Helen for the Holiday

Charlotte had the entire week off of school for Thanksgiving and she and Toby enjoyed catching up on some sibling time and lounging in their jammies.  It made my heart super happy.

They also taught Jakey how to stay safe by walking on the furniture when the carpet turns into lava.

We ate a simplified Thanksgiving dinner on Tuesday. Toby is the turkey leg man.

I made turkey, gravy, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, green beans, rolls, and cranberry sauce shaped like a can (my personal favorite.)  It wasn't fancy but it worked.

The reason we ate on Tuesday was so that we could go to Helen, GA on Thursday.  We took our leftovers and headed to this little cabin in the Georgia mountains.

Charlotte brought along a notebook and pencil and discovered she loves drawing from nature.

Yup, Rob is THAT dad.  Saw some rocks in the middle of the Chattahoochee River and took Charlotte and Toby out there to explore.  

We hiked up to the Anna Ruby Falls.

They were very pretty and it was a totally do-able hike for the littles.

Monkeys in a tree.

This is what downtown Helen looks like.  I was excited to explore this Appalachian Alpine village, but it turns out it is basically a tourist trap.  Ah well.  We still ate German food (not great,) played at the playground, bought fudge, played mini-golf, and bought German salad dressing mix (Woo-hoo! Rob and I were just talking about how we were missing that.)  So it was a fun family weekend.

On our last day in Helen we drove up to the Appalachian Trail in the Chattahoochee National Forest to do a little more hiking.  We went straight uphill for nearly a mile and then decided to stop while the kids were still having fun.  We really want them to LOVE hiking, which means we have to take hikes that are short enough to be fun for them right now and not go until they get cranky.  That's our theory anyway.

On the way down we saw this in a tree over the trail we had just come up and which we now had to hike down.  It's a black bear.  It's not a large black bear, but that made me more nervous because maybe mama was around and wouldn't like us very much.  At any rate, we explained to the kiddos about respect for nature and quickly and quietly returned to the car.  It was kinda a great ending to our week of giving thanks for family, nature, home, and love.  Happy Thanksgiving!

Project Runway - Christmas Edition

I was on Pinterest one day and saw a link to this blog- Craftiness is not optional.  On there are tutorials for making Barbie clothes and I was like, "What? I could make Barbie look more like the girl next door and less like the cocktail waitress from the corner bar?!!?  Sign me up."  Now, I know there are Barbie clothes in the stores- but not as many as you might think, and they are made of really cheap materials that tear easily.  (Trust me, I know, I've been shopping for them.)  And despite the marketing of Dr. Barbie, Archaeologist Barbie, etc., most outfits are either designed for Hoochie Barbie or Princess Barbie.  Ugh.  So, don't tell Charlotte, but this Christmas she will be getting some Barbie clothes made by MOM.

My first pattern choice was the "simple skirt." It is really easy, so I made eight of them.  Doesn't Tiana look like she is ready for the neighborhood 4th of July picnic?

This little dress is possibly my favorite.  All of the fabrics came from my scrap box.

I made four dresses total. The ones without sleeves took about 10-15 minutes start to finish.

I'm not great at doing the darts yet, and Ariel is not as.. um.. well endowed as some of the other Barbies in the house, but I wanted to make one gown out of red satin.  It's okay.  The satin was harder to work with though for sure.  I also made a top out of the red satin.

I love this one too.  It's a bit longer and I found a scrap of white eyelet in my mom's old sewing basket so I trimmed the bottom. 

This poofy skirt is adorable... if I do say so myself.  I used the last bit of white eyelet to trim it.  I would totally wear this outfit.

Some of the tops have darts in the to give them a more fitted look, this one does not.

Altogether I made 8 tops, 8 simple skirts, 5 poofy skirts, and 4 dresses.  I hope that Charlotte will like them. I had fun doing this project for her.  Possibly too much fun.  And I will certainly be more willing to play Barbies with my sweet girl in the new year.  ;)  

An Incredible Halloween

Happy Halloween from The Incredibles!

Jack Jack gets into a LOT of mischief these days, but we worry about telling him "no" as we don't like when he bursts into flames... especially around the books. 

Dash is always ready to GO.  He ran from house to house when it was time to trick or treat this year.

Violet makes excellent force fields to protect us all from the spooks and "bad guys" out on Halloween night.

Mr. Incredible and I (In-Elastigirl) hope that you enjoyed our family Halloween costumes this year.  We had a blast dressing up together.  :)

Peanut-palooza!

This is my Charlotte girl one short year ago.

And here we are at SIX years old! Am I the only one who is shocked by this transformation?

For Charlotte's birthday this year, she wanted to go to Peter Pan (the ballet) at the Imperial Theater in Augusta.  She and I went to it on a mommy/daughter date and mingled with the cast afterwards.  This is Charlotte with her favorite character- Tinkerbell.

We also attended our first school fund raiser event during birthday week- 

the FUN RUN!

Whatever, it wasn't that fun, and I don't think we will be raising funds for the school in the future.  Donate? Sure. But call people? Um no.  Charlotte did run/walk a total of 2 miles though and she LOVED it.  So that was great.

On Charlotte's actual birthday, Rob flew home from a month away for work.  Charlotte requested we go to Red Robin for dinner and that SHE get to sit by her daddy. Who could say no to that?  So we had a nice dinner out and then they SANG to her and brought her an ice cream sundae.  ;)  Charlotte was overjoyed (I knew our extrovert would enjoy that surprise) and my introverted Rob was mortified (bonus.)  We also took cupcakes to Charlotte's class for snack, so there were plenty of birthday treats and I made no family birthday cake this year.

Charlotte has always been a fun girl to talk to, but as she gets older we are finding more things that we both enjoy talking to each other about.  She has loved starting Kindergarten, and she and Toby rarely ever argue when they play together now, because they are both just happy to be together. Charlotte is generally a confident, assertive, happy little individual (though we are already having some hiccups as she compares herself to other girls at school- that is such a hard thing to try not to do, I know.) And I love my girl sooooo much!  Happy birthday to my Peanut girl.  

Charlotte's birthday interview: (These answers are amazingly similar to last year)

What's your favorite color? Pink

What's your favorite movie? Rapunzel (Tangled)

What's your favorite song? I am a Child of God

What's your favorite food? Macaroni and cheese

What's your favorite thing to do with Toby? Play cars with him on his carpet.

What's your favorite thing to do with Jacob? Tickle him.

What's your favorite thing to do with mommy? Cuddle!

What's your favorite thing to do with daddy? Go bowling- just like we did today!

What’s your favorite part of the school day? Going to art.

What do you want to be when you grow up? A cooker and a haircutter. I want to live in Paris when I grow up.

What makes you feel happy? My mommy. (Awwww)

Once upon a time

Once upon a time there was an adorable little boy. As he grew older he would have very poofy hair, play the trombone and piano, and torture his younger siblings. Eventually he would serve a mission to Madagascar for the LDS church and graduate from BYU and become a linguist.

Once upon a time there was also a precocious little girl.  As she grew older she would love art and poetry, dye her hair every color of the rainbow, play the flute and french horn, and torture her nephew. Eventually she would graduate from BYU and continue on to Rutgers to become a librarian.

One day the linguist met the librarian. They found out they were both silly and serious. They had both taken time to grow into their own people. They both loved the Gospel, travel, music, words, family, laughter, and best of all- each other.

Happy 7th anniversary to my sweet Rob.  

Real life is better than a fairy tale because of you.  There is no end.  :)

Yes, I can!

Don't worry, this has nothing to do with politics or the current election season.

I've made strawberry freezer jam for several years now, but wanted to try my hand at some "real" canning this year.  So far I have done whole roma tomatoes, peach slices (in juice,) 2 varieties of applesauce, dill pickles, my usual strawberry freezer jam, and plum jam. 

The main thing I have learned is that it is a whole lot easier than I thought it would be.  I wish I'd tried it sooner.  (Except for the tomatoes that is... I'm not doing tomatoes again, they were kind of a pain and they taste no different than store bought canned tomatoes to me, so what's the point.)  The plum jam and applesauce are AWESOME though. And we haven't tried the pickles or peaches yet, so I'll let yas know.  ;)  I love opening the cupboard and seeing these beautiful jewel toned jars of wholesome foods put up for a rainy day.  

And I do see those storm clouds brewing.  We have been very blessed to be able to live comfortably on a single income and I know that for today's world we enjoy considerable job security.  But many, many people right now are without work. We, in the US, are also dealing with extensive drought conditions that are (and will  continue) effecting the cost of food to feed our families.  I don't want to be all doom and gloom or have anyone thinking I'm preparing for the zombie apocalypse, but it gives me a sense of security to develop some skills that could help me better stretch our resources should the need arise.  A few other things I've done this year- besides canning- are: 

-Got into better physical shape (to limit preventable medical conditions that incur high medical costs.)

-Grew a few foods in our backyard garden.

-Took the Heartsaver CPR and First Aid class. (I only wish I had done this before Toby sliced his fingertip.)

-Prepared a 72 hour kit in case we would need to leave our home in the event of an emergency. (Hurricanes and tornadoes are both possibilities where we live.)

-Began to plan and implement long-term food and water storage.

-Began to remove more processed foods from our diets and make more healthy alternatives from scratch.

Here are a few things I still want to do:

-Take a class on basic mending and clothing alterations. (This is coming up soon and I am excited!)

-I want to try pressure canning- but pressure canners are expensive, so I'm on the lookout for a used one.

-I want to learn to make soap.

-I want to bake something in a solar oven.  (For as warm as it is here, solar cooking is probably possible 10 months out of the year- in Germany it's probably possible like 2 months out of the year.)

-I want chickens.  (This one is going to have to wait a few years though I'm sure.)

Doesn't that sound like FUN?!?!?  (I can hear the groans from some of you.)  But seriously, I am enjoying learning my old timey homesteading-traditional-whatever-you-want-to-call-it skills.  In many parts of the world, this is still how things are done and it can't hurt to learn.  If you want more info, these are a few of my favorite resources:

LDS- Provident Living

Food Storage Made Easy

The Prudent Homemaker- this lady's story is crazy inspiring

The Hillbilly Housewife

And one final thought, if you have read this far...

Being self prepared is really ingrained in Mormons. I think because of our pioneer heritage and because we believe so strongly in helping others... if you are not prepared in a crisis, you will not be able to help anyone else either.  Dieter F. Uchtdorf said it better than I can, “Too often we notice the needs around us, hoping that someone from far away will magically appear to meet those needs. … When we do this, we deprive our neighbor of the service we could render, and we deprive ourselves of the opportunity to serve.”  Huh.  Maybe this does have something to do with my political feelings after all.  :)

The eyes have it

At Jacob's 3 month old check-up it was noted that he had clogged tear ducts in both of his eyes.  They had been that way since he was born; getting all gunky with yucky green stuff each morning. The pediatrician recommended I wipe them with warm wet washcloths several times a day and I did.  But nothing changed.  

By the time he was 5 months old I was beginning to be concerned about the upcoming 6 month check-up so I took the advice I had received from more than a few mommies and squirted breast milk in his eyes.  Jake, I am sorry if you are reading this as an adult and are appalled, but that's what I did, and guess what?  The next day your left eye was clear and never became clogged again.  

The right eye however, would not clear no matter what I tried.  So at the one year check-up the pediatrician said it was time to address this and have a specialist look at it.  We went to eye surgeon Dr. Brooks and he recommended Jake's right eye be aspirated.  "Such a simple procedure, it'll be over in 10 minutes, no side effects... but we will need to put him under anesthesia and be at the hospital.  But don't worry."  Yeah, okay, sure, no worries.  AAAAHHHH!  

I can't imagine the stress of having a child undergo a procedure that is actually dangerous, (as I know some of you dear friends have had to do,) because I was very stressed about this. So stressed in fact that I rearranged the living room furniture the morning beforehand and washed all the bedding in the house.  (I like distractions.)  

Adding to my stress was the fact that Rob was unavailable (due to a work commitment) and Jake and I needed to be at the hospital at 6 am.  My sweet sister offered to drive down and help with the big kids, but thankfully a woman from church generously offered to take Charlotte and Toby at 5:15 am and even got Charlotte to school for me.  (While managing her own 5 children's morning routines.) Thank you, thank you, thank you!  (Also, Pam, I fully expect you to make that trip sometime in the near future now just to play with me.)

So... the procedure DID go smoothly and WAS over with quickly.  And now nearly a week later, Jakey can see clearly now the gunk is gone.  He can see all obstacles in his way.  Actually, he had no problems seeing before, but isn't that a great song?  

Dr. Brooks did tell me there is a 1 in 20 chance that his eye will re-clog itself because his passageway, or whatever, is very narrow on one side.  (I'm so technical, huh?)  If that happens, then Jake will need a procedure to put in tubes- similar to when kids have tubes put in their ears.  But thankfully that is unlikely, and so far all looks well.  I am very thankful for modern medicine and that this was not a lifelong problem for Jake as it may have been in days gone by.  That said, I hope we don't have to go to the hospital again anytime soon.  For that matter, I hope YOU don't have to go to the hospital anytime soon either.  Let's just all be healthy and not go to the hospital, k?  

Toby is grrrreat!

We've just recently celebrated Toby's 4TH birthday!  My little man is getting all grown up. For his birthday, he wanted us to go the zoo together, (like we did for Charlotte's birthday last year,) and he wanted a yellow cake, with chocolate frosting and a T-Rex, and a soccer ball on it and his favorite colors blue and green... but we'll get to that in a moment.

 These are a pair of robots, that Toby built, dancing. I don't know why he poses like this so often.

This is a fort that Toby built during Jake's naptime one day.  He truly is our little engineer. 

For his birthday, like I said, we went to the Riverside Zoo in Columbia, SC.  This time we took the tram to visit the Botanical Gardens for the first time and they were really nice.  This was in the little children's area and you could play music on it by hitting it with a stick like a xylophone. 

We have to ride the carousel whenever we go to the zoo.  (Jakey loved this.) 

 Almost got all 3 kids' attention.

Our big 4 year old boy had a great, sweaty day.  It was 96 degrees out by the time we left in the afternoon.  Around Toby's neck he is proudly wearing his new "finoculars" he picked out in the gift shop as his birthday present. 

This is his soccer, dinosaur, blue & green cake.  It is not pretty. 

But he liked it.  :) 

Hmmm, I wonder what he wished for. 

Toby is also playing soccer this season and as a veteran soccer player, is doing much better.  His team is called the Rapids, but he thinks it is called the Rabbits.  Goooo Rabbits! 

 Hangin' around with Coach Nick.

He really has improved and his coach this season is much more geared toward 3-4 year olds (yay!) Whenever Toby kicks the ball he yells, "heeee-yah!"

I seriously don't have words for how much I love this sensitive, sweet, handsome little man.  Every year I worry that he will grow out of wanting to cuddle with his mom or telling me his secrets, but thankfully it hasn't happened yet.  I hope he never does!  It will be a very sad day if and when it happens.

Here is Toby's birthday interview:

What is your favorite color? Blue and green and brown.
What is your favorite food? Banana and oranges and apples and pineapple and broccoli and peas and cranberries. (this is a much healthier list than last year.)
What do you like to play? Build with my blocks and look at my fish and soccer and feed my fish.
What's your favorite animal? A frog and an elephant.
What's your favorite movie? Blue's Clues and Batman and Spiderman.
What's your favorite song? "The Snowman melted in the sun" (Once there was a snowman.)
What do you want to be when you grow up? The sign maker (he's fascinated by road signs right now,) and I'm gonna build houses too, but not building roads, only houses, and I'm gonna be in a dumptruck.
What's your favorite thing to do with Charlotte? We love to get flowers for you (me- awwww.)
What's your favorite thing to do with Jacob? Sword fight with him carefully.

PS.  This is my 300th blog post, and I've now been blogging for 6 years.  Time flies.  ;)

Happy birthday Bear!

Nearly 2 weeks ago, we celebrated Jakey's first birthday!  (I was shortly thereafter struck down by the nastiest cold bug I've had in a loooooong time, and am still on the mend, which is why it has taken me so long to post these pics.)  Jake had a fun birthday celebration with one of our favorite curries for dinner, kukupaka (coconut chicken,) and dinosaur cake for dessert made by mom.  Yes, Jake already eats curry... but honestly, he will eat just about anything you put in front of him.  (Except for bananas- he only eats them 50% of the time.)

Charlotte and Toby told me that Jacob wanted a dinosaur cake.  I did my best, and this is what I came up with.  I like making the kids' birthday cakes-so far we have only done one store bought cake and we all agreed it didn't taste great- but inevitably about 20 things go wrong and I get very frustrated.  So far the kids have all been happy with the end results though and I hope they will make for happy memories of their homemade cakes.

Jakey liked it.  He kept looking at it like he was trying to memorize what it looked like for future reference.

The happy, sugared up, ONE year old boy!

We did invite just a couple of our friends over to celebrate with us, and the kiddos had a great time playing together.  I confess, Rob and I don't socialize much, and WE had a great time visiting with a couple of our grown-up friends as well.  :)

Today we took the kids to Monkey Joe's for a fun family activity and for the first time Jacob was DETERMINED to participate. He bounced and went down the slides and just smiled from ear to ear.  

His personality is emerging more all the time- he is super kinetic... always in motion.  His favorite game is to play ball.  You have to be careful though, because he will throw anything that comes into his hands, including my Kindle which is currently broken from being thrown on the tile floor. He especially likes to throw things down the stairs. He empties my cupboards and rearranges the chairs several times a day. He is also fearless about water and sticks his face under the water in the bathtub regularly. I don't think he has any idea that he is a baby; if he sees Toby doing something then Jakey will try to do it too.  He will occasionally settle in for a cuddle, and he likes to give kisses, but only for a moment because he's got to get back to making messes! 

Jacob is still not very verbal.  We can make out a few things like "dada," "om," "up," and "all done." He also shakes his head no.  But that is pretty much it for communication beyond growls and giggles.  He is a speedy walker and doesn't resort to crawling anywhere anymore. He can go up and down the stairs.  He has also gotten better about sleeping and will often sleep from 8-10 pm, then get up and have a bottle and then sleep from 10pm-5am.  He also still takes 1-2 naps during the day. He has 8-10 teeth in his little mouth- though it is challenging to get a good look at them as he speeds by. 

One of Jake's absolute favorite things to do right now, is to brush his hair.  Which is really very funny considering that he hardly has any. He gets a brush out of the bathroom drawer and just strolls around the house brushing his hair and smiling.  You will no longer be his friend if you take the hairbrush away from him.  We are so thankful for our funny little Jakey bear. I am somewhat dismayed at how quickly he is growing up, but I'm guessing that will always be the case.  Right this moment he is pulling on my leg to be picked up, and I suddenly want nothing more than to cuddle with him... while I still can.  Happy birthday Bear!  

In her own words

Ready to go to Kindergarten!

Charlotte found her locker, and her seat, and was all set for school to begin.

One last squeeze before we left our sweet girl!  

(I thought I would be emotional, but I guess I got that out enough beforehand because we were all just smiley and excited for her new adventure.)

Here is Charlotte to tell you all about her first day of school... I thought about writing something to accompany (explain parts of) this, but I decided it would be best to let her speak for herself.  ;)

Edist-ooooooooo!

On Saturday we ran away from home. We drove to Edisto Beach in South Carolina and spent the day as a family enjoying the sun, sand, and surf.  I would call Edisto an overlooked little beach haven.  There was ZERO traffic on our route there (something unimaginable on a Saturday in August in NJ or MD!) We were able to park the car (for free) and be on the sand in about 10 steps. Across the street was a Piggly Wiggly where we could grab milk for Jake's bottle and snacks for the rest of us.  Perfect spot for a day trip.  :)

Jake embraced his first time at the beach by crawling straight into the water. No fear.  Even after getting nailed by a wave, he came up sputtering and kept moving forward. He is a crazy kid! 

Our engineer, Toby, dug ditches and built castles in between dips in the ocean.

And Charlotte barely left the water all day. 

As you can see, the beach was nearly empty.  There was a group of young adults from Quebec next to us though.  We had fun chatting with them (in English and French) about their travels down the coast headed for Florida, then west to California, then north to British Columbia, and then back east to Quebec in a van- picking fruit as workers when they are in need of cash.  Sounds like an adventure, huh?! The kids enjoyed sharing seashells, buckets, and shovels with our new buddies from the north. 

Fun memories.  :)