kids are funny #473 (who's counting?!)

Today while cleaning and listening to Blondie's "In the Flesh" (which goes something like: "just can't wait to see you . . . in the flesh" ) I had the following conversation:

Isaac: in the flesh?!?

me: yeah, that just means like "in person"

Isaac: that's disgusting.

ok, so maybe you had to be there. :)

Have a nice weekend . . .

not much to say

Well, for some reason, I can't seem to organize my thoughts enough to write anything significant, so here are some photos of a sledding excursion we did over Christmas break to tide you over. Nobody even asks to go out and play in the snow anymore. We're all pretty much done with it all.

But anyway -

some other random things going on recently:

- I've been typing up more poems. Up to 225 now, and still many many more still to go.

- Zac has been working on the finishing the bedroom in the basement, at long last. It's pretty much the neverending project (has it been 3 years since we started? I've lost count).

- I've been pondering what to do with Samuel's school placement for next year. Talked to his teacher and left feeling confused as usual.

- My sister and her boyfriend were here visiting from VA. They came over for the circus show that we call "life at our house" one day. :)

That's about it, I think, other than all the normal mundane things like tantrums, messes, meals, homework, activities etc.

Happy Thursday.

snowfall

Dear Winter,

It's been nice to have you over to visit for awhile. We've enjoyed some sledding, hot chocolate, warm cozy movie nights, and books snuggled in bed. I have appreciated your sparkling snow and glistening ice. I have liked bundling up in my sweaters and thick wool socks. We've had a pretty good time, all in all, you and I.

But now. I think I've had enough. You see, I am tired. Tired of shoveling my driveway and slipping down the street. Tired of wet gloves and snowpants on my floor. Tired of staying inside all day every day and having the kids bouncing off the walls.
These past 3 months of cold and ice and snow have been quite sufficient, thank you. I just don't know if I can stand you hanging around for another 2 months or so, really.

So. You can go now.
Pretty Please.

Yours Truly,

Kristen

call me crazy

Here is just part of my collection of letters I've saved through the years.
We'll just label this as more proof of my memory-collecting neurosis.

I do miss real mail, actually. I really do. I listened to a radio show (on NPR) talking about letter-writing not long ago and the guest was talking about how with letters, our DNA is actually all over the place in hand-written letters, not to mention the personality and moods that come out in handwriting. But the thought of touching the object that the other person was touching, the paper they folded, the stamp they licked; there is a measure of intimacy that is missing in electronic communication. It really is too bad.

Anyway - I can mourn the loss of the past as much as I wish and it doesn't change a thing. I am overly dependent on email and the internet just like the rest of you. But I'll hang onto every shred of my paper past for as long as I can, thank you.
And you can call me whatever you wish.

(and can you tell I am still a little lost in la-la land? yes, well. I guess I'm catching up on the many years that I kept all this boxed up and out of sight. It's a time for digging and delving for me. And I'm ok with that. You just get to join me for the fun! You lucky ducks, you.) :)

(PS the book that was discussed on NPR was Yours Ever: People and their letters by Thomas Mallon - for those interested. I have it on hold at the library, of course.)

yet another reason to love my journals endlessly

There was this book I read long ago. A book called Lost. And I had written the title down on a list of books I'd read at one point, but no author. And as I became obssessed with Goodreads and keeping track and tracking down all the books I've read and loved, I kept trying to find this particular book. But with no author and a simple common word as a title, I could not find it anywhere. It was sort of driving me crazy (as any unresolved question or quest usually does).

Until today. I was flipping through an old high school journal and glimpsing pieces of "oh how glad I was that this boy called" and "I can't wait to go to this dance" and so on and so on and then . . . I just happened to mention this book I was reading. Lost, by Gary Devon. Hallelujah to my teenage self for writing that down!! YIPPEE!!

So now I can buy it with my swagbucks giftcards and read it again! I can't wait to see if it's worth all the wondering I've done about it. Just. Can't. Wait.

:)

Book Addict: Final Total for 2009 and some favorites

Well, the final total number of books I read in 2009 is (drumroll, please) . . . .

93!

That's a lot of books, if I do say so myself.

Here are some of the useless statistics:

The month I read the most: June (with 13!)

The month I read the least: March (only 4)

For 7 months out of the year, I read between 4-7 books, and the other 5 I read between 9-13 books.

# of non-fiction books: 21

# books dealing with special needs issues: 6

# of "classics": 8

# of children and/or YA fiction: 33

YA fantasy series I read: Harry Potter, Fablehaven, Inkheart, The Anybodies, and Into the Wild. I think I'm doing pretty well in keeping up with the books my kids want to read. :) This year it looks like we'll all be moving through The Lightning Thief books.

Here are some of my overall favorites from last year:

1. Five Quarters of the Orange - Joanne Harris

2. A Tree Grows in Brooklyn - Betty Smith

3. Healing ADD - Daniel Amen

4. The Little Guide to Your Well-Read Life - Steve Leveen

5. Camilla - Madeleine L'Engle

6. all the Harry Potter books lumped together - JK Rowling

7. The Story of Edgar Sawtelle - David Wroblewski

8. The Scarlet Pimpernel - Baroness Emmuska Orczy

9. The Year My Son and I Were Born - Kathryn Soper

10. Into the Wild and Out of the Wild - Sarah Beth Durst

11. The Disapparation of James - Anne Ursu

12. Speak - Louise Halse Anderson

Obviously, I read more books that I enjoyed than just these, but I have to limit the list somehow, so these are the ones that stood out to me as I looked over the list.

I am hoping to get back into the routine of doing monthly book reviews of the books I've read. It's kind of hard to keep up on it, but it sure is fun. :)

Any thoughts on these books I picked? Any other thoughts on books for today? Any bets on whether or not I'll reach 100 books read this year? (hehehe)

Some of my sorta long term reading goals are to read all of Madeleine L'Engle's books, try to read at least one "classic" (or book from the '1001 books you must read before you die' list) a month, read at least one Shakespeare play a year, keep up on the bookclub books (that's a relatively easy one!), read all of the Jane Austen and Bronte sister books . . . and I think those are the only ones I've actually articulated in my little brain - to work on over my lifetime, you see. I'm in no rush.

Anyway - I've also been working a bit on that personal poetry compilation project of mine I mentioned awhile back here and here (which you will most likely never see - hehe). I've got 165 poems posted so far, and ohhh sooo far to go. It is sort of overwhelming - but still fun. I am sorely tempted to leave some out, but I promised myself I wouldn't - so even though it is almost painful, I am forging ahead completely uncensored. Making slow erratic progress in spurts and stops - but maybe sometime before I die it will be completed. That's my only hope anyway.

And that's my news in the reading/writing realm. :)

Thanks for supporting my addiction and happy reading . . . .

Good Day, Sunshine

The sun came out to play today.
She was a most welcome guest. I had forgotten how much we've missed her.

Made me so happy, I felt inspired to take a self-portrait to share with you.

Sort of.

In other news, here's a conversation I had with Elisabeth this morning after her neighbor-boy-friend left and she was smothering me with hugs and kisses:

me: do you kiss him too? (wanting to nip the playground-chasing-kissing in the bud)

her: no, I only kiss you guys!

me: that's good

her: does he not like kisses?

me: um, I don't know (let's not get into this)

her: maybe he has green spit!!

ummmm . . . . . . . . . .

Well . . . . as long as she doesn't get too curious to find out for sure, I guess we're safe for awhile. :)

(and yes, my only reaction was to laugh hysterically. I mean really, what could I say?!)

here we go again

It seems to be that time of year again.
No, not new year's resolutions.
No, no.
It is the time of year when I start agonizing and worrying and wondering and stressing out over where Samuel will be going to school next year.

For those that may not know, my 2 older kids go to a rather "academically challenging" charter school. Class sizes capped at 25 students. Some advantages in many ways. But no self-contained special needs classes. They can only offer specialized "support."


Samuel is at the public school right now in a small group Special Needs Kindergarten class (about 6 kids) because we felt like he couldn't handle being in a regular classroom yet. He kind of shuts down in larger groups. We tried having him go to the mainstream class for just 15 min. of morning circle time for a month or so, but his teacher recommended that he's not quite ready for it yet and would benefit more from participating in the small group circle time where he is gaining confidence and starting to participate more.

So. We have tossed around the idea of having him redo kindergarten in a regular classroom next year, having another year of maturity and speech therapy under his belt. And that could be either at the charter school or the public school. Or he may (????) be ready for a regular 1st grade class, again either at the charter school or public school. But the charter school does a lottery to fill their available spots for students - and this is in FEBRUARY. Which means we need to know by then whether or not we want him to have a spot. And we need to know which grade.


So I'd like to get Samuel's teacher's opinion of where she thinks he would be best placed for next year. But. They tell me they don't make formal placement decisions until around May. So they can only give an unofficial preliminary opinion, and rather reluctantly at that. So frustrating.

Because if she thinks he should be either in a regular kindergarten or 1st grade class, then I feel like he might as well be at the charter school with his siblings. If for some reason, he is going to be in a self-contained class or getting more involved help at the public school, then that would be the best place. grrrrrr. . . . . decisions, decisions.

I am not even sure what the possible options might be. Hopefully the teacher will at least be able to clarify that for me this week when we meet together.

I think there is:
1. an autism class (where he doesn't fit)
2. a learning disabled class (not exactly fit)
3. emotional/behavior issue class (not exactly fit)

It seems we are caught again in this quagmire of feeling like there isn't anywhere that is "best" - he doesn't really fit in any of the options. So we just have to weigh it out and pick the "least bad." Ugh. And I don't think homeschooling would be the best option either, because he really needs specialized help that I am not qualified to provide for him. And besides, I really need a break from his needs sometimes, honestly. He really needs to learn to be with other kids, too.

So anyway - that's on my mind. I am also still struggling somewhat to get my mind to come back to earth from all that crazy "flashbacking." I know it seems unbelievably silly. But the back of my mind is still spinning back in 1990 somewhere (give or take a few years). I'm feeling very distracted and fluffy-brained. So if any of you should feel like slapping my face and telling me "snap out of it," I just might appreciate it. I could really use my brain again, should anyone happen to find it hiding from me somewhere. Thanks a bunch . . .

Good Post of the Day

Love this post I read this morning (click on it)

Perhaps my New Year's Resolution should be to remember that there is no race.

There is no race.

And I can skip instead of run.

:)

(and perhaps even dance to some 80's tunes)

Flashback Party!!

And now for the moment you've all been waiting for! Pictures of the 1990's party!

Some of the more ambitious folks came dressed up, which was awesome. I think we may have spanned the 80's and 90's (and beyond) in our dress choices - but it was all terrific. And actually the party theme was more of a "Kristen's Teenage Years" flashback - so late 80's into early 90's was perfect.

(And, I suppose I should also clarify, just in case anyone was wondering: We are a 100% stone-cold sober group of fairly conservative mostly stay-at-home moms. So although we may think things got a little wild and crazy, they weren't really that crazy. Whether that clarification is a relief or a disappointment to you depends, I guess, on your own perspective. At any rate, there it is.) :)

(a couple people came later and missed this group shot, unfortunately)

We started off with a "Name that Tune" game, taken off my 80's and 90's ipod playlist. And my friend Julie M. won that hands down! She may have been the only person there that even halfway recognized some of the tunes that came up in my randomized list of songs. But it only proves that she and I had excellent taste. Of course. :)

We ate lots and lots of yummy food and then . . . the highlight of the evening . . . dancing in the unfinished basement! (I told you I was intent on acting the part of a teenager) Anybody recognize this set of fancy shmancy moves??

Oh yeah - that's the Electric Slide, all right. We didn't actually have that song - but these ladies were quite impressive, nonetheless. I can't disclose all the various dance moves that came out through the course of the night (circle of trust!) but we did see some sides of some of our neighbors that we truly never suspected!!! It was soooo much fun. I honestly haven't had such fun dancing around since I was probably a teenager. And, admittedly, although we were all sober, some of these girls were consuming a bit more caffeine than usual, I think.

And then a few of us stayed up even later and shared silly stories. I laughed so hard I think I probably had spittle drooling out of my mouth, couldn't even breathe.

My only regrets:

1. Why did I wear such a retarded outfit?! I am in desperate need of some new clothes. (see, I'm not that much more mature than a teenager after all) And why do I look like such a retard in all the pictures?!?

and 2. It's just too bad not everyone enjoyed my taste in music as much as I do - and we didn't get through even a fraction of my oh-so-awesome playlist (granted, the playlist was something like 5 hrs long. I got a little carried away. hahaha).

Anyway - for those who might like to take a virtual stroll down musical memory lane, here are some of the fantastic tunes we enjoyed as part of the party, either groups or title names (or were on my list but we didn't get to it):

OMD

New Order

Come On Eileen

Dancing by Myself

The Housemartins

Depeche Mode

I am Superman

Funkytown (!!!)

Erasure

Deee-Lite

One Thing Leads to Another

You Spin me Right Round

and many more

Most of this stuff I haven't really heard for many many years. But it was great fun to listen to it again!! In fact, I've been compiling this playlist over the last few months or so and just loving finding more and more of these musical memories. Zac laughs at me, frequently, over how excited I get over finding old songs I had forgotten about. But it is so fun to me. I had to share.

I also dug out this big box of old journals, trying to gear myself up thoroughly for the flashback experience. I've skimmed through a few of them and found some good times that made me smile, a few traumatic moments I had forgotten about, but mostly just so glad to have this very detailed record of my "formative years." I have a sort of latent goal to someday reread all of it in order. It's sort of masochistic to put myself through all that all over again and relive it through my journals - but in some ways I hope to be able to put it all in perspective at last. Let go of my particular glimpses that have stuck in my memories and be able to see "the bigger picture" in some ways. Anyway - someday I'm going to do that. And I do have some other thoughts about journals that I'll try to make sense of and blog about another time.

Anyway - I think this sums everything up fairly nicely.

Now that I have sufficiently celebrated my "old age" and had a great time living in the past for a bit, now I need to come back to reality and pay attention to my real life again. It was a super fun party. And I'm all caught up.

Moving forward . . . :)

I had a very nice birthday, thanks for asking

So, my actual birthday day was disappointing in that I suppose I haven't quite outgrown the silly expectation that my birthday should be any different from any other day. It isn't. It never is. I should be used to that by now. Elisabeth snitched my cake and ate the top 4th of it before I discovered her (along with a container of salsa and some cream cheese or something from out of the fridge. Do I not feed her? Why does she raid the fridge all day long?!?). There was much fighting and screaming. And messes. And homework. And all of the normal day-to-day-ness of raising kids.

But Zac brought me home flowers and a hazelnut chocolate bar, by my request, and I indulged in a not-so-healthy-but-very-tasty dinner and lemon cake and vanilla ice cream. Yum, yum, yum.

Abigail gave me this picture of a dolphin that she drew, knowing that dolphins are one of my favorites things on this earth. :) And she gave me a little booklet of poems she wrote for me, which was very sweet, entitled "The Best Mom Ever."
Now, how could I say I didn't have a good birthday after getting a gift like that?!

Here's one of the poems:

Some moms kick
some moms hate bunnies
some moms stick to honeybees' honey!
But I know a mom
that's great to me you see
Hip Hip Hooray!
She belongs to me!

Isn't that cute??

Zac and I got to go on a super-date last weekend to celebrate his birthday, my birthday, our anniversary, and any other special occasion we might have missed. We hardly ever get out on "real dates" so this was very exciting for us. My mom came down to babysit for us and we went to see Avatar, which was fun. We shopped at Kohl's with some free Kohl's cash we had. We ate dinner at the Olive Garden. And then we stopped by Target thinking I might get some new mixing bowls for my bday. Well, and we ended up buying me a bookcase instead. :) That's a little bit more fun than mixing bowls, I have to say. And now I have had the enjoyment of rearranging books and deciding what to put where and how to organize them and all of that. I love it. I got some new books for Christmas, you see, and have run out of room on our other shelves. So we justified the bookcase as a sort of "need." Sort of.

Anyway - then Fri. was the girl's night party-party. So stay tuned . . . !!

samuel art

And while we're on the subject, here are some of the cute drawings Samuel made in church yesterday. It seems we have waited a long time to see him drawing pictures of people, so I find these portraits of himself and Elisabeth just adorable. :)

And this is a creation he has worked on over the course of a few Sundays in church. He seems to really like making the letter E. And it sure is an interesting piece of art, if nothing else. :)

Such a funny boy.

Inspirations

I think I mentioned long ago back in December sometime that I was going to post about the kids' school Inspirations contest (this is the charter school version of the Reflections contest).

SO here it is.

The topic was "The Power of One."

Abigail won an honorable mention in Visual Arts for this drawing she did of The Nativity.

And she won first place in Literature for this little story she wrote. (sorry that you can't really read it. I didn't want to type it in, so I just scanned it)

She was so excited to win first place for the first time!!

Isaac submitted this little poem he wrote, but he didn't place. I don't think he could feel too bad, though, because he only did it because it was required as an in-class assignment and I really don't think he put his best effort into it (and he did win before when Abigail didn't). And I'm not quite sure how to feel about the morbid way this toy died by frying in the sun. But I think he was just trying hard to make it rhyme. :)

It was also tough for Isaac because his age group was 3-5th grade, so he was being judged against Abigail's grade as well. It's always harder to be the youngest in the age group.

Anyway - I have some personal issues with these contests (mostly because the rules clearly state that the kids are not supposed to have ANY help AT ALL and it is obvious that some of the kids are getting help, some getting so much help that it is much more the parent's work than the child's. I helped judge some of the other age groups this year and it was so difficult to try to be "fair" for this reason. Do you let the ones win who are clearly "better" even though it is also clear that they didn't do it themselves?!? Or do you reward the ones who clearly show independent work, even though it is sometimes inferior quality? Such a quandry). But I try to put this aside and encourage my kids to participate as much or as little as they would like. I don't push it too much - esp. with my bitterness for feeling like one of the only ones who follows the rules (don't you hate that feeling??).

But. Anyway.

I am proud of both of them for their creativity. And I hope they know that winning - or not winning - this contest is not a measure of either how proud we are, nor how talented they are. :)

ghosts of birthdays past

(NOTE: I wrote this a couple days ago but was afraid to post it. I've decided to post it anyhow - and hope none of this comes back to bite me. Names omitted to protect everyone involved. And I do hope everyone involved forgives me for being a typical self-absorbed teenage girl. Really, I cringe. But this is all in the name of laughing at flashback reminiscing - right?? Right.)

Well . . . this idea of a flashback party has had me thinking back quite a bit, for better or for worse. And I did some digging through some old boxes of mine, yearbooks, journals, pictures, notes, dried flowers and other such teenage memorabilia (ohhh, brother).


Just for fun, I thought I would share an excerpt from one of my journal entries January 1991. It's rather humorous. And I am disconnecting myself from this poor young girl writing and sharing this from my perspective 20 yrs later and the opinion that I am no longer really this girl at all. Right.

And if you knew me then, try not to read too much into this stuff and try not to remember me from back then. Just enjoy it as some strange character written in a young adult fiction novel. Really. Try it.

Here goes:


"Anyways, I've been sitting here thinking a lot about my birthday (In ONE DAY! I might add). I remember in eighth grade I made up all those neat little fantasies about what I wanted to happen and I ended up crying half the day then spending time and having fun with ____. And then last year, I was with ____ and _____ (mostly ____). But this year is my 16th birthday! Whoa. Something exciting is supposed to happen. I'm supposed to have a party - or do something big - or something, anything.


But I haven't written ____ since our horrid conversation and everytime I think of _____, I feel twisted and uncertain inside. I don't want to have a "party" cuz then it seems that ___ would have to be invited - he truly is a good friend, but, in all honesty, I would not want him there if ____ were going to be there. But would ____ even be there? Would he want to?
. . . . .

Anyways, I suppose my greatest hope has been that someone will throw me a surprise party but what are the chances of that happening? Shall I say, practically non-existent? I think I've wished for that to happen every year but this year I've wanted it the most. Maybe it doesn't happen just because I want it to so much. Maybe you have to make the best things happen for yourself.

Everyone I can think of has had some sort of get-together for their 16th birthday. ____ had her big thing at my house (which I disliked muchly). ____ had a little group of us and we ended up going ____ and seeing _____. _____ had a party at _____. And I am doing NUTTIN'!
--------------------------------------------- THE END


Well, and it did turn out that most of my closest friends forgot my birthday that year, after all. It was sort of awful. Oh well. Yes, woe is me. Pitiful, isn't it.

But - my favorite line from this entry is as follows:

"Maybe you have to make the best things happen for yourself."

And that, my friends, is why I find myself nearly 20 yrs later, throwing myself a party. Better late than never. :)

POSTSCRIPT: The party last night was awesome. I will blog about it later. Although I guess I will have to think about what to censure so no one hates me for revealing anything. Hahaha!!! :)
Good times, good times.
More later, to be sure. . . . Have a Happy Saturday!

Piano Recital and Violin, too

Around the middle of December, Isaac performed in his Annual Christmas Piano Recital. I really wish I could get a video of his pieces up on here, but I am giving up on blogger video. I've never gotten it to work for me.

So here are some pictures. This would be his 3rd recital (except last year he was running a high fever and couldn't go). He did a really great job and has improved so much. He played an arrangement of "Ode to Joy" and "Joy to the World" and it's so great to hear him playing songs that we recognize!! :)
He even played while we sang along on Christmas Eve.

This is a group shot of the students (Isaac is on the right in the black vest).

Here he is introducing his pieces:

Abigail also learned some Christmas songs on her violin and played in a small party just for the students at her teacher's house. So I didn't get to hear her (and I don't have pictures). She played "Silent Night" and "O Christmas Tree." She is finally taking lessons now from someone other than me and I think that is working out much better for both of us!! I hope she will continue to make good progress now that she is having consistent lessons and practicing.

Anyway - we are very proud of both of them for all of their hard work and for their musical accomplishments so far! We love it.

One thing we haven't figured out is how to continue to afford all these activities for the kids. I always kind of had this thought in my mind that I would like the kids to be able to participate in one physical activity (dance, sports, or something) and one musical instrument. But - it sure does start to add up. Exponentially, it seems. We'd really like to get Samuel started in some things in the next year or so - but our budget is already stretched pretty tight. grrrrr . . .

Anyway - I'd love to hear your philosophies on what to involve your kids in, and how to manage it all (financially and logistically). And do you try to provide more or less equal experiences and opportunities for all your kids? And how do you narrow down all the infinite choices of activities?

I've always felt it's important for kids to develop their talents and try lots of different things and find hobbies that they truly love. I just don't know how to do it all.

Happy Birthday to ME

Well, it's true. I am turning 35 years old this week. (Yikes!!!)

Something about this has struck a strange chord in me lately and as I read this book to my kids recently, it described exactly how I want to feel about my birthday this year.

Allow me to quote:

"If we didn't have birthdays, you wouldn't be you.
If you'd never been born, well then what would you do?
If you'd never been born, well then what would you be?
You might be a fish! Or a toad in a tree!
You might be a doorknob! Or three baked potatoes!
You might be a bag full of hard green tomatoes.
Or worse than all that . . . Why, you might be a WASN'T!
A Wasn't has no fun at all. No, he doesn't.
A Wasn't just isn't. He just isn't present.
But you . . . You ARE YOU! And now, isn't that pleasant!"

"Today you are you! That is truer than true!
There is no one alive who is you-er than you!
Shout loud, "I am lucky to be what I am!
Thank goodness I'm not just a clam or a ham
Or a dusty old jar of sour gooseberry jam!
I am what I am! That's a great thing to be!
If I say so myself, "HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME!"

I will sadly admit that I haven't always felt this way on my birthdays. But, I figure since I'm very quickly riding the slippery slope down to 40, I may as well embrace what I am today and be happy about it. I am even very slowly learning to accept all of the other "me's" I have been throughout my life (remember my trauma last year over being embarrassed by some of my teenage self?). I think I'm over it. Finally.
Yes, 20 years later, I think I might be able to show you what I looked like, and listened to, and what a goofy crazy hormonal mess of a 15 year old I was, without blushing. Maybe.

And perhaps it is with this goal of embracing my teenage self right alongside my current self that I have decided to throw myself a party (yes indeed! And you are all invited to come - ladies, that is. Friday 7 pm at my house)! I have dubbed it a 1990 flashback party (basically because the music I still enjoy the most comes from the 80's and 90's). As I thought about it, there were a lot of great things about being 15 (I had soo much ENERGY, for one!!). And while I don't necessarily endorse always acting at the maturity level of a 15 yr old (heaven help us!) - I think for this one night at least I am going to try to throw away all these strange (self-imposed) expectations of how an upstanding, grown up, responsible mother of 4 children (who is 35!) should act and behave. And . . . I'm going to have a party to celebrate. Care to join me?!?

More Dr Seuss:

"Now, by Horseback and Bird-back and Hiffer-back, too,
Come Your Friends! All your friends! From all over Katroo!
And the Birthday Pal-alace heats up with hot friends
And your party goes on!
On and on
Till it ends."

Exactly.

getting big

For those that may not be familiar with Primary, the children's organization in our church, kids start going to Nursery when they turn 18 mos. old, where they play with toys, sing kids songs, and learn short lessons for the 2 hr block when the other classes are being held for the older children and adults. The January after they turn 3, they join the Junior Primary in the Sunbeam class, where they have group singing time and sharing time (more active participation) for an hr. and then individual class time for the next hr.

So, with Elisabeth now being 3, today was her first day in the Sunbeam class. She went to class happily, glancing back to wave to Samuel sitting with the kids his age in his class, and then came home and announced to me that she was a "big kid" now. I suppose she really is. It is hard for me to see sometimes, because she is still the "baby." Sometimes I am really surprised at how big she is getting.

On Friday, when my mom babysat the kids for us, she asked Elisabeth if she was going to go to Primary this Sunday. Elisabeth replied, "yes, I going to be a Sunbeam." And then she paused and asked, "does that mean I not be [Elisabeth] anymore?!"
silly silly. :)
At least we can always know that no matter how big she gets, she will always be our little Elisabeth. At least that never changes.

I just couldn't resist

Happy New Year everyone!

Isaac and Abigail stayed up late playing games with me and Zac last night. We played Mastermind, Parcheesi, Phase 10, Apples to Apples, Jr. and a few rounds of MarioCart (we're such party animals). Isaac went to bed around 11. Abigail lasted until 12 when we ran outside and banged pots and pans. Of course, she was still up by 8 am this morning and is so grumpy I don't know if we'll be able to stand her. Oh well.

Hope 2010 is off to a good start for all of you, as well! :)