I am now up-to-date on the basement photos. It’s getting closer to being done. Hopefully in the next two weeks we will have a painted basement with heat and flooring.

I think the next couple weeks will be busy so I don’t know how long it will take to get Halloween photos up but I thought I would share the two I finished so far.

Up first, the most awesome cake ever. The Husband took my idea for a tall ghost of some sort and came up with a kid under a sheet. I made all 7 layers and then constructed and iced the entire thing. The Sister made the fondant and decorated the whole thing.

And then, the costume. The Husband is getting ready to tie me to the train tracks.

This month’s header is thanks to a mysterious drive-by Buddha…

We came back from a trip to NJ over the weekend and sitting in our garden next to the driveway was…something different. A Buddha, as it turns out. The Husband picked it up to see if there was a note but nothing was attached. I refused to touch it in case it was a trap.

Hey, you never know.

Anyway, we thought it was cute and left to add charm and character to the garden. This morning the Husband came in from his run to let me know that another Buddha had appeared in the front garden. Or maybe the little Buddha was there all along and we didn’t notice. Either way we now have two.

I must admit that it’s starting to get creepy, like they’re evil Buddhas secretly multiplying like in a horror film. Some day I will walk out the door and the whole garden will be filled with them and then they’ll attack.

I have theorized that someone is stealing Buddhas from the neighbors and leaving them in our yard but since they are the exact same Buddhas we think this may be unlikely.

We are convinced that a friend is putting them in the yard and are pretty sure we know which friend it is. However, he/she is denying it. We’ll see how long he/she keeps denying it as the Buddhas start to attack.

I have a husband that apparently makes my friends jealous with his gift-giving ability. He’s not perfect and occasionally his gifts are (Husband, stop reading right this instant) off, but so many times he is just awe-inspiring with what he is able to pull out of his brain that the off times are sufferable.

(Ok, you can continue reading again).

Some of this will be familiar to those you who know of other journals I keep. Sorry.

The Husband and I agreed that we would not buy each other gifts for Hanukkah. After all, we had just paid for a new kitchen and will be going to Kuaui for vacation so we need to keep spending to a minimum. So what did I receive on Friday, the first night of Hanukkah? A gift. Of course it’s just not any gift. It’s the best gift ever.

Well, maybe not ever but it comes close.

I received a magic box. It’s a beautiful glass box with two white stones added inside and a note that read,”This is a magic box. It is fueled by the contents found within. With each day it becomes more powerful. On the 8th day, you will understand.”

On each day of Hannukah I received two more stones and with it more questions. What would the gift do in the end? Will the stones turn into a nice rock, a.k.a some sort of diamond? Doubtful, because I don’t wear much jewelry, mostly just my engagement and wedding rings, but on occasion I start pining for something. Had I been pining? Or maybe the 8th day arrive and I’d be carted off to a location the stones represented?

A few days into the game, I decided to add a quarter into the box. I figured that I may be required to participate with the box and thought to test the theory. I was also curious as to how the box would respond, if it would think it was funny. The next day I ran to the box and found that the quarter had changed into a Canadian quarter. Thank goodness I didn’t add yarn, it may have ended up as a spool of thread. Useful, but not yarn.

Then on the last day of Hannukah, my box produced a note (as follows)

“Inner Workings of the Magic Box

The sole predictable power of the magic box is replication. Specifically, that of a rare stone which can only be found growing in pairs deep within the mines of Tibet. The magic box is at it’s most powerful during the Jewish holiday of Hannukah, when it replicates nightly, although no one seems to know why. Normally, the stones only replicate once a week until such point that any of the stones are removed from the box for an extended period of time. The stones themselves have no discernible power besides being a fuel for the box. However, because of their rarity, they do maintain a street value of approximately ten dollars (US) each, which, given enough time, might add up to the value of a reasonably large item…say, a spinning wheel, for the lucky recipient.”

Have I mentioned that I love this gift? And that I think it is one of the Husband’s best gifts ever. Over eight days I would smile thinking that I had a magic box and noone else did. At a funeral we attended on Saturday, I broke out into a grin several times. People were dead, but I had a magic box. Why yes, I’m going to Hell, but after a few months of my magic box building up value, I’ll be riding my way into Hell on my nifty spinning wheel.