Saturday, August 23, 2008

M is 3!


Well, I'm a little late with this post, but this wonderful girl turned 3 yesterday. My baby girl isn't such a baby anymore. She's such a fun, funny, bright, beautiful, silly girl. She's a total ham - if it makes someone laugh, she's sure to do it again. (I'm expecting future teacher notes about the class clown....) And she makes me laugh. She loves to play imaginary games - and her imagination is so good that when she doesn't have any toys to do it with, she'll just go ahead and "play fingers" - make her fingers be a family that talk to each other. She likes to dance (although she looks kind of like me, poor child - hopefully she'll grow more graceful as she gets older!) She loves music - she sings all kinds of songs. She's constantly making up new songs about whatever she happens to be doing at the time. ("I'm a cowboy riding in the forest...") She likes to play together, but she's content playing alone, too. She likes to have some alone time, certainly more than her sister does. We've read about a million books in the last three years, but she's always up for more. She can count pretty well - she says the numbers almost to 20, but she can actually count items correctly up to five or so. And I'm amazed at how many numbers and letters she knows - one day this summer, we were driving along, and she said "That sign has 2 and 5" - that would be the speed limit of 25 miles an hour. And she likes to "write" her name - one of the letters looks like it should, anyway. ;)

I love you so much, my girl. Happy Birthday!

Tuesday, August 12, 2008

Picture of my skirt

I just remembered that I needed to post a picture of the skirt I mentioned in an earlier post. Here it is:


It's kind of wrinkly from being sat in for quite a long time before this picture was taken - it's not really all wonky in the front. And it's pretty comfy, too!

Changing times....


That is a picture of my big girl going off on the bus to kindergarten yesterday, for her very first day. Kindergarten. My kid's in kindergarten. She spends almost 8 hours a day away from home, including bus time. (Seems like such a long day for a five year old, doesn't it?) And now, instead of having a clear picture of what she's doing with her time (or knowing *exactly*, because I'm there), I have to rely on the memory and whim of a five year old to have any idea what's going on! Okay, it won't be quite that bad in a few weeks, once I'm allowed to help out at the school and go eat lunch with her, but still, it's a big change. She was in preschool, of course, but it was a shorter amount of time, and I went in and talked to her teachers every day. I guess I didn't know exactly what she was doing, but this feels much bigger. You're more distanced once they go to real school. Plus I miss my girl!! I'm okay in the mornings, because we're used to that, but by about 2:00 I want her home! (Although as a side note, apparently she takes a lot more energy than her sister, because I've accomplished a lot since she started!)

On the plus side, so far she loves it. She was tremendously nervous about the bus, and the second thing she said to me yesterday afternoon was "I love the bus!!" And she says her teacher is really nice, and of course she's already made friends. And she loves learning things, so she's having a ball. Not to mention, they can earn "dollars" by being good, and they can use the "dollars" to get prizes at the end of the week. At the end of the first day, she already had six bucks! Her teacher must've slowed the rate down today, though, because it sounds like she only got one today. ;)

It's funny - they gave us a copy of her schedule, but I didn't quite understand all of it, I don't think. She said today that they had Spanish class. Who knew? I guess that must be part of "specials", since I had no idea what that meant. I'm looking forward to being more involved in things in a few weeks, so that I have more of an idea of what's happening. But even then, I'll never really have the same clear picture of her activities. It's normal (and honestly, we're happier when she has some school), but it still makes me a little sad. Plus I'm afraid of what she's going to hear about at school. (At camp this summer, she came home and was wondering who Hannah Montana was *and* was told that "Thomas was for babies". We were able to convince her that one was ridiculous, anyway. Of course, this is the camp that thought Open Season - rated PG - was an appropriate movie for 5 year olds. Hmph.)

This was M at our dropoff yesterday:


She tried to follow A onto the bus! Ies had to catch her... To be honest, she's actually been fine during the day, but I think she'll be glad once her school starts. And boy, are they happy to see one another when A gets off the bus! The big smile on A's face and the giant hugs for both of us are just lovely.

So, kindergarten. My babies are growing up!

Friday, August 8, 2008

Renewed creativity

Our vacation was a week on Amelia Island, FL, and it was absolutely lovely. We really liked the island - nice beaches, lots of things to do in addition to the beach, and it was a friendly little town. Plus there were lots of yummy restaurants. Even though we ended up eating at the same Mexican restaurants twice and the same pizza place twice... :) (I highly recommend Moon River Pizza and Pablo's Mexican restaurant - the chicken fingers at Pablo's were highly rated, which is useful when you love Mexican food and your children won't eat it. Plus the churros were delicious!) And the condo on the beach was really nice, despite the renewing right in front of our condo. (Our view was blocked by bulldozers the first few days. But they moved surprisingly quickly.) It was a great vacation, and I feel all inspired since we got back.

First of all, I've drawn out lots more little round animals, so look for those in coming weeks. (And Ies and I both wonder why my craftiness inevitably returns to round animals - this is at least the third medium that I've made them in!)

Secondly, I got a lot of inspiration from some sewing books I read while I was gone. I read Sew What Skirts, which is a quick and easy read. For some reason I have trouble directly following patterns for myself - I'm always making minor changes. But sometimes they don't work out so well ;), so the information in this book was great. I have a bunch of skirts planned now. So far I've completed one - a straight skirt in some Amy Butler Nigella fabric I had in my stash. I'm more or less happy with it, although clearly I need to work some more on the curving on the sides. But it's cute, and certainly wearable. I'll have to post a picture later.

I also read Sew U Home Stretch, all about sewing with knits, and that was really inspiring as well. It renewed my love for my serger, especially since I think I've figured out my issues with ribbing. So I bought a bunch of knits at Joann's big sale last weekend, and I have shirts for me and jammies for the kids planned out. Now I just need to get to work on them. My to-do stack is huge, as always! But I have been productive the last few days - a skirt for me, first day of school dress for A (kindergarten! sob!), and a baby gift for a friend. So if I keep this rate up, I might actually get through some of my list before the weather's too cold to wear any of them!