Formal Attire

There is nothing classier than wearing long white gloves. In the absence of gloves, one sometimes must rely on socks instead. And when you're all gussied up, there is nothing classier than making fish faces.

Edible Frozen Water

Between yesterday evening and today, we received four inches of snow. Analeigh once again found that she enjoys eating snow. David learned that icicles can also be delicious.



When Ben returned home from work, Liz brought the kids inside as well. Apparently neither had gotten their fill, as they both clamored to eat any and all snow that had been tracked in. Their obsession to eat frozen water is apparently an addiction they can't do without.

Adventures with Mr. Vacuum

Whenever Liz does the vacuuming, David and Analeigh climb out of reach of the terrifying monster. Sometimes they shriek loudly, not in fear, but rather as if singing in chorus with the vacuum. The following photos don't show them shrieking, just cowering.



But, when the vacuum is turned off, they both love playing with the vacuum. They race to be the first to help Liz wrap up the cord - which actually slows down the process considerably. We can't really explain the whole love-fear relationship, but it is certainly interesting to watch!

Baby Wipes

A while ago, we mentioned making our own laundry detergent. Less than a few weeks later, some friends from our college days talked about making their own baby wipes. In fact, they provide step-by-step instructions for making the wipes (it is a private blog, so you would need to get an invitation to get all the details - or just ask us, and we'll tell you how to do it). In spite of being told about it in October, we didn't try making them until a week ago.

Anyway, using a roll of Bounty paper towel (cut in half), baby wash, baby oil, water, and storage containers, we ended up with two of these:



The wipes actually work surprisingly well. So we'd like to thank Scott and Marsha (mostly Marsha) and their private blog, for enlightening us.

Uses for Ribbon

Liz has a large stash of ribbon. When she buys more, she tells Ben all the many uses she has for it and yet, the stash continues to grow. Well, she has proven herself resourceful with the help of some thread, hot glue, and hair clips. These new hair bows are for Analeigh:

Catch Me If You Can

From time to time, David and Analeigh enjoy chasing one another - today was no exception. Sadly, we don't have a video to show you, but you can try to imagine the scene with the following pictures.

First, David would begin chasing Analeigh from the couch in the living room to their bedroom door.



Then David would take off, enticing Analeigh to chase him in turn.



Analeigh would realize she'd been left behind and chase after her brother.



Then they would crash on to the couch in a fit of laughter.



Then the scene would repeat itself again and again.

Pancakes!

For Christmas, David received the book, The New Adventures of Curious George. He loves it. That is to say, he loves one particular story within the book: Curious George Makes Pancakes. We've possibly read it every night for the past three weeks (maybe more). He also likes the story, Curious George Goes to a Chocolate Factory, but that is a bit off today's topic. However, we don't often make pancakes, so we're not really sure why he thinks so highly of them.

Our plan was to make pancakes for breakfast. Alas, the kids woke up way too early, at which point cooking was the last thing on our minds. So, we made pancakes for lunch instead.

In the story, George helps by adding blueberries to the pancakes. We do not stock blueberries, but we do keep chocolate chips on hand. So David was still able to emulate George's example.



Of course, Liz helped flip the pancakes, because to have David emulate George in that aspect would have been irresponsible. However, when they were done, David proudly held a plate full of pancakes, which he shared with his family.



After this experience, we'll probably be reading the pancake story again tonight!

Balancing Act

As any faithful follower of this blog knows, David loves his trucks. We will often find that he has lined them up side-by-side in our living room. Today he organized them in a way we did not expect - vertically.

Demolition

One of our favorite shows to watch as a family is Extreme Makeover: Home Edition. David's favorite part is the demolition, as he gets to see excavators tear down the houses. YouTube has a number of examples, if you want to know what we're referring to.

Since David does not have an excavator, he uses his front loader. Since he does not have a play house, he uses a play barn. Luckily, he doesn't really demolish it, he just pushes it over. Then he does it again, and again, and again. However, we're only going to show you him doing it once. Enjoy.

Bowling

Ben had the day off today for the holiday, so we decided to go bowling. We have a place just down the street called Walnut Bowl (however, the B is missing from the sign, so it looks like Walnut Owl). Before leaving the house, we watched a few videos on YouTube to help David get an idea of what we were going there to do. We arrived as soon as they opened so that there would be very few witnesses to our lack of skills.

Analeigh wanted to pick out her own ball, but had to settle for sharing a light-weight ball with her brother.



Fortunately for Analeigh, she had the assistance of a ramp to help her bowl. At first she had to have her mom hold her, because she didn't really want to bowl.



Later, she happily joined in pushing the ball on her own and waving goodbye to it.



Here she is, knocking down one whole pin.



David also enjoyed getting into the act. For most of the time, he refused to use the ramp, insisting on pushing the ball using only is own strength. This resulted in long waiting times as the ball rolled slowly toward the pins (allowing David to sit back and admire his handiwork).



When the inevitable happened and the ball got stuck in the middle of the pins, the ramp was forced upon him, which he ended up liking after all because the ball went faster.



Anyway, here is a video of one of David's agonizingly slow rolls. He actually did pretty well for himself using this method.



Ben and Liz also had fun (even though Liz readily admits she isn't any good).



Ben and Liz both started slow and were humbled by their children taking early leads. The order of the players on the screen is Ben, Liz, David, then Analeigh.



A few strikes later, Ben was able to pull ahead (though he continued to have a handful of letdown sets, which has always hampered his professional career). Alas, David and Analeigh did quite well for their first time and enjoyed themselves immensely. Liz, while still admitting she is not that good, was still pleased to see the kids enjoy themselves.

Rediscovering an Old Friend

Long ago, we told you about our adventures in replacing David's old bunny, which he loved so much as a toddler. Lately, our old bunny friend has been sitting around not being played with all that much - until today!

Analeigh discovered him anew and happily danced with him as he sang for her when she pushed his stomach in. Sometimes she would set him down to sing while she danced to his songs, but regardless, she was enthralled with him for all of 20 minutes. We're sure that the bunny loved those 20 minutes and is looking forward to more time in the future.

Alphabet Power

Using nothing more than clipart, plastic sleeve protectors, and photo paper, Liz has created a new way to teach the alphabet to David (and eventually Analeigh... and any other children that creep into our lives sometime in the distant future).

David knows most all of the items pictured on the sheets, now we're just trying to get him to figure out that a letter is associated with each word. Currently, after we've told him "Apple starts with the letter A," he will repeat back, "A starts with Apple." Obviously this remains a work in progress.

Getting Warmer...

The weather has warmed up a bit since last week's frigid temperatures. Well, at least warm enough for David and Analeigh to get some outside time, rather than be cooped up inside the house. It was good for everyone involved.

Cold Much?

With sub-zero temperatures gripping much of the nation, it shouldn't be too surprising that our poorly insulated windows produced the following icicles. It would seem that our plastic sheeting to assist with the insulation isn't doing much good. We're looking forward to slightly warmer weather next week.

Taking a Walk in Another Person's Shoes

While David was sitting on the potty today, Analeigh ran off with his shoes. In her defense, David's shoes have a pretty cool flashing lights feature. Anyway, she walked around the house in them for a little while before her smaller feet slipped out on their own.

"I Got Shot and it Hurt"

David had his blood drawn at the WIC office this morning to test his iron levels (they're fine by the way). When Ben came home from work, David proudly announced, "I got shot and it hurt." Nevertheless, David was quite proud to show off his band-aid. David is handling needles fairly well right now - we just hope this mindset keeps up before he gets all his shots for going to school in a couple of years.

All Grown Up

David is out of Nursery class now and into Sunbeams. David still wanted to go to Nursery, since that is where all the toys are at, but he handles himself well, staying in Sunbeams, without so much as a tear.

Here he is in front of his classroom door, showing off the picture he colored about being a child of God.