Katelyn Strikes Again

I have started teaching Katelyn how to skip count by 2's and 5's. Any little game helps to teach a new concept so I made up a game for the 2's. I would say, "2,4,6,8, who do you appreciate?" Katelyn would tell me who she appreciates and why and we would switch roles. It was a good way to commit to memory the first few numbers. However, the real treasure turned out to be her answers on who she appreciates and why. My very favorite was when she said Daddy. There are a million reasons why she should appreciate Rusty. Really he is an amazing Dad. Her answer was, "I just really love that when Daddy makes quesadillas he puts a tortilla on the top,too. It is so much easier to chew and hold and it just tastes better!"

Valentines Day 2012

I love any excuse to make colored, shaped pancakes. Really I like to color and shape any food. Valentines Day is a great excuse to spice up the regular old stuff. We started off this years V-day with pink heart shaped pancakes. What a great way to start a big day.

For lunch we had heart shaped sandwiches with strawberries, chips, and smoothies. We have enough girls who are home-schooled near us that we made it a home-school valentines party. 7 girls total, including Kyleigh and Katelyn, came over for lunch. After we ate we did a bunch of crafts. We made candy rings, hersheys kiss rose bouquets, valentines mailboxes, and heart shaped crayons, decorated a valentines mailbox, learned how to twist roses from napkins, and decorated sugar cookies. We also had a valentines exchange. The girls were so excited about the valentines exchange. We got on our faithful website, familyfun.com, for ideas. Kyleigh chose to make an valentine that looked like an ipod, and Katelyn made owls that said, "I'll owl-ways be your friend." They turned out so cute. By the time we were done with all the crafts and the exchange they each had a mailbox full of fun treats and crafts.

By the time we finished with that party it was time to start working on our family Valentines dinner. I made heart shaped garlic french bread, bacon-chicken alfredo pasta in red heart shaped pans, and a salad, with plain white dressing. I know, white dressing is a disappointment. The girls got Valentines gifts from GG and Gpa, Nama and Papa, and Holly's sister Amy. I laid out all of their fun things next to their plates and called them in for dinner. They had so much fun looking through their Valentines treasures. For desert I had made cream puffs with red pudding. However, we were so sugared out from the treats that we saved them for another day.

The kids went to bed asking if they could have more candy before breakfast. I love Valentine's Day.

Birthday Boy is 2!

It probably gets old when I say I can't believe, but, I can't believe my little boy is 2. He has the biggest smile and the sweetest heart and he really, really loves Santa. I'm not sure how that happened, other than he is the son of a super Christmas loving Dad. I started out the day with our usual pancake people. I thought I was being so clever with blue dye for our little boy to decorate his pancake man. But, he said, "anta, anta" (Santa) as soon as he saw what we were doing. I guess I should have gone for red. Rusty helped him make a pancake Santa.

At lunch time we went to Poipu to have lunch with Russ. The girls thought since Ridge was a bit small to have lunch by himself with Daddy that they might score some lunch and hula pie at Keoki's along with the birthday boy. Instead they got peanut butter sandwiches at the boat harbor. The tide was really low so we looked for sea creatures. We found a couple of sea cucumbers and had hermit crab races. The girls also chased chicks and played with some dogs.

For Ridge's party I had originally planned to have a construction theme. I had inflatable hammers, construction hats and I was going to steal my sisters idea and make a cake in a dump truck. However, I started thinking about what Ridge loves more than anything else. Of course, that is Santa. So I planned a Santa party instead. It was luck that Walmart still had a few Christmas items on clearance. I scored some plates with Santa on them and some bows. Mike, Holly and girls, and Riley the neighbor boy came over for the party. We had lasagna, garlic bread and salad for dinner. For desert we had santa cupcakes and peppermint push pops. I made peppermint ice cream with leftover candy canes, vanilla ice cream and my food processor. The santa cupcakes were decorated with red sugar, coconut, a marshmallow, and various colors of frosting. The girls helped me with those. We played pin the bow on the present for our game. Ridge was really excited about opening gifts this year. He sat on his monkey chair for each one and ripped the paper open as fast as he could. He played with each gift until we reminded him that he had another. He would rush back to his chair and do it again. The girls both bought him gifts with their allowance money. Katelyn bought him some punch balloons. There were enough for all of the kids and they had a great time. Kyleigh got him a toy story ball. We gave him a bin of potato heads and parts. He loved all of his gifts.

Happy Birthday to my cute little boy.

Visqueen Slip and Slide

One large black sheet of visqueen+
A hose+
A bottle of dish soap+
Sunny day+
Three cute kids (and their hot dad)=
A super fun afternoon!

Song-isms

When Kyleigh was four she thought that "cotton eye joe" was HOT NACHO! Today Katelyn thought that the line "as we were lying on the couch" in a Taylor Swift song said "there's a lion on the couch." I love hearing their funny things.