Coal for Christmas?

Last weekend we went out for dinner and then walked around the mall for a bit. First stop was the American Girl store...holy cow. That's all I really have to say about that store, and that it was totally awesome. While walking in the mall we noticed that Santa's workshop was all set up and the sign read that he would be arriving the next day! Holy cow again. So, of course Annie was wide awake bright and early the next morning begging to go see Santa. Tim wasn't up for it and so it was up to me to create the distraction.

Annie - Let's go, let's go, let's go see Santa!!!
Me - Well, it's not even Thanksgiving yet.
Annie - Huh?
Me - Well, the weeks before Thanksgiving...see only bad kids go to see Santa before Thanksgiving. They met to work out agreements to see if they can get off the naughty list in time for Christmas.
Annie - Oh, well...I don't want to see him today then! I'm a good girl!

She hasn't mentioned Santa since. I wonder how long I can continue to make up stories to avoid things. What can I say? It's fun for me plus it works! I guess I forgot to mention that the "packrat" came to our house last week and ate all the Halloween candy....well, they did leave their candy bucket on the floor right there for the snacking on.

Hola Senorita?

The girls go to a Spanish class at school each Monday and Friday. Annie has picked up quite a few animal names, colors, and numbers. Olivia surprised us the other night by counting to 10 in Spanish. I think they are starting to talk about holidays in their class because both of the girls are especially smitten by the phrase "Feliz Navidad". While I was putting Annie to bed last night, she made me promise that I would go downstairs and write the phrase down on a note. I'm not sure why, but I did it for her. Probably because she never forgets making those requests and if I hadn't written it down, it would come back to me in a few weeks. Just a few minutes ago, Olivia asked me to say Merry Christmas in Spanish....after I said it, in my very best "acento español", she said..."no no no, it goes like Police Flappeda". I'm not sure she would fair very well south of the border.

Halloween!

These photos were stuck in our camera for the last week...then last night Tim discovered something stuck to the contact points of our camera's memory card that was gumming up the works. I few seconds of cleaning up the card and voila!, let there be Halloween photos.

Here are the girls in their Mermaid costumes that Nana whipped up for them. I made the crowns with some sea shells and leave it to Annie to lose her crown the day before trick or treat. I looked everywhere for that thing...finally found it in the basement storage room, inside the baby cradle under a bunch of blankets. It's always in the last place you look, and I cannot believe I thought to look there. It was missing one of the shells, but a few drops of superglue fixed that and almost fixed my fingers to the crown (whoops!) Olivia made it around half the block before deciding to call it a night and hung out with me on the front porch to pass out our candy to the neighborhood kids. Annie made it around our block and the next block down...I cannot believe how much candy she ended up with!

Annie's way of thinking

Annie has had a few interesting ideas come into her head tonight. After dinner, we all had a little bowl of ice cream. When I was done with mine, she leaned over and asked "Who ever heard of ice cream that comes with a kiss?" Then she gave me a little peck on the cheek. How sweet is that? Olivia heard this and leaned over and asked me the same question, but she gave me a big slobbery kiss right smack on the lips.

Later in the evening, I was looking for a misplaced item and usually when things get misplaced around our house I loose my temper. I'm not very proud of this trait, and it's something I'm trying to stop, but sometimes it happens. Well, tonight I didn't yell or slam doors, or scare Bailey...I just walked around a little more aggressively than I normally would. Finally, I found what I was looking for and sat down exclaiming "Well, I did pretty good keeping myself under control there!" Annie replied by asking "How do you keep yourself under control with out a remote controller?" Hmmm, maybe that is what I need! Anyone know where can I get a personal remote controller???

A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To The Gym...

A story, as told to me by Tim...

Last week, we drove to the gym and parked close to some sort of asphalt roadway equipment, which stunk like roadway asphalt. Annie jumped out of the truck and exclaimed "Let's get out of here! This stink is going to make my boogers taste bad!"

Funny Stuff.

BIG NEWS!!!

Drum roll please.....

After one year and 4 days of Tim being a full time stay at home Dad....he's decided to make a career move and get back to engineering!

My only complaint is that he has had one year and 4 days to paint our new doors but has yet to finish them all. Oh well, I guess you can't always get what you want. Although he doesn't start until next Tuesday so I guess he has a few more days to make a last ditch effort to get this job done.

Congrats Daddy! I know Olivia is not going to like being seperated from him, she's grown into quite the Daddy's Girl over the last year.

Art!

Last week held a lot of art enrichment for us girls. First I attended a painting session with a girlfriend and created this "masterpiece". My only regret is that I wasn't exactly following the painting that everyone else was and didn't realize that middle ground flowers should have been painted before foreground, so I had to leave those out, but you live and learn I guess. My next one will be twice as good...maybe. Here is my painting.


And here is the painting the teacher was leading most other people in...



I also had Tim and the girls help with painting some of the equipment the bridge group was using in our office putt-putt fund raiser. Tim splatter painted a return box and Annie fell in love with how beautiful it was. Incidentally, I fared very well in the putt-putt challenge - first place ya'll! And our hole was voted second best, loosing out to a Halloween themed hole. Whatever, it's not even Halloween yet. Anywho, here is a photo of our putt-putt hole.


Since Annie thought the splatter painted box was so great, I decided to let her and Olivia have a go at it. Super fun! And as soon as I remember to buy more paint (we ran out soon after Olivia decided to smear it all over her body), we are definitely going to do it again.