Pool Party

What to do when a major snowstorm has hit town, shutting everything down including dance lessons? If you have cabin fever like we did, get out the kiddy pool and swimsuits and pretend it's summer. Tessa loved it.

Don't worry, our house is warm
We found 4 pairs of sunglasses and several hats. I think more than anything she liked playing around with them.


Charley liked getting in and out of the pool over and over


We made fruit slushies, which Tessa also loved. Tip....Schwans sells individually packaged packs of fruit to use for smoothies or slushies. I know it's extra waste and money to buy prepackaged things, but sometimes so convenient.


Once Tessa got bored pretending to swim, she piled some pillows and blankets in the pool to curl up and watch Word World. At the end of the day we got in our garden tub and I let her keep her suit on. It's the little things that make a toddler happy.



Last week Elmo grew a bean plant by putting a kidney bean in a glass and watering a paper towel every day. To pretend that it's spring, we did the same thing!

On tomorrow schedule? Root canal for Mommy....much less fun.

Snowman

Like our snowman? This is what Tessa and Jeremy did yesterday while Charley and I watched from the garage. The snow wasn't very sticky so they had some trouble and Tessa got cold after like 10 min. So he is a short and simple kinda guy.

We put him right out the front dining room window so Tessa can see him. Let me tell you, at 11pm last night when I was 'shutting down' the dark house all alone, his peering coal eyes staring in the window scared the crap out of me.

We happened to have real carrots and charcoal!


Mmmm hot chocolate. I'm starting to think this is the only reason she likes playing out in the snow.

***To answer the reader question- why do we have charcoal? Um, for the grill. We have both a gas grill and charcoal grill/smoker. ***

Men and Childbirth

Saturday morning Jeremy woke up bushy tailed at 6:15 saying that he had dreamt of a book he was going to write about natural (med free) childbirth. His first proposal was that it will empower women not to choose epidurals and risk unnecessary c-sections. Not a bad premise but not great either, given that his only training in the area of labor was our own two.

We revised his idea to instead be book written by a husband, for husband, on how to support your wife in natural birthing. That sounds a little better.

For his own protection I will not saying the two title ideas he proposed because frankly they are offensive to what is a very personal and difficult decision for women to make. I'm afraid that women everywhere would hear the title and start throwing bricks through our window.

Before Jeremy writes his book, I think he should try this experiment below. I love it that the guy only made it 3.5 hours before he begged for mercy, haha:

My Big Guy

Eating a grilled cheese and drinking cow's milk from a sippy...when did he get all grown up? He's doing much better with the sippy nowadays and seems to prefer a soft straw cup. He still doesn't drink much, but does some.

He's not really into being spoonfed at all unless it's something really tasty like blueberry yogurt. So yesterday I just whipped up TWO grilled cheeses for lunch. It felt so strange to be feeding the kids the same thing. When did this happen?

Tea Party

I was making tea today because I had a scratchy throat and Tessa was very interested. I told her that after nap she could have some special tea, and that's the first thing she wanted to do upon waking.

I was lucky to have passion tea onhand which is not only caffeine free but PINK
Sid was talking today about how things change, so we watched the water turn from water into pink tea when it gets hot. I'm not sure if she 'got it' or not.

She finally drank it after it got cool, in MY old strawberry shortcake mug from the 80s

Up For a Vote

Today Tessa and I played hair salon and decided to involve Charley. I've never really brushed his hair cause it has a mind of it's own, but I guess he's get old enough now for a 'do.

Classic Charley??
Or faux-hawk Charley??

Tessa decided to improve on his look my adding a blue hair band

Tessa's Medley

Tessa's Medley from Laura Sargent Bennington on Vimeo.

A mix of a couple Disney songs, Twinkle Twinkle, a church song and a sprinkling of ABC's....all topped off with her version of the Pledge of Allegiance.

Groundhog's Day

And look what we made, Groundhog's Masks! Well technically it could be a bear or cat or any assortment of rodent. We talked about weather and that the groundhog said it is still COLD outside.I was babysitting Tessa's little friend Rachel this morning and meant to get a pic of both of them together in their masks, but wasn't swift enough.

Charley's Birthday Party

We had a great time yesterday celebrating our little guy. Given our artic temperatures and the blizzard that occured last year when he was born...we went with an Arctic theme. There were penguins, snowmen and personalized paper snowflakes made by Becky.

Not do be outdone, Jeremy made a baked Alaska in the shape of an igloo for us all to eat, while Charley had his own little penguin cake thanks to Erin. I ate neither although I did like my fair share of icing while cleaning up.

Charley got several trucks and cool boy toys, which we don't really have any of yet. Our house still looks like it exploded, but that's the sign of a successful party I think.

Thanks to all, enjoy some pics!

Mommy's Favorite Weapon....er, Kitchen Tool

Yes this is a giant pair of super sharp scissors with a scoop on one side, made by the geniuses at Pampered Chef. What would a person use such a tool for?

allow me to demonstrate

leftover spaghetti


scoop and chop, scoop and chop


ta-da, spaghetti perfectly sized for a baby spoon!

I also highly recommend it for making homemade salsa!