No Focus

This post has no focus.  However, I have so little time on my hands these days that I just have to blog when I can blog.  I love these little stories of my kiddos though.

 

 Every six months or so, I re-vamp our chore chart.  We do great with it for a few months, slack for a month, and then get a new one.  This one is fun so far.  I'll have to post more on it soon.

 

To the new chart I added dishes.  I meant this to be for D to help me put dishes away.  However, M really wanted to do dishes.  And you know what?  He did a good job!  I remember doing dishes at 5-yrs-old, so I don't know why I didn't think to add it to their chores.  Maybe because I also remember getting in big trouble for breaking dishes.  Anyway, I had already loaded the dishwasher so he had to wash the rest by hand.  He soaked the kitchen, but who cares! He loved it and I didn't have to do the dishes!  Woot woot!

After chores we colored Easter eggs.  Mr. D loved the vinegar water.  I'm a fan of vinegar myself, but this was weird even for me. Sorry about the terrible lighting, I decided not to rearrange their fun just for a good picture.

This is the only pic of Miss L and actually it does show her personality with this.  She definitely had her opinions on what she wanted, did her own thing, experimented, but then she sat there quietly to see her results.

And this is always Mr. M.  He's a nut.  He can't hold still, he is hyper and silly.  He was having a blast. 

Right after this was bath time.  After he got out of the bath it was very quiet.  That is such a rare occasion around here that I went on a hunt to find him.  I found him sitting in the chair reading his scriptures.  (Amazingly he had on pajamas and wasn't just in underwear!  It was like I was meant to actually get a picture of this moment. Haha.)  

Carcasonne

It's official.  Mr. M has Mom and Dad's love for games.  He begs to play Carcasonne every day. We are getting ready to introduce him to some harder games.  Miss L does pretty well too.  The problem: Mr. D.  He's two.  He there.  Enough said.

The Bug Whisperer

Miss L has always loved bugs.  She has an amazing ability to capture flies right out of the air.  I've never seen anything like it (from such a small child anyway).

 

She is constantly asking if she can have a container to put her bugs in.  The other day she asked for one and I assumed it was for bugs.

 

Instead she came in with a dead lizard (not pictured below).  As I'm looking at this nasty lizard I see it moving.  And suddenly maggots splurt out of it.  Two big maggots.  I thought I'd loose my lunch. 

 

She kept taking off the lid and I kept freaking out.  I told her if those maggots ended up on my couch, I was moving out.  She finally kept it lidded.  The thought still gives me the creeps...and nightmares...several of them.

 

Then the next day we showed the bottled dead lizard to Dad.  Inside were not just two maggots, but twenty or so.  AAAHHHH!!!!

 

And the most disgusting part is, that jar is still somewhere in this house. Everything is dead in there, but it's still here. I keep meaning to throw it away when she is sleeping but she hides things well and I'm forgetful.

 

Yesterday she asked for another jar.  Less then a minute later she came in with a huge bee captured in the jar.  A HUGE BEE!  I'm absolutely terrified of bees.  If you have ever been by me when a bee comes around, you know how I react. It's not pretty.

 

My L captures them like she's picking up a piece of candy.  She went out a few minutes later, was gone about two minutes, and came back with four more!  Four!  In minutes.  She says she holds out a flower until they land on the flower and the she just grabs them.

 

Cabe calls her the bug whisperer.  She really is amazing.  He is so proud of her.

Below are her two greatest loves in life (proven by the fact she lined these up and took this picture), her bear and her bugs.

Oh the Weather Outside is Delightful!

These two are still really big into gathering flowers for me.  Flowers and flowers and more flowers.  I try really hard to be excited about each little batch, but I'm afraid sometimes I'm overwhelmed with flowers.  Hopefully they think I'm as excited as I'm trying to feign.

We have an elderly neighbor who is in love with Mr. D.  She watches him out her window and just thinks he's so funny and cute.  The first time I saw him perform this bike trick he's doing in the pic, was for her.  He stands on it and tries to do different tricks with his eye on her the whole time. 

See the big wad of flowers in her hand?  In TX we really didn't have a great yard.  I love our yard simply for the joy of watching her discover nature. (Although sometimes it's freaky, I'll get into that on another post.)

His big handful, "Here Mom.  I got fyowers a you. I wanna tek a pich chure (take a picture)! Ders my bike, I wanna do (go) fast. I do!"  And just like that he was gone.

 

It was hilarious to watch him try and go fast on the grass.  He'd bend over, his brow furrowed in concentration, his shoulders hunched. I wanted to catch the moment in time. 

He doesn't actually use the pedals.  He uses his feet and pushes along.  He either has bloody toes afterwards or ruined shoes.  I have a hard time decided which disturbs me more.  He doesn't care either way.

 

"I make a cake. I do anodder one. I make ears.  I make you.  I make dad."

Miss L's big thing right now is, "Right, mom?  Right?"  She points out the obvious all day long and then asks me over and over.  She is always trying to teach Mr. D things.  He usually loves it.  We are going to miss her during the day when she starts school next year. 

 

We've been outside a lot enjoying the beautiful weather we have right now.  Only problem is, this year, we have horrible allergies.  Bummer.  Last year we were find.  I guess they built up?

Mothering

For a long time I was surprised that my Miss L didn't have my love for babies. She rarely plays with dolls.  For some time she ignored all babies around her.  I needn't have thought anything of it.  This girl loves babies.  She keeps telling me she wants another brother or sister.  I keep telling her I'd love to give her one!

 

We watched my friend's kids the other day.  She has three cuties but I only got a pic of Miss L and the little one.  L helped with him the entire time.  She was amazing.  And he loved her too.  It was really cute.

When we do have another baby, I think this girlie is going to be a big help.

Our Week in Really Random Pictures

We got a necklace holder for Miss L for her birthday.  I think it's getting good use!

The other day I realized how much time I spent keeping my kids busy lately and not nearly enough time doing with them.  That is usually one of the few things I do really well as a parent.  I go through stages, hopefully I'm not the only one.  So I've made a huge effort to spend my time doing things with them, not just being there.  Whenever I do that I can't help myself, I want to capture their precious little movements, expressions, everything, so the camera ends up with us. 

Miss L likes to take pics as much as I do, so we take turns.

I LOVE this pic.  L always catches the cutest little moments with Damon and me. Look at his little smirk!  I love it!  And he is a lover-boy.  He always gives kisses, and hugs, and loves to shout out that he loves me. 

 

This girl has my hair.  The humidity makes us have the frizzies.  I love her sweet little face though and her lisp.  She has a cute little lisp. She's very bossy when we play.  Not sure where she got that bossiness from.

 

This pic is actually for the peeps back home that wanted to see my new color.  I love having freshly cut hair!  I actually want dark hair but the dark washes out of my gray too quickly and then it's all I can see when I look in the mirror.

Mr. M wanted his bear to have new clothes so he made him some out of paper.  I love his creativity and how proud he is of his work. 

A friend gave me a scavenger hunt to do with the kids.  We had a blast.  It was mostly an outdoors one.  We had to gather nuts, draw pictures of plants, make bark rubbings, etc.  This was building a house out of blocks. 

Today we rode bikes and jumped on the tramp. Two of my favorite things to do!

Our First Trip to New Orleans

Our cousin J and her hubby K were staying in N.O. and then coming to our city.  We drove out there to pick them up and see a little of the city.  We were so glad we did.  And J loves N.O. so she was able to teach us a lot about it.

 

On the way to their hotel we were having some directional issues and ended up going straight down Bourbon Street.  Wow.  That was interesting.   Once we were off that road though, things were pretty cool.

 

The pedestrians rule the roadways and no one watches where they go.  They just wander down the street completely ignoring cars.  Then the streets are extremely thin, so if someone has to stop for some reason, which we did, everyone behind just has to patiently wait while you take up the entire street.  People seemed patient about it though.

 

After picking them up in the French Quarter we walked down to the riverside.  It was chillier then we were expecting so I wasn't really dressed appropriately.

 

Monument to the Immigrant

This is the only pic I got of J from the front. Not sure why I didn't take more pics of humans.  I was distracted by the sites! 

Kids being kids.    

The princess was there too. 

 There was something special about this cathedral but darn if I can remember what.

This is where the Louisiana Purchase was signed:

No words..... 

K and the kiddos.  He was saving Lil' Guy's life. Lil' Guy has no fear.

The historic mint. 

Apparently the balconies that we so enjoy and admire are actually the place they used to throw their muck and mire off of.  The fronts of the buildings are on the inside of courtyards so from the streets you can't see the front of the houses.  This is the corridor leading to one of the courtyards. 

Buying a small house in the French Quarter will cost one millions of dollars.  We did see Delta Burke's house and heard about a few others such as Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt that we will see when we go back for a bus tour.

 

The kids needed a break from all the walking, so we plopped them down in front of what used to be the blacksmith shop but is now a bar.  The people coming out thought it was rather funny that they were sitting there.  I promise they weren't seeing anything too hairy.  It was pretty calm and quiet.

It was a short trip.  It was also the Sabbath so we weren't able to eat there, but we are going to go back and try some world famous food!  However, we live in the city that was voted best food in the U.S. so I'm not sure what we will be looking for.  I've lived here a year and have yet to have a beignet, so maybe we'll get one of those.

 

It's a good thing we have Cousin J to inform us of all the good places, tours, and food.  Now when others come visit I'm not as scared.  Come visit, we'll take you to New Orleans!