School Christmas Programs

The boys' school is different from how my school was when I was a kid. Instead of some big Christmas (Holiday these days) program, each class is responsible for doing their own thing. It's kind of nice that way, as we don't have to sit through everyone else's kids doing things and can just go to the ones featuring our own kids.

Niall's was last week. They did a few songs and the teacher read a story where the kids "acted" their parts by standing around in different colored scarves holding props. Niall had stage fright for most of the action, muttering his one little couplet and not singing the songs. He did the best with Jingle Bells, so that's the one that survived the agony of uploading to youtube.


Rowan's class program was today, and his was simpler. The children divided into groups, and each group played a different song on the handbells. Rowan's little group did the Carol of the Bells. He was very proud of himself and told me what he was playing every time the song came on the iPod for the past week, so I knew I had to be sure to get it on video.


Enjoy!

Ho ho ho!

Presenting a picture of the picture with Santa.
Eleri did fine with it, because John put her down in front of Santa, and he didn't pay her any attention until she decided to go sit on his lap. If it's her idea, she's cool with it. If we'd tried to put her there, all hell would have broken loose.

It's Niall's birthday!

Can you believe he's 6 years old today? He was born at 1 minute after midnight. I'll never forget my midwife shouting, "Holy Cow!" when he came barrelling into this world. We knew he would be big, but we weren't expecting a 9lb baby! I had no idea my baby was capable of carrying such a huge guy, and he was born so quickly. He was in a rush then, and he hasn't stopped yet.

 

Niall was such a big baby. People would stop us when we were out to tell me how big my baby was. Like I didn't know... I was carrying him. I knew!

He's tested my patience more than anyone else on this earth, which has made me a better person than I was before. And we've had plenty of laughs along the way.

And now he's six. Can you believe it? He's learning to read and write. He loves math and is already learning some simple multiplication. He's well liked at school, and is an all around great boy.

I'll be taking more pictures tonight once he's home from school. He's been begging for a powerwheels for his birthday, and I scored one on Craigslist way back in September. It's been hidden at the university since then, and I finally get to give it to him this afternoon. I can't wait!

Mom was asking for some pictures, so here's one from the Christmas card photo shoot. You know, Mom, you'd see these faster if you were on Facebook. ;) Here's one of my favorites.

The whole album, which is going to eventually be all of the Christmas pictures, can be found here.

Halloween!

It is seriously difficult to get 3 kids to look in the same direction for a picture.

 

But getting an 8 year old to behave is easy. Meet Harry Potter. Various parts of his costume pulled from eBay, and the vest hand knit by me.

Who needs a flashlight? Lumos!

We had an astronaut drop in from the international space station.

 

Here he is, letting us know where Astronauts spend their time.

And lastly, a very cute cheerleader. She was much to busy for pictures.

 

I did my best. Forgive the clashing shoes and focus on the cute face.

Pixie turns two!

It's somebody's birthday today! She's had a very good day so far. Rowan was home sick from school so she had a brother to play with all day. We tried a portrait session this afternoon, and I forgot how hard it is to get a picture of a 2 year old. Here's one peek, and I made the set public, so all you have to do is go here to see them all, including the blurry outtakes. Pictures will be added, too. She hasn't gotten her present yet. We're waiting for Daddy to be home so he can see it, too.

Thank you, Fannie!

Eleri got a new winter dress in the mail from Fannie today. She will wear this a lot this winter. Probably not with the hat, though. We had to use a popsicle to bribe her into wearing it for the pictures. :)

Well hello there

I haven't been posting. Isn't that how it always goes? I say that I will but then I disappear and I get emails from Mom and Fran asking what happened and where are the pictures.
I have no idea what I've been doing. But I know that this week ahead is going to be crazy busy.
Monday - teacher conference and feeding therapy resumes
Tuesday - storytime at the library and knit night
Wednesday - Eleri turns 2!!! Niall has bring a parent to school day, and I have to go help a friend buy yarn.
Thursday - Eleri's pedi appointment, lunch with a friend, knitting circle at the diaper store
Friday - No school for the kids.

Somewhere in all of this I have to knit a vest for Harry Potter, preferably in time for him to wear it to school on Friday. And the computer is getting worse and worse with it's reliability about things like turning on, so that's always fun. I have plans to get a macbook. I need to save up some cash.
You probably want pictures. I can't show you what I've been knitting. I'm in a gifty swap and you never know who's lurking. We got the winter clothes down from the attic and I found out that I DID buy Eleri some red dresses last year during the year in sale. She'll wear one of them for Christmas. Here's one now.

Scouts Honor

 

That whole posting more often thing? Riiiight.

This week's calendar

Monday - cub scouts

Tuesday - story time at the library, knit night

Wednesday - baseball game

Friday - baseball game

So... have a picture of the Cub Scout. Buy some popcorn from him, if you are so inclined.

Go GAMECOCKS!

 

I think the cute cheerleader had something to do with them taking down the #1 team.

Bomb

 

Someone is on a food strike. That's okay, little diva pixie. I've got you covered. She still drinks her shake in the morning. She doesn't know that I performm small feats of alchemy every morning to mix up a 700calorie bomb. Greek yogurt, instant breakfast, flax seed oil, benecalorie, rice milk. That's right. So while I'm pulling my hair out trying to get this baby to eat something again - this is day 3 of the no longer eating strike - I don't have to freak out too much because she is getting something. It's just not my ideal of what I want her to eat. She will grow out of this someday, right?

Yum

I've been meaning to get back to making my own bread for a while, but kept putting it off because I remember how many tries it took me to get a good loaf when I did it before. Once I finally got it, I knew what to do, but we had quite a few sad and sorry loaves before I got there. So, I kept putting it off.
A while ago, Fran showed me this article about how to make really good bread in 5 minutes a day. I figured I could manage that, but it still took me this long to get a pizza peel and stone and actually try it out. But yesterday when we were at the store and I knew we were out of bread, I purposely decided to NOT buy any, because I knew if I had bread in the house I would put it off again.
My first loaf looks pretty good, and tastes pretty great, and that's even with all the mistakes I made in the making it. I didn't leave it in the fridge long enough, and I forgot about it on the peel so it tried to slither away, and I think some cornmeal got on the inside when I had to reshape it after the slithering, and then I forgot about it in the oven. Actually, this bread seems to be pretty idiot proof, which makes it perfect for me.
Yay for bread! The boys had some this morning, and came running back for an extra slice to have in the car on the way to school. I think we have a winner!

Two things that should never be near each other

I went to Ikea with a friend today. We drove down this morning, walked all over the whole store and bought many things, and then drove back home again. I'm am tired and weary, so it seems as good a time as any to tell you why I recently had to replace my toothbrush.

The Pixie still sleeps in our room. Her crib is there along the wall, right where I can see her when I am lying in bed. It works well for us, but it also makes us do some things differently when we come to bed at night. For instance, I don't go into my bedroom until I am ready to go to sleep, and I move quietly and quickly to do all that needs doing and get into my jammies so she doesn't wake up and cry at me until I come and nurse her. This means that we don't turn on the light in the bathroom. We leave the closet light on and crack the door, and that dim light is what we get for toothbrushing and toileting. Normally, this isn't a problem, but sometimes I have moments in which my brain has already gone to sleep while my body is going along with all the mechanical processes necessary to get itself there, too. That is where this comes in.

 

I'm sure you can spot the problem here. Two containers, roughly the same size and shape, in the mostly dark with a brain that has already turned in for the night...

I did notice that the substance on my toothbrush was more liquidy than it should have been, which made me sniff it and realize what happened before I put it in my mouth. I think that's pretty good for a body operating on autopilot. 

I moved the hair stuff back where it should have been so the mistake won't be repeated. At least until the next time I decide to try to be a grownup and use product on my hair.

Story time at the library

We went today because we were running all over and beating Walmart yesterday.

One good thing about living in a small town is that you can ride your bike to the library. The great thing about being almost two years old and riding on a bike to the library is the opportunity to create a great outfit with your bike helmet. The Pixie picked out her own outfit this morning.

 

The pictures aren't that great, but it's very hard to get a picture of someone who believes that helmet means go and who is not in the least interested in stopping to look at the camera.
Story time was lots of fun. Eleri is much more interested in dancing to the songs and playing the games than Niall ever was. Participation is cool! And she got all sorts of smiles and love for her bike helmet. It was a good morning outing.

renovations

I discovered today that since blogger has changed all it's wiggly bits to make creating a fun template easier for people, now I can't change the number of gadgets and whatnot that I have here.
So there might be some changing around of things going on. Who knows? Maybe it will be prettier? My little lemon buttons are going to go though, because I had to make them match with html code things and I have no idea how I did it last time.
Weeeeee! I don't know what I'm doing!


LATER: Well? What do you think of the white? I could not figure out what pink I used before, and I was getting tired of the pink anyway. Is the white classy? Boring? Who cares?

Me Vs. Walmart

I just beat Walmart again.

I say again, because this is the second time this month that Walmart has tried to foil me, but I managed to come out ahead.

The first time was a couple of weeks ago over some eggs. I needed to buy some, and since the boys were in school and it wasn't a race to get everything I needed before one of them destroyed something or maimed himself, I took the time to actually consider what I was doing. They have those little "price per unit" parts on the price tags, but I don't trust those. Half the time they label comparable items differently - like one is per oz. and one is per lb, which would be helpful if I didn't have to do math to figure out how the prices really compare.
So back to it, I was buying eggs. (and I can tell you all about this because I was so proud of myself for figuring it out that I went and posted about it on my forum of friends)

I had my choice to purchase:
1 doz. eggs for $1.41
18 eggs for $2.22
30 eggs for $4.40 

Now, somewhere in my brain, I always thought that buying the economy sized whatever of anything was supposed to give you the most bang for your buck.  NOT SO, WALMART. Because I stood there pacing back in forth in front of the eggs and muttering to myself. Pixie was fine. She had crackers. I could take my time.

I figured out that 2 of the 18 count eggs is 4.44, so 4cents more but you get 6 more eggs. But 3 of the dozen eggs is 4.23, you get 36 eggs, and you save money. You do not want to know how much pacing and muttering it took me to come to this conclusion, and then I had to come home and use the calculator on the computer to make sure I did it right. My brain is not very mathy, and I was taxing its abilities, but I did it right and got more eggs for less money.

I beat Walmart!

And then today, I decided that it was time to stop walking on the treadmill in my 5 year old shoes. They are old and sad and make my feet hurt, but I haven't done anything about it because have you seen the price of running shoes when you have to buy for a wide width? And also, why is it that I wear a 6.5/7 in normal shoes, but in running shoes I have to buy an 8-8.5? Do my feet get bigger when I'm running and then shrink back down?

Anyway, I decided that I would get myself a pair of Walmart running shoes for now, and then when I reach some fitness goal I will reward myself with some nice shoes. Good goal! Non food!

Walmart had some on clearance! Yay! I paced and squinted at the boxes, trying to find some that fit me. There were a few styles on markdown. Most of them just did not feel right at all. One felt great, but there was only one shoe in the box. I put it on the floor because I didn't feel right about putting a box with only one shoe in it back on the shelf. I kept looking, and the Pixie was getting kind of worried because I'd removed one shoe and it was just sitting on the floor and you know how she is about shoes. But I found another box, with two shoes in it, tried one on, and yay!

I put it in my cart and started to walk away, but part of my brain woke up and reminded me that I was in Walmart and it didn't pay to be stupid. I stopped right there and checked BOTH shoes in the box. They were different sizes. But they were the same style as that single shoe that I had put on the floor instead of putting back on the shelf. I checked, and it was the size I needed, and the opposite shoe - I made sure to check that, too. All I need is to buy shoes on clearance and get home to discover that I have 2 right shoes and no left shoes. It all worked out, though, and I walked out of Walmart with a pair of running shoes for $15, plus some raisins, grapes, and the Pixie's iron drops, because it is a law of Walmart that you can't go in there for just one thing and manage to get out with only that thing. I think they put something in the air.

But, no matter. I still won. Twice.

Resolving again

Hey! I'm going to blog more. Again.
I do really well for a while, and then a whole bunch of life starts happening and I kind of forget about doing this. It's somewhat for the grandparents, somewhat for the knitting, but mostly for me, and sometimes me comes last. But right now I can say that I'm going to take it up again because the baby is in bed, Niall is in the tub, John and Rowan have gone to cub scouts, and I'm sitting here in the dim with a dog on either side of me.
Pretty good.
So a lot has been happening lately. The boys started school, Rowan is playing baseball and is joining Cub Scouts, Eleri is out of therapy but I'm still trying to get weight on the little stinker.
I've had pretty good luck improving my Corelle collection. I scored some dessert/snack plates and found a bowl.

That was a particularly good day for thrifting. We also scored some boots for Eleri. She adores them and puts them on every time they catch her eye. The clomping noise she can make while going down the hall is part of their charm, and the easy on and off makes them all kinds of win.

So there you go. More blogging to come. Most of it will be inane, but I need to get back in the habit of writing again and I can't think of a good story every day. I'll try to have some sort of fun for you though. At least, until life gets in my way again.

Big news here!

We are expecting a visitor tonight.
A very tiny, magic vistor.
You may know her as the Tooth Fairy.

Our Niall is growing up!

Rowan's first ball game

It was a fine evening for baseball. The Knights took on the Timber Rattlers, and won 1-0 (though officially we are not keeping score because the fall league is all about skill building and not tournament, but whatevs, we won!)
Rowan was very serious about playing. We have some work to get him up there skillwise (batting stance, throwing, hitting...) but he got a hit so it's all good. It's strange to think of teaching a kid to play ball. I don't know how I learned, but we didn't do much besides play baseball and hide and seek in the summertime when I was a kid. I suppose someone had to show me how it's done at some point. Rowan is a fast learner though, and it's nice to have him playing a sport where I understand the rules.

Friday Flick! on Saturday

This is a video that I've been trying to upload for about a month now. The upload time was insanely long. I finally figured out how to set the computer so it wouldn't go to sleep and left it to upload overnight. It worked! So now you have a good almost 4 minute long look at the Pixie.

:D This makes me happy

I plugged a couple of samples of my writing into a website and got this.

I write like
Stephen King

I Write Like by Mémoires, Mac journal software. Analyze your writing!

Even if it's not entirely accurate, that makes me way happy.

Tori's pants

And now for a little sewing! (thanks, Fran, for fixing my machine for me!)

I have a friend named Tori who had a favorite pair of jeans. We all know about those. They're impossible to find, and once you do find them you hang on to them with a death grip until they're just a sorry wad of threads that may or may not have once been jeans. It's important to get every last second out of them.

Her jeans were worn through in the seat. This is a problem for any self respecting southern lady who does not want to flash her delicates to the world, right?

So, she asked her neighbor to fix them for her. Bought some cute fabric that could show through the holes. And handed them over.

The neighbor...

Well...

The neighbor did this:

Now... Let's examine this, shall we?

Not only did she use hot pink thread to sew them down... The patches are on the outside of the pants. What does this say to you?
"Hello, I would like to introduce you to my butt!"
"Check out my boo-tay."
"Is your butt swank? 'cause mine is."
"For a good time, grab here."

Now, Tori didn't know quite what to say. She took them home and tried them on. Showed her hubby. He would never be seen in public with her and these jeans. But they were THE JEANS. The FAVORITE jeans. So, she snagged me at knit night one week and told me the whole sad story. She didn't want to go back as a dissatisfied customer. She didn't know what to do. I didn't believe how bad they were until I saw them, and then, once I did, there was no going back. These had to be saved.

Those patches were on there GOOD, too. Three step zigzag all around them. Thin, fraying material near where the holes were. I took my time and removed them over the course of a couple of days. No rushing on this job. A sharp stitch ripper, good light, and a little tv company.

You'll be glad to know that the jeans are saved.

A little fabric peeks through the hole - like grownups wear.