Advent: Days 18 & 19

Yesterday our Advent package was paper snowflakes! I found some templates on Pinterest and the idea to use coffee filters. Since we don't drink coffee and my dad left a bunch, we only have a ton of coffee filters. Today's package was another book. Yesterday and today's packages kind of got jumbled into today, as all we did yesterday was open the package. Leilani and I made some snowflakes before she went to school, and while she was at school, I made a bunch more and hung them up above the TV. Leilani was enchanted when she got home from school.

Leilani's been a bit worried about how Santa's going to get in since we don't have a chimney, so I found a "Santa Key Poem", attached a bow and key to the card I wrote it out on, and Christmas Eve we're going to attach it to the door. We're also going to sprinkle the reindeer dust out that Leilani made at school a couple weeks ago. She's very excited about that.

We all have colds over here, so we have the humidifier going with the VapoSteam stuff in it, meds galore, and sniffles, coughs and watery eyes. Not much fun, but thank goodness for those boogie wipes. I always thought they were a waste of money and just some goofy thing, but they're the only thing Natalia doesn't scream at having wipe her nose. And I don't blame her, they feel at least a bajillion times better than kleenex!

Advent: Day 13

We finally got our truck back, so I could drop Leilani off and I'll pick her up this afternoon. I'm really quite excited to be doing that again :). When I picked Leilani up, she looked miserable. If she's not feeling better by morning, she's probably going to have to miss tomorrow. Her nose is running like crazy. We went to Wal-Mart to get the milk for our hot cocoa (it's National Hot Cocoa Day!) and Leilani fell asleep on the ten minute car ride to the store.

After dropping Leilani off, Natalia and I came home and Natalia took a nap (I watched How I Met Your Mother and worked out our Holiday menus and a corresponding shopping list). After Natalia woke, we went to the library, came home, read and watched some Backyardigans. Natalia loves the colors and music. I think they're super cute and like the songs.

Our Advent package today had a book - A Charlie Brown Christmas. As I was reading it, Natalia crawled! She wanted the book, so did an actual crawl to get to it! I rewarded her by letting her have the book when I finished reading it. It's a board book, she she can't really destroy it *grin*.

Advent: Day 9

Leilani is loving school again. I cannot tell you how happy that makes me. The kindergarten workbook I bought her is her new favorite thing to do, even over watching movies! She's been doing math, social studies, science and writing all day. And she's having a blast! We finished the Magic School Bus chapter book today. Leilani loved learning about the Solar System - as we taked about the Voyager space probe, I told her that her cousin A, G and L's great-grandpa worked on the Voyuager's systems and that it just left our solar system the other day. She promptly declared that she wants to build one. I told her she can do anything she wants to, if she puts her mind to it :) She also read me two stories today!

Our Advent project today was making salt dough handprint ornaments. Natalia wasn't very cooperative, but we managed to get both girls' handprints. I was going to dry them in the oven, but changed my mind and we're letting them air dry - that way we don't have to turn the oven on and can save on electricty *smile*.

I finally got a decent night's sleep last night, and my three-day headache seems to be subsiding. Finally. I'd almost forgotten what no headache feels like.

Advent: Day 8

Today, we had an indoor snowball fight. There was a picture circulating on Pinterest, and if you follow the link, it's to buy this indoor snowball fight bucket. So, instead, I scrounged up a bucket, found some old, mismatched socks that I stuffed full of stuffing, and - waalaa! - our own indoor snowball fight, for free. Leilani liked getting to actually throw stuff in the living room, but I think she had more fun disassembling the sockballs when she was done throwing them.

So far, so good - Leilani's been brushing her teeth, keeping her playroom clean, making her bed, putting her dishes in the sink, doing her homework and being kind for three days straight now. All to earn some fake dollars to buy real stuff with. She already knows what she's saving for - a needlepoint kit I got for her. Initially, I was going to put the kit in her stocking, but I thought she might appreciate it more if she had to work for it. She's bound and determined to get it, so she's cleaning her playroom as I type this. Fingers crossed that I found the secret to helping her learn to take responsibility, clean up after herself and learn about money all at the same time.

And one last thing - I LOVE her going to school! I could kiss her teachers (not literally, but I'm pretty excited here) - Leilani read me an entire little story. She sounded it all out, and read it to me. Super short, but the main thing is - SHE DID IT BY HERSELF!!!! I'm so proud, I'm going to share the whole story with you, and you can pretend she's reading it aloud to you *grin*

Dan and Jan
Dan ran.
Jan ran.
Dan ran fast.
Jan ran as fast as Dan
Dad can see Dan and Jan.

My little baby's learning! It makes me so happy, and reinforces that I made the right decision in putting her in school!

Advent: Day 6

We all accidentally slept in this morning - we had around 30 minutes to get ready to go, and Leilani can take that long just to eat! We did get out on time, and got Leilani to school in good time. Natalia and I came straight home, had some breakfast, cuddled and then Natalia took a nap.

I came up with a payment system for Leilani to do chores - everyday she does her chores, she gets a fake dollar, and I have small toys and things she can "buy" with her "money". I put all the little odds 'n ends in a drawer and now she can start to learn the how work = money = getting things. Also known as the value of a dollar. I'm quite hopeful that this will motivate her and get her excited. As soon as I explained the system to her, she put her dishes in the sink and ran off to brush her teeth again, make her bed and make sure her play room was all cleaned. Of course, she got a bit sidetracked by the legos,(yesterday she made the Great Wall of China, and today I heard her say she's making the Eiffel Tower) but I'm still hopefull. After all, it's only 4, still time for her to play *grin*

Today our Advent package contained a book: I Want a Dog for Christmas, Charlie Brown. Leilani was so excited, she wanted me to read it twice! We're also reading a Magic School Bus chapter book. And, when I went to the library yesterday, I picked up a few books she can help me read.

Advent: Day 4

Naturally, Leilani wanted to sleep in today. I had to wake her to get her ready for school, and despite the somewhat rocky start, she still got a green card for good behaviour. She did have a slight meltdown, though, as I was picking her up. She cme out with tears streaming down her face, and through her sobs, it took me a while to figure out what she was tring to say. Apparently, the other kids got holiday pencils and she didn't. I asked her if she wanted to talk to the school counselor and tell her what had happened (since she had witnessed the whole meltdown and wanted to help) so Leilani told her and then got to choose a pencil. All was better and we headed home.

Leilani was super excited to open todays Advent package - it was the VeggieTales Nativity Playset. She and Natalia played together for a while, the we read some and danced to Big Band Christmas music. I think Leilani's favorite part was spinning around, and Natalia's seemed to be me boucing around with her. It was a lovely afternoon. After dinner we watched Beauty and the Beast, The Enchanted Christmas Tomorrow's "Late Start Wedsnesday" so I'm going to figure out something fun for breakfast, and Leilani wants to make some fudge so it's ready to eat when she gets home from school.

Advent: Day 1

Today, after finishing up Leilani's homework and reading some books, Leilani pulled out the folder with the number one on it. It was a recipe for cake mix sugar cookies, which we read through, then made. Leilani had a blast mixing the sprinkles in, them the wet ingredients. While the dough chilled in the refrigerator, Leilani colored, then she and Jeremy put the decorations up outside. I put Natalia in the Moby and took pictures. After dinner, we rolled out and cut the cookie dough. The cookies turned out really cute and taste just like sugar cookies. I didn't get any pictures of the cookies, but some of the decorations. *smiles* A nice day mostly relaxing at home with a lot of family time.

The last picture is of our Advent Activity Bucket

Advent Calender

I've made a kind of Advent Calender I found on, naturally, pinterest. I used the idea of getting a bucket and wrapping up things to do each day, trying to use things I already had so as to not spend too much money. In that strain, we used the packing paper left over from our move, red and green folders we've had for a looonnnggg time, and things lying around the house made into new things.

Each day, we're going to do something fun:

1 - bake cookies
2 - bake brownies
3 - make fudge
4 - play with the Veggie Tales nativity set
5 - make a "year in review" ornament
6 - read a book
7 - red and green playdough
8 - indoor snowball fight
9 - hand print ornament
10 - handprint Christmas trees
11 - Christmas jokes
12 - letter to Santa
13 - read a book
14 - make pine cone birdfeeders
15 - make gingerbread house
16 - make coffee mugs
17 - make snowglobes
18 - make snowflakes
19 - read a book
20 - Christmas bingo
21 - go Christmas light hunting
22 - make gingerbread cookies
23 - read the Christmas story
24 - Christmas Eve box

We're looking forward to having lots of fun this Advent season.

It's Monday

Well, it's Monday again, and that means Leilani's back to school - she's been wanting to have pumpkin pie, so after Natalia and I got home (and napped) we made one big pumpkin pie and a dozen individual pumpkin pies to fit in her lunchbox. To make the individual pies, I just used a cookie cutter and put the crust into a muffin tin. The pumpkin pie turned out super yummy! Vegan and easy to make, even Natalia loved the filling - she ate her entire spoonfull *smiles* I had a hard time making myself stop eating the little pies, I never knew I liked pumpkin pie before.

Speaking of Natalia eating - she loves crackers, she gums those little things to death. And while we're on the Natalia subject - she has the most beautiful smile. Her eyes light up and shine. She loves it when I read to her and she has this absolutely adorable way of bouncing up and down to try to get ones attention when she wants to be picked up. While sitting on the couch next to me, she grabs onto my arm and bounces into a standing position. She's crawling backwards super fast, and occasionally taking a tiny scoot forward. She's just weeks from actually crawling.

Leilani had a bit of homework tonight, which we knocked out as soon as she got home. Leilani loved the pumpkin pie, and has been eating tons of bananas all day. She's still loving school, but was a bit disappointed today, since it was raining, they couldn't play on the playground but instead had to play in the covered area. She said it was too loud and she couldn't hear the bell, but was so sad she didn't get to play longer. (Her exact wording, there) We've been reading a chapter of Charlotte's Web a night, and she got her first book from the school library today, which made her incredibly excited! She loves books so much, which makes me happy, too. Yesterday, she read the first BOB book, with just a bit of help. Natalia was fascinated by her sister reading to her.

Tomorrow I'm planning on making cinnamon rolls, which I'll bake Thursday morning, then I'm going to make dinner rolls. I'm really excited to have my first vegan Thanksgiving - I've wanted to try a Tofurky for years, and now I finally get to *smiles*.

Last Sunday in Ohio

Today is our last Sunday here. Tomorrow the movers will be coming out to start packing all our stuff. In the interest of having less stuff to move, I used up almost the last foodstuffs in the cupboard. I made a quinoa pilaf with vegetables I had in the fridge, added in some basil and oregano, and it turned out surprisingly yummy.

We all slept in some today, and Leilani played most of the day. Yesterday she lost her movie privileges because of throwing a fit, then arguing. Basically, the moment really sucked for all parties involved. But I stuck to my guns, and she seems so much happier. I usually relent after a while, which is definitely not good. See, she usually watches movies in the morning, since Natalia sleeps in, but because of what went down last night, I told her she couldn't. And this morning, I didn't let her. I put the movies up, and told her she would need to play quietly, which she did. So, I'm patting myself on the back here *grin*. She did wind up with a slight fever this afternoon, so I heated up some vegetable broth and put on Dora. Since she still wants to go to Awanas I told her she needed to sit still and drink up the broth, and I figured the best way to get her to be still was with a movie. It seemed to work. She actually sat on the couch and drank the broth. And I think it helped.

We read lots of books. All six books Leilani got yesterday, plus two of Natalia's books. I'm glad both girls like me reading to them and enjoy books so much. We also went over verses for tonight. Tonight's "parent night" at Awana. I told Leilani and she said "but I don't need you there, I'm not a Cubby any more." I love that she's growing up, but it still sometimes makes me kind of sad. The good kind of sad.

A Much Better Day

Thank goodness Leilanidecided to rent Dora yesterday! She watched it this morning while Natalia and I slept in a bit. Just enough for us to all get a good start to the day. We finished the first Molly book - Meet Molly, which I read to her while she ate her breakfast. Natalia was incredily uninterested and watched Baby Einstein instead.

Phonics went amazingly smoothly, math not so much. She keeps making her 6's and 7's backwards, so I need to find a writing program that will help with that. For bible we're working on memorizing John 3:16 for Sparkies. They've broken it up into sections which I almost think makes it harder. However, she's doing a fantastic job with it. History and science were just reading and oral answers, which were nice and easy. Leilani can now play an "a" and a "b" on her flutophone. I decided on the flutophone for music because it's small and portable, and she and I didn't seem to really be "getting" piano together. I think I need to find an actual piano teacher for her.

Natalia is definitely sitting up by herself for short periods of time. Of course, when I praise her and tell her how fantastic she's doing, she gets all excited and goes a bit rigid and falls over, with the biggest grin on her face and her eyes all alight with happiness. It's funny and adorable, all at the same time.

On our drive to take the movies back to Blockbuster, I was enjoying the drive, fresh air, greenery, new colors on the trees and sort of lost track of where I was. I passed our turn by a huge margin. But it really was a beautiful drive, so instead of getting upset, I just looked at the beauty all around us and Leilani and I tried to see who could see leaves turning first.

So, really, today was a much better day. It's amazing how much sleep helps!

Thoughts on Books

Then people look at me like I'm crazy, but who cares?


so I have a lot of books,

which leads to this:




ALL the time!

Which, naturally, led to trouble


and this was the punishment

FYI...worst ever!


which drives everyone crazy :)


true story


and in my future home, I will!

so, in conclusion: