a busy month

February has been a busy month and I am sort of glad to see it is over. I can't believe I am really admitting that but it's true. But I did get to do a lot of fun things in February and thought I would share a few...

I finished a few more digital layouts for my Digi in Deep class over at www.jessicasprague.com. This layout was directly from the lesson 2 materials, the only exception is my journaling and my photos.

Journaling says: Nothing is more special to me than watching you read to your little sister. I am so impressed with how much you are learning and growing the 1st grade and so very proud of you. Love you bunches...

I also finished my own camera bag. I like my real camera bag which is a Lowepro Slingshot but I really wanted something cute, fun and feminine... I think this fit the requirements nicely and I love that I made it!

And as we turn to March 1st, Alyssa and I finished her invites for her upcoming 5th birthday. Unfortunately, I was using scraps and only had enough scraps for her friends so this year, I am very sorry family but you will have to view from here. Of course, you are always invited to attend!

This morning Alyssa came into our bedroom and asked Daddy "Is today my birthday?"

D: No, not today.

A: How long until my birthday?

D: Well, there is 13 days until your birthday party and then your birthday is just a few days after that.

A: Oh, okay. Where's Mommy?

So here's to the end of a month full of "love" and to a new month full of 14 days of asking "Is today my birthday?"

a day in her life...

... can be a very busy, busy day and somehow, I imagine that is how most 4 years old are. Today I was struck by how silly, cute and outrageously funny she was. One moment she would play quietly next to me and then for the next hour chatter incessantly about who knows what. Here were a few of my highlights with her today: 

"Mommy, come sit with me so I can READ TO YOU!" And as crazy as it sounds, she really was reading the book. She didn't get the words right but she told the story as she heard it for the first time yesterday... and strangely, several times she REALLY did read the page as it was written!

She asked for grapefruit for her snack, and then slurped, sucked, squeezed, squashed as much juice as she could out of it while watching it snow.

She pestered me to make a snowman all morning but when I would say let's go, she'd vanish to play with something else. We finally made our "baby snowman" and she talked to it for quite awhile.

I went in to grab my other gloves and came out to find her making a snow angel.

And then later she played darts which involves pulling up the step stool to the dart board and putting the darts in where she wanted them!

And it just wouldn't be a fun day without including her big brother in the mix of stories. Tonight during bath, he asked about the tub toys under the sink. I pulled them out and he saw his razor so he decided to shave. I lathered him up and he turned to his little mirror to start to shave. After pulling the first row, he turned to me and said "Wow Mom, this really works!"

What a perfect day!

a weekend of games

There was a lot of rest and a lot of game play involved in this weekend. Jaiden had a knee bleed and we really worked on enjoying the 3 day weekend while lying low these past few days. The kids and I picked out two new games - Battleship and Life. Both were a huge hit among our other games of Monopoly, Uno, Trouble, and the usual card games of GO Fish, War, Crazy 8's and Old Maid... phew, did I remember all of them?

Here Jaiden concentrates as he continues to sink my battleships!

And this was taken this morning. The lighting a little challenging but I was coming down the stairs and the 3 of them were so intent on the game of Life. Alyssa only wanted to get married, have kids and a dog; while Jaiden was Doctor and Daddy was a veterinarian... can you guess who won?



xoxo...

Happy Valentine's Day!

PS. The kids had a blast at school and I will post photos tomorrow of them. They were delighted to receive all their valentine's from family and friends. In the meantime, here is a little valentine fun I created today. I really like how it turned out!

xoxo

go directly to jail, do not past go, do not collect $200

If you would have asked us this morning, going to jail and not passing go didn't sound like a bad plan... we tried to get up early and go skiing but driving up, the wind got windier and Jaiden got more car sick. We weren't but 10 minutes from the ski resort when Jaiden lost it on himself; and while I tried to clean him up outside of the car, he and I were nearly swept down the mountain by a gust of wind! The day was not looking promising so we canceled skiing and came home.

Monopoly was Jaiden's idea and the three of us played for almost 3 hours!

He loved every second of it... of course, he had a monopoly and whooped Daddy and Mommy with a total of over $5800! while Mommy suffered at $5 and Daddy at $1800.

Alyssa enjoyed her role as the banker! Given she doesn't understand math or counting anything larger than 20... we enjoyed most of the time the money she gave us as passing go ranged from $20 to $300!

34,699 days...

Remember when I calculated  how many days the kids had been alive on their birthdays last year? 2191 and 1461 days respectively? Well, 34 THOUSAND 6 HUNDRED and 99 days is how many my Opa has been alive! And to think I was impressed with 2191 and 1461 days? And in case you aren't good with math or you aren't sure how many leap years there were, he turned 95 years old today!

Happy Birthday Opa!

I hope you have a great day!

loving...

Remember that free Joy of Love class I mentioned? I haven't been feeling very inspired ... although truth be told, it's been busy without Dennis around and then not feeling well isn't helping either ... but not being inspired to capture something with my camera is pretty low on my list around here.

The prompt for the day was "gift from the heart: (what they have said, promised, done, given) What has your spouse (or loved one) given or promised to you (material or immaterial)? Try to capture this “gift” from their heart." As I was trying to explain an example of this to my mom, it dawned on me I had one of those treasures out on display this month!

I instantly captured this:

I vole you!

One of my all time favorites that Jaiden brought home in preschool. I adore the spelling of love.

And I always love the little remnants of play I find when the kids have gone to school. This was Alyssa's line up from playing so sweetly this morning.

And this...

... I wasn't loving this but I did love the fact that as I started to clean it up, Alyssa declared me as the "heedless spiller" since I failed to attend my soup before boiling it over!

100 days of school... finally!

Technically, the 100th day would have been February 1st but with the past two days of school closures for severe cold weather... the 100th day was today!

And I got to be in the classroom to take photographs. Jaiden presenting his 100 day project... 100 bees in 10 bee hives!

I wish I had 100 DS games.

I wish I had 100 Game Boy games.

But I wouldn't want 100 bug bites.

I could eat 100 pizzas.

I could eat 100 skittles.

But I couldn't eat 100 vegetables.

I could hold 100 buttons.

I could lift 100 feathers.

I could make 100 pictures.

But I could never lift 100 big inner tubes.

Happy 100th day of school!

loving...

... the really cold weather we are having! Today's high was -1 degrees Fahrenheit... LOVE IT!!! I did not realize how much I missed Alaska until I stepped out to shovel snow... in my lovely warm parka... call me crazy but I am not the only one... 

She also loved helping shovel the snow. No complaints about the cold from her and in fact, she wanted to go sledding!

I think the groundhog will be frozen in his hole for tomorrow but if he did happen to pop around here, the sun is magnificent and I am sure he'd see his shadow.