May, part 1

We were asked to come help clean the church building one Saturday.  I wasn't able to do any of the work, so instead I pointed out spots for the girls, carried a few pieces of paper towel for them to swap out, and took pictures (of course).

The last week of school: crazy hair day!  After Halloween we picked up several cans of colored hair-spray for about $0.25 each on clearance.  Best idea ever.  It was fast, easy, and very fun for crazy hair day.

Author's Day at school, where the girls get to share their portfolio of writing from the year.

The last day of school I waited for the girls to get home on the bus.  They each got some balloons to celebrate.  6 for Kate since she's going into 6th grade, 4 for Lizzie, and 2 for Sabrina.

...and, of course, more pictures.

In case Kate ever decides her mom and dad *aren't* cool, here's proof that she once did.  Also, a clematis bloom off the vine out back; Lizzie and Sabrina trying out the unfinished dog houses at Home Depot; Sabrina making slippers for her cousin Eliza L's birthday.

Going into summer was wonderful.  I love having the girls home.  And I *really* love not having to wake up to an alarm, make sack lunches 5 days a week, or be responsible for signing homework packets and reading logs.  Huge sigh of relief to have 10 weeks off!

February 2013

 February was a flurry of ice, snow, and pain.  There were a few delightful highlights, though.

One benefit of lots of cold and snow, is that it makes the perfect opportunity to try out snow sculpturing.  The girls made this snow dog in our yard.

I enjoy working with the 8-12 year old girls from church.  We arranged a Daddy/Daughter Dinner in February.  We served breakfast for dinner and played some fun games.  I was in charge of decorations.  We decorated with blue, white, and silver and snow.  Pompoms strung on invisible thread, silver glitter mixed with epsom salts in vases holding up pipe cleaner stems for tissue paper snowflakes (cut by the girls), snowflake table scatter shapes, etc.  It's wonderful to see the girls with a father, uncle, brother, or friend who they love.

Since Sabrina is our youngest, this is the last year for me to see the 1st graders production of "The Little Engine that Could".  Sabrina was chosen to be a narrator.  It is done entirely in choral readings / recitings.  The narrators do most of the talking, so they got to read it from a folder.  She loved it.  Especially the poster-paints she got to use for the "costume"

Around this time I took over sorting, scanning, and captioning photos from my mom's house.  There are quite a lot, many of which I don't remember having ever seen before!  Ginger was very suspicious of the scanner, though.  She often stayed handy and occasionally growled at the box that seemed to growl back.

December (part 1)

 Fun new stockings and festive poinsettias:

Picking out a Christmas tree.  Though we ended up with three instead of one.  A tiny one went to work with Michael, the middle sized one lived in the great room on the homework table, and the regular sized one in the family room.  It was a fairly mild evening at the tree lot and smelled wonderful.

Before leaving we did stop momentarily by the fire in a big metal drum to warm our fingers.

Kate, Lizzie, and Sabrina took care of the tree decorating downstairs again this year.  It was cheerful and festive well into February... or March?  (The beginning of the year kinda flew by.)

Alternating sunshine and below zero temperatures led to epic icicles this year across the porch on the west side of the house.  The largest one morphed from stalactite to column!

Shopping at the mall as a family.

The girls were very excited to take part in "Ugly Sweater Day" at school.  I found some base sweaters at the thrift store and picked up some random things at the dollar store.  The girls got to go to town with needle and thread, hot glue guns, etc.  Kate's even had a battery operated line of Christmas lights decorating a tree made of ribbon.  Sabrina loved her sweater (poncho) so much she carefully removed the ornaments afterward so she can wear it again!

We shared a huge Hershey's Kiss.  It was hilarious watching Kate and Lizzie try to get decent sized bites off the thing!  Sabrina was missing both front teeth, so she finally gave up and got hers trimmed off with a paring knife.

Lizzie's 3rd grade Christmas Program!  She even got to play the ukulele for one of the pieces.  Sabrina entertained herself, as the program started to get kinda long, by coloring pictures.  Including the freaky yellow skinned monster!

 Feeling like Christmas at home!

Snow piled up around town all winter, and was reluctant to melt off.  The fellow who does snow sculptures nearby did some great work!  The top right one was specially for the so called "Mayan Apocalypse" on 12/21/12.  If it had actually happened I suppose I wouldn't have to catch up here ;)

 The church (ward) Christmas party included a program my the children.  Lizzie is the shepherd on the right in a blue gown.

by this time the countdown until the holidays was in full force!

Happy Halloween

All three girls chose characters from "Doctor Who".  Sabrina dressed up as the 10th Doctor (played by David Tennant), Lizzie dressed up at Rose Tyler (the 9th and 10th Doctor's companion), and Kate dressed up as a Dalek (the nemesis of The Doctor).
Sabrina was very concerned that the 10th Doctor has brown hair, and she really does not.  So I promised to get some brown hair spray for her hair.  Unfortunately the brown turned out burgundy!  So I added some black.  (Spoiler alert: the sprays stained her hair and she had pink streaks in her hair for 6 weeks!)
In this pic Kate was tacking some stuff on her costume after wearing it to school and before going Trick or Treating.
Also note the sonic screwdriver :)

School parade:

The 5th and 6th grade performs The Thriller every year after the costume parade.  Kate memorized the dance really well so she got to be front and center.  It's very funny watching a dalek do the Thriller.

After school I drove the girls to daddy's office.

The office was thoroughly decorated, including black lights.

the teenage boy across the street enjoys playing the part of a child-teasing zombie.  Sabrina finally decided the candy was worth the obvious trap.

then the 3 girls together made a plan.  Sabrina played the part of the distraction while the other girls grabbed the loot.

top right: the loot was totally worth it!
I moved the big recliner from the living room to the front porch where I sat with my computer.  I turned on the Phantom of the Opera and passed out candy from under my heated blanket.
I spent all afternoon getting dressed up.  I took a shower AND did my hair AND put on makeup.  I'm pretty sure nobody recognized me.

Skipping back to the office, the Salem City civic trick-or-treating was in the parking lot outside Daddy's office, so we went around there too.  Then the girls left notes and drawings on the boards at the office as usual.

See?  I told you Sabrina's hair was tinted pink afterward.  She can totally pull it off.

Soccer, berry picking, soccer spaghetti, field trips, dentist visits, carnival, tooth fairy, and women's conference!

Okay, so we got Andrew home from his mission, all three girls back to school, and some of our fall soccer season.  Next up: 

Soccer Pictures (we skipped the packages and I took picture of the girls instead.  Way more fun!)

Raspberry picking (It's so much more exciting with a two year old and a baby!  Actually M. did an awesome picking berries and was absolutely delighted to discover real reindeer on the other side of this fence!)

More soccer.  Including eating spaghetti out of thermoses because that was the only way to avoid yet another night of Little Caesars Hot-N-Ready $5 pepperoni pizza.  Other parents were jealous of our real meal, naturally.

First grade field trip!  We went to the fire station, bank, library, and post office, followed by lunch at a park.  And then I slept for a week.  Phew!

Dental cleanings / check-ups for Lizzie and Sabrina.  Lizzie: 8 cavities, Sabrina: 7 cavities -- 6 of which require pulpotomies (root canal on a baby tooth).  (*breathing slowly into a paper bag*)

School Carnival!  The girls got their hair sprayed pink!!!  (I did it ahead of time at home.  Smart mama!).

I'm always impressed at the way these girls can scale a rock climbing wall.

 *side note -- while waiting in line an obnoxious older boy kept trying to sneak ahead in line.  Lizzie politely, but firmly, put him in his place.  Despite the fact that she didn't even come up to his shoulder!  It was excellently done on her part.

Lizzie lost a tooth and left this note to the tooth fairy:

 "Dear Tooth Fairy, Here is a tooth for you.  Please, before you leave, leave some evidence so I know you exist.  (P.S. Use pencil above).  Love, Elizabeth"
"This pencil is so very large for a little fairy like me!  Thank you for the tooth, Elizabeth.  Love, Your Tooth Fairy"
Apparently she believes again.

For the General Women's Conference, Mom and I went to watch with Michelle at her place.  It was very relaxing to sit together and listen to the words of such inspired leaders.  Little J was enthralled.  He sat for several minutes just staring at the speakers!

I believe this takes us through the end of September.  Life is good.

Our Favorite Things 2012

  

First Day of School 2012-2013

This summer seemed to just fly by.  In no time at all we went from spending days at the library and visiting with cousins to getting back on a decent sleep schedule and preparing for soccer.  I'm exceedingly grateful that all three girls still love school.  They were excited to go back and spend time with friends and learn new things (no, seriously!).  Sabrina filled out an "about me" paper at the open house.  It asked what her favorite thing is about school.  Her answer?  Homework.  I'm not even making this up.  She was sad that she doesn't get her first homework packet until tomorrow.  Of course, I remember hoarding times tests and grammar sheets to play school during the summer, so I guess it's just in her blood ;)

Sabrina and Lizzie still look more like twins than older / younger sister.  In fact, Sabrina's teacher assumed Lizzie was a friend tagging along since she looked the same age.  You also can't see it, but Sabrina's shirt has a silver butterfly on it.  I made them each a shirt with their own symbol on it.  Daisy for Kate, sunshine for Lizzie, and butterfly for Sabrina.  Three of the prettiest, happiest things I can think of.

Monday night the girls each got a chance to take a bubble bath in my huge tub, then I painted their fingernails and toenails.  As shown in the bottom right picture, above.

 Michael stayed home "late" so he could walk the girls to the bus stop.  Fortunately I'm not the only mamarazzi.  There were nearly a dozen mothers with various cameras and recording implements.  We were waiting on the wrong side of the street, so when the bus stopped the kids all ran across.  (Upper right corner, below).  Lizzie was on the bus before I got to the right side of the street to get a picture.

There's something about a bright yellow bus and "early" morning sunshine that chokes me up a little.  Probably to do with the fact that it keeps carting my children off!

Michael ended up working from home all day.  We went out to breakfast together (well, ran through a drive through since we were short on time).  I finished baking brownies, went visiting teaching, ran errands and did some shopping, ran back out because I'd forgotten the flowers, and got home just in time for us to go back to the bus stop to pick the girls up.  I have met the girls at the end of the first day of school every year with flowers.  It's a good thing I didnt' forget them this year.  They were expected!  I also cut out brownies with a heart shaped cookie cutter (also for VT because it was a birthday) and the girls got fancy after-school treats.

It is impossible to properly show (though if I slowed the shutter speed down a bit you might get a better idea) how very many words were coming out of the girls' mouths at such a great rate!  (Side note: that top left picture above makes me laugh.  Kate appears to be levitating off the bus!).  They all loved their classes, their teachers, their friends, and so on.  All in all, a very successful first day!

One more note: I was talking to Sabrina that evening about her first long day at school.  I was asking about lunch and how much she ate and where she sat..  She was relating to me how excited she was to see someone who was sitting alone.  I couldn't figure out who it was, though obviously she expected me to understand.  I finally understood.  Sabrina had walked into the cafeteria, looked for someone to sit with, and seen one of the aides for the special ed students sitting alone.  She said that [the aide] looked lonely so she asked if she could sit by her.  Then Sabrina went on about all the great friends who came to sit at the table too.  All special ed students with varying physical and/or mental disabilities.  She thought one boy might be blind because he poured his juice over his corn, then in retrospect mused that perhaps he just didn't realize that it wouldnt' taste very good.  It was absolutely delightful to hear her talking so comfortably and lovingly about these students, using their names and everything.  This is a part of Sabrina I have seen before (can you see why I represent her with a butterfly?) and hope she never loses.  She loves people no matter how they may be different from her.

I'm so glad my girls are happy with school!  We've made it through one full week now.  They're long since asleep, getting ready for another new week.  Bring on the homework!