Today was a delightful day. We had sunshine, caribou, a train ride, a football nap, little cooking, games with kids, books with kids, some yummy cookies, and Santa.
Let's start with the Reindeer. My favorite. Apparently they tried bring the donkey, but it wouldn't come....so they brought a pig instead. (They being the farmers who raise these special animals.) Here is Santa with a sobbing Josie. She was so afraid. We even had Wrigley "hold" her.
(Side note - aka "rant" - from Aaron: Worst Santa ever... I think it's more important for the impersonator to possess Santa's "spirit" - joy, excitement, happiness, listener, etc. than it is to possess Santa's appearance... Yeah, this guy looked like Mr. Kringle, he even had a real beard... but he hardly looked at the kids, didn't look at the camera, didn't bounce the crying baby on his lap, didn't listen to my daughter share what she wanted for Christmas - she was prepared for that, however, and handed him a list - and was practically begging his "assistant" to remove the children from his presence as soon as the photo was snapped. I'd rather had a happy skinny man with a cottonball beard and a $17.95 costume from Walgreens that actually enjoyed spending those couple minutes making a memory for my children. Bah!) And here are the two not afraid children. After the pictures were taken they both started talking to Santa. I don't know exactly what was being said, but I'm pretty sure Santa was ready for them to move on before they were. My kids are talkers. Next we have the train ride. We had to wait in line for quite some time. Thank you Aaron for waiting. Here is Theo's super happy face. There are no pictures of the football nap, but be assured it was so good and long awaited for.
Here are a few pictures that I noticed on the camera. I thought they were cute. Theo is super into belts. He points out other people's belts and/or belt loops. He doesn't have one so the other night he put on Aaron's. It was too big so we pulled the extra into the back which made a tail. Could this get any better?! Oh and he is wearing his Diego pj shirt, because his mommy has three kids now and I let him wear his clean pajama shirt all day if he wants. I sometimes leave Josie in her pjs all day too. ugh more on three later. Next we have a cute mini puppet show. Josie is just at this super cute stage. Here are some fun shots. We got to spend some time with Audra and Campbell this week. One quick comment on having three. Tonight while feeding Josie dinner and trying to spell words for Wrigley I found myself struggling with doing a "good job" with either girl. While trying to help Wrigley figure out the letters, I realized I hadn't asked Josie to "say" please once. So when I started trying to engage Josie more (try to use her sign language) I couldn't keep track of where Wrigley was in her word and found myself just spelling it for her. Ugh. I wasn't able to be the best mom for either girl. Just an ok mom for both of them. That didn't feel good. And what was Theo doing during this time.....I don't have a clue. Wait, I remember he was using the black dry erase marker on a wipe-able place mat. He tried to cover all the words so Daddy couldn't see it. But I never figured out why and he tried to show Aaron, but Aaron was on the phone. (middle lost child) hmmmmm.....I think the truth is that.....God gave me to these kids. I am not enough, but God is.
I am learning that ART looks differently when done by a boy. When Wrigley was Theo's age she would paint a cute picture with watercolor paints with lots of flowers and trees and girls in dresses. Theo covers the paper with some shade of brown green made by mixing all the colors together. Then he covers the picture with scotch tape. I've stopped being miserly about the tape and now I let him tape whatever he wants. He likes to tear paper then tape it together in different designs. Then he tapes it to the frig.
Health update: Theo is fine. Josie is almost (hopefully) over a different less awful virus. Wrigley seems to still be fine. I am just now getting a headache so I will end this and not reread it.
Yep. Theo has it. Now you may be thinking....wait a minute, just a few posts again she said the kids got their shots for that. You are right. Good memory. They got their shots last Thursday and it takes about a week for the vaccine to become effective. But over the weekend Theo (all of us) were around lots of people and Theo was exposed to it before his vaccine was complete. So Tuesday night he started running a high fever and coughing. Hopefully, the girls were not exposed to it over the weekend and were just exposed yesterday to Theo. So Hoooopefully, their vaccine will be complete enough to be immune. And HOOOOOOOPefully, Aaron and I will not get it either.
To catch you up about Homecoming weekend: it was great. We saw several of our classmates from 1999 and students "of ours". We enjoyed a great Variety Show. We enjoyed two funny comedians and lots of amazing desserts and coffee. Aaron got to watch the boys basketball game and some of the girls' game too. I was sitting beside him, but am able to completely miss the game in front of me. I still like my blue blouse. It also washed nicely.
I attended the Moms Connection at WLGBC on Tuesday morning. It was interesting. All about hospitality. Good thoughts.
Wrigley found a picture of herself when she turned one. She decided to give it to the babysitter tonight. hmmm? anyway. She wanted me to help her write the year on the back, but she couldn't figure out how to use the pen she had found. I noticed that it was untwisted a bit. So I twisted it and then pushed down on the button. Oh My...not a pen or pencil but a razor blade. Sure looked like a pen.
My kids were anxious to begin eating their lunches so they suggested we all pray quietly on our own. I agreed thinking a moment of silence would be excellent. But in that silence we ALL realized that Poop on the Potty by Over the Rhine was playing. What a way to set the tone for lunch!
Driven by despair I took all three children to Kohls to look for something dressy for tonight. I have one nice warm outfit, but I've already worn it twice this fall and will need to wear it one of the two dress-up nights this weekend. So I thought I'd peek around and see if I could find something. Here's what happened: Josie fell out of the stroller, we lost Wrigley, I lost my cell phone, we left a trail of gold fish, Theo did not use his inside voice and I bought a blue blouse.
