erin is 14!

Our Erin is 14. Wow...14! The older wardlings had a teacher workday on her birthday so no school. Clyde, the girls, and I were able to go out for lunch and spend some time together while the little wardlings were in school. Clyde and I wanted to treat our birthday girl with a trip to the salon, for her birthday present. She got highlights and a cute haircut. She looked so adorable while she sat in the chair all foiled up. Erin had her choice of colors with her imagination being the limit. She decided on golden highlights which are subtle but sparkily.

 Isn't she a beauty!

Happy Birthday Erin!! We love you!!

felt food

Penny's Pre-K teacher gave me a big stack of felt before Christmas and asked me to do something for her classroom with it. She hinted that she would love some felt food. Anything else would need to be in multiples of 10.  These are the felties that I worked on today. I made two fishes, 2 mashed potatoes with gravy, green beans, 2 pita bread sandwiches with lettuce, tomato, cheese, and ham, raviolis, 2 eggs, and a bag of chips. I ran out of yellow for more chips. I had alot of fun making these little sets. I know that Penny would love a set of her own.

her favorite fruit

As Penny was eating breakfast this morning, she had her princesses in front of her. (I have noticed lately that she keeps them on the dresser beside her bunk bed at night and looks at them while falling asleep.) She wanted to take the princesses to school. We have an agreement, that if she takes a toy to school that it #1 has her name on it and b- that it must stay in her backpack. She has agreed to the above rules. I was writing her name on the bottom of her toys when I asked her if she liked her name. She told me no. I asked her what name she would like to have and she grabbed Ariel, the mermaid, and said, "her name." My theory is that she grabbed the closest princess to her and chose that one. (She agreed with my theory.) Then she said, "Mom they are all good people." while she pointed to her princesses. Yes they are all good people.

This morning was a funny one for me and I didn't have anyone to witness it. Clyde has similar stories but my recent most favorite is one  that happened  in Lancaster, PA this summer involving some slim jims, sprite, a flat of water and a box of tampons. Funny story, but one that'll have to be flipped to get the whole hilariousness of the situation.

Every morning there is a man who volunteers at the school, helping children out of their parent's cars. He is very friendly, very southern, and very hippie...you know "peace e'rybody" etc. etc. I sometimes have extra non wardling children with me and today he said, "you just confuse me with these children, you remind me of that poem..." That's when I said, "the little old lady who lived in a shoe, who had so many children, she didn't know what to do?" "That's the one!" said he. Nice...I'm an old lady. Then he shouts across the parking lot, "But I'm not gonna call you the old Lady though!" alrighty...

My morning doesn't end there. I had to go to the blue super store to buy a few ingredients for tonight's dinner. I walk up to the meat counter and get hit on by the butcher, which is something, because it isn't 8am yet. When I get up to the register to pay, I get a talkative cashier. Let's call her Alice. She notes my ingredients and chats about how she doesn't like lasagna and something about baby showers and then she sees my choice of soda. Call me redneck but I really like some grapefruit soda. That started this conversation..."Do you know what my favorite fruit is?" No, I just met you. "I love me some grapefruit. I can't drink it no more because of the yeast infections it gives me. One time I drank a glass of grapefruit and the next morning, I was burnin' so bad, I thought my boyfriend had given me somethin. I went to the dr. and he wanted a urinalysis and I told him it stung too bad to pee so he had to use a catheter. All he could smell was grapefruit! He axed me if I had been drinking grapefruit juice and said that I was allergic to it. I love me some grapefruit but it gives me the yeast, so I can't eat it no more." Thanks Alice for making my day, and all this before 8:10am. Thank you!!

grind it twice, baby

Today I decided to break out my wheat grinder and hand grind some wheat for bread. I have been spoiled by a friend who loaned me her electric grinder.  I love her electric wheat grinder. I'd love one for our family for Christmas...hint, hint. The wardlings were surprised with how hard it was to crank the grinder to grind the wheat.  They were breaking a sweat! We did learn that with the hand grinder that the wheat must be ground twice and maybe even three times to actually get it a bit finer. The first grinding is quite coarse while the second time around made it smaller, but not like the electric one.

 The bag on the left are some oat groats ground with the electric grinder. The bag on the right is some hard white wheat hand ground.  The left is lighter and more flourery, while the right is just coarser.

 I was curious to see if the dough would be any different with the different texture to the flour.  It was interesting to me that the dough rose, just like normal. It was just grainier.

The bread turned out great too. It was just what we needed on this cold, very cold...22* Saturday. Thanks Clyde for modeling my bread.

sparkles and more sparkles

Penny and I have several things in common, one being that we both love to sparkle. (I prefer for my hands and ears to sparkle more than my clothes.) Today was quite the sparkily day for Miss Penny. She wore her new favorite sequined puppy shirt...

The very one that she fell in love with in the store. The one that she just had to try it on! (note the back of the picture with all the sparkle on the other dresses.)

 Today I made her a sparkily headband, using the rhinestone tape that I have had since I was pregnant with Jacob...that's right for 8 years!!

 Then she even wore the sparkily shoes that Papa and Grammy gave her for Christmas. more Sparkles!

go me

My year of Ashley began last Saturday with a house project. This past summer, Clyde and I scraped the popcorn off the ceilings in the downstairs of our house. Man was that a messy, messy job. Well, there was one nasty patch in our kitchen that would not be scraped. We decided to add a beam to cover it up. One of Penny's speech therapist's husband is a woodworker and built us a beam. This was a big job. It is such a heavy beam. It took three of us holding it up, so that we could secure it to the stud above. No joke that thing is like 150 lbs! It took longer than what we expected and it still isn't finished, but it looks great in our kitchen. It makes it feel so much bigger. Nice!

I have been intimidated by yarn patterns, especially crocheted yarn patterns. Not understanding all the lingo yet has stopped me from a few projects. I know what a single, half double, double, treble crochet are and what they look like, but reading them in a pattern is a bit trickier for me. Anyway, I decided that since this was the year of Ashley, I was going to throw caution to the wind and experiment on a crochet granny squared pattern. I mean really, it is only yarn. If it doesn't work out, then uncrochet it and wind that yarn back up into a ball, right?! Well, I carefully read and reread the pattern and on the first go, this pattern is a huge success. I wanted it to be a scrappy blanket, (using all my left overs) but the pink, purple and green combo is turning out great. I am using the pink and purple that Ed and Becki gave me for Christmas with the green left over from a baby hat that I made my friend Ashley, the photographer. I did buy another skein of green and I may end up trying to find more pink. Right now it is a good baby sized afghan. Go me.

toto is AWOL

We have had Toto now for over a year. He is a super Houdini dog. I was so frustrated with him digging out from under our fence that we added redneck blockades to keep him in. Then, when that no longer worked, my trusty knot tying skills came into play when we tied a zipline across our yard to keep him in. I felt horrible keeping him on a zipline, but the booger would escape. Our neighbors have been super dooper cool about Toto just showing up to their house(s) and hanging out for awhile. We had other neighbors that would just point home and tell him to 'git on home!' and he would trot across the street to the brown house and bark in the front yard. Others walk him home.

With the weather turning cold, we have been suckers and allowed our pack of ruffians inside to stay warm. They all got bathed and gave the brown house a lovely wet dog smell for a day. While getting bathed, Toto's collar was removed. The wardlings put the puppies outside on one of the warmer days and that rascal Toto escaped and failed to come home.  To add extra worry and stress to the situation, the temperature dropped to 19* that night. We were very scared for Toto. He usually comes home. He didn't return that night and the following morning. We drove around our neighborhood looking for him. Went to the vets office down the street to see if anyone turned in a stray, as Toto wasn't wearing his collar. Nothing.  To be perfectly honest, I wasn't too terribly upset. He is a stinker! He kept escaping time after time and I thought that he felt as though his time here at the brown house was over. So, recapping...no Toto Thurs., Fri., Sat., Sun. Our wardlings were beside themselves. I was sad for them more than Toto. Last night, when Clyde was bringing the other 2 dogs in...all 3 dogs rushed into their crate. Toto had escaped from wherever he was, climbed back in under our fence, wearing a new collar, to the brown house. We let him run upstairs to the glee squeals of delight from 4 of the 5 wardlings. (Jacob was sleeping from his hard day of with Max and Luke.) Erin, Libby, and Penny bathed him and he nestled into their bedroom for sleep until 10ish, when he came downstairs for some love from Clyde and Ashley. Libby was sweet after his bath. She came down, gave me a hug and said, "He answered my prayer." Heavenly Father answered many prayers from the brown house.

So, Toto is home, wearing the new collar, and he isn't allowed outside unless he is on a leash. I don't think he will complain with all the added attention he will be getting. that stinker!

darth maul

It is absolutely no secret that our family really enjoys Star Wars. Jacob had been totally into Star Wars since before he was 2 years old. As a matter of fact, he got the Millenium Falcon for his second birthday. Our family pictures for the last few years have been accompanied by a Mace Windu action figure, in the hands of our Jacob. I have made numerous Star wars cloaks not only for my boys but for friend's boys. I think it is ok to say that Jacob and Josh have enough star wars things to be considered collectors. This being said, I am so toally impressed with the new clone wars cartoon series. (well not so new...I think we are in the second season of it.)



I do feel that Jar Jar Binx was a mistake and we didn't see enough evil or scenes even from Darth Maul. The cartoon we watched tonight showed us where the evil began in Darth Maul. Totally impressive. I do not forsee our family losing interest in Star Wars anytime soon. Nerdy, I know. :)

crazy eyes

Jacob and Libby had eye appointments last week. This was one of our first attempts to photograph how big Jacob's pupils dilated. I just caught him looking off and got one funny picture. I still laugh when I look at this picture of him. What a ham!!

class par-tay

I am Penny's room mom this year. My job was to coordinate the pre-k's winter party. Penny's class is a very diverse class with about half of the parents speaking spanish only. There are 2 moms who are bi-lingual. We decided to split the class into two groups...food and goodie bags. The english speaking parents got the food and the non english speaking parents had the goodie bags. This was one amaz-z-zing winter party. There is one little girl with 2 moms in Pennys class. The mom and girl went out of town and the other mom still brought in cupcakes, paper products, and cookies, and stayed to help out without her daughter even being there! The non english speaking parents had santa hats for every child and a huge stocking filled to the brim with goodies...presents, candy, crayons etc.  They even made smaller goodie bags for siblings of  the pre-k children. amazing! We had so much fun with the little ones! Merry Christmas Pre-K!

snow?

School was canceled for all the wardlings today. As of right now, 10am on Monday morning, not a flurry has been seen here at the brown house. Bubbie called not to long ago to inform us that they already had an inch or more on the ground, with a steady display of flakes falling from the sky. I do feel though, that our emerald city wardlings coulda and shoulda had half a day of school.
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It is now 3:30 pm and just a handful of flakes have hit the ground. Shoulda had school today my wee wardlings! It is really cold and we have tried to make the day fun. Clyde made some awesome beef veggie soup. I made some hopefully yummy banana bread and we have watched a few movies that the wardlings have fogotten about...like Monsters Inc. and Nacho Libre. "Don't you know I've had diarrhea since Easters?!" I crack up each time. We have also enjoyed Percy Jackson and the Lightening Thief.  On a seperate note, since it is so terribly cold outside, we decided to bring our puppies in, wash them and keep them warm. The wardlings have enjoyed the puppies being inside, except when the dogs need to go outside and the smell of their gas could burn your eyebrows off. grody!

the year of ashley

2011 huh? Well, decisions have been made to make 2011, great. I am calling it the year of Ashley. One morning while getting ready, the thought of something in Relief Society came to mind. Each week some crappy purple cow book is passed around with the news of the ward for the month. I have never been a fan of the purple cow book. I think it is impersonal and gives people the excuse not to have any contact with others. It is also an excuse to blame others for not getting the word around.  "Well...it was in the purple cow book!" It does have it's role i guess, but really so does email. Anyway...on the cover it says something like "10 cow women." If you aren't a member of our church, this must sound really odd to you. It is referring to a movie our church made a few years ago...like 20... called, "Johnny Lingo."  It is about a girl who has no self esteem. Her father, along with other members of their island call her ugly and devalue her. She believes them and devalues herself. She is noticed by a wealthy, savvy trader Johnny Lingo who a-has loved her since they were small children and 2-realizes her worth. When the day of bargaining, or the day the dowry is set, Mohanna is hiding in a tree to watch to see what her value is. Talk in the village is that since she is so ugly, Mohanna's father can only ask maybe a cow tail for her. Her father is bold and asks for 2 cows or something to the laughter of the villagers. Johnny of course sees her worth and offers the dad 8 cows. This shocks and surprises the villagers. Johnny did this not for the villagers, or to be boastful, but so that Mohanna would realize her worth, her beauty. (It of course would also be bragging rights to the women who's husbands only paid 3 or 4cows.)

      My point. Clyde is my Johnny. He has always recognized me to be the schniz-nit of gals, the ruby of women, the peanut butter to his chocolate... the list can go on and on. I just haven't seen it in myself. I have placed myself on the back burner in more than one way. Emotionally, spiritually, physically, mentally. Our children's needs and wants have always been placed first. They are growing and need new shoes more than I do, even though I have had the same church shoes for the last few years. Same with clothes for me or haircuts or whatever it may be; Knitting and sewing even. I love it. But the things I make aren't for Clyde or for myself, but for the wardlings. We were given something for the boys and today my job is to make room for it in their room. Hopefully this thing will help them stay organized and me sane. We have been bugging them and bugging them to clean their rooms for a long time now. (The cleanliness of bedrooms in the brown house is a very touchy subject. Clyde and I feel the rooms must been clean whilst the wardlings think we are kidding.) Well, them thinking that we are kidding ends today.

So, for the year of Ashley, positivity, and a few of my needs and wants are going to be accomplished. Trust me I understand the value of a dollar. I am not going to get my hair done when our power needs to be paid, but I am going to allow myself to enjoy life a bit more. I would just like to feel better about myself.  I want to see what Clyde sees, for myself. When I feel better about myself, many things in and around the brown house fall into place. Happy New year to you and thus beginnith my year of , the year of Ashley.

not so fast

I thought I was finished blogging and uploading pictures from Christmas, but alas no. As I was thumbing through the pictures stored on my cell phone, I found these beauties...

We were secret Elf'd, from a Michigan Elf. The elf gave us 6 sleds! The wardlings sledded all Christmas break...even when there was a mere dusting of snow and lots of ice.

 We have a tradition of making gingerbread men on Christmas Eve each year. I so look forward to this every year. I love buying the treats to attach, along with making the dough, rolling it out, baking our wee gingerbread men. I love it. This year, because I was sewing or embroidering til Christmas Eve, I handed the project over to Clyde to supervise. I had to take several deep breaths when I saw what he was doing. It started off well...

 Until I noticed that he was making anatomically correct gingerbread men.

 I was trying to be positive with it until I saw the boys making anatomically correct gingerbread men and having a fabulous time at it.  They had their giggles and then it was back to making G rated gingerbread men. (mainly because I had finished sewing and was back to supervise.)

 Then of course the snow came on Christmas day and the day after. Libby and Penny loved sledding again and again!

 This was the dirt pile I swept up after sweeping at least 3 times a day for the last 2 weeks, yesterday. No matter how much we swept, the floor was still just dirty. Yesterday I even moved the couch and chairs to get the gunk off the floor. I washed, dried and folded nearly 9 loads of clothes. (Clyde had begun the job for me washing several load prior to me finishing up the job.) I even washed 2 dishwasher fulls of dishes. What is amazing to me is how quickly the brown house can become dirty. We could sweep the floor and within minutes it was time to sweep again. grody! This picture doesn't give the pile any justice either, because it was enormous!

 Once the roads were clear enough to leave the emerald city and return again, we headed over to the Cecil farm to visit Bubbie and PopPop along with my brother G and his wife and 5 children. We loved visiting with everyone and I even took a slushy snowball to the face.  Thanks Mom!! :)  Thanks again for everything! I failed to take any pictures except for the faces of the Wardlings on the way home. Some were goofing off in the back seat, while others simply crashed.

 Clyde's brothers got coats and I believe I did Clyde a misjustice by telling his folks that he had plenty of coats. (His Christmas wish list was really long this year, simple but long.) So he decided to try on R's coat for giggles.

I actually need CLyde's cell phone to send pictures of our new year's eve with Maylee and her gang, along with M (R's wife). R was sick and so his wife came alone to hang out.  Fireworks were shot off, cheese sticks were consumed, gifts were given and recieved and memories were made. I am way impressed that fires weren't started with the fireworks on our newly laid hay in the back yard.

Jacob had one quote for the Christmas season that he would say over and over and over again. Sometimes he would say it 10 times in a row. He would say, "It's just not smart, it's K-Mart smart!" He is still saying it as a matter of fact. (deep sigh inserted here.)

pink cabled sweater

This is one of the two sweaters I knitted over the Christmas holiday. Ed and Becki gave be some really soft yarn for Christmas and below is what I made with some of it. I have always loved looking at a skein of yarn or a yardage of fabric and imagining the finished product. This sweater turned out so nicely. Penny wore it to school today. For whatever reason though, she was holding it when I checked her out of school this afternoon. She did agree to wear it again for some pictures...mainly for me to boast I suppose.

I used part of the Hermione Granger cabled hat pattern for a reference for the eyelets and cables.

Thank you Ed and Becki!!

the day after Christmas

It snowed on Christmas Day this year! We had an actual White Christmas! The last white christmas in the emerald city was in 1969. It was magical. A few weeks before Christmas, we were secret elfed! Our secret Michigan Elf left us 6 sleds. It was perfect timing for the snow and wintry mixes that we have been graced with lately. Papa and Grammy got snowed in with us and stayed for a few days. Church was canceled. We hung out, ate, played games, slept, ate, and I even knitted 2 sweaters with the yarn that Ed and Becki gave me. (2! pictures soon.)

christmas morning

I'll just let the pictures speak for themselves. Merry Christmas!

santa came to town

 Santa was in town on an early run and decided to drop by for a quick visit. We had another visitor to come into town. We loved seeing you Jamey! We even got a picture with Santa. Our only wish was that Clyde could've been here to see Santa. Thank goodness we have photographic proof that Santa did in fact come to town!

Christmas clothes

A few years ago, these Christmas clothes were a gift from my parents. They still fit the majority of the kids this year. Jacob had outgrown his sweater. Libby was totally annoyed that I had them wear the matching clothes. I do believe that this"ll be the last year for the dresses. I am saving them though for maybe christmas blanket for each of them. Thanks for being such cool sports. We got the wardlings all together with the G girls for their picture. :)

big girl check-ups

I realized a few months ago that it had been awhile since I took the big girls in for check-ups...two years to be precise. Erin goes several times a year for her NF, but not for her usual check-up. Not to embarrass the girls with their weights shared on the blog, to the only number I will share, is that at the time of the check-up they were only 6 oz. apart. Libby is 2 inches taller that Erin, though Erin was quick tongued with something like, "Oh yeah...well I have scoliosis! If the curve wasn't there, I'd be as tall as you!" She's right, but I thought it was funny.(Erin is 5'2" and Libby is 5'4".)

We haven't had to wait as long as we did that day and the girls were totally bugging me. The only thing I could do to shut them up was to take some photos.

 This is when the whole subject of height and scoliosis happened.

 I had to take Penny with us and man was she a busy, busy little girl. She amused herself though.