Smarties

Tonight was fun. We've had a good Sunday. The kids have made me smile more than they've made me mad. At dinner I asked Ben to get me my camera. He asked me why, then answered his own question. "Oh, I know you're going to blog. You're going to brag on your blog. They should call it bragging not blogging." Kannon and I had a good chuckle over that one. He's pretty smart, my boy.

Sarah was looking out the window with us. We were watching it snow. She just randomly said, "I'm just going to sit right here and watch the world go by." Where did that come from?!

And Joshua was given a helium balloon today. It was in his room and the string's just that much too short for him to reach it on his own. Well, he grabbed his box of blocks, plopped it down on the floor and used it as a stool to reach his balloon. No prompting necessary when it comes to stools. I had to confiscate all of ours (2 from the kitchen, 1 from the bathroom and a myriad of other stool-like containers) but he always finds a way around that. I have a box in the kitchen of scrapbook stuff. It doesn't have a lid, but that doesn't bother him. He slides it around and steps on the corner of the box to give him a boost up.

On a side note, he's finally starting to try to speak. He's been jabbering forever. And we never know what he's talking about. He's been able to say mama, daddy, hot and ball. That's it. At 20 months we're used to a lot more than that. I think Ben was just a bit older than that when he could say the alphabet, numbers and colors (with prompting of course). I think Joshua is just too busy to slow down long enough to try. But, now he looks at me for a second and usually repeats at least the first sound of a word. Yay!

So, then our Sunday ended with a group hug. What a special, nothing extraordinary day!

Bathroom Update

On Friday, Kannon and I took the youngest 2 with us to Carson City to the Home Depot. We were picking up the shingles to put on the outside of our new bathroom and the wainscoting for the inside. We asked, too, if our flooring had come in and they told us 3 more days. When we got home there was a message telling us that our flooring was in. Kannon was pretty annoyed and did a second trip to Carson City to pick it up. He traveled 4 hours that day. Well, we jumped right in on Saturday and got some of our projects done. These are the windows with the trim. There is some touch-up to do, but between us we were able to get it done without too much frustration.

Wow, you can really see how crooked this house is. Basically the space in between the windows is where the joint is for the old house and the extension on the porch (which is now our bathroom). It's pretty bowed right there. You can also see the paint color. Right now it looks pretty gray, which is the color I picked out. When the sun is shining it takes on a purplish hue. That's okay with me, because it matches the towels I bought about 2 years ago!

We put down our flooring. It's called "resilient flooring". This is Traffic Master by Allure. It is vinyl stick flooring and is a blond maple look. It was so easy to install. My knees are sore today, though. It's a floating floor and the pieces stick together with pre-glue strips. It becomes like an epoxy and doesn't come apart after a bit. To cut them to fit we only had to use a pencil, ruler and razor blade. It was actually kind of fun and I'm glad it was something I could help with.

Ben, with help from Dad, made supper for us. A lasagna hamburger helper. We told him we would start asking him to make dinner all the time now. He said he'd just make pizza all the time. Then mentioned that he'd need money and a car, too!

And this is the finished floor. I matches in color to the rest of our wood floors. I'm so excited to have this bathroom done!

Like Mother Like Son

A few nights ago, Joshua was getting ready for a bath. He had his pants off and I remembered a picture of me as a little 2-year-old. I asked him to show me his belly button and got this picture.

I was wearing my brother Johnny's socks and shoes. He's eating popcorn behind me. The good old days, eh?

March 2011

This month has been pretty much a do what needs to be done kind of month. We had the inspection on our finished sheet rock, giving us the go-ahead to finish our bathroom. We went to the cub scout Blue and Gold Banquet and enjoyed the many cakes that were decorated. I'm finding joy and excitement as the boys complete their achievements. It's still a super hard calling but it's getting better. Ben's our next boy to come in and then I get about 2 more each month this year! We'll have to figure something out to divided them up. I can't do much more than the 9 I have right now! But, I'm so grateful to have 2 capable assistants.

We enjoyed the school's book fair family night. We had dinner there of pizza from Papa Murphy's and took pictures with the Cat in the Hat. The kids each got a book and we did a few crafts. Joshua had a bumpy day. Sarah accidentally got him on the top of his head with a hoe. He came in crying with blood dripping down his forehead. I think he was most upset when I washed his head with cold water, though. It was only a little cut and didn't continue to bleed at all. Then at the book fair, he was running up and down a ramp. When Sarah joined him he ended up tripping and skinned his forehead. The next day he did something outside and has a little cut under his eye. I always knew he'd be our crazy accident kid.

Last Saturday was such a nice spring day -not like yesterday or today with the wind blowing so chilly! We (Kannon, because he's good like that) decided to go to the park for a picnic. We rode our bikes over and enjoyed an hour at the park.

Ben made our sandwiches and they were yummy. We got pretty bothered by a bee that wanted our food. I even thought it was stinging me in my pants at one point, but it wasn't and I never did figure out what was poking me.



We played on all the equipment and tossed the Frisbee around a bit, too.

On Saint Patrick's Day, Ben and I looked at each other and said, "oh, it's St. Patrick's Day" and went back to our rooms to put on some green. To my amazement I didn't have any green. If you asked me for my favorite color I'd tell you green. So, it surprises me that I don't have any clothes that color. (I did remember a shirt that has some green on it - it was tucked in the back of the closet so I missed it. I wore it the next day instead.)

Here's Ben sporting the socks I bought him. He also tucked a sticker on his shirt so he wouldn't get pinched. I told him I thought that when I was a kid, if you were wearing green and someone pinched you anyway you got to do something back. We always had to be careful with my dad who tried to be sneaky about it. What was the "something?" Extra pinches? A punch in the arm? I can't remember!

Now, Sarah wore green like only a little girl can get a way with! She wanted pony tales AND a bow on the top. So, this is what we came up with.

I made her skirt the day before. I really like the choice of ribbon, kind of like a rainbow. Speaking of rainbows, I wish I'd had my camera available earlier in the week. We put a rainbow across the top of her head with little pony holders. She kept it in for 3 days. It was so cute, hopefully she'll let me do it again.

And Joshua. He wore this adorable shirt I picked up at Target a month ago. "Totally Charming" with the Lucky Charm guy on it. (and you can see his owie on his forehead)

So the only thing I found of my own that was green was a bracelet. Not even my favorite crayola color green. It was that bright lime green color. About halfway through the day I spotted a piece of fabric I'd cut off of Sarah's skirt and tied that on my wrist, too. At least I didn't get pinched!

We spent a good few days researching, planning and building a Leprechaun trap. This was a school family assignment. And we all pitched in. It was fun to do together. I didn't get a picture of it until he brought it home from school. In the wind coming home some of it blew away. Then Joshua attacked it, but you can get the idea.

The top here is missing the slide. We built a slide out of pipe insulation by cutting it in half and using toothpicks to make a ladder. So the Leprechaun would climb up the ladder and slide down, then follow the glittery path to the gold. But just before he reaches the gold the "ground" would slip out beneath him. We cut a square out of the box top and stuck it on with toothpicks so that it would flip over when stepped on, dropping the Leprechaun into the big box.

When Ben first got started he had a bunch of toothpicks poking up for the Leprechaun to land on. I had to remind him a few times that if he kills the Leprechaun he won't be able to get his gold! So we settled for this.

The Leprechaun lands in the bowl and can't get away because of all the toothpicks! We had a good time doing this, but didn't catch a Leprechaun. Maybe next year!

Kiddie fun!

For my turn at ABC School in March we were doing the letter 'P' - I decided to have a 'P' party! The kids got to wear their pajamas. Sarah and I almost forgot. We were all dressed for the day and remembered a few minutes before. I was glad to hear how excited the boys were about the day and how they'd looked forward to it. I hope it measured up!

We played hot potato and musical pillows. We had a p-word treasured hunt following clues like, pillow, picnic, pickle and pear. For snacks we had pretzels, popcorn, peanuts, pineapple and punch. We made a paper plate pizza for our p-page.

We colored princess and pirate masks and received a present of playdough, punch-balloons, and pop rocks. I had a good time, too!

Our other 'P' day was right after President's day so we did some fun activities with pennies and made popsicle stick puzzles. The kids got to have a new name for the day and they really had a good time coming up with them. We had Pepper, Patrick, Peach, and Panda. We also read, "If You Give a Pig a Pancake" and had pancakes for snack.

I'm in charge of the letter T and number 6 in a few weeks and haven't figured out what to do yet! Any ideas?


Benjamin and I remembered about the school's twin day the night before. Again. He called a few friends and was excited to be able to be twins with his friend Kale. They dressed as Salt and Pepper. It was an easy last minute shirt to make and then Kale got to come over and play for a bit after school.

Ben's been trying new things with his hair. He wants "cool" hair. I don't know how to cut cool hair. The night before school pictures (the spring ones) I remembered I'd wanted to take him to a salon and get his hair cut. But, by then it was too late. I cut it like I normally do. But, do you have any "cool" hairstyles for boys?