Warewolves, Vampires & Six-Foot Tall Rabbits

It's been almost a month since I made my last post, and wouldn't you know that another holiday is upon us. Growing up I always used to really like Easter, though I remember never having the desire to see the Easter Bunny quite like I did to see Santa Claus. For some odd reason the thought of a large magical rabbit seemed more frightening to me than a jolly old fat man, even though both were delivering presents. It's even more odd to me to think of being scared of the Easter Bunny, considering that I was a Disneyland child who loved (to my recollection) going and seeing the characters.

I still remember my brothers and I dying the Eggs, something that I still enjoy doing and look forward to teaching to my own children soemday. Always the artist it wasn't enough for me to dye eggs the standard colors that came in the kit, I always felt the need to try and color the eggs in shades that I personally preferred. I would try and experiment with the crayon that came in the kit to create teal and earth-tone eggs because I thought it was pretty awesome that I could mix and match to create those colors. If I were possible I probably would've tried to create a black egg... doesn't that sound appealing?

Sadly, this year it feels like Easter completely snuck up on us. We didn't even start thinking about it until last weekend, and even after that we forgot about it on and off. No egg dying this year, no stuffed rabbits invading the house, nothing. Mrs. Nutz and I determined that we will have to get better about that when we have a family of little Nutz running around.

Last Monday night we decided to do a family activity, baking cookies. We'd both been craving chocolate chip cookies, and decided that it would be a fun thing to do together. I gathered the ingredients for Mrs. Nutz while she carefully placed them into the Kitchenaid and delicately added the flour to keep from covering the kitchen in a fine mist of fluffy whiteness. Because we doubled the batch, it soon became too thick for the mixer to do it's job, at which point my wife batted her eyes and asked that I saddle up to the bowl with a wooden spoon and start mixing.

I was a little less careful about my mixing strategy, allowing flour to escape from the bowl on more than one occasion. At one point in my vigourous attempt to mix the dough, I even broke one of our wooden spoons. Mrs. Nutz laughed in disbelief at that one. Finally after moving the bowl from one side of the sink to the other, Mrs. Nutz took over and demanded that I clean up the mess that I had made. I told her I was giving her practice, allowing her to see what it would be like baking with a child. She didn't argue that point with me...

That evening we finally got around to renting Disney's Bolt. I had wanted to see this movie, as I'd known quite a bit of the production behind the feature, and I'd heard some great things about it. We'd had several options to watch it on the Cruise ship, but circumstances had made us not able to do so. I have to say that of the big 3 animated films from last year (Bolt, Wall-E, and Kung Fu Panda) I thought this was by far the best of them. It was especially fun to watch with Iola laying on us in the couch, obviously jealous that we were paying so much attention to a dog that was not her.

Not this last Friday, but the week prior, we were determined to finally watch the movie adaptation of Twilight. We had been trying to find it in RedBox for the past while, and were never able. Having read the books, I was initially hesitant to see the movie, but friends and family kept telling me that they had done a great job with it, so I had developed a desire to see it. My more senisible better half had not caught the fever yet, and I figured she would eventually get to the books, but I knew that she would want to see the movie before she would be willing to crack open the novel. We had stopped at Walmart to check their redbox, and do some light shopping (I swear if we leave that store and haven't spent $100 we consider that a good errand.) While there I noticed that they were selling the single disc version of the movie for a reasonable price, so I convinced Mrs. Nutz that we should buy it anyway, and then we could always sell it off if we didn't like it.

We watched the movie Friday night, then again Saturday night. Sunday Mrs. Nutz watched the movie, then started reading the book that night. Monday night we made cookies and watched Bolt, then read in the books (I thought that reading with her would be fun, so I grabbed the second book in the series and figured I would keep a step ahead of her.) for a while. Tuesday she wasn't feeling that good, so she stayed home while I went to work and school. When I got home I found out that she was a little over half-way in the book, and had watched the movie a couple more times. Wednesday she watched the movie while I did my homework, and I'm assuming that she watched the movie again Thursday night.

By Friday we had both finished our books, so I thought it would be fun when we got back from our errands to have a quiet evening reading. During our errands we went to the store and bought Twilight themed candy hearts, and both the movie soundtrack, and the movie score. That night we read from 7 pm until 2:30 am. The next morning I got up late and went downstairs where my wife had been since Iola woke her at 9, and she was reading again. Since we had borrowed the books, I reasoned that we should go and buy copies of the last two books so that I could continue reading and still not hinder her progress. We went to the store yesterday and bought the last two books, came home and watched the movie AGAIN while we ate, then stayed up until 1 again reading the books. She's nearing the halfway mark in the 3rd tome, and I am just breaking the surface of the final novel. As I type this, she's in the other room reading.

I remember when I read through the books the first time thinking that she would like them as well, but figuring that she would in no way become as fixated on them as I had... I'm happy to say that I grossly underestimated the power of those books!

Well, I think that catches us up on the events of our recent weeks. My artwork for the Disney World trip recap is coming slower than I would like, but that's the rub when life (and apparently Twilight) intervenes. I'm still planning on it though, better late than never.

Happy Easter everyone!