Recent Doings

Where the heck have I been? For a moment, I forgot I had a blog. My mom always told me that time gets away from you the older you get (I believe this was supposed to start in my 20's). Well she never said it ran in leaps and bounds. What have I been doing? I started a LOOSE homeschooling unit to give Emma and Mary some introduction to the alphabet. Thanks to my genius brainiac friend (I'm referring to Lydia here), we have embarked on a preschool unit based on learning the alphabet through exposure to a South America theme. So we started with Anacondas. I actually started in the fall and then all of us got stuck, so we restarted the middle of January. Lydia mostly supplies the content, but all of the moms (there are 5 of us crazy women, spread out from Virginia to California) contribute to the website. We just finished up C is for Capybara (with a strong focus on caterpillars) and completed the unit with a Continent Cake that I made in the shape of South America. I also got a brand new gym membership to Lifetime Fitness (thanks to my fairy godparents) - that just happened last week but I felt compelled to provide adequate excuses for my extended absence from blogging. And this past weekend I went to an all day crop (scrapbooking, for those who don't know) and completed a satisfying pile of 13 pages. Usually those take 1-2 hours each so it was a good haul.

I have also been spending my spare (?) time engaging in some new playgroups in the subdivision and searching out preschools for Emma, who turns 3 in March. I have to say, I am an education snob. My eye had been on the local Co-op preschool until I went to their open house this past weekend. The teacher that would be running Emma's class room could not remember how to talk to someone who was not 3. She also couldn't give me a straight answer. And, they have no benchmarks for Kindergarten readiness. Now, I don't want Emma to be sitting at a desk for 2 1/2 hours doing letters, but I want to know when she is done with 2 years of this place that she will be allowed into Kindergarten. And "Miss Susan" wasn't really that reassuring. Then Jim and I had the argument of cost. The Co-op is, of course, VERY reasonable. But the other choices have more structure and allow for readiness to pass onto the next level. So this week we are at a stall. I have sent out for information from mores schools, but think I may be just as annoyed and end up choosing what I think is the lesser of two evils.

For now, we are getting ready of tomorrow's lesson for D. We are doing a drum circle and painting some little Ducks. I haven't figured out what kind of snack to have - nothing really beats the Churros we made for C. If you want to check out Lydia's awesome website, click on the underlined, purple website word. I have some pictures up under each of the kids, but I am working on putting them under the letter tabs. You know, when I get a chance....

Little Nothings

I've not been writing much because we are back to potty training with Emma. That pretty much takes up all of my available patience, leaving me a raving lunatic and unable to sit quietly and write. But now Emma has decided to do it all HERSELF, except for a couple of intermediate steps such as putting her panties back on or putting the towel back on the rack. Now, I did not mistype that - Emma must get completely naked when she uses the toilet. I am not sure where she got that from, since I believe she has never seen Seinfeld. So except for the problem of figuring out solid waste going INTO the toilet, she is progressing along with the training. On a lighter side, the game she invented for the afternoon is running around with her hands clasped, presumably because she has captured my "pretty eyes" and I am supposed to chase her down and get them back.

Mary is quickly becoming the next cutest being on the planet. Nothing specific, mind you, just a bunch of consecutively sweet and endearing actions. Today we made tissue paper butterflies and she loved hers so much that she had to put it in the stroller and take it with us on a walk. Yep, I'm telling you, PURE CUTENESS.

Well the children are clamoring for dinner, so I think that, as the only parent currently in the house, that responsibility falls to me.

From the Front Lines

Today has been a horrible day getting back to normal. I've been peed on, gotten poop on me, been vomited on and slip and fell in a puddle of milk. Despite that, I am not going to moan about it beyond that. I wanted to post a couple of pictures of the "New" dining and living rooms now that we have the furniture all put back in place. I am uploading an Ofoto album right now, so you can check out the the link in case anyone wants to see the whole thing. But, until then, here's a few to whet your appetite: