Emma Walking

Just for proof that Emma is walking and for those living farther away who would like to see just how cute she is. :) Check out the video of her walking.

How Does Your Garden Grow?

Ok, so I am just happy that everything didn't die! But am excited about actually getting vegetables and fruit now to enjoy. Food you grow yourself just tastes better than store bought. :) We have now been enjoying cherry tomatoes (the orange and red type) strawberries, and cucumbers. We are anxiously watching and waiting for the big tomatoes, green beans, pumpkins, and carrots. I also hear I can plant lettuce again, I was bummed that I had missed the first growing time, but am excited I can do it again this summer! Next year I have visions of onions and broccoli as well. It just feels good to see the fruits of your labor. :)

Family Update

Two little ones have colds, and for Michael that means every 4 hours medicine, plus steroids twice a day, plus still getting over an infection with antibiotics. Sorry to say but with the abutoral every 4 hours, Michael is getting good at Mario Cart Wii, he actually beats the computer (although, I think it some how makes it easier for him. :) It is either that or TV to keep him still so that the mask stays on and he gets the medicine. And with the abutoral it makes him so hipper that at night he wont go to bed, and to top it off I am waking him up every 4 hours in the night as well. But I think we are close to an end and breathing will be back to normal without an emergency visit. YEAH!

Emma also has the cold, but in spite of it, has taken off in walking. I knew it was only a matter of time. Prior she would take steps, but would prefer to crawl. Now she is walking tons! She just had to have the desire, and off she goes. :) She went from not walking, to walking long distances while holding a toy in each hand. She is so hilarious and adorable.

Soon Emma will be going into nursery, it will be fun to see how she likes it, I think she will love having friends her age to play with. Then shortly after Michael will be a sunbeam. I can't wait to have him in primary with me! I am so excited, he will be a ball in primary. :)

Kent and I are just trying to keep up with our children, and trying to remember to enjoy it too. :)

Sewing Project

So I had this problem. Since all our children books are in bookcase, sideways, Michael will pull out tons til he finds the one he wants, and leaves a mess behind that Emma finds, and has a grand time with. The solution, I thought of those hanging bookcases that I could have sworn we had as teachers, but after spending a couple of hours looking for them on the web, I gave up (I know not much time, but I wasn't going to waste my time!) So I decided to make one myself. I had the idea in my head, I just hoped it would work and made it up as I went along. The end result works just great (I would make a few changes, but hind sight is 20/20 of course). I hung it high enough out of Emma's reach, yes Michael has to get the stool, but he can, and gets to the books he wants. I can monitor him more with the books this way and I figure every week or so I will rotate the books. I have noticed that since I have had the new bookcase up, Michael is only choosing books for there because he can see what they are. I'm just happy it turned out how I visioned and not as a great disaster and waste of money. :)

It Makes a Difference!

I am blessed to have a nursery leader that loves Michael and it really makes a difference! The other day when I went to drop Michael off at nursery, the leader asked me to stay a minute and handed me a book. She told me how it was Michael's favorite, how he was continually asking it to be read to him. She decided that since he liked it so much she would buy him a copy. And of course wrote a sweet note to him on the inside cover. It was so sweet of her to even think of doing that. So we came home with the new book. And Michael asked to be read it over and over. It is a cute book, about a car race, so of course he loves it. :) He basically has the book memorized now and will "read" it by himself when he is unable to get us to. :) I have to say my boy is totally adorable, but it is nice to have others adore him too. :)

Wool Soakers

Ok, first I have to apologize for doing so many posts in one day. But I transferred all the pictures to the computer, and knew that if I didn't blog about them now I would forget to.

Now on to the wool soakers. I have now knitted 4 total soakers, so I thought I would show off the last 3. Aren't they adorable! Ok, well I think so. I just use them as shorts and diaper covers right now, when the colder weather comes they will go under the pants. I am loving this, there is something very satisfying about making things yourself. :)

Cousins

So our family got a little bigger for a few days as we had 3 and at times 4 of Michael's cousins staying with us. So of course I pull out my teacher side and had a plan to keep them all busy so that the chaos would be kept to a minimum. (Doubling our family in such a small home was an undertaking) But in the end it was fun. And Michael LOVED it! Their wii remotes added to ours gave us 4, and so all the kids (except Emma of course) were able to play Wii Mario cart together. They had a blast, yet at times we had to drive for the younger two (Michael and Alain) so that they could actually finish the race and the older kids could move on. :) Then came out the sock puppet decorating, naming, and skits. (Those who knew me during my junior year in college, know I LOVE sock puppets!) And in the end Michael had a BLAST having a sleep over with the boys in the toy room. Here are some pictures of the fun.

Street Fair

We were headed to the park, when traffic was diverted because of a street fair. So I decided to stop there and check it out. It was actually not as good as I had hoped. Too much $ for simple things! But Michael did get to check out the fire truck and ambulance, and try on the fire hat, which was very heavy! Michael got to pick one thing to spend money on and he choose to buy balls to throw at a dunk tank. I was fine with that as it went to support our local fire department. So Michael got three balls and got to go up extra close. He actually hit the bulls eye twice, but didn't have the force behind it to dunk the firefighter. So another firefighter hit the bulls eye for us. Shocking the one in the dunk tank, but the one who hit the button felt very justified as he declared that Michael did hit it twice. :) After that a quick walk through the fair and then on to the park.

Michael in the back of an ambulance, at least this time he is not lying on the bed headed to the hospital! :)

Driving the fire truck

Hitting the bulls eye and the other's surprised that it didn't dunk the firefighter.

Spiders and a Sweet Boy

Anyone who knows me knows I am not a fan of spiders. Usually, they met their fate when they run into me... unless we have an agreement made where they stay in their corner and don't bother me (only if the corner is very much out of the way of family life) a few have broken the agreement and hence are no longer with us.

But yesterday morning I went to the laundry room and found a, big enough for me not to like, spider in the mop bucket. But I remembered that I had a glass jar going to the recycling bin, and thought it would be fun to catch it and let Michael observe it and see a spider up close (since he never gets the chance as I always kill them). So I put holes in the lid and caught it in the jar and showed it to Michael. We count the legs and made other observations, and then we moved on with our day.

I was debating what to do with it... then as I was cleaning, another spider was found, I quickly took another jar and put it in there. Then we commented on how they looked different, yet had the same number of legs, etc so it too was a spider.

I forgot about the spiders on the counter top and went about my day until Michael came to inform me that the spiders were very sad because they were trapped in a jar and that they wanted out. I quickly informed him that they would not be let out in or near my house... but that we should and would let them go later today.

So our adventure for today, finding, catching, and letting go of two spiders in my house. They were informed before they were released that if they came back to my home they would not be given a second chance.

It does make me happy that my little boy has a sensitive spirit and wants even spiders to be happy.