Notes on Everyday Stuff

Lil Jo (for those of you who are into Veggie Tales - I do call her that because I love that particular episode) has started saying a lot more lately. She has also taken an interest in repeating words we say to her so her vocabulary is increasing daily. I forgot how fun it is to hear new little words! Her most frequently used word is, of course, no. But she also really likes juice so she asks for it A LOT. I had to cut her off of it entirely for a few days after Daddy let her have *gasp* TWO cups of juice a day while the girls and I were away in KS. She also uses 'peez' regularly and does not understand why she doesn't get everything she asks for when she uses that word!

Lil Jo loves, LOVES fruit snacks. She gets more excited for a packet of fruit snacks than any other food (even chocolate, chips, or juice! - yes, she likes junk food way more than I like). Today she pulled me into the kitchen (if a person does not come when she points and says 'peez' she will tug at his/her clothing until he/she complies with the request/demand) and over to the cabinet where she pointed and said 'peez, peez' until the snacks were procured. I gave in to her demands today (usually fruit snacks are only for after nap) because she's a bit congested and has some eye goo so I thought so extra vitamin C might be a good thing.
Her sisters were not allowed to have fruit snacks until they were almost three because I thought they were a choking hazard. I still think most varieties are unacceptable for under 3's, but I had to find a compromise after Daddy gave Jo tiny pinches of his "Smiles" (GV brand snacks) which caused her to go around begging for more tastes. Her sisters, usually not so fond of sharing, love to give her food items that have been forbidden to her by Mom. Luckily, I found Welch's fruit snacks that are VERY soft and small (and relatively cheap) especially compared to the firm, throat sized 'Smiles'.

A and B have taken interest in reading lessons again so we are giving that another go. They have also become obsessed with 'Super Why' and 'Word World' so they are hopefully learning a bit from those shows. Our break from Spongebob has been going well, and we really haven't been missing him all that much. Every once in awhile the girls will still try to convince me that they are ready to not say naughty words like Spongebob....but I remind them that it's not just the naughty words but also the tears and tantrums when Spongebob time was over that necessitated the break.

I'm eagerly awaiting the end of summer which in this hot climate means highs under 90. Then we can start playing outside again!

I'm sure there are more things I wanted to record, but I had a visitor (yay! -three in one week) and lost my train of thought.

I'm off to go cook up a pot o' beans - yum (and cheap!)

Goals

I've been feeling a bit...blah the last couple of months. Probably a combination of a hotter-than-usual Texas summer and the useless feeling that came from weaning Baby Jo. Anyway, I have come up with some goals I'd like to accomplish over then next few/several months.

1)Find a piano - start teaching the girls or at least brush up on my sorta-skills
2)Find/buy a sewing machine - attempt to make clothes or something else useful
3)Find a productive hobby - something that produces something useful or at least pretty.
4)Start to learn Spanish - the Latin American kind. I also want my kids to learn - but I don't want them to do it without me (can't have them talking behind my back right in front of me!)
5)Find inexpensive ways to improve our house.
6)Set a consistent schedule that allows for quiet times, exercise, quality time with each family member (this might be the hardest on the list!)
7)Become reaquainted with my Horn and look into local groups that might need an extra.

So these are just things I would like to do but don't want to forget about during the busy-ness of every day stuff.

If any of you, my few, but faithful readers, have any pianos or sewing machines or great hobby ideas or expensive language learning programs (Rosetta stone!) you'd like to share - I'd be grateful!

A month off...

I haven't posted in forever because I took a month off from Internet 'distractions.' It was a good month and my brain stopped thinking in facebook statuses. I also stopped writing blogs in my head so it may take me a bit to remember some of the stuff we did this summer!

The biggest development of the summer has been in my girls' ability to swim. They took swimming lessons at the 'Y' and did well. I did have my doubts about whether or not they did as well as the instructor said in the completion certificate. We practiced at several friends pools - but they were small enough that the girls could easily reach the sides or bounce off the bottom to catch their breath. There wasn't a lot of opportunity for the to actually swim. But last week we went to a birthday party at a big, deep pool. There friend (the birthday girl) was an awesome swimmer(probably because she has a big, deep pool in her backyard!) and she seemed to inspire the girls to swim so they could keep up with her. I was prepared to jump in at any moment to rescue them should they flounder...but they did great! I'm so excited that they love to swim. It's one of my favorite things and I love that we can all love swimming together. Now I need to get Baby Jo swimming so I can swim with them!

I hope that they will dive (ha) into reading like they did into swimming.

Baby (or Toddler now, I guess :() Jo is starting to test her limits and her Mama. She loves to climb up on the table or the computer desk. She pushes buttons on the computer screen and dump her sisters' cups all over the table. She also really enjoys eating crayons and chalk so I have to be constantly monitoring where the girls put their art supplies.

That's what I have for now!

The girls, however, did not take a month off from internet distractions - they found a teletubbies game and were very excited to show it to Lil Sis.