Tuesday Tidbits*

• I just got the call from the preschool, Gwen has been accepted! I have just finished the paperwork for the financial aide forms!
• Federal tax returns come back very quickly, we have already sent in all tax forms and received our refund! The state of MD is the same, still waiting on NC...(a sigh of relief was probably just heard in several households that know our current living situation!)
• The weekend was lovely hear, 60s, a lot of time was spent outside and our kids were exhausted
• We had our last music "class" Monday, we are all sad because our neighbors who were hosting the class are moving to a new neighborhood and they will be sorely missed!
• Our washer is making a terrible noise and I'd like to take it apart and try to fix it, but am nervous about that since my alone time is so limited with the 2 little ones at home
• I have begun spending most evenings away from home, at the gym and Mom's group activities, I have lost 5lbs so far, but will not be able to continue track the weight loss since Nate broke the scale, this time beyond repair I am afraid to say.
• The bulbs that I planted after we moved in are starting to come up, seems spring is on its way here.
• I have moved Gwen's clothes off the hangers into a dresser in their room that I had been using for clothes that were still too big, Gwen for a while has been taking them out and putting them on, so now we go out in public with a child dressed in the most unusual outfits, which is a trial for me, but hopefully the ability to chose for herself will allow her to feel some more independence. I just hope I can last through this mismatch stage...
• I am quite addicted to the exclamation mark, I think I use it too much, but I feel when I am typing things out it is far preferable to use the exclamation point to the caps.

*Idea taken from Two Princesses and a Pirate...thanks Beth!

Valentine's Day

I intended to come on here and post about the cookies and the decorating on Valentine's day, but well, I was a little distratcted, so I am putting it out here today. We had been cooped up in the house for a while and it made me in the mood to bake. I thought why not invite over my new friend over and have the girls decorate cookies. So Wed Gwen and I made cookies the cookies, she actually helped me make and cut out the cookies. Then Fri my friend came over with her daughter and the girls decorated cookies. Her daughter is about 2.5 but the girls play well together and get along, so we like getting them together. I did NOT let Nate decorate the cookies, I learned from Christmas, he's not much interested in the whole decorating, he's all about the eating!

So as you can see from the slide show, Gwen just got down to business and started decorating (my Dad would be so proud well except for the amount of sprinkles!), it was going a little slow so I put a little icing on just a couple of Gwen's but really all in all the girls had fun. I orignially gave Nate a undecorated cookie, but he is too smart and demanded some icing and as you saw from the picture he was pleased to have icing on there even if it did make him look like he had lipstick on!
Eric seemed to enjoy the cookies, it didn't make very many, I wasn't pleased with how hard the cookies got, but apparently no one minded that but me! Hope everyone had a great V'day, we did!

Random

I have not had much opportunity to write on here. I have been super busy, well, maybe not super busy, but it seems to me that I have a lot of things pulling at me during my "free time", I have been working on Eric's quilt, and going to the gym. Lately though my thoughts are on the tragedy in Hsv and reading everything that is written about it. I used to work on the same floor as one of the professors that was killed and spoke to her many times. Several of my good friends worked with her. She was a super hard worker and gave me a plant that sadly didn't make it through our many moves. Randomly early this year I was speaking with our neighbor and we talked about the same plant and how I wanted to get more of it. It is surreal to know someone who was killed in such a manner and well, Maria was such a sweet person, very driven and sometimes difficult to work for, but she always wanted the people she worked with to be the best they could and that can often cause challenges when you in that situation.
On to happier things, I think. My Mother always says that one thing about my kids, they are never lacking in imagination. I don't let Gwen watch a lot of TV-Sesame Street while Nate is napping, but Eric likes to let her watch movies occasionally, so she has now seen many Disney movies. When people used to ask her name she would tell them "Belle" all the time, but she'd say "it is ok if we still want to call her Gwen", that kid! She has recently moved onto Briar Rose and Ariel. Although come to think of it, she doesn't call herself Ariel, she calls herself the mermaid and she goes to the sunken ship (in our bedroom by the closet, where she brings "treasures"). What is funny about it is when she is Ariel she puts both of her legs on the one side of the pants and hops or crawls around the house. She will do this all day! I had some pictures of it on the old computer, but I lost them :( I have some I recently took, but I don't like them, actually, I do like them, but I feel they are showing too much skin for the internets...so for now you will just have to live with the image in your head.
Nate is still quite the character, his words are very clear. He is speaking 2-3 word phrases, maybe even sentences. He is quite smart I think. I find myself qualifying his intelligence when we are in public. I don't want people to feel bad because Nate is so smart. I don't know if that makes people feel better when I say things like "he has an older sister and that makes a difference". I don't know that it does though, certainly he wants to keep up with Gwen and they spend an awful lot of time together so she teaches him a lot of words. He is also quite humorous right now because his favorite animal is "a duck". So hilarious, anytime we sing a song about animals and ask him what animal he'll ALWAYS without fail say "a duck!" This has been going on for at least a month. Have I metioned yet he can sing his ABCs and count to 10?
We are definitely at fun stage with both kids. I have started to let Nate walk more and hold hands, previously he would lean real far forward when you tried to hold his hand and then try to get out of your grip. Recently he has started to calm down and hold my hand and then also hold hands with Gwen, I so wish I could get a picture of the 3 of us walking around holding hands I feel like it is so cute and it warms my heart! Although sometimes just to be funny when Gwen and I are holding his hand he'll go down on his knees and then we will all laugh. Stay tuned for pictures from V'day cookie decorating, hopefully I will get to that soon!
Oh and if you were paying attention to one of the last slideshows with the snow, it may have looked like Nate was going to be run over by the Jeep, he was not in fact run over by the Jeep or was the Jeep even on, just a product of the "fade", I sadly don't watch the slideshows after I make them!

An overdue update

Hello, how's it been going? You good, I'm great, thanks for asking. Things have been rather different around here. I haven't had my laptop for a week or so, the back hinge broke, fortunately we have the accidental warranty on it, so I got the email today, they decided to replace it instead of fix it! WOHOO! The process of getting the actual computer was quite INVOLVED! I am telling you, it took 2 hours, should it have taken that long? I think not. But the kids behaved remarkably well, as did Eric! It ended up being an upgrade and we had to pay some money, and we repurchased the extended warranty, but it was way less than buying me a new laptop even when we included the warranty! YAY! I think that laptop was about to die anyway, and well, now I hopefully won't have to worry about that for a while! I have also been going to the gym with my new friend. Man am I glad I met her, the gym membership is also probably the best money we ever spent. It is so great for me to get out of the house in the evening meet with my friend (most nights) and get some exercise. I get some much needed girl time and I am so energized and happier. We are going to try a Zumba class which I suspect is going to be hilarious, us 2 old farts and a bunch of college girls is what I am picturing! I think we are going to be in the back giggling, but we'll see!
So, thought you would like to see what else has been going on around here. A major case of the cabin fever. We haven't seen much of people you know people we could talk to, or really been spending much time outside in the elements, it has been rainy and today I was hopeful until I stepped outside and felt the frigid air. UGH! I am hoping for better days to come, I've heard the spring is lovely. Of course if I was in MD I would be under 3+ ft of snow. But I don't think that would be that bad for us, with the Jeep and the walking distance to grocery store we probably would have been able to get out and at least we could have played in the snow.
I digressed and didn't get to the actual pictures, so I'll try again. While I was getting ready to take the kids to the grocery store this is what I found:

Yes, that is my son using the chair as a slide. Would you say he is really into sliding right now? We went to the play area at the mall the other day and he was going down that slide like a pro...it is rather step and he has been avoiding it for a little while, and yesterday he went in, slid, ran back around and would go again, this was at least 5 minutes, maybe more, and if you know 20mon olds, this is a long time! One of the other Mothers even commented to me about how he seemed to be enjoying himself and how her 17month old wouldn't go near it.

Gwen and Nate have been playing really well together, Nate appears to be getting used to the fact that Gwen wants hugs and today when he got up from his nap he let her give him a hug. This is a big step for us, Nate doesn't really like Gwen to touch him. I think she has been rather pushy and pully with him, he's not fond of that at all.

Can I tell you now nice this new computer is, dude all the keys work! (some of them would require more work to get them to type)

Well, going to bed now, more later.