Rare Moment Caught on Film

This rare creature in the orange stripes, playfully dubbed by locals, the "Domestic Goddess" is seen here with her cubs on the verge of memorializing the date of birth for her youngest.  In an unexpected turn of events, the mother's ears turn erect as she hears a call from a distant plain.  Instead of employing her cat-like reflexes to stay her hand and continue this long-awaited ceremony without delay, she allows this call to draw her focus from this most important moment.  Note the elongated, downward pointed shapes displayed on the faces of her cubs.

(Guest Post by Dan!)

Apple Day!

Delaney's kindergarten class had "Apple Day" and all the families were invited to attend.  It was pandemonium!  There were 6 different tables for the kids to do an apple themed activity and they spent 15 minutes at each station.  Delaney had a marvelous time.

Here she is making her apple sun catcher. 

Yep, having a great time.  She was happy to do the projects and to let me chat away with the other moms. 

 They got to sample green apples and red apples here.  They decided which taste they preferred and made a chart about it.  Cute.  And tasty!

 Delaney is showing me her sun catcher and her "10 Apples Up On Top" projects.

 This is how Rylee entertained herself.  Well, this was after I let her run around and she ran out of the classroom while I was gabbing away and it was pure coincidence that a mom who knew who she was found her roaming the school and brought her back.  Yeah, that's how I roll.  She had a lot of fun with the flannel board though so now I know where to park her next time!

And she was happy to get a cupcake at the end.  And Apple cupcake!

It was fun to go spend time with Delaney.  There is nothing like being a parent to a kindergartner, where you are the center of the universe to them. It was worth messing with Rylee's naptime to get over there to hang out with my girl!

Why do I bother?!

The big library here has a pretty good story time, so I try to take Rylee each week.  Somehow, despite the inevitable outcome, I always think it is a good idea to go.  What is the definition of Insanity, again?  Doing the same thing over and over, and expecting a different result?  Yep, that's me!  

Let me tell you how it goes.  We have plenty of time to get ready, yet when it is time to walk out the door, Rylee suddenly can't find her shoes, or needs a new diaper, or is too busy playing with her toys to want to go.  I finagle her out to the car, where she decides she doesn't want her car seat to be is that spot, or she needs some toy/object to sit with her.  I eventually talk her into sitting in her seat and  get her buckled up.  As I pull out, she'll start asking for her "nungie & binky" and I will tell her I didn't bring them, and she'll whine all the way to the library.  

Once we get there, I'll barely be on time. I'll wish I'd been a little earlier so I could look at books, but oh well.  We go to the story time area and Rylee will refuse to sit on the carpet.  She'll want to nestle in my arms.  Well, nestle like a perpetual motion machine.  Sometimes I'll coax her down to the carpet and sometimes she'll sing the songs from the safety of my arms.

Oh, look!  She actually sat down with her friends.  Check out that grumpy face!!

Sometimes she decides she doesn't want to be there at all.  Sometimes she'll dash off to hide behind a table or shelf and I'll hear noisy harrumphing from afar.  If I am really lucky she will race off screaming or crying and will hide, wailing about the injustice of being dragged out of the house to this horrid chamber of tortures.

Once she has suffered through the songs and the stories, it is craft time!  Whoo-hoo!  Usually Rylee is happy to start using glue and scissors, but on this particular day, she was not going to have any fun at all.

See, the darn sparkles would not cooperate and we were nearly in full melt-down over it.  Such angry eyebrows!

Do you see the offending articles?  They would stick to her fingers, but not properly to her paper.  It was pretty devastating, I must admit. 

Whew!  We made through the craft and it is Clean Up Time!  Somehow, this is her favorite time.  There is nothing like collecting all the glue sticks and scissors and putting them where they belong.  (Sadly, this behavior is confined to the library and does not seem so attractive at home.) This is her almost-happy face, as she cleans up the spilled sparkles.

The end is the best part.  Occasionally I'll dare to try to browse books myself, but mostly I don't push my luck.  Rylee will want to run away, usually to the drinking fountain. Or she will pull out lots of books (kids books are less guilt inducing and when she piles out grown up books).  Sometimes she will want to peruse a particular book that she thinks needs to come home with us but she doesn't want to take the time to properly check it out.  Whatever it is, she is never happy to leave and the crying and drama continues in reverse back to the car.

Yes. We do this every week.  Same kid, same library, different stories, different craft... and yet somehow, it is always the same story!

Lucky Dog.... or maybe not!

Today it is all about Levi!  Levi is a lucky dog.  He is a handsome little man with a huge fan club.  Okay, the fan club resides in our home mainly, but he is distinctive enough that he is recognized when we are out walking. 

Here's the good-looking fellow now.  He had a trip to the groomer and got a little trim and a good brushing.  He was quite the dapper boy here.

The girls set up these chairs in the yard and I let Levi out to play.  I do not know what he was doing, but he hopped up onto the chairs.  

 "Levi, What are you doing?!"

Someone is hoping I'm going to drop some food for him.  Never gonna happen! 

This is what you get when the kids get the camera, a pair of glasses, and the dog. 

This is what you get when you take the dog to the vet for a little snip-snip.  Poor Levi! 

I know!  I thought this cone of shame was ginormous!  I was going to get a smaller one, and then I realized this one might not be large enough.  This is Levi, caught in the middle of a yawn, but he sure looks disgruntled. 

I think he looks like a lovely flower!  Levi gets to wear his cone of shame until Friday, when his stitches come out.  I'm getting tired of getting wacked on the legs with this thing, so I can't wait till he's done with it!  He's done really well with the cone and has not fought me at all when I put it on after walks.  He's a good doggie!

What fun!!

While I do not do Pintist myself, that doesn't mean I can't appreciate all the lovely things that other people do pin. And the lovely-lovely things that are shared.  I discovered this fabulous blog- the Sassy Pepper-  through the beauty of Pintrist and I HAD to try it out!  So I did.  Results- super easy, super cheap and came out well.

 The picture here is too dark.  I was too excited to try this so I one-hour photoed them to Walmart so I could run out and buy canvas and mod-podge and get started.  I do like the way it turned out.  However, I was a bit heavy handed on the mod podge and that wasn't good.  It makes the photo a little glare-ey from certain angles.

So I tried it with my very favorite picture of my folks.  Much better!  Except I need to work on my border technique.  Perhaps black is not the way to go, I think.  But aside from that, I love it!

By the way, these were both 8x10 pictures on 8x10 canvas and I trimmed the pictures just a tad.

Marian decided she wanted to use some of the pictures from Africa to put to canvas as well.  I had gotten the 6"x6" four pack from Walmart as well.  We grabbed a couple of the photos from her Africa book (the one the pages were coming out of) and mod podged away.  Sadly, the pictures from the book wrinkled a bit.  I was surprised how well they turned out, because the bubbling was pretty significant at the beginning.

Yep, they came out nicely.  Marian picked the blue border paint.  I'm not in love with it, but she's happy. 

And now for some completely random pictures that I felt the need to share:

 This is the sign at the Baptist Church.  If you can't read it, it says, "Stop, Drop, and Roll does not work in Hell".  Makes me giggle every time I drive by.

And this is the creepiest, most disturbing Halloween costume I think I've ever seem.  And how spectacularly awesome, because it doesn't look too hard to do!  

Playin'

We had a lovely deluge of rain last week.  Since the pool is closed, the girls decided swimming in the backyard was the next best thing, so they donned their swimsuits and headed out to play in the water.  The rain wasn't coming down hard enough so they employed the hose as well.

Thank Goodness they have a boat! The yard was quite the swamp about now. 

Ahoy Delaney! 

Oh yes, these girls know how to have a good time. 

And then it was time for a real bath.

Birthday Boy

Yes, someone had a birthday last week.  I've been thinking of him as "almost 11" for so long, now that he's finally 11, I keep thinking, "Isn't he older than that?"  

I love this kid.  He is so responsible and tries so hard to do the right thing.  I love that he is sensitive to his sisters.  Sure, he makes unkind remarks and will shout at them and (gasp!) has even been known to belt one of them.  But he saves snacks for them and buys things for them and loves them.  He makes sure they get to school and back home safely. He is a really awesome boy.

Joshua wanted a Chocolate Truffle Pie for his family party.  

 It was delicious! 

Just ask Delaney. 

 And the chocolate mustachioed Rylee!

For his friends party, Joshua wanted a Minecraft Cake.  This was the best I could do, but Joshua was pleased.  I suppose one day I will try fondant, but so far I have refused!

Unsupervised Children

The kids came home with a bucket of toads.  I knew that had the toads and I knew they were playing with them in the back yard. The kids knew that they would have to release the toads before dinner, so I wasn't too worried.  What I did not know was how much fun it would be to pick up my camera and discover this:

Obligatory First Day of School Pictures!

I know, no one but moms and maybe grandparents care about the first day of school pictures, but here they are anyway!! 

This school does the first day differently.  The big kids started school a few days before the Kindergarten did.  Delaney was so sad.  Callie was so cross, because it was not fair!

 Here are my favorite big kids, making silly faces before their first day of school.  I love these kids!  I especially love that Marian is smiling and that Joshua and Callie were being so goofy.

 And then the 3 of them did some hip thrusts for me and I laughed so hard I couldn't take any more pictures.  They are my favorites!  They did have a good first day and have had pretty good days so far.  However, there was the little matter of Hurricane Isaac that cancelled an entire week of school.  Delaney did not get to start Kinder on time as she had hoped.  She had to wait an entire week longer!

Here she is, all dressed and ready to go.  This school also had the Kinders start school an hour later on the first day.  So the big kids headed in at 8, and she didn't start till 9. I'm not a fan of that, I think.

They did make it a big deal though and the kids all met in the gym.  I'm not sure why, since there was a huge bottleneck when they sent us off to class and it took 20 minutes to get out. 

We were in no rush to get to class.  Delaney is in the same class as her best friend James and they were running all over having a ball together. I thought they were so cute!

 I got to walk Delaney to class and she found her seat and settle right in.  She was so excited!  As was I. The school had "Krispy Kreme and Kleenex" for the parents in the library.  I went for the donuts.  No tears from this mom!

Here are Delaney and James, after a successful first day of Kindergarten!   Hooray!