A Little Medley

Yesterday, St. Patrick's Day, was a very special day at our house.  You see, I love Ireland and I am partly Irish, so St. Patrick's Day is my favorite miniature holiday.  And I love corned beef.

Here is what we had:

Soda bread, corned beef, cabbage, carrots, and potatoes.

My animals have been doing very well.  A few days ago I thought Salieri (one of my ducks) had been stolen by an animal.  When I found her under an old rabbit hutch in the ducks' pen, I thought she was dead, so I poked her with a stick and she shifted and quacked a half-quack.  I discovered that she was simply laying eggs under the hutch.  Good old Sally.

Sara has been reveling in eating all the nightcrawlers Mother and I have been digging up in the garden, and Scarlet cares about her crickets just as much as she always has: she loves them.

Well, it's getting late, so I should probably stop writing and finish my Latin before I go to bed.  You may expect me to blog again soon: I forgot how delightful it is.

  

A New Year

It's been over a month since I last blogged, but first there was Christmas, then I was sick for a week, then there was school, and now we have a car predicament and some leaks: and besides, it's a new year.

Every new year entails "New Year's Resolutions," or as I prefer to say, "the stuff I want to do this year."  Those things for me include sewing, blogging and becoming a dancer.  Of course there are more, but those three are the most important.  Let me tell you why:

Sewing

• There are plenty of wonderful doll clothes that are easy to make.
• Liberty Jane sells simple doll clothing for a ridiculous amount of money.
• I'm convinced I can sew anything this year.  Nothing is too hard for an Adventurer.

Blogging

• In 2012 I published 215 posts.  Last year, 2013, I managed to write 27.
• I feel guilty when I blog only once a month.
• I'm positive that with lots of Rainbowland stories and pictures of turtles, I can surpass my goal of 100 posts this year.

Becoming a Dancer

• American Girl's 2014 Girl of the Year is a ballerina.
• I can almost consider myself graceful. (Behind those long black skirts and flowing dresses is a pair of wide, sausage-toed feet.) 
• Rainbowland Dancing (the dance I made up for Rainbowland) is so pretty.

I must say, I do have many aspirations this year.  As for if I shall accomplish them, well, we shall just have to wait and see.

I hope you all had a lovely Christmas and New Year, and if not, this sweet little face will cheer you up!

Walter, my adorable nephew

A Delightfully December-y Month

Near all of December has been a frozen, cold, snowy and/or rainy time.  I enjoy the snow, I don't mind the cold, and I don't care for the rain; but when we had about a week of low temperatures and a frozen little world, I went outside as often as possible to enjoy the ice and crunchy ground.  I took my dolls out to play with and take pictures of them several times that week.  Of course, I also had to break all the animals' water and pour hot water upon each thick sheet of ice, but I didn't mind at all.

December is not only fun because of the cold; it is also a particularly enjoyable month because of Advent and Christmas.  I must admit, the thing I like most about Advent is opening up a box from the Playmobil Advent Calendar every morning and, on Christmas Eve, admiring my lovely, complete Playmobil Christmas scene.  The best parts about Christmas are having family over to eat and talk and opening presents.  The problem with me is that when there is a crowd of people, I feel as though all eyes are upon me, watching me unwrap each gift.  (I feel the same way about my birthday.)  I usually hand out each gift under the tree to the person to whom it belongs while building up my pile slightly behind the tree, and when the tree is bare underneath, I plop myself down at my stack and open them while everyone is exclaiming over their gifts.  It usually works very well, but perhaps this year I shall sit in a chair and open my presents.  Yes, I suppose it is possible.

My Plucky Duckies

Before I write anything about my wonderful ducks, I wish you all a delightful Thanksgiving.  In Rainbowland they have what is called "Day of Thanks," which is their Thanksgiving.  It is always on the 30th of November.

Now for the ducks.  In April I got two ducks whom I named Salieri and Victor.  Now they are grown up and Sally lays eggs for us.

Here is the picture I took of them when they were a few days old.  Victor is on the right and Sally is on the left.

And here they are now.  Very beautiful ducks, if I do say so myself.  They are a bit dirty and messy looking now, but this summer their feathers were sleek and gorgeous and their beaks weren't caked in mud.

This is Victor:

This is Salieri:

They love each other (and me) very much and are definitely inseparable.

I decided to show you a picture of Feisty (outside that cage) and Patrick (inside the cage).  Feisty and the two ducks are very good friends: after all, they do live together.

Well, that is all I have to say about my ducks.  Again, I hope you all have a lovely Thanksgiving.  We shall be driving off to Shedd, Oregon for Thanksgiving in a very short while, so I must hurry up and end this post, as much as I should like to continue writing.

A Visit with Walter

Last Friday Mother, Daddy, Patrick and I drove down to California for our yearly visit with our grandchild/nephew, Walter, who turned a year old on October 12th.  I could only write about the adventures, but of course you want to see pictures, so I shall tell the adventures along with the pictures I took.

                                                                          Saturday:

We went to the beach, and since Walter is always eating (he's a growing boy), he ate the whole way there.

Waving to Aunt Janet (he's the best waver and ball-thrower I know.)

His Cowlick

Matthew, Patrick, Margaret and I climbed up a little cliff-type rock and Grandpa and Walter stayed down on the beach.

This is the view we had from the cliff.

Mama, Grandpa and Walter 

Grandma was sitting with Walter on the blanket while he played with rocks and ate.

Of course our boy needs lots of kisses.

His Beautiful Curls

A horse came by and stopped so Walter might see it.

Once Walter had had enough of the horse, the horse and his rider went down to the water.

Walter and Uncle Patrick

My Doll, Consuelo

                                                                            Sunday

Uncle Patrick played guitar for Walter and he enjoyed it very much.

I forgot: he's also the best little clapper.

Walter and the coasters

Monday (our last day there)

Papa, Sad Baby and Mama

And those were our adventures.  I took 375 pictures altogether, but I limited myself to 30 for you to see.  Ah, and we did so much more than the pictures tell, but this post is long enough with the pictures and a bit of writing.  I hope you enjoyed looking at the pictures as much as I enjoyed taking them.

The Tale of Rainbowland

Today I'm going to tell you a story, so make some tea, fetch your favorite blanket, and curl up in the coziest chair you can find.  Now, be prepared to be taken far away into the land of a young child and her father.

Once, years ago, an imaginative little girl and her daddy created a world.  In this world were vampires and dragons; Cloneys* and horses.  Together these great beasts and strong men kept the land in harmony and peace.  They encountered and conquered many villains and creatures, especially Cobrae**, while dealing with their own troubles in their own lives.

All this fancy was created in the bed of the daddy, turning it into a magic carpet-like object as it delivered the girl and daddy to their magnificent world.

As time wore on, the girl grew into an adolescent and their world turned into hers, and her world expanded into the outdoors.

You, my loyal readers, know this world as "Rainbowland."  Though "Rainbowland" is its original name, what is inside this world has changed entirely, making it an almost unrelated world, but still the product of my mind.

As I close my story, let me remind you: Rainbowland was created and played by a daughter and her father in a simple little bed.



*A "Cloney" is my version of a clone trooper.  I came up with them while watching Star Wars with my dear brother Patrick.  In the original Rainbowland, I was Pink Cloney, Daddy was Blue Cloney and my husband was Red Cloney.  There were many more, but I am certainly not going to list them all.  They're just humans in special suits, by the way.

**"Cobrae" are like cobras.  They were highly venomous and quite common in original Rainbowland.  The "Cobrae" is also my original idea, just like the Cloneys.

I'm Back!

The title says it all; I'm back!  Did you miss me?  My plan was to blog about going to American Girl Place Seattle and my birthday back in July, but obviously that never happened.  The rest of my summer was spent doing summery things and not blogging, which resulted in two months' worth of nothing on my poor little blog.

Anyway, during my absence, I decided to change the name of my blog.  "The Blog of J.M. Newhall" is boring and unoriginal, and I wrinkle my nose when I say it, thus I have given it a Rainbowland influence.  I hope you like it, because I shan't be changing it for a long time - I think.

To end this delightful little post, I shall make a commitment to blog on either Friday, Saturday, Sunday or Monday, depending on how busy my days are.  And, just to let you know, "Old Rainbowland, New Rainbowland" will be back within a few weeks.