pictures of Meg's creativity

Megan's creativity on her reindeer that I posted about yesterday-




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Creativity

Those of you who know me pretty well know I'm not creative. I need directions for things and am not llikely to change up colors or supplies specified in the directions. My "art" tends to be more realistic and matchy.

Well, apparently this not one of the things Megan got from me! Case in point-

Megan and I went to a pottery painting place recently and of course, painted pottery. We had fun- a great mother/daughter day.

I chose a penguin ornament- I painted him black and white and within the lines. Megan insisted we use the paint that had flecks of other colors in it and that made it slightly less conservative.

Megan chose a cartoonish reindeer to paint. The all important red nose is present on this reindeer. Otherwise, It was one colorful yellow polka dotted reindeer!

It was so hard for me to not make suggestions on which colors to use where. She did ask me to help her paint "Mommy, my arm is tired. Will you paint this part yellow, I want it yellow" and so Mommy did as requested. It was killing me to not "fix" it.

As we walked towards the counter I saw several other moms with that "I can't believe you are painting it like that, but I'm not going to say anything" look! I looked at them with a knowing sympathetic smile.

It turned out cute and is a one of a kind masterpiece . One I will cherish forever.

(When I get the camera battery charged I'll download the pictures and post them in a new post)

Farm fun Weekend

On Saturday we went to Jumbo's Pumpkin Farm and South Mountain Creamery (Michael, Samuel, Luke, Carter, Danielle, Cara, and Natalie joined us- poor Cassie wasn't feeling well so she and Angie stayed home and watched movies!).

It was fun-At Jumbo's they had a hay ride, pumpkin patch, corn maze, pony rides, farm animals. The kids really enjoyed themselves. The guys and the bigger kids went thru the corn maze- to Danielle and I who were chasing Kel and Nat around the patch it seemed to take them a long time, but they made it out safely. Everyone picked out pumpkins to take home and enjoyed running around.

At the Creamery there were cows, free kittens, fresh ice cream, , another hay ride, other fun stuff, some guys selling chocolate covered espresso beans (something new to add to my list of things I like to eat!).

On Sunday the 4 of us ventured to Whispering Meadows Alpaca Breeders. Alpaca's are such neat animals and they are soft. However, they aren't the friendliest animals- not mean just kinda snobby. They had a hay ride, pony ride, a cool store full of Alpaca fiber items (such soft warm gloves, hats, throws) and of course Megan asked for a bear made of Alpaca fiber- so incredibly soft.

Such family fun this weekend! Check out our photo sharing site to see more, if you want!

Bookend birthdays and cousins

Happy 1st Birthday to my grandniece Sophia and Happy 4th Birthday to my niece Cara!

Last week we attended Sophia's party on Sunday and Cara's on Saturday. What a way to bookend a week- with CAKE (I love cake, esp birthday cake!) and family (I love family, too).


Both parties involved driving for a while to get there, so I had time to think about stuff. This is a synopsis of some of those thoughts...

Our struggle with infertility was hard, but because of it our kids are close in age to all of their cousins.

Even though Danielle is 8 yrs younger than me, with the infertility that Angie (our oldest sister) and I struggled with, our kids aren't that far apart.






Kevin's niece had her children while she was young, add on our infertility, and our kids are really close in age.










It's nice that the kids are close in age and have playmates at family gatherings and hopefully friends for life.


If I could go back and do it all over, would I choose to struggle again- nope, while we were in the middle of it if you told me it would work out this way would I have been ok with still waiting- probably not, but since it is how things happened- it's good. He took what was happening and made good things out of it!


Sometimes things that are hard to endure, when you get to the other side, they work out ok.

Webkinz addict

Megan now has 14 Webkinz (well, one belongs to Kellie, but Megan gets to play with it, too). Her 1st Webkinz was a cute koala that she got from Aunt Angie when Kellie was born. They are what she asks for as a reward and as gifts and what she saves her money for.

For those of you who don't know what Webkinz are- they are cute stuffed animals that you "Bring to life" on line. Next to this is a picture of a few of her pets. On line you can dress them, decorate their rooms, play games with them, feed them (you can cook for them), take them to the drs, do jobs & play games & answer questions to earn money. And of course, they sell clothes and accessories for the stuffed ones in real life as well.

Megan's Webkinz world has a room for each pet, a kitchen, a bathroom, a yard (which has a pool), a garden, a TV room, and a school room. We had to "dig up" the garden and unplant it because with school she isn't able to visit every day to tend to the crops.

She is learning the value of money (and mommy has found a few games that she enjoys playing, so I can make some Kinzcash for Megan to spend- good way to unwind after work) and how it's important to save up her money in Webkinz World to buy the next cool thing for her pets and also how to save money in real life to get one more Webkinz.

It has also been a good tool to help her focus while she is wearing the patch on her "good" eye. This way she has to focus with her "bad" eye and it's something she enjoys so patching time goes a little smoother.

Our neighbor says we have a stuffed version of nearly every animal. I think we're pretty close!

Progress report and I love this age!

Megan's 1st Kindergarten progress report came home this week. I'm so proud of her, as she received satisfactory in all categories. There were only 2 options Satisfactory and Needs Improvement so as "ok, but not the greatest" as satisfactory sounds, it's the best!

She has received a star for good behavior each day of school so far and several little prizes from the treasure box. I'm proud of her, it's hard to be good every day! She is learning a lot and loves to sing all the songs (they sing about everything- even about being quiet. I was walking down the hall at work the other day humming one of her songs- Our hands are by our sides, we're standing straight and tall, we do not talk at all, we're ready for the hall. Catchy little tune and not a bad idea for the hospital corridor at midnight!)

Kellie is 15 months old and it's so fun to watch her grow and develop. I had forgotten how much I enjoyed that time with Megan. It's so amazing to watch Kellie explore her world and become a little person. She still needs me, but is pretty independent with some things.

She has suddenly started signing several words - help (which from her can also mean pick me up, give it to me, and some other things that I'm not quite sure about), bottle/drink, all done, out (her favorite is a funny combo of out and all done so she can get out of her highchair or stroller), more, dog, fish, baby, eat. It has helped reduce the squealing/screeching as we can sort of understand what she wants.

We've been working on signing, but not consistently- I forget to do it sometimes. We need to work on thank you, please, sorry, and more specific words for food and drink. With Meg we were much more consistent, the poor 2nd kid gets shorted again! But Kel has picked up on them pretty well.

Emmett, our dog

I realized that while I have posted about both of the girls and about Kevin, I have neglected to post about our dog, the one mentioned in the title of this blog!





Emmett is a Sussex Spaniel. I know, "what the heck is that?" People have looked at him and guessed that he was a Cocker Spaniel mixed with a Chihuahua (that one made me laugh), and when we tell them what he is the response usually is "never heard of them before. Is that a new breed?" Nope, not new, just not common esp in the US. Here's a link to tell you about this beautiful breed- http://www.akc.org/breeds/sussex_spaniel/index.cfm

He and I are the lone brown eyes in this house of blues! I've frequently said that if I ever get my hair colored (it's getting gray so that may come soon) that I was going to take a piece of his beautiful golden brownish redish fur with me to get it matched!

He is such a laid back guy (until you leave him alone then he howls, neighbors know when we're gone b/c he can be so loud). He tolerates being the last on the list, but is finally learning to speak up if he wants something. He is so good with the girls and deals with Kellie getting right in his face and panting back at him. Megan says she wants a dog who plays, Emmett never has been a dog that played- no ball chasing, stick retrieving, or swimming. Our bulldog did all that, but not Emmett. He'd prefer to sit on your feet and bark at birds and squirrels.

When Kellie was still getting up at night to eat, he'd get up and sit by my feet. It was nice to have his company. He never seems to really sleep, he seems to be half on alert.

I am thankful that God placed dogs on the earth, they are great companions.