The Hansons On Tour

Is it just me?

2011-11-20T15:40:00.000-06:00

Or should we sign this kid up for some art classes? (I'm talking about the drawing vs. the painting :])

I'm a little afraid I have that 'my kid is the greatest' virus that chronically infects most parents, so really do tell me if it's just me!

Playing Catch Up

2011-11-18T15:48:00.001-06:00

I am going to be (hopefully) making some posts that should have been done this summer. But you should be aware that I am going to shamelessly back date them so I can easily find them in the future!

These trees are in a yard just down the road from us. They are gorgeous every fall and this year I managed to get a picture of them before all the leaves were gone!

Cookie Time

2011-10-20T22:52:00.000-05:00

Having decided that:

Changing one bank account to joint (how was this not done before?), closing two other bank accounts, opening a new credit card, transferring old credit card, finishing work on photos for a large important photo client that has to be done TODAY, prepping for a large, imminent craft sale (including appliqueing 50 dish clothes among other things), trying to fix an $10 account issue with the applique website, trying to finish joining phone and internet accounts (for us the landlords who are out of the country and not able to) that have old, faulty and messed up records that an hour on the phone with customer service can't fix in order to get a monthly savings of $18 and making important decisions about it that effects the landlords while I can't be talking to everyone in real time, after starting all this: totaling my car, dealing with totaling the car, fixing insurance problems and getting police records to fax for the non-guilty party, looking for a new car, and trying to be a good mom and wife

all in one week was probably a good reason to feel a little stressed, I sat down and ate a cookie. (and complained about it in a blog)

Abigail's Hello Kitty Birthday Party

2011-10-05T23:44:00.001-05:00

We had a lot of fun this year with Abigail's first 'all kids' party (which means most of the parents dropped their kids off). I put the pictures in an album and did most of the explaining there. So, click on the picture to go see them!

The Beach 2011

2011-09-20T17:02:00.001-05:00

We got to go to Destin, Florida this year. It was beautiful and relaxing!

^ click on this one to make it bigger ^

IT'S A.....

2011-09-13T16:21:00.000-05:00

GIRL!

We had a great ultrasound appointment yesterday and everything with baby girl looks great! She was moving around quite a bit and it was so fun to see her kicking her legs and moving her arms around. She did decline to turn on her side and give us a profile shot of her face, which was a little disappointing, but here is her foot and face:

Abigail is very happy that she is getting a sister and almost just as happy that she was right it is a girl- being right and winning is a very important thing these days. So now, supposedly, we can start talking about names, but don't be surprised if we don't decide for a long time. I promise when we know, we'll let you know! Abigail is currently rooting for the names Candy or Elizabeth (her good friend at school is Elizabeth, as is my friend Rachael's 7 month old, who we hang out with a lot. We also have a lot of other Elizabeths near and dear to our hearts, but they are known to Abigail by their shortened names).

One reason I am happy it is a girl is that we get to use all our cute girl clothes again. :)

Hey, we also got to go to the beach this weekend!! It was such a great time and we were so thankful to have the chance to go. We stayed in a condo in Destin, Florida, which is directly south of here but doesn't have a major highway to get Alabamians there. For some reason, they built the highway going directly to the Alabama gulf coast! :) It was a beautiful weekend (much better than the previous weekend, during which the weather was controlled by tropical storm Lee- the same storm that left us without power for three days and three nights- ugh- but we were very happy for the rain!). One of Jake's clients graciously offered us their condo for the weekend, which made the trip 100% more fun! I'll put up some pictures from the trip in the next post.

Abigail Finds Out She'll be a Sister

2011-09-13T12:14:00.000-05:00

Okay, so this happened in May I think, but here ya go:

Our Dinner Entertainment

2011-08-20T12:44:00.000-05:00

That's a grape, in case you are wondering.

My Girl

2011-08-16T21:58:00.000-05:00

A few recent pictures of Abigail

Response to the fireworks this year. I wish I had video taped her- she was ridiculously excited!

Jake convinces Abigail that she will have to sleep vertically in this bed they put in our hotel room (the rollaway). "Head up or down?" He asked.

Little bug lover and her (almost dead) leopard moth she found on the ground. I can't quite remember what she said about it, but I'm pretty sure it involved the words "precious" and maybe "little cutie?"

Ready to "jump" off the diving board at swim lessons

Daddy brought home from work one day FOUR little bitty frogs that he found and they hung out at our house for a while. They were sooooooo cute.

The missing tooth grin :)

My Guy

2011-08-16T21:42:00.000-05:00

I love this guy:

(don't worry, I didn't just invite kids to his birthday party)

And I am thankful the Lord hooked us up officially 8 years ago today!

New Family Portrait

2011-08-09T21:29:00.000-05:00

I know you've been waiting for this, so, without further ado, the family sketch, as done by Chuck E. Cheese:

Great, isn't it? One detail you may not have caught by looking at the picture is that there are FOUR people in this picture. Well, sort of "in" the picture.

That's right, I'm pregnant! We are praising and thanking the Lord for this little one, who should be joining us around February 4th, 2012 (Great birthday present for me, don't you think? The 5th is my birthday. This means I'm 14 weeks, for those of you who are counting). Abigail is very excited and is very hopeful for a little sister. She will be 5 years old and an awesome big sister! We should find out boy or girl on September 12th. So far this pregnancy has been very different (mainly, I've been much more sick this time!), but as my friends have experienced, that doesn't mean anything as far as figuring out the sex of the baby. Ah well, we'll just have to wait.

*so excited*

Special Talents Caught on Tape

2011-07-10T15:16:00.001-05:00

These are all of Abigail... sorry if you were hoping for Jake or me on video!

1. Slinky Skills

2. Tooth Teetering (warning, tooth fairy spoiler)

(this tooth officially fell out in June)

3. Swimming Success

P.S. It officially took me 3.5 hours to get these three videos off the camera, condensed and edited, and put on the blog. Now you know why I don't do it often! I'm hoping I will get the hang of it though and it will go faster.

Funny things said

2011-06-30T23:36:00.000-05:00

"Sometimes really special times I can have soda. I had soda a long time ago. About 8 inches. Not short 8, I mean long 8."

"I do want to draw a picture. It will take a long time. It will take longer than you think Mommy."

Abigail, we only change our undies in the morning. "This is the morning!" No it isn't, it's the afternoon. "Oh Mommy, you don't know what you are talking about."

"Is this chicken? I mean chicken you eat, not real chicken."

"Daddy you should call and say you can't work because it's your birthday."

Just a few pics from June

2011-06-24T23:58:00.000-05:00

Sweet girl is growing up

From a VBS that Abigail went to at Dawson Memorial Baptist Church. God built you to BEE like Jesus!

Her teachers for the week and a friend from our church

At the Barons game... can't remember what they were discussing

My handsome hubby won a pizza by yelling the loudest, goaded on heartily by his wife (you see all the people he had to beat in the background)

Guess who did this? The little person that organizes every where we go

Jake and Abigail building a book binder. The hardhat is from VBS :)

Success!

A good movie watching position

We're feeling just orangey

2011-06-06T21:12:00.000-05:00

We're feeling just ~~peachy~~ orangey

I'm tempted here to rant about the rating given to the movie Rango (see previous post), but I will just give this word of warning. What the previews do not show at all, but what consumes the movie is: cursing, lots of violence, kidnapping, racial and religious slurs, attempted suicide, large over protruding bosoms (on animals), shooting, children playing with guns, hangings, drownings (near and complete), drinking, lots of smoking, glorifying of murder, disturbingly treatment of a kidnapped female character- snake licking cheek with sexual overtones (if there were more actions like this I don't know, because I had to take Abigail out of the theater), and just a dark tone of death. It is rated PG, and we looked at trailers before going, but shame on us for not reading reviews first and trusting the rating system to be more trustworthy. Like I said, I had to take Abigail out at one point because it was so scary and disturbing, even to me! The animation is simply outstanding. But that only makes all the terrible stuff more realistic!

That reminds me of something that happened to me the other day. I was innocently driving a down a residential road that has frequent stop signs. I was behind a person who makes two stops at every sign, that's right, I said TWO. They stop at the line, roll a bit and stop again. So I was driving behind them, doing a really good job about not getting impatient- in fact my thoughts were more absorbed with trying to figure out the thinking behind this bizarre behavior. At the last stop I kind of grinned to myself thinking, well that's a two stopper, probably won't ever see that again! When it was my turn I started through the intersection, only to have the person across from me start turning left, straight toward my car, and honking at me (I feel like adding 'rather loudly' here, as if there were any other way to honk). *At this point, I stopped the car, rolled down my window and nicely informed the male driver that his turn signal wasn't working, even though I figured he just hadn't turned it on. He was thankful and we both went on our merry ways.* Okay, alright, that's what I should have done. Replace the sentence between the stars with this, the actual response: *At this point, I freaked out, stopping in the middle of the (small) intersection and quickly grew very angry, making large mouthings and throwing my arms wildly around in the universally unrecognized sign for, "TURN ON YOUR TURN SIGNAL YOU DUMMY!" And made my feelings more known by honking (rather loudly) back at the rude man. Several times, if I remember correctly. I stepped on the gas and we both went on in our hot-headed, mean-thinking ways.*

So this kind of thing always gets me thinking about Abigail and what kind of example I am to her. Obviously, I was not a very good one then. She was very curious about the matter, as you can imagine, and I was able to quickly admit my wrong in the situation. It is very humbling that my daughter thinks that everyone who does me wrong (especially while driving) is probably not a good person (wrong), and therefore, not a Christian (wrong). We have had discussions about this time and again, but mostly unfortunately, she still thinks that mostly I can do no wrong (though she has head knowledge that I do sin) and that I know everything. I know, this will change rather drastically all too soon but it doesn't change the fact that it gives great importance to my example for her now. Not only in character, but in how to drive too! I inherited a mixed bag of how to drive from my parents. My mom is a very cautious driver, sometimes too cautious, but she can definitely get out there when needed. My dad is crazy aggressive, and I believe he really does think that driving is a race, but he is definitely thinking through all the possibilities and situations: Who might suddenly change lanes, where to be that you always have an out if something unexpected happens, which route is faster, etc. So I got my mom's cautiousness (like checking over my shoulder every time, even when I know no one is there) and my dad's aggressiveness (Abigail often says driving is like a race 'though you can't race when driving' and that certain cars are slow-poke drivers). Now I just need to always remember that Abigail is learning how to drive RIGHT NOW.

But seriously, we are just peachy.

The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

2011-05-27T23:34:00.000-05:00

Good

Bad

Ugly

Joplin, MO (AP Photo/Mike Schiefelbein)

5ish observations about the tornadoes

2011-05-20T23:08:00.001-05:00


Tuscaloosa, AL REUTERS/Marvin Gentry

Click here to see a few of my pics of Pleasant Grove, northwest of Birmingham

#1A. As gmail and firefox have continually reminded me and thankfully finally taught me, tornadoes is spelled with an 'e' in it. #1B. Apparently, tornadoes can cause bouts of unbloggyness, as confirmed by me.

#2. When tragedies happen, whether they are snow storms, hurricanes, tsunamis, earthquakes or tornadoes, normal things still happen. People still have babies and get kidney stones, even if the power is out and the hospital is running on generators. For some reason, this is hard to believe in the moment.

#3. God is amazing and works through His people. I have personally met 3 people from New York that have come to volunteer their time to help, but hear about others coming from all around the country. God had laid it on the heart of these particular people to come, help, and tell others about Him. I have read several stories on the Samaritan's Purses website of victims coming to know Jesus through this, which has been our prayer. Many that were in the path of the storm are telling their amazing stories and of their confidence in God's mercy through it. Jake wrote an interesting blog about this and his experience the first weekend helping tarp roofs and cut up trees, go read it here

#4. Bad things are very easy to forget about when they happen to other people. Today Abigail and I went to the toy store we usually visit to get presents for birthday parties. It is in Cahaba Heights, which had an EF2 tornado go through it Wednesday morning, April 27th. This store and the ones next to it were closed for a while as the awnings were blown off, I don't think anything more serious happened, but the neighborhood around it had a fair amount of damage. We walked out of the store and our view was of dead and dying trees, tarps on roofs, sawdust all over the streets, and debris all around. For some reason, it took me by surprise. Yes, we did just drive past it and we did just go to some of the hardest hit areas to deliver boxes of toys for children who lost their homes. But when you have a relatively normal shopping experience and you are surrounded by stuff and all things of this world (including a clothing boutique selling toddler's swimsuits at $50 plus dollars- oh, they were on a sidewalk sale for 55% off though which makes them closer to $25. I'm sure my eyebrows looked like they were on top of my head) and then you are faced with the reality of hurt in this world, it just shocks you. Well, it shocked me anyway.

Also, we have found that some people don't really want to hear about what happened. Well, they want to hear at first, but they don't want us saying a lot more about it. Either that, or they have a better story to tell us in the attitude of "that's nothing, listen to this." We can identify with this through experience, it is kind of a downer, isn't it? And of course, tragedy is not the only thing happening in the world, other people have lives of equally important goings on. We hope that this experience will teach us how to properly be on both ends of these conversations to be a witness to Christ and an encouragement to His people.

#5. It is interesting to see children react to tragedy and unusual circumstances. I believe with people helping children work through their thoughts and emotions, these experiences will often lead to growth. Most of the children I know are still too little to comprehend everything. As we have had the opportunity to go to several of the areas that were hit, I have enjoyed hearing what Abigail has had to say. At first, and I believe still, she didn't understand why we were looking, why this is such a big deal. Why are we taking video and pictures, why are we helping? Our challenge has been to try and answer these questions for someone who doesn't have the life experience we do!

The day of the storms, when we got our 'safe place' ready (as these terrible storms were predicted since the week before) her main priority was to get as many of her precious items in the little closet downstairs as she could talk me into. I managed to head most of them off, but this was definitely another fun adventure for her. Usually, we are the people who are upset that the weather reports are taking over our TV shows. We make fun of the weather guys and wish they would tell us the weather report faster and be done with it. But on wednesday we walked around all afternoon and evening with our battery radio, ears bent to hear of the news from around the state, shushing Abigail often so we could hear.

We lost power for two days, others near us for 5, and our friends in another part of the state for over a week. So Abigail and her friends know all about 'tricity' and how it is not always a given. Abigail's friend Jonathan still walks into stores and says with surprise, "They have power!" When I went to Tuscaloosa last week, we drove by some of the areas hit with the EF4 tornado that went through there and all the way up through Birmingham. Abigail had only seen the parts of town hit by smaller tornadoes and when we drove past these areas and she saw through the rain what had happened there, she said these things, among others, "Look at that damage. It's at my FAVORITE place! Awwwww! [burger king? what?]", "Wow that's a hundred trees damaged! AND houses! And people.", "Some houses are getting really old when they crashed down.", "Why did the bad tornado rip up people's homes?", "I've never seen this before! I only saw trees falling down the other times we saw damage." and "I'm really hungry, when are we going to eat?"

Often now when we drive by construction, old trees or old houses, Abigail thinks it was caused by the tornado. She's not alone, I found myself looking for days at the debris along the road, thinking, "I wonder if that is from the tornado or if it just fell of someone's truck." We hear lots of debris stories too, of clothing from the Old Navy in Tuscaloosa found in a yard in Birmingham (confirmed by the tags) and family photos and checks found in the next state. Jake found a piece of for sure debris while doing yardwork - a VHS called "14 Wealth Building Strategies You Can Use Today." Here is some interesting debris info from al.com:

"Government workers, private contractors and volunteers have cleared about 10 percent of the wreckage left by storms that pounded Alabama last month, officials said Thursday.

They now estimate the storms littered the state with 10 million cubic yards of debris -- a massive amount that would create a stack as big as a football field and standing a mile high, said Art Faulkner, the director of the Alabama Emergency Management Agency."

#6. With around 312 tornadoes in the states in the April 26-28th outbreak and 339 deaths, this storm has set several new records. We have learned a bit about the EF scale for rating tornadoes. It is based mostly on estimated wind speed, which is determined by the destruction it leaves behind. Alabama had every level of tornado in the state that day. To help you understand, here is the EF scale in pictures. This guide is on Our Amazing Planet and features pictures from all over the states. Note that as little as an EF1 tornado can flip a mobile home. People staying in their mobile homes has been attributed for many of the deaths in the northeast part of Alabama. Here is a ranking of the deadliest tornado outbreaks in the US from the National Weather Service. Note the years, the top 6 (besides this year) were before the modern tornado warning systems were developed. Please continue to pray for Alabamians and everyone else effected by these storms and flooding!

DEADLIEST US TORNADO OUTBREAKS:

RANK    DATE(S)          OUTBREAK NAME                                                 FATALITIES

1              3/18/1925       TRI-STATE TORNADO OUTBREAK                                 747+
2              4/4-5/1936      TUPELO-GAINESVILLE TORNADO OUTBREAK*         454
3              3/28/1920        PALM SUNDAY 1920 OUTBREAK*                                 380+
4             4/25-28/2011    SOUTHERN STATES OUTBREAK SEQUENCE*            339
5             3/21-22/1932    DEEP SOUTH OUTBREAK*                                              330+
6             4/23-25/1908    DIXIE OUTBREAK*                                                           324
7             4/1-4/1974        SUPER OUTBREAK SEQUENCE*                                    319
8             5/27-28/1896    ST LOUIS/EAST ST LOUIS OUTBREAK                          305
9             4/11-12/1965    PALM SUNDAY OUTBREAK 1965                                  256
10           6/7-9/1952        FLINT-WORCESTER OUTBREAK SEQUENCE              247

*INDICATES OUTBREAK AFFECTED ALABAMA.
NOTE: TORNADO FATALITY NUMBERS FOR 2011 ARE STILL PRELIMINARY.

taken from: http://www.srh.noaa.gov/bmx/?n=climo_2011torstats

"I'm NOT grumpy"...and neither am I

2011-04-24T22:14:00.001-05:00

So, I know my wife is so funny...but I thought I would share this one. The regular act will be back soon.
Last night, I was trying to get Abigail to bed (yes, after doing 'something special' and staying up later reading or something as my wife has pointed out in previous posts). Abigail was throwing a bit of a fit over something, and so I explained we could not read any story tonight because "you are being grumpy." And then she got the look on this video below and said, "I am NOT grumpy. I'm never grumpy." She was sticking to her guns, so I thought I would take out my smart phone and take a video of her. This time with a bit of a smirk. Here it is:

People keep saying that Abigail is just like her mom...but could I just get one attribute that is like me? The grumpy one?
It reminds me a bit of the Christmas gift my parents once got me with a scroogey like duck on the front and the words, "I don't have an attitude." Never wore it out, though I did wear it as pajamas for a few years.
The next year, I thought it only fair to give my dad "The Grinch Who Stole Christmas." He didn't think it was that funny. Maybe I got the grumps from him. But we all know where Abigail got it from...yours truly. (The stubbornness and persistence are from mom).

5 things about 4.5 year olds

2011-04-22T17:56:00.000-05:00

Perhaps 4.5 year old girls in particular. These are things we ~~read in a book about 4 year olds~~ know by experience.

But first of all, let me say that today is Good Friday. The day about 2000 years ago that the Good and Righteous God Man sacrificed himself for us, in love for us. Why did He have to die? Well, I heard a sermon this week that addressed that very question and I thought it was pretty good. It is about 20 minutes long if you want to listen to it, I hope it will bless you. Click here to listen. Click here to download it for your mp3 player.
It is called "Reflections on the Crucifixion of Jesus Christ" and is preached by Jake Hanson.

Back to 4.5 year olds...

They are old enough to:
1. Fill all the plastic Easter eggs for playgroup all by themselves.
2. Draw beautiful pictures of Easter eggs, all out of their heads.*
3. Convince their father on almost any night of the week to do something special- like play wii or go to the park or get a treat (donuts, ice cream or hot chocolate in particular) or just stay up late reading together.
4. Go put a letter in the mail box at the post office while their mom stands in line for other other postage. (Yes Grandma, within sight the whole time!)
5. Work the system to their advantage.*

They are not old enough to:
1. Remember and see the caterpillar box on the floor where they just put it, right where they are about to walk.*
2. Remember to pick up off the middle of the floor (right where their parents walk) their very special shell that they tenderly wash and love every day.*
3. Keep one outfit on the whole day.
4. Know they shouldn't ask a grown man, who is not their father, to tickle their mother.
5. Lose gracefully.*

*******************************

The Fine Print

2. I admit, this is one of those unabashedly "look at how smart my kid is" proud moments:

5. To be explained in a later post... as if it needed to be. But it does have to do with this:

1. Somehow Abigail knocked over the caterpillar cage when it was on the floor. The cage is almost as tall as her knees, so I'm not quite sure how it landed upside-down with enough force to crack the top in several places and spread dirt all over the floor and a little bit on the table and chair. This all happened just outside of my view and very quickly. It was followed by a brief moment of silence than then huge tears of worry for the little caterpillar, who somehow survived it's bath and had made itself a cocoon on the roof of the cage. Abigail is old enough to lie to try and stay out of trouble, but not old enough for us to not be able to tell by her eyes. She sticks to her story and the CSI team cannot put the pieces together. I guess it will be a cold case. In the mean time, we're not sure of the effects on the caterpillar/moth. We'll have to wait the three weeks to see if he comes out.

2. Said shell came from her archeological endeavors at my parent's house. It is frequently washed, along with several plastic gems and a marble, with soap and water- ever since Abigail found out about jewelry cleaner and I wouldn't let her use it for her gems. Unfortunately one parent, who shall not be named, stepped on the shell and broke it during one of our 18 hour power outages these past two weeks.

5. A bit competitive, I think. ANYtime she loses, she whines, "AHH! I NEVER win!" We're trying to fix that attitude...

*******************************

Jonathan came over one afternoon and they had fun playing together again. Jonathan looks suspiciously taller than Abigail in this pictures, but I'm thinking he had his shoes on and Abigail didn't.

Ants, Ants, and Caterpillar

2011-04-13T19:23:00.001-05:00

I'm afraid this post is rather buggy.

Here is an updated look at our ant farm (click here for a previous picture, it's at the bottom). For the past few weeks they have made no new tunnels, instead concentrating their efforts on trying to get off the farm. They have spent days trying to cut through the hard plastic at the top corner of the box, to no avail. Yes, it is kind of sad. No, we will not let them go. We got a warning on the instructions that came with the ants saying, "IT IS ILLEGAL TO RELEASE LIVE..*something something*... INTO THE WILD." They're from California anyway, I bet they wouldn't like Alabama. Plus, I read somewhere else that released harvester ants can cause structural destruction to buildings! Oh wait, when I looked today they have started a little side tunnel.

Remember the lame amaryllis that I got from WalMart? Turns out it came with another present. I had been looking up how to take care of amaryllises, trying to decide if I should try to keep it through the year and tend to it carefully enough that it would bloom again at the end of the year or next spring. I think the majority of me knew that it probably wouldn't work out- not only do they take up a lot of room when their leaves grow so huge, but what if we moved? And what about the nasty raccoon that likes to uproot all of our plants outside? But that part of me that admires gardeners, the part of me that wanted to show everyone I could do it and wanted to satisfaction of seeing the beautiful blooms again hung on. So the website that instructed me how to care for amaryllis bulbs sat up on my web browser for several days in silent suspense as to what my decision would be.

In the mean time, we started seeing some teensy ants showing up on the table we keep most of our indoor plants on. We couldn't figure out where they came from. One morning we came down and there were about 75 of them walking around. AHH! So, after sending those little gals to a quick end, I decided it was time to uproot the amaryllises. So outside we went and dumped out all the dirt. Guess what? My walmart Amaryllis, the one with the dried up dirt thing that expands when you put water in it? It came with it's own colony of ant eggs. After we dumped most of the dirt out Abigail said, "Wow, that's full of lots of ants!" I looked at it and didn't see anything, but when I looked closer and longer, the whole thing was crawling with tiny ants! And some of the eggs hadn't hatched yet. I think I made a good decision, but I'm wondering- where did those ants come from, don't they know it's illegal to travel across states like that? Now they live in our backyard! I hope that they don't wreak any havoc.

Abigail and Daddy looking for the penny she buried for him for a "birthday gift" This is where we later dumped our dirt from the pots, so it's not completely random.

We have a new pet at our house- a caterpillar. Abigail didn't learn her lesson about washing bugs I guess, because I came in from outside today to find her washing the caterpillar. Poor little guy. To be honest, I'm not entirely sure it will live through the experience. I hope she understands now that it's not the best for bugs AND we do NOT want her to do it! I believe this is an Eastern Tent Caterpillar, which turns into a moth and is considered a pest.

Oh, and, as promised, here is a link to picture of my dish mat when it still lived at Betsy's house. Isn't it pretty?

Day in the Life of My Sweetie

2011-04-10T16:53:00.000-05:00

The little one. This started as a project to give Abigail a visual as to what a 'day' is. She's having problems with that, she feels like the morning and the afternoon are two different days. I guess she just has a problem with the definition of 'day.'

I picked a Friday, which is the day we don't have a weekly activity planned. And the breakfast pic is not the same day, because I forgot to take the breakfast one that Friday :). So she only changed clothes on time that day (normal for her). Click on it if you want to make it bigger!

Our Home

2011-04-08T11:36:00.001-05:00

I have decided that the following is true for me.

If one has a small business run out of the home, they can also be a:
1. stay at home mom or
2. stay at home maid
But not both. And I'm horrible at the maid part all by itself anyway.

That said, here are five things that you will almost always find in our home if you were to just happen by.
1. A craft or two or three out and in the works, sometimes for err.... weeks (yes, that's my crafts, not counting Abigails)
2. Random stuff on the stairs. These things are waiting to go upstairs to be put away. This habit, by the way, used to drive me crazy when I first met Jake and saw him doing it. It doesn't help that I'm the only one who takes things up the stairs most of time- that means I haven't trained my family members to do it yet. Novel idea!
3. Leaves on the floor. This does bother me quite a bit, but not enough to clean it up every time I see it. With a tree right outside our front door and Jake working hard all day in a job that involves leaves, they always end up in our house. And cleaning them up right away doesn't help because they'll be back a day later at most.
4. Stacks of books/papers. Either on a table somewhere or stacked crazy on a shelf. No comment.
5. Bugs in jars. Contained to the kitchen, unless one sneaks out in a forgetful girl's arms.

The other day Abigail came in from the backyard and asked if she could wash her earthworm. Just a liiittttllle bit, so they don't drown. The hopeful/excited/glee look in her face promised a crushed little girl if I said no. Ahhhh.... I think. One worm? A few drops? "Okay" I say. A few minutes later I start listening to her from the bathroom. "Hush. HUSH! no." Facet turns on, drip drip, turns off. "Hush!" Drip, drip. I start thinking this is something I should see, so I head over to the bathroom to see not one, but 4 or 5 earthworms of different lengths squirming on our hand towel on the floor. ~~I did get a picture of this, but regrettably deleted it when I thought it I had put it on the computer, but hadn't~~. FOUND IT! It was one of those, ohmygosh how funny and wrong moments where you get the camera, take a picture, and then address how wrong their behavior was. Well the worms were clean, but not clean enough in my thoughts for the hand towel, so the towel went to be cleaned and I explained to Abigail that though it was fun to wash the worms, we weren't going to do it again.

Making Easter (kinda) Cookies

2011-04-03T22:04:00.002-05:00

The day upon which I learned that 4 years old is not old enough to leave alone with the sprinkles.

Yesterday we made some cookies. Also yesterday, Jake found a four leaf clover! I can hear you now, "nuh-uh!" To which I say, "Yeah-huh!" We were puttering about in the backyard, I was pulling weeds, Abigail was inspecting all the wonderful little things of this world, Jake... I'm not sure what Jake was doing. Abigail wants to know if this little bunch of clovers is a weed. Jake tell here that yes, they are and starts telling her about four leaf clovers. She says, let's look for one! He's all like, nahh... we're not going to find one. I've never found one in my life. They're like one in a million. She pleads some more. He hesitates and protests. She pleads more. Daddy assesses the situation and sees that there are only about 30 clovers and relents. A second later I hear him saying, I FOUND ONE! I say, yeah right. He pauses and continues, I FOUND ONE! Me: Whatever. But my curiosity kicks in and I go over to look. Yes, he found a four leaf clover in our back yard. Jake and I were all excited, it being the first real one we've seen (yes, we know probably about half of you have found one) and we're taking pictures and stuff and Abigail was watching us trying to figure out why we're so excited- her first experience with clovers is that finding a four leaf one in a tiny sampling is easy to do! So now we are pressing the clover and deciding what to do with it later. That was fun.

That afternoon we were planning on making the cookies, we had made the dough the day before and we were ready to cut them out. Last week my friend Mary gave us a bunch of cookie cutters she didn't need anymore, over doubling our cutter collection. Ever since then Abigail has been very keen on using them. So anyway, we cut out the cookies using a variety of seasonal cutters, including a four leaf clover (how appropriate), snowflakes, gingerbread people, angels, a mitten, several pigs, teddy bears, owls, and some Easter related ones too. Then last night Abigail and I frosted and decorated a lot of them, doing the rest today. I left Abigail unsupervised for some, and those cookies definitely turned into a pile of sugar. But "It's okay, Daddy can eat them."

Making cookies attire. My mom made Abigail this very cute apron that matches the one for she made for me, but is was dirty at the time.

Another shout out- those cookie cutters are drying on a beautiful quilted drying towel that Betsy made me for my birthday. Too bad you can't see it very well... I foresee a picture of the towel in my blog's future.

soooo excited!

Some of these awesome frosting colors are from the special neon food dye Courtney gave me for Christmas, Thanks Court!

*pile of sugar*

Proud of Myself

2011-03-30T15:26:00.000-05:00

I am really proud of myself.
Last night we had grilled cheese and tomato soup for dinner and I:

1. Did not boil the soup over. Believe it or not, the last three times I have made tomato soup it boiled over. Did I forget about the soup again this time? Yes. But I planned ahead for my forgetfulness (How hard it is to remember one thing out of two in such a simple meal? Really hard for me, evidently), I did not put a lid on, put it on the back burner and had it really low. Was it cold? Well... no, I turned it up in time.

2. Successfully tested a theory I had: One can cut three warm sandwiches at one time with a metal spatula without compromising the integrity of the triangle shape or shifting the bread and cheese to a non directly-on-top-of-each-other state. Woo hoo!

Go ahead and applaud, you need'nt be embarassed!