Halloween!

Pictures of the spooooooky day are here.

Vote of confidence...

This morning, I was digging through Natalie's sock drawer looking for a pair of black socks. It's Halloween. A witch needs black socks.

As I was digging I didn't know if I'd find any, and I said to Natalie, "We don't usually..." (and I paused). I was going to complete the sentence with buy you black socks. During the brief pause, she jumped in very helpfully and said, "know what we're doing."

Ummmm, thanks Natalie.

Earthquake

At approximately 8:05, we had an earthquake!

Earthquake stats from USGS

It was the girls' first one!

Kira cried and said, "But I didn't want to see the earthquake!"

Pizza Girl

Here are pictures of Kira cutting play-doh into little pieces. She said she was a pizza girl and was cutting up pieces for a pizza. She said she wants to make pizza when she is big! (Nick was proud.*)





*for those of you who didn't know Nick when he was in high school, he worked as a Pizza Boy and did lots chopping of stuff for pizzas.

First one!

The tooth and the little girl who lost it!

You can see the new one coming in as it came in slightly behind the baby tooth.

Updates

Natalie lost her first tooth last night! The tooth fairy came. Going rate for a tooth is $1.

Natalie asked for the pedals on her new bike and she's riding! No training wheels. It's cool!

Kira had a pajama party at school yesterday. She wore her new Dora night dress. It's red with eyelet trim. She looked like she stepped out of a Laura Ingalls Wilder book--except, they didn't have Dora back then.

Tia is still lying about her age. You ask her how old she is and she says 3. She has the most mischievous look on her face too. To look at this positively, lying at such an early age is a sign she is very smart.

(Pictures coming soon. One of Judi's dear friends is in the hospital. The outlook is not good. It was very sudden and unexpected. Judi's friend is only 35 and suffered a massive brain hemorrhage. Please think good thoughts for her family. She has a little girl who is Kira's age.)

2 from 2

Here are 2 pictures by Kira... She painted the ballerina at school. Pretty impressive for a 3-year-old! I am fond of the painting made with funky pieces of plastic too. I love the colors.

Natalie made the pictures of the pets because she wants to get a pet on a Sunday when she's six. She has it all figured out. The picture on the left shows the animals in cages at the pet store and the picture on the right shows all of the animals she's considering as pets in a more ecological setting.

Loose Tooth

Natalie has a very loose tooth. It's on the bottom left. The adult tooth has already made an appearance behind the baby tooth. It's a matter of a very short amount of time before she wiggles the baby tooth out of her head and the tooth fairy has to make an appearance. She is so excited!

The table Daddy built

Yippee! We have a new table in the kitchen. Here's where we'll eat most of our meals. When it was installed, the girls started calling it, "The table Daddy built." It's true! Nick designed and engineered the table. It had to be strong to hold the corian and plywood. The base is securely fastened to the floor (bolted), and there is silicon caulk around the base so our crumb generators can't get stuff under the table.

The table is the same corian as the rest of the kitchen counters. Our kitchen is done! There's a notch cut out of the table so it is also braced by the cabinet. I'm so excited. The new table is so easy to clean, and we don't have to use (or clean) placemats!

Next up, new kitchen chairs.

Haircut

Since her last haircut in the beginning of August, Kira has been asking to get her hair cut like mine. While I am flattered, both Nick and I liked her hair long. It's been growing. You can see how long it got here.

It was finally time for another trim. I took her in and she wanted her hair cut. I had it shortened by a couple of inches. She expressed displeasure at not having it cut like mine, but I didn't want to have to deal with displeasure of having it cut short and her not actually wanting it short.

A week later, Kira's in tears because she really wanted her hair short like mine. Friday night, we went and got her hair cut short like Mommy's hair.

Here you can see her in the chair, before and after. It is really cute short. Kira has a great fashion sense!

Chicken Dance

Here are some photos from Natalie's chicken dance day. Video coming soon (hopefully)*. (Nat's wearing the flowery pants and is next to the girl in the white dress. Nat's got a chicken on her head too.)


*Getting the video of the chicken on the web involves connecting the video camera to the external hard drive and my computer all at the same time. The number of wires I have to find and have in the same place at the same time may preclude the download from occurring for a while.

First day jitters

I took this video of Natalie as we drove to the first day of kindergarten back in August. She's pretty nervous, eh?

Video of Natalie in the car on the way to kindergarten.

Rainy Day fun

It rained last Friday. We went to eat lunch and then Uncle Joe took us to ride Champoline Forsie (as named by Nat when she was 2). Thanks Uncle Joe. We had lots o' fun!

Using her head...

Tia is starting to work on potty training. It's exciting, and we bought some Elmo underwear to encourage her. She wants to wear them on her head. We think she can pull off the look. Hee.

Uncle Joe

It was fun having Uncle Joe come for a visit. He may have found a new golf buddy in Kira. She cried when she woke up Saturday morning and he was gone. She wanted to play more golf. Here's a few shots of Kira and Uncle Joe playing.

I love the last photo... the look on Joe's face is how I feel most of the time. Yes, that is an "Elmo" in the photo. Tia loves Elmo. We just got her the costume. She says she's going to be a black kitty for Halloween, but once she puts on the Elmo costume she won't take it off. She has taken two naps in it and eaten dinner in it once. Joe got to witness the reaction she gave when I tried to remove it.

Natalie's bike

Here are two shots of the girl and her bike. Note how it doesn't yet have pedals. It's called a float bike. The "new fangled" theory about teaching kids to ride a bike is teach them to balance and steer, and then give them pedals. It is thought to be easier to learn to ride this way--and prevents kids from falling victim to the training wheels co-dependence syndrome.

Natalie's doing really well on her bike. We've told her to say the word and she can have her pedals. She says she's not ready yet. Fine by us... she's slower without her pedals!

Video of her riding coming soon! (As soon as I get time to upload the video camera.)

On or in?

Tia eats some ice cream at the amusement park.

9 years ago

Some pictures of the wonderful day.

Happy anniversary to us!

Conversations

Last night, Kira was talking to Grandma F on the phone.

Grandma F: What'd you do today at school?
Kira: I made the earth.


They do a lot at preschool.


Grandma F: Oh, how'd you make the earth?
Kira: Well the green is grass and the blue is water and you paint it.

---

Tia came up to me last night, in tears and holding her shirt. She said, "Mommy, take my cheese-puff out." I was a little confused, but when I looked down her shirt there was a cheesepuff. Apparently cheesepuffs are slightly painful when they get stuck down your shirt. Who knew?

Busy

We're busy over here! We're still looking for a nanny so Nick and I are each doing extra!

My brother, Joe, is visiting right now. He arrived on Saturday, hung out with us on Sunday and now he's gone to some fabulous golf places close by and will return on Thursday night.

On Sunday, we went here (the one closest to our house--you can select it from the drop down menu on the page). It was a fun but tiring day. It's about 80 miles away from our house. The three little ones loved it. They got to see an orca, dolphins, ride Thomas the train, fly a helicopter and play a lot. (Plus, they ate french fries and ice cream in practically the same meal--what could be better?)

Pictures coming soon.

More Art

Here's the horse picture after Natalie finished it (she cut him out and put him on a picture she drew).

Here is a picture Kira painted in preschool and one she made with stencil. I'm impressed by both. (She's 3... She did multiple colors with a stencil!)

Story Time....

Natalie shares a story she made at kindergarten. All of the parts are about 20 seconds. If you're having trouble viewing, let it download all the way first... click the button, go cook dinner, or something, and come back.

Part one

Part two

Part three

Nothing like roasting marshmallows over the campfire...

Natalie drew this campfire, taped it to the wall, and then she and Kira roasted marshmallows on sticks (that Natalie drew). Creative, eh?