costume on it!

And now when you ask Clementine what her favorite animal is, she says…"NOMES!"

I bought these little gnomes at the same time as her "Gnomie."

Then we made shrinky-dinks. All gnomes.

Someone gave us this gnome bag, which she carries around possessively

Abe talked me into buying this light-up gnome while he was on the phone with me and I saw it at the store (Abe is part and parcel to our gnomania)

(She's not really supposed to carry it around the house, but she does.)

Sometimes she comes and gets in bed with me at night and says in the softest little whisper, "where Gnomie?" Then I'll rummage around in the blanket and find him for her, and she'll snuggle in contentedly and sigh, " 'member gnomes?" (I do remember gnomes.)

Junie made this little rice-filled gnome for Clementine for Christmas.

And then Daisy made this amazing and wonderful stuffed gnome for Clementine for Christmas.

One night Seb suddenly felt like baking, and he made these amazing and beautiful frosted sugar cookies, one for every person in the family. Guess what he made for Clementine?

She has now added "NOME cookie" to her list of things she wants to talk and reminisce about.

What I want to know is: will we all still love gnomes next year? Will we love them forever because of her? I think we might!

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And now, few more things, if you care about other things besides gnomes:

Family Home Evening drawing night

Clementine proudly showing off what she drew

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Every year Sam decides what to do with the Christmas tree. We have ornaments in most colors (some more than others) so we've done rainbow trees, warm-colored trees, cool-colored trees, and so forth. (We have other weird assorted ornaments too…those get tucked in between the others or go on mini trees cobbled together over the years.) This year Sam asked Gus what kind of tree we should do and Gus said…"Caw colors!" So Sam made a Macaw-tree. Red, yellow, and blue…with a white stripe high up to symbolize the white stripe around the eyes. Can you see it?

And do you see who is sitting on top of the tree?

Don't worry—it's just one of Gus's tiny caws (he couldn't spare the real Caw all through December, naturally!)

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Clementine holding Baby Jesus, who she calls "Baby Dape-up" about 50% of the time after her baby cousin Jacob we took care of a little while ago.

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The rest of Seb's amazing cookies (that boy never does anything by half-measures)

Favorite animal: police car?

He even found a recipe to make the icing shiny, which I have never successfully managed. Of course, my sugar cookies always grow into huge (if tasty) blobs too, so clearly he is doing a lot of things right.

On the other hand, I saw a ton of gelatin packet papers on the counter and said, "Just how much unflavored gelatin did that recipe call for?"

"Oh, I used 6 packets, but then I messed it up, so I used 6 more packets."

…oh. Well. Good thing I buy everything in the hugest quantities possible, I guess.

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Christmas-y bedroom

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We had to go clear up to Bountiful to get Junie some new pointe shoes rather than getting them at a store closer by, and I was so annoyed about it. (Long story.) But, I decided to make the best of it and stop at City Creek with the kids on the way home for our "Christmas activity." (We tried to do something "fun" together every day of December…we really stretched that definition of fun sometimes but we did our best.)

Watching the fountain show

Giving machines (we bought some chickens!)

Big Christmas tree!

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Showing off some coloring (face paint courtesy of the ward Christmas party)

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Matching coats! The one on Junie used to be mine…and before that it was my mom's!

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Delivering flyers together

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Emergency workers

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Riding Trax. We can all ride free (we have faculty/dependent cards because of Sam working at BYU) so we like to ride back and forth places when the train isn't crowded, which is nearly always.