Video

Rock Star at Two

Posted on by Amy

I know this makes two posts in two days with a video of my middle child.  But this video just cracked. me. up.  I have been trying to explain to people how she does this little rock star jam on her fake guitar, but it really defies explanation.  At two, this girl rocks the guitar like it’s her job.

She takes after her Daddy, I think.

Also, I apologize for the video from yesterday.  I didn’t realize that it wouldn’t play for anyone but me, because I had uploaded it as “private.”  I have fixed it now, so both videos can be viewed.

A New Book To Love

Posted on by Amy

My mom is a children’s librarian.  When she comes to visit, she usually brings cool books or book-related activities for the girls to do.  This is great, because I’m not always so great at coming up with stuff like this for them (says the mom who is planning to homeschool her kids when they begin kindergarten … yikes).  During my parents’ recent visit she brought a fun project to go with the new book “The Artist Who Painted a Blue Horse” by Eric Carle.

We love Eric Carle books.  We have a ton of them.  With this new book the publisher is doing some sort of marketing thing where they encourage kids to “paint” their own horse picture, using the printable you can find here, and mail it to Mr. Carle.  So, we did.


Love.

We mailed them off the other day.  Miss was excited about sending them to Mr. Carle, though she didn’t really understand what he would do with them (nor do I).  As a nice side note, the activity prompted lots of discussion about authors and artists and the mail and addresses and how all that works.

After reading this book and talking about how books get made, Miss asked to make a book to give to my husband when he came home from his trip.  She titled it “Wee Willy Winky” and had me write that on each page that she illustrated with her art work.  I’m thinking I might print out some other pics like this horse and let the girls color and put together their own books.

They are quite into being “artists” after reading this.  Awesome.

How to Have the Best. Party. Ever.

Posted on by Amy

As I mentioned yesterday, I went to an awesome family reunion party with my husband’s family this weekend.  I have been to a lot of parties in my life.  This one was definitely one of the very best.  All of the best parties I have been to, including my wedding reception, have had several things in common (most likely because they are all parties involving my husband’s family and/or the Farm).  My in-laws seriously know how to party.  So here’s what I’ve learned from them in the past 10 years about throwing a good party.

1. Have it in a barn (Morton building).

Nothing really screams “party hard!” like a big, cleared out building, ripe for dancing and all sorts of other antics.

2. Involve camping of some sort.  When people come from far away and are able to stay in close proximity by camping out, the fun is bound to multiply.  This was our home away from home for the weekend.

Along these lines, include a campfire.  And throw in some swine (or other farm animals) whenever possible.  Just because.  This was the view from the front door of our RV (one of these guys is going to provide some yummy bacon for our freezer come November):

3. Get a band.

Better yet, be the band.

Yes, this is my awesome husband

And play awesome music, like “Fight for Your Right (To Party)”

PAAAAARTY!

If you have no awesome musical talent available, get a karaoke machine.  Seriously.

4. Make it about family and include all generations.

My father-in-law and his brothers routinely get up and sing with the band at these family parties.  My 13-year-old nephew played the fiddle during “Thank God I’m a Country Boy” and the trumpet during “Sweet Caroline.”  My five-year-old nephew played cowbell during another song while his dad played the guitar next to him.  It was awesome.

And have a good way to keep on partying once the tiny ones go to bed (notice the monitor clipped to my waist so I could keep an eye on the girls in the RV after they went to bed).

5. Get people moving.  Encourage crowd participation.


medium

^This link goes to a video of part of the “Sweet Caroline” performance.  You might have to click on it twice.  I haven’t quite figured out uploading videos with this new platform yet, I guess.

6. Don’t take yourself too seriously.  If your idea of a good party involves breakable dishes and pinkies out, these tips probably aren’t for you.  But if you like a sweaty, exhausting, dance-til-you-nearly-pee-your-pants kind of crazy good time, try it.

In all seriousness, I don’t think a party like this can be easily replicated.  It’s impossible to truly describe the fun and family togetherness that is The Labor Day Party.  It’s a big group of people dancing and singing and hugging and laughing, and all of them are related.  The band is made up of my husband, his brother, three cousins, and a family friend.  The dance floor is packed with more cousins, aunts, uncles, nieces, and nephews of all ages.  We used to have these parties annually at the Farm every Labor Day weekend.  We had a similar party for our wedding reception at the Farm.  For the past three years there hasn’t been a party, and I’ve missed it.  But I didn’t even realize how much until getting back to it this year.  This year the party was hosted by my husband’s amazing cousin and his wife.  Different venue, same crazy fun family, same awesome party.

The best thing this year was being able to see Miss enjoy the party (Lass and Sis were in bed before it started).  She loved dancing and I think I could have just watched her do it all night.  She totally got into the Hokey Pokey.  The first time I got up on the stage to sing, she looked up at me with a quizzical and slightly awed expression.  Then I pointed to her while I was singing, and the beaming smile that broke across her face was priceless.

What a way to wrap up summer.

Miss starts school tomorrow.  When we were talking about what she wanted to wear for her first day she said, “School tights, a skirt, and a topping,” and then she picked out a lovely outfit.  Photos of her first day to come.

La La La

Posted on by Amy
A few weeks ago I posted this entry about how much we all love to sing at our house, and included a video of Miss singing “Whistle While You Work.”  I still watch that video from time to time because it makes me chuckle.  
I mentioned in that post that Lass also loves to sing, though of course she can’t quite do all the words to the songs like Miss can yet.  Tonight my husband captured Lass singing on video.  One of Miss’s favorite songs to sing, besides “Whistle While You Work” is the theme from the new Care Bears movies.  She sings it loud and proud, “We are Care Bears, La La La-la-la!”  She sings this so often that Lass’s original word for “Care Bears” was “La-la.”  Now Lass can sing the La-la song herself.  Check it out.

Have a great weekend.  La La La.

Song Bird

Posted on by Amy
Last night I had some special girl time with my eldest before bed.  We painted her fingernails.  She chose blue, of course.  While waiting for them to dry we made some funny faces and sang some songs.
My girl loves to sing.  Both of my older girls do, in fact, though Lass is still working on the words a bit…  Miss goes all out in singing her favorites.  She lifts her chin up and belts them out at full volume.  In the car, in the playroom, at the store, on the swingset, wherever.  We were even informed by her teachers that she sings like this at school.  I absolutely love that she does this.  I think it might be a little bit hereditary, because I think I used to sing like that when I was a kid too (okay, I still do).  I remember singing with my mom and my Grandma a lot.  My Mom and I used to rock out to “Barbara Susanne Stripe” (a.k.a. Barbara Streisand), Neil Diamond, and Barry Manilow on 8-track. Or we’d sing all sorts of kid’s songs: You are My Sunshine, Eensy Weensy Spider, Gray Squirrel, Gray Squirrel, and so on.  My Grandma is a very talented musician, and she used to play the piano and teach me lots of old-timey songs.  I think singing is an expression of happiness.  It’s good for the soul.
We sing a lot in our family.  My husband plays the guitar and we sing along with him in the evenings.  The girls and I sing lots of little songs during the day.  We sing while we play, while we are in the car, while we do just about anything.  I’ve had strangers chuckle at me for singing with my girls in the grocery store.  I think it’s usually a nice, friendly chuckle.  I hope.  I’m no vocal sensation, but I can carry a tune.  And who doesn’t love a moving rendition of Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star in their grocery’s produce section?
Anyway.  Back to last night.  After Miss and I finished with her nails, while they were drying, she was singing her latest favorite song, “Whistle While You Work.”  I especially love when she sings the songs from Snow White, because she doesn’t just sings the words, she does the vocal trilling “ha-ha-ha-ha-ha…” like Snow White does.  I don’t know if that’s the right term to describe it, but it’s so cute.  And since I can’t really describe it well, I captured it on video.  Though my girl sings loudly and unselfconsciously almost all day long, like most kids her age she was a little less willing to do it on command.  When I first asked her to sing for the camera, she said that she had “run out” of singing.  But then when I told her that I wanted to take a video of her and she could watch it afterwards, well, I could just see the wheels turning as she thought about that. She’s more timid and much quieter than usual in the video.  But I couldn’t help but smile when I watched and listened to her sing her song.

Membership Has its Privileges

Posted on by Amy
For months now, I have been saying that I want to rejoin the YMCA.  My husband and I were members when we first moved here, because we lived in a rental house and didn’t have a good place to exercise at home.  When we bought our current house, we set up a nice garage gym area and let our Y membership lapse.  Miss was too tiny to do any activities there and we could exercise at home, so we let it go. BUT, now Miss is bigger.  She’s old enough to start getting into some of the little classes they have at the Y and I really need to keep up with swimming lessons for both of the girls. There are so many good activities for families at the Y.  Plus, there isn’t a whole lot else to do indoors in our town during the winter.  So, this week I finally got myself in gear and went to the Y to renew our family membership.  We started taking advantage of it yesterday by going to “Wiggles and Giggles.”  Our Y has an indoor soccer field, and they open it up twice a week in the mornings for little ones to come and play.  They pull out ride-on toys, balls, big mats, and various other things for the kids to enjoy.  Not to mention there’s lots of room to run.  The girls had a blast.
 (Quick snack break)
 
I’m so glad we joined.  The girls ran and danced and got to blow off some steam.  And we met some other moms and kids there, so I got to visit with some grown ups.
And speaking of visiting with grown ups, my husband and I had a great date night last night.  We went to a new sushi place, and it was pretty good.  Of course the best part was just being able to hang out and chat with my hubby.  Before dinner we went to Miss’s school and met with her teachers for our little parent-teacher conference.

It was great to hear all about what she has been doing in school and to see how thorough they are in their assessments of her.  And it was pretty cool to hear someone else describe her spot-on and know how much time and attention she must get there for them to be able to really “get” her so well.  I loved when they told me how much she likes to sing at the top of her lungs and to shake it when they dance.

No one needs to tell me how much my girls love to dance and that they’ve got some moves.

Miss got new ballet shoes yesterday.  The ones I got her for her Halloween costume had cut into her little heels and one shoe had totally split on the side from being worn so much, so I told her she couldn’t wear those anymore.  She was so upset and asked repeatedly for them for several days.  When I pulled out the new shoes yesterday, I was relieved to find that she loves these just as much even though they’re a different style.  She immediately asked, “Momma, can you play some music so I can ballet dance?” So I did. The Cure.

I got a question in a comment about organizing photos, related to my last post about taking at least one photo a day.  Unfortunately, I’m not really great about organizing my photos.  Mostly I just dump them into iPhoto.  I do “flag” my favorites when I’m going through and editing them, which is how I select the pics I’m going to upload to a blog post or use for something else.  Just in the past few days with the start of this new project I have begun putting photos into folders by month, so I will have a little bit better organization of them that way.  I also have set a goal to start deleting photos a little bit more so I won’t have such an overwhelming mass of pictures.  And few years ago I set a goal to make photo books for each of my girls for each year of their lives.  Unfortunately, I’ve only completed Miss’s first year book.  So making the rest of the books needs to become a priority, and I’m hoping to get my photos more organized that way too.  I will make folders for each girl, each year in my iPhoto in addition to making the books.  That’s it.  I don’t have a great system yet.  Anyone else have a good way of organizing digital photos?

A Great Big Kentucky Post. Y’all.

Posted on by Amy
Last week we went to Kentucky to spend the week with my parents.  I have virtually no internet access there, so I couldn’t post while we were gone.  Somehow we have been home for three days, and I am just now getting around to posting about our fabulous trip.  I would say with all the holiday craziness I haven’t had the time to post.  However, I am a firm believer that you have time for what you make time for.  So.  Sorry, I haven’t made time for this.  But if it makes up for it, I’m posting right now during naptime instead of taking a shower…
Anyway.  Our trip was really wonderful, though it was unfortunately delayed for a day.  Remember how I posted that we had all managed to escape the stomach bug except for Lass’s very brief encounter with it?  I typed too soon.  Friday night, the night before we were supposed to leave, I was up all night sick and ended up going to the emergency department for fluids around 4am, right about the time Miss woke up crying and asking for “new jammies,” meaning of course that she had thrown up all over the ones she was wearing.  So, needless to say, she and I were under the weather for the day that was supposed to be our travel day, and we didn’t make it to Kentucky until Sunday.  But the visit was so worth the trip. My parents rock.  They are so awesome with my girls and give them so much love and attention it just makes my heart melt to watch them together.  I love that my girls are the center of attention with my parents for a whole week.  And they eat it up.  Miss just glows with happiness when playing with my Mom, and Lass got there too, though it took her a bit longer to warm up.  Little girls can just never have too much love and attention from their grandparents.  I only wish my parents lived close, so my girls could have the experience of spending time with them more often.
Here’s a big, huge photo tour of our week in the south:
We went to story time at the library where my Mom is the children’s librarian.  I was so proud of my girls.  Both of them sat nicely and listened to the story, even though there was a good bit of chaos going on around them.

Then Santa showed up…

Miss got all shy and scrambled for my lap

where she clung to me for dear life

until Santa called her name to come up for her present.

She was so shy!

But my shy girl braved giving the big guy a hug.

Lass was surprisingly calm about the process of seeing Santa too.

Probably because I didn’t even attempt to get her any closer than this.

The story time was great.  We colored and had a snack and crafted a paper chain.

All the kids got in a circle with my mom at the end to sing a song, which was very cute.

Then it was time to go.

We did stop upstairs to check out some books, which Miss had fun reading to her baby doll when we got back to my parents’ house.

The day of the story time was also my husband’s birthday.  This year I let Miss pick out a few presents for him in addition to what I got for him.  A couple of weeks ago I took her to the dollar store (the real one where everything costs $1), gave her a $5 bill and told her she could pick five things that she thought her Daddy would like for his birthday.  She walked around the store clutching the $5 bill in her hand, selecting things at her eye level.  It was so fun to watch her make her choices and then to pack them up when we got them home.  In addition to the five presents, she was also allowed to pick a card and a gift bag for him.

And all on her own, she also picked this hat as a must-have for her Daddy.

So what were the gifts?  A Winnie the Pooh chalkboard set,

a pink jumprope, blue safety scissors, and a pen with a bobbling dog on top, set into a suction cup base (not pictured here, but shown above).

My personal favorite?  Floral foam.

Miss had no idea what it was when she saw it at the store, but she thought it was awesome and knew her Daddy would just love it.  It was great to watch her getting so excited about her Daddy’s presents.

We also got to visit with my brother and his family for an afternoon.  We went to their house to do our Christmas with them.

A good time was had by all, I think.

And a great holiday tradition was passed to the next generation during this visit.  Every year my mom and I watch the movie “Heidi” with Shirley Temple.  Some people watch, “Miracle on 34th Street,” maybe even “A Christmas Story” or some other traditional holiday movie.  Our movie is “Heidi.”  We know the dialog by heart.  This year, my girls watched it for the first time.

Okay, so the above photos are a little misleading.  They really only paid attention to the movie for about the first 10 minutes.  But I didn’t expect much more for the first viewing.  This movie takes time to appreciate.  My husband and brother, even my Dad, still don’t quite appreciate it yet.  The girls will get there.  Of that I am sure.

One other movie experience we had while in Kentucky, that Miss did greatly appreciate (to the point that we watched the movie 3 times in 24 hours), was her first viewing of “Snow White.”  I hadn’t seen the movie in many, many years, so I probably enjoyed watching it with her almost as much as she did.

The still photos don’t quite do justice to our enjoyment of the movie.

I’m glad to be home, though I miss my family.  I can’t believe Christmas is already almost here.  Tomorrow is Miss’s school party.  I have way too much gift-wrapping left to do.  This weekend we’ll go to the Farm to “do Christmas” with my husband’s family.   It’s the most wonderful time of the year.

Three Day Potty Training – Day Two

Posted on by Amy
We are potty training this weekend. No pull-ups. Not even at night. Miss threw away her leftover diapers at the start of day 1. We’re using this 3-Day Potty Training Method and it’s working like a charm. I selected this method for several reasons. One is that I know several people who have used it successfully. Two is that it doesn’t drag out the process of potty training. Three is that is makes sense to me. I could go more into detail about why I like this method, but it is a pretty intense, focused potty training strategy that has left this momma pretty tired after two full days of hovering over my two-year old, saying over and over and over “Make sure you tell Mommy if you have to go pee-pee or poo-poo okay?” So I’m too tired to do a lengthy post tonight.
I’ll just say for now that we started with many accidents and mad dashes to the potty. But today we had no accidents except a little dribbling when Daddy didn’t quite get Miss to the potty in time. She even had a couple of times when she told me she had to go in time to keep her underwear totally dry. We have had dry underwear after naps on both days, and this child who has been such a heavy wetter at night and has never woken up with a dry diaper made it through the night with only slightly wet underwear this morning. I went in to check on her at about 3 am, fully expecting to have to change her jammies and sheets (or peel off the top layer of my two-waterproof-layer-sheet system),and she was dry then. So I’m happy with the strategy we’ve chosen to use. I’m thrilled with my girl who just gets it. Here is an amazing video of my amazing girl (in her big-girl underwear) dancing with her shadow. I couldn’t stop watching this.