Conversations with the Peanut Gallery

Some of the latest gems from our little peanuts:

Anna and Lauren were talking about Heaven and Hell.  Lauren asked Anna where to find heaven.  Anna responded, "Heaven is on a cloud in space."

It's tax time and so  everywhere we go we're seeing people dressed like the Statue of Liberty; trying to get us to come in to Liberty Tax to have our taxes done.  One place had a blow-up Statue of Liberty that was waving.  Her hands were otherwise empty.  Anna asked, "Where's her trident??"

Our last family night meal was Papa Murphy's sausage pizza.   The girls both love pizza and were chowing.  Anna stopped for a moment and began to examine a piece of sausage.  Inside the sausage there was a small fennel seed.  Excitedly, Anna said, "Lauren, it's a seed!  Let's plant it and grow some pizza!"

Anna is always making books.  She penned a book about princesses the other day and was having trouble getting it stapled.  Lauren came to the rescue and finished off the book.  Lauren told her, "Isn't it cool that I could do that for you?  If you need help again, just call me like this..."Lauren COOLEST!"

They say that bad things come in threes.  Well, the past few Thursdays have not been so great.  The first Thursday Lauren was sick....everywhere (#1). We had our babysitter Amanda over both times and on the second Thursday she dropped a bowl and it cut her so badly she had to get stitches on the back of her hand (#2).  I decided maybe we should avoid Thursdays and had Amanda over Tuesday instead.  As I was leaving I told her that I wanted her and both kids to sit on the couch and not move until I returned home!! :)  A few days after that Doug missed a step on the stairs  and twisted his ankle....there was #3.

Yesterday, the day started off a bit ominously as well.  Anna left a bag of craisins near the baby and he dumped the entire thing in his lap.  He then toddled over to the spice drawer and dumped an entire jar of whole cloves.  Doug was tossing pancakes to the kids (they love Daddy's flying flapjacks) and one hit Lauren in the eye and left a big red scratch down her cheek.  Who knew pancakes could be dangerous??  Then Jake toddled over to the ledge around the fireplace and fell, scraping his chin and biting his tongue.  Arrggh.  The day actually went well from that point forward and actually ended on a high note.  Doug and I went out for a bite at a Chinese buffet.  When we opened our fortune cookies, mine read, "Your true love is sitting right in front of you."  How awesome is that?

{The picture of Jacob was inspired by a shot I saw on a photographer's blog a while ago.  I cannot find the blog or picture and I would like to give that person credit.  If anyone knows who did it first, please let me know!}

Anna Banana

Yesterday I took Anna out for a few photos.  She's quite the poser but not a very brave model.  I must admit there were a lot of ants and other crawlies.  She held on very tightly to Mommy's hand whenever we ventured off a trail to find a suitable photo spot.  She checked every tree, branch and post for moss and red ants.  She was very thorough and kept me in stitches!

I loved the look of the brooch bouquets featured on Amy Atlas a few weeks ago.  Jan gave me permission to use Ruth's brooches to try and make one of our own.  Anna is holding the result in the first picture.  It's really quite special to have a picture of her with some special mementos that belonged to her Grandmother.

 

Are you there Spring? It's me, Sandy.

Old men must be snoring somewhere because all it seems to do around here lately is rain and pour.  Everything is so lush and green right now.  The trees and flowers are blooming like crazy.  I want...no, I need to take pictures!! Unfortunately, it's also raining.  Doug has reminded me often that my camera is not weather proof and I need to take better care of it.  So, yesterday afternoon when it stopped raining for 15 minutes, I ran to get Lauren.  She was taking a nap in the blow-up house and I hated to disturb her.  Instead, I grabbed the baby, stripped him down and took a few naked baby shots in the yard. (I'm sure my neighbors love me).  Drop by for those later in the week.  I mean, c'mon, who doesn't love naked baby shots? 

Anyway, I finally had to wake Lauren up in time to get Anna from yoga (or yogurt as my mom calls it...sorry, Mom, it was too funny not to share) and decided to dress her as if we were going to be able to take some pictures.  I drove to the spot where I wanted some shots (hey that ryhmes...it's 0400 in the morning so you'll have to forgive me) and sat with the kids in the car willing the rain to go away.  We finally gave up and went home only for the rain to subside.  I grabbed Lauren and we headed back out after Doug got home.  She was such a good little model for me yesterday.  She liked the fact that we both ended up with, as she put it, "soaking doaking wet feet".

Nothing Gold Can Stay

Whenever I see something this golden, I can't help but think about that line in the movie "The Outsiders".  Johnny is talking to Ponyboy and quotes the Robert Frost poem:

Nature's first green is gold,
Her hardest hue to hold.

Her early leaf's a flower;
But only so an hour.

Then leaf subsides to leaf.
So Eden sank to grief,

So dawn goes down to day.
Nothing gold can stay.

Our friends told us about this field on Saturday and so we rushed over to take some pictures.  Last year I had taken some shots of Jacob in some of these flowers as well but it was just a strip along the highway in the back parking lot of the Ace Hardware distribution center.  I must say this is much more spectacular.

Teapots and Blossoms

Dear Blog,

I'm so sorry to have neglected you in such a shameful manner.  My family is now over the flu and the nasty stomach bug.  Life is almost back to normal.  I promise to be more diligent in updating you.  As a token of good faith, here are some shots from sweet Kate's first birthday party.  I think the world of my dear friend Trish.  She was kind enough to agree to let me host Kate's party yesterday...even though she knows I have a tendency to go a little loco when it comes to planning.  I just can't help myself.  Trish wanted the party to have a tea and blossoms theme in teal and pink.  I love teal and pink.  We had so much fun putting it together and Kate was absolutely adorable!

Don't you love her little dress?

The cake was made by Trish's friend and neighbor Sarah.  She's starting her own cake business and these were the very first flowers she had ever made from gum paste....amazing.  The cake had an almond flavor and was absolutely delicious.

Kate has just started walking but she walks so incredibly well....everywhere...non-stop.  She was cracking me up with this balloon.  I made both of the teapot canvases.  The button teapot was super easy and fun.  I realized while making the other canvas that even though I thought I knew how to decoupage, in fact, I do not.  Of course after seeing Mommy at work, the girls needed their own "campuses" as they called them so they could "make art" as well.  They've already been busy creating masterpieces this morning.

See you again tomorrow.  I have some fun pictures of Jacob to share.

Our "Forever" Vacation

We’re home, again. We cut our trip to Yosemite short by a few days because 4 out of the 5 of us have a nasty bug. I seem to be the lone man or in this case wo”man” standing. We had planned to stay until Monday but noone was sleeping well enough to warrant the extra few days. This was our second trip as a family to the National Park. The girls were much more interested in Yosemite this time around….or at least I think they were. Anna kept “oohing” and “aahing” on the way in, saying “Look at those rocks! They’re amazing. I love it here, Mommy! This place should be our “forever” vacation.” Lauren, on the other hand immediately told us she didn’t care for the place because there were “too many rocks and trees”. Although having said that, she was practically in tears this morning when we were leaving “U-sem-a-tee”.

Our visit this time around was quite different from the first. Our timing was only different by about two weeks but two years ago it was a true winter wonderland.  (Pics below from our trip in 2008)

This time the temperatures were in the mid 40’s-50’s and although there was definitely some snow around, it wasn’t nearly as much as before. We did attempt a little sledding but didn’t get a snowman built. The girls were happy though that we did get to enjoy a fire and have the requisite s’mores.

 Everything is just better with s’mores.

Doug and I were excited at the prospect of having our nicer cameras with us this trip but with everyone under the weather, we honestly just didn’t get many pictures taken.

We’ve decided that when making a reservation, in addition to the normal questions:

~Preferred date and time of arrival

~Smoking or non-smoking

the reservationist should add a category: ~What camper type are you?

We’re always the family that gets stuck next door to the “Stay up until 1 in the morning, pacing the floor, talking at the top of our lungs, drinking until all hours” camper type family. I’m pretty sure if questioned our appropriate category would be something like this: “The go to bed obnoxiously early and wake up obnoxiously early family”; subcategories as follows:

~6 year old wakes the entire floor up at 0430 in the morning fighting with 5 year old over who gets to play PBS kids first on the laptop and slams every door in the room

~5 year old talks, makes that yells at her sister in her sleep periodically through the night and wets the bed

~Infant with an eagle scream, cutting teeth, and dealing with the flu wakes up the entire family at least once an hour, occasionally bites

Yep, that’s definitely our category.

One extra funny tidbit from the peanut gallery on this trip: For Anna’s special treat this trip she selected an explorer’s backpack from the Lodge store. It had binoculars, a hatchet, a knife, a shovel, a magnifying glass, and a compass watch. While we were driving around the park yesterday afternoon, Anna kept looking at her compass watch telling us which direction to go. She finally yelled, “Okay, now it says we’re going to Nebraska!” Well, I have to give her credit for knowing her state abbreviations…NE could be Northeast or Nebraska. I guess it’s all in the way you look at it!!

Here are a few of the shots from this trip.  I seemed to be on a tree kick this year!

 

 

 

Wow!

I am totally blown away.  Our circus party was mentioned on Party Perfect!!  If you've never been to Party Perfect, you should go right now!!  She features the cutest parties and the site is chock-full of inspiration. To say I'm excited would be an understatement!

Since our circus pictures appeared, people have been so kind and said the nicest things.  It's really made my year!  Here are a few other wonderful blogs who have been nice enough to mention us as well.

Little.Lovely: Here and Here

Bits & Pieces: Here

Tania McCartney: Here

THE BEAN AND THE BEAR

Hip Hostess:  Here