All Good Things...

...Must come to an end.

My Kaylie girl is no longer nursing.  It wasn't my decision.  It was hers.  She just up and decided that she was done, about 2 weeks ago.  I thought at first that it was only a nursing strike, so I continued to offer, but she continued to refuse.  I've accepted it now.

Mostly.

We Went to a Party!

We went to Sydney's birthday party this past weekend.  Sydney's parties are the best.  Last year, Syd's parents (her dad is one of Bran's co-workers) got a bouncy house and a cotton candy machine.  This year, they got a petting zoo.

That's right, I said petting zoo.  There was a pony, 2 rabbits, 2 chickens, a sheep, and a goat.  Oh, and another pony, for giving rides.  Holy cow.

The girls had a blast!  Naturally, I dressed Elora in her Jessie outfit, because #1: that shirt was Syd's gift to Elora at her birthday party, and #2: what better time to dress as Jessie the Cowgirl than at a party with ponies?

It was just perfect! Elora might have been born in a saddle, she loved it so much.  She rode that pony three times--more even than the birthday girl herself.

Kaylie rode once, and definitely enjoyed it.  She giggled the whole time.  But she was just as happy to pet the bunnies, chase the cat or make friends with the goat, so I wasn't worried about her getting a second turn.

When it was time for the animals to leave, Sydney's mom broke out the cake and ice cream.  The rest of the party was pretty tame, but still a lot of fun.  Except for this part.

Kaylie and I were petting the little brown pony, and I stood up because she's was getting cranky.  I hit my head on a square metal lantern hanging from the tree; the corner caught me right on the crown of my head.  Brandon had been taking pictures of us and he just happened to push the button at exactly the right moment.  Hitting my head sucked, but the picture is pretty awesome.  Or am I just weird? 

Oh wow, lots of pictures of Kaylie.  I didn't realize that I had so many of her.  But I guess that since Elora spent so much time running around with the other kids, and I had to stick pretty close to Kaylie, it makes sense.

When it was time to go, Elora did not want to leave, even though we were the second-to-last-family to do so.  I had to coax her to say good bye, but she did.  And very sweetly too. 

I wonder what they'll do next year?  Her dad said something about a clown and a Ferris wheel, but he's probably just joking.  Probably.

Space Hats

Elora loves chatting with her Gigi on Skype.  They read, they play, they talk about their days.  This time, they went into space.

This was not their first journey into space, but this was the first time that they required space hats to do it.  No sooner had I provided the space hat and sat back down, they informed me that their space hats needed antennae so they could communicate.

I made antennae.

Isn't Elora adorable?  Aren't grandmothers fantastic?  Isn't the internet wonderful?

Tire Trouble

We have a slow leak in the right front tire on our Ford.  We have to put air in it every few weeks, so when the "low air pressure" light came on, I wasn't too worried.  Until I saw this, on Friday.

See the problem?  Here's the zoom view.

Yeah.  That's a problem.  The bad news is that the tire is unsafe to drive on, and will have to be replaced.  And Brandon was gone.  AND I'd never changed a tire before.  The good news is that Rebekah was with me, and Rebekah has changed a tire!  The guy at Sam's put air in it for me, and we got it back to my house safely.   We put little James in the baby cabana, plunked the girls in front of the TV, and put our Big Girl pants on.  

I had a handle on Tire Changing Theory.  My dad showed me what to do when I was a teenager, but I'm so spoiled that I've never actually had to do it.  Rebekah walked me through the execution of said theory, filling in the gaps in my knowledge.  Like, I didn't know that there was a certain place for the jack (indicated on my car by a handy arrow).  Rebekah walked me through it, and for the most part, I did it myself.  She did have to help me get to donut on, and she had to help me wrestle the ruined tire into the back of the car.  

I'm sure I could have figured it out on my own, and I probably could have managed the donut and I could have just rolled the tire into the garage, but I didn't have to.  Thank God for friends, especially friends as wonderful as Rebekah.  Thanks, lady.

Mother's Day 2012

I had a wonderful Mother's Day weekend!  My family took me to dinner Saturday night, and to a movie Sunday afternoon.  We caught a matinee showing of the Avengers at the Cinema Cafe. (The tickets were cheap, but the food was pricey.)  The venue was pretty much perfect for taking two small children, especially since it wasn't exactly a tot-friendly movie.  Amazingly, Kaylie slept through at least half of it.

As we were coming out of the theater, we saw this car with the S.H.I.E.L.D. logo on the side, and we totally did the cheesy  photo thing.

Elora wasn't ready to go home, so we detoured by the park.  We let her play for a while, and snapped a few photos of me and the girls with Bran's phone before heading home.

I hope everyone else had a great Mother's Day too!

Potty Chart

Elora is back to being uninterested in potty training, so I spent more than an hour making this....

only to realize that my printer can't handle paper any wider than 8.5".  So then I made this.  

At least making the first one wasn't a complete waste of time...and maybe I'll order a print, and have it laminated so it can be used repeatedly.  I covered this one with clear contact paper, so this one is re-usable too.  Too bad that she isn't filling in those blocks.  I even have these to use as an incentive, courtesy of Gigi:

She wants them, but apparently, she doesn't want them bad enough.  Or maybe she's not getting that she has to use the potty every day for a week to earn them? (Elmo is her reward for #1, Big Bird is for #2.)  She tinkled in the potty once (see Tuesday on the chart?) and wanted me to hand over the Elmo puppet.
We'll get there.  Right?

Update: 5 minutes after writing this post, she asked to use the potty. :)

Military Wives

May 10 was Military Spouse Appreciation Day.  I just stumbled upon this graphic this morning.

Found here:  http://yourlocalsecurity.com/in-good-measure/support-military-wives

Thank you to all of our military personnel, and THANK YOU to all of the spouses and families who support our soldiers, sailors, and airmen!  

Weekend in DC

We went this past weekend to see Peguy up in DC.  (Finally!  Why does it always take us so long to do these things?)  We drove up on Friday afternoon, and spent Saturday taking in some of the sights.  Our first stop was the obligatory visit to the White House.  We parked just around the corner, and walked over to join the crowd right in front of the iconic building.

Over the course of the day, we took the opportunity to snap photos with a few of the other major land marks, like the Washington Monument, and the Capitol Building.  We didn't actually make it to see any of the monuments; that'll be something for us to do next time.

After leaving the White House, we piled back into our cars and went to find parking closer to the Smithsonian museums we wanted to visit.  By the time we finally found a garage to park in, we were starving.  It was a bit of a walk from the garage to the Museum of Natural History,  and long the way Peguy spotted the little cafe in the National Gallery of Art Sculpture Garden, so we stopped there to eat.  Let me tell you, that cafe could give Disney a run for the first place prize in pricey tourist trap restaurants.  I was a little disgusted at how expensive it was, but considering that the museums themselves were free, I didn't think I could complain too much.

I have been dying to take Elora to see a dinosaur exhibit ever since Peguy and I first hatched our plan for us to visit them in DC.  Elora is a big fan of Dinosaur Train on PBS, and is familiar with a wide variety of dinosaur species, as well as the concept of fossils.  I just knew she would get a kick out of seeing some in person--and she did!

We spent about 2 or 3 hours in the NMNH, before moving on.  It wasn't nearly long enough to take everything in, but with three very little ones we pretty much had to keep moving.  Then it was getting to be late in the afternoon, and we were all flagging, but we still had another museum on the agenda.

There was only a short walk from one museum to the other; they lay on opposite sides of the mall, pretty much right across from one another.  We passed a carousel on the way, and decided to stop and let the kids ride.  They all enjoyed it, but Elora loved it.  She just kept saying "I'm having so much fun!" over and over, and when it was time to go, I had to pry her fingers away from the pole and drag her back to her dad.

Our last stop for the day was for Brandon: the National Air and Space Museum.  It really was just right up his alley.  His whole face lit up to see all of the historic vehicles on display in the main atrium.  He tried to tell me about them, to impart the significance of what I was seeing, but I just couldn't appreciate it the way that he did.  I did enjoy the interactive exhibit on the physics behind flight, and I did enjoy wandering around and chatting with Peguy while Brandon and Elora went to check everything out.  (We weren't sure what Peg's husband, Neil, did during that time; he must have just found an out of the way seat on which to relax and wait.)

We finished the day at a restaurant in Chinatown, and headed back to Peguy's.  The kids were exhausted.  Kaylie fell asleep in the car and didn't wake up again until almost 7 the next morning.  Elora and T-man woke up when we got back to the house, so we let them stay up for a while before putting them to bed.  Elora woke up shortly after her sister did, and T-man didn't rouse until after 8.  (All three kids usually wake up for milk at some point, but that night they let us all sleep.)

Sunday was our lazy day.  We woke up slow, sipped coffee, made crepes (ham & cheese and banana & Nutella), and played around with doing some maternity photos of Peguy.  We were back on the road, headed home, by about two Sunday afternoon.  It was a great weekend.  :)

The Green World Health

Remember last fall, when I was all about getting healthy?  I did really well for about four or five months, until after the first of the year.  Then I started being less awesome.  Now I'm trying to get it together again, and figure out how to re-claim the motivation and energy I had when I started down this path before.  I think part of it was that I was excited about it, and sharing it here, and on Facebook.  Keeping other people involved with it helped me to hold myself accountable, so I'm going to start posting about it again.  This time, though, rather than boring you with the details of my health journey, when all you really want to see are pictures of my children or my latest project, I've started another blog for my posting my progress and inspiration. 

I'm doing it mainly for me, but it's there for anyone who wants to have a look.  :)

Kaylie Walking!

Kaylie can walk.  She just doesn't want to.  She'd rather get around by walking on her knees.  When playing outside, though, she doesn't like the feel of the grass, so she's found walking on her feet preferable to walking on her knees... and I got it on video!