Another snow day!!

Yay, it's snow day part 2!! Well I made a deal with the kiddies that in every 3 hour increment if they would allow me to have 1 hour of cleaning and 1 hour of scrapbooking, I'd give them 1 hour of Mommy time. That way we should have 12 hours total and 4 hours devoted to each thing. That sounds like a good deal to me. In the other 8 hours they are free to do whatever they choose (within reason!!). Hopefully that'll make for a nice, fun and peaceful day!! I'm making french toast now and then we'll go from there. Oooh, I Just took the dog out and it's so weird because we have a pretty good layer of snow and then on top is a layer of ice, the snow is crunchy!! It was very strange, I didn't even sink into the snow just rested on top of the layer of ice! Well we'll see how the rest of day goes, hopefully not too much ice. Hope everyone enjoys their day!

sweetheart spud

here's sonya's two sweetheart spuds, for those of you interested in his appearance

Sledding

Well I picked up Noah and the three of us went sledding!! It was actually pretty fun. I was a bit nervous being the only adult, but as long as they came down one at a time I was fine. They both really liked it and hopefully this next storm will give us some more snow because I'd like to go back with Daddy at the end of the week, I know he'd like to see it too!!

Alright, alright

Noah's gift

Abby's gift








Our yummy Valentine's Dinner (on our expensive Spode dinnerwear we got for our wedding!!)







My gifts!! Sorry no pic of my painting, the camera doesn't do it justice, you'll have to see it in person!!






Dang, can a person have a nice weekend without being tied to this darn computer?!?! You people really need to get some lives!! SM Well, we had a pretty busy weekend, Friday is when Noah has both karate (every other week) and basketball practice. Usually Abby and I just stay home because they'll be gone from 5:10 until 8:20 and that's just a long time, but this week I needed to go to Wal-Mart anyway, so Abby and I tagged along. While Daddy and Noah were at Karate, Abby and I went to wal-mart and then picked up some dinner in the drive-thru. Before we got back to karate, I realized we had totally forgotten all of Noah's basketball clothes and shoes!! What in the world were we thinking!! Well, luckily I had enough time to run and get them and get back in time to pick the boys up and go to our church for basketball. At Wal-Mart I got some things for my honey for v-day and I also got something for my Grease costume!! OOOOHHH you girls better be excited about this party!!! Well Saturday we took the kids to my parents to spend the night. This was the first time they've just spent the night without us with them at someone else's house. A few times someone has come here to stay with them (a grandparent), but never at their house. Abby was so excited, she kept saying "this is my first sleepover!!" . The kids had lots of fun, they ate pizza, got some new toys, watched movies, stayed up until 10 and then had donuts in the morning. They really enjoyed it. Meanwhile Steve and I just came home to enjoy a nice quiet evening in our own home. I made my very yummy chicken alfredo and we watched the Wedding Singer in the theater. It was so nice to be alone in our home, we've never done that before. We also exchanged gifts for Valentines because Steve's out of town this week. I painted him a picture of a sunset over a beach, like we saw in San Diego and I put our initials inside a heart in the sand. It's cute!! We had a 10 dollar limit for each other and I was able to get a canvas, a few paint colors (thank goodness for wal-mart's .44 cent paints), plus a few little candy items and a card. He got me a ton for 10 bucks though! He got me three votive candle holders that say I love you (1 word on each holder), a cute valentine pail that he put a stuffed valentine king frog inside (very cute!!) plus two reese peanut butter hearts!! He decided to write his own card in the form of a very sweet poem. It was just a really nice night. Well Sunday morning we went to church and then to pick up the kids. After that, Noah had a basketball game, we went to get Steve's Mom's car so he could use it to go to the airport today (since she's not using it because of her shoulder injury), so I don't have to go all the way down there today and again on Thursday, and then we came home where I made dinner and we cleaned out the garage enough to fit the car in. During our basement finishing, the garage became home to lots of giant empty boxes and other home improvement implements. So we finally decided to clear enough space for the car, especially with the potential for ice this week. So we were pretty busy this weekend. Today, I need to get my coupons and ads together and decide if I need to get any good deals today and then when Noah gets out of school, we're going to go sledding down a big hill we saw yesterday. I'm not sure how good it would be to sled if after tomorrow's storm we have ice or freezing rain, so we're going to just go today, Noah doesn't know yet, it's a surprise. Oh I forgot, yesterday we also gave the kids a few little Valentine gifts as well. Just a couple of chocolate items, a card and a small toy-Noah got a small Lego set and Abby got a new pet from Littlest Pet Shop. We got them on Saturday at Target and we also found there a cupid potato head. I love all the different potato heads (like Sonya does) and begged Steve to get it and he let me!! Yay!! It's so cute, it has a bow and arrow in one hand and in the other a big read heart that says "cutie fry"!!! He also has angel like wings and real potato feet, which we haven't had before. We've had real feet inside sandals but never just on their own, so I'm excited about that!! Well we have a lot to do in the evenings this week, hopefully by Wednesday evening, we'll be able to get out!! I promised the kids we'd go to McD's for Valentine's Day and Noah has football registrations that night as well. Why do we have to register for something now that doesn't start until August? That just seems so dumb, but oh well. And then Thursday it's Baseball registrations which starts and ends before football even begins!! Very strange and confusing!! Plus I have to take Noah to karate (supposed to be Tuesday and Thursday, we'll see with the snow and all). Both kids are also having Valentine parties that I have to get ready for and attend. It's a crazy week!! Maybe it'll just snow so bad that we can cancel everything and worry about it all next week when my dear hubby is back!!! Well how's that for a post, it should be considered a novel it's so long!! Now at least give me 18 hours before you hound me for another, please!!

French words of the day

The first is a full phrase
1- Pouvez-vous m'aider, s'il vous plait? Can you help me please?
2-le poulet chicken

Abbsy

Today, my Abby had a bit of a meltdown when I dropped her off at school. It was so strange because she never even bats an eye when we leave her there. At first she was in a great mood, but it suddenly changed and she just clung to me and cried. I honestly don't know for sure what's wrong. I guess it could just be a bad day, but she's been fine since then. Her teachers told me they calmed her down right away and everything was fine after that, but I just found it a bit strange. Up until January there was only 4 kids in the class and since then they've doubled and at the parent-teacher conference, I was told that she was having a little trouble adjusting to the new kids. She wasn't very keen on inviting them into their small close-knit group, plus as I've mentioned before, 3 of the 4 don't speak English well and none of them have been in preschool before and don't know the rules yet or "manners" in social settings I guess you could say. So it's just been difficult for her to get used to that. I think she was very comfortable in her class before and now it's been disrupted sort of. I guess that could be one reason why she acted like she did today. She's definitely a creature of habit and changes to that are often met with a struggle. I'm trying really hard to explain to her how the other kids must feel (shy and scared at being at school for the first time, etc..) and she seems to be understanding that, but this is all really difficult for a 4 year old to understand. I just hope she starts to feel comfortable again soon. She has loved her class all year and I'd hate for that to change. We'll see what happens Tuesday!!

Busy today

Hey, I have Riley all day today, so I won't be able to post until he leaves at 7. Just didn't want you all to keep checking!!

French words of the day

1-le pain bread
2-le beurre butter

Our Snow Day

Today was great!! I slept until 9 and then got up slowly, ate some food and watched a little tv. Then I went up to Noah's room where he, Abby and I played Legos for like an hour. We also took some funny photos of the three of us. I made a great little house and Abby made a garden for my house out of Legos. I also made a very nice artist photo frame which I modeled. Noah made a great submarine and a space rocket, and Abby also made a droid. We had a great time doing that and taking pictures of our creations. After that we did a craft. We made love bugs out of pencils, pipe cleaners, cardboard wings and googly eyes. They turned out really cute!! The kids love crafts so much. Then we had lunch and I decided I wanted to scrapbook for awhile. I haven't been doing that lately and it really felt good to get back into it. I had a few pages that were already decorated and I just had to add the pictures and journal them. I got most of those done and now I think I have the itch. After this I"m going to snapfish to order more pictures!!! Then we had dinner and I made us some yummy valentine cupcakes for desert. And of course the kiddies wanted to go back out in the snow, so that's where you'll find them now!! Oh and did I mention, I haven't left my jammie pants yet!! I even went outside to take the dog out and just now to get more pics of the family in my jammie pants. Yay!!! I love it, the kids didn't put on clothes until just now to go outside. It was such a good day. I know I look forward to snow days just as much as I did as a kid. I love it!!! I hope everyone had a great day as well.

French words of the day

1- la salle de bains -bathroom
2- le lit -bed

more snow pics

Abby's pink cheeks and blue eyes are so cute!! (If I do say so myself!!)



My Noah is such a cutie, and I love how the ice formed on his eyelashes!!

Twillight snow

We just took the kids out in the snow and it's getting really dark quick. I love that you can see the snow falling in the pictures. So cool!! I LOVE the snow!!

French words of the day

I thought it would be fun to post a couple of French words everyday that I need to learn for our trip. So I'll only be putting up words I think we'll need to know.

1-l'avion airplane
2-l'automne autumn

(as you can see I started in the a's of the dictionary!!)

Today

What's with this crazy weather/school stuff. Last night we found out Noah had a 2 hour delay, so I thought yay, sleep in!! But then I remembered that Abby's school is usually in line with Mason so I watched and waited and of course, she had to go in early in the morning. Noah actually is closed now, so he's home all day which is good for him because it seems like he's always gone anymore, and he loves just being home, free to do whatever. But dadgum, I had to get up and get dressed and dress the girl and fix her hair and bundle us up and freeze in the car all the way down to Mason. Oh well!! Fingers are crossed for tomorrow, because she's off on Wednesdays and maybe just maybe Noah will be too!! I"m hoping for a full on stay in your jammies, don't brush your hair hang out at home day!!! Come on clouds, you can do it!!

So I'm getting really excited for our trip to Paris. We've been doing some serious planning and we're getting our airline tickets this month because we have some credits that expire soon. We've talked to people at church as well as some people online (message boards) about it and it makes me even more excited. We're also trying to learn some French because I took Spanish in school and the man of the house took Russian in college, so we don't even know where to start!! We're hoping to try the Rosetta Stone website, we took the free demo yesterday and it was very good. What we really need to work on is stair climbing because it's I think 379 steps to the top of the bell towers in Notre Dame and I really want to go up there and see the bells and see where Quasimodo lives!! I've been worried about the dining situation because I'm just not into going into places where I have no idea what they're going to be serving me. I know they have tons of fast food places and I would be perfectly happy just going there, but I think others in the traveling party may want to try other options. I found this neat place called Hippopotamus which is sort of their version of a Fridays or something. And they serve traditional american food so I think I will definitely try that, but I'm such a picky eater, I would be terrified to go into a stuffy French restaurant. I'd probably just order french bread and a diet coke!! I do want to try a French ice cream (la glace) because Graeter's is supposed to be like a french ice cream and I'd like to compare them. I think this is going to be a really fun trip. We're doing a lot of work now so that we get there, we'll be well prepared and ready for some parisian fun!!! Plus my kids love the Cars movie and they have a new cars ride opening before we go there and I can't wait to see what that's like. I'm not as worried about the Disneyland portion of our trip as I am the actual Paris portion. OH, a man at our church travels all the time to Europe for his work and knows Paris like the back of his hand told us to be careful just watching commercials there, his example was here in the US an underwear commercial may be considered risque because a woman is running around in only that but there, the commercial is the woman going from nothing and putting the underwear on!! So that's going to be interesting... But anyway, it should be fun so far I know we're visiting the Eiffel Tower, the Arc de Triomphe, the Louvre, the Cathedral de Notre Dame, the Champs-Elysee (which is just a big boulevard with shops and stuff, complete with a Disney store!!) and Disneyland of course. You have no idea how excited I am to just have the pictures of my kids in front of these things!!! Well that's enough babbling for today, I'll let you know when we find our more info!!

Noah's journal

Noah writes in a journal at school almost daily and he brings them home every month. His teacher usually gives them an idea of what to write about and they go from there. Well the other day I was reading through it and he said something he really likes to do is play games on his new computer and also on Daddy's computer. They also draw a picture to go along with it and he drew two pictures, side by side, one of him on a computer and one of Daddy on a computer and he made sure to label both computers "Dell". I thought it was so darn cute. For those who don't know my husband works for Dell. I just loved it and told all of our family at a big dinner Saturday night and they thought it was cute too!!

It's a Puzzler

We got the kids these really cool Usborne books for Christmas. On each page there is a puzzle that snaps into the book. I think there's 5 or 6 different puzzles and they're all on a different page. You just turn the page to do a different puzzle. I wasn't sure if they'd really care about them, I just thought they were neat but Abby especially loves it. She will sit and play with it for at least an hour and that's a huge accomplishment for her. Usually she wants someone to play with her or she gets bored, but she's perfectly happy doing these puzzles. We got her the fairies one and Noah a pirates one. He likes his too and has done all of the puzzles but he's not as crazy about it as she is. He's more crazy for his Legos!!! Oh and the books were only 15 dollars, I thought that was a good deal for all that they have in them.

Little Ballerina

Abby had her observation day at dance class again Friday. Usually the parents wait out in the hall so as not to distract them, but once every couple of months we get to come in and watch. Here's some pics of her tapping and balleting for the camera!!

Jasmine's new collar

I know how much Sonya loves posts on puppies, so I thought I'd show a picture of Jazzy Belle's pretty new collar. It's full of pretty pink flowers so everyone knows she our little princess puppy!!! I love it!! She's our sweet little pupster!!

Farm Living!!

Oh it's so fun to live so close to a farm. We're on a cul-de-sac and behind it there's a big farm with lots of animals. Every now and then the animals will escape. Usually it's over on the back road where you'll see piggies out in a mud pile or cows in the road, but today I looked out my side door and saw a huge black bull in the neighbors yard. We tried to tell the neighbors but they weren't home, I guess we'll call the police or something because he's eating their landscaping!!! On windy days you can smell the farm and all the time you can hear the cows calling!! It's been fun and interesting I'd say!! We've also seen wildlife out here such as foxes, hawks, deer, turkeys, and one toasted snake (he was out by the road and was all burnt, I don't know what happened to him, but at least he was tiny). It's so fun out here in rural Warren county!!

Winter Party

Time for yummy hot chocolate and snacks


Ice skating on paper plates


Hunting for Owls


Snowball Fight (yarn balls)


Today Abby had a winter party at her school. They made yummy hot cocoa, went on an owl hunt, went "ice skating", had a "snowball" fight and read books. It was lots of fun for the kids eventhough they had two new kids today who apparently haven't been in a preschool class before because they were a little bit disruptive and that coupled with the fact that they spoke little English made for an interesting day!! The kids had fun though and it was a nice party!!