I'm often told...

...that we look alike. I'm not sure I see it...

Go Team!

Last night we went to watch a baseball game. We cheered and stomped our feet and cheered some more but the team lost. No matter we enjoyed a very wonderful display of fireworks at the end :) It was a good time!

Hatching eggs...

Welcome to the jungle...

Rosie Meets Coco...

Some of you may or may not have met Rosie:



Rosie was given to us. Just like Skittles was given to us. Skittles, however, moved on to greener patures. She went to a home with no kids, with two other small dogs and the owner lives in the country on an acre of land and says, "I tend to spoil my dogs". So Skittles has it good now.

Rosie is the runt of the litter and is on the small side. And she is called a red due to her coloring. It is apparently not desirable to have this combo in a yellow lab but I think she's just lovely. She came to us at 10 mos old and had no training. Ugh. At 40+ lbs she will pummel Silliness to the ground when she jumps on her so we have to be careful. (Silliness, however, is not afraid and will purposely get close to Rosie to be able to pet her. It's a good but bad thing!)

So we've had to really put efforts in to training her. She shows promise but there are a lot of bad days. Somehow she seems to know when to have a good day just in time.

One evening Papa Chanoli was gaming online. I had put Rosie in the office with him so he could keep an eye on her so I wouldn't have to. I needed a break. Rosie had the opportunity to "meet" Coco the play horse. Coco stand about 2 1/2 feet tall and can support 120 lbs. The kids love playing with her.




Later, Papa Chanoli came out and made a statement about goofing it up. I thought Rosie pooped in the office. He showed me what he was carrying in his hand:

Yep, Rosie ate the head off the horse. So we live, we learn and then, Lord willing, we get to start a whole new day of the same thing :)

So, as Chuckles is blossoming in the creative department I thought I share a bit more of ways in which he's wowed us. For most kids this is probably normal activity. But for Chuckles he seems resistant to drawing and the arts and crafts type stuff. I haven't been able to place my finger on why he's so uninterested but I guess I'll take what he gives me when he comes up with these sorts of things!

Ok, we all know boys like their guns. Here we have a cowboy holding one. I like how undetailed the cowboy is but the gun is full of it. Oh, and it's HUGE in comparison to the cowboy :)





But wait - who's that happy cowboy over there?




Uh, oh - we've got a shoot out!




Wait! There's another joyous cowboy - where'd he come from?




That's it - May the best cowboy win!

Creative. Memories. Bam.

A couple of years ago we bought Chuckles some Legos. We knew he would love them. I mean what boy doesn't? Fast forward (or rewind?) to a year or so ago I really, seriously considered getting rid of them. They had gone unused for all that time. He clearly wasn't the type to be interested.

But much to my surprise and delight here a couple of weeks ago he decided to start using them. He just spent, like, 14 minutes in his room and *bam* he had a car! So I sent him back to make a different vehicle and *bam* he had another! I was truly impressed with his attention to detail. Most of it can't be seen in these horrific pictures:









He has since made a submarine and a dog - we are loving it! Of course, as a kid who loves to be praised he's only too willing to make more stuff :) Stay tuned for more creative memories. Bam...

Speaking of a leash...

So this lady person who feeds me treats and makes strange gestures when I tinkle or poo on the floor read in a book that I ought to learn how to use a leash. So she thought it was a good idea to have me in the kitchen with her while she did the dishes so I could learn it. Ok, so here's the thing - I'm not fond of the leash tied to the barstool business! I kinda tried to figure out a way to remove myself from the situation:




Strangely, the more I tried to flee the shorter the leash got!:




People! I think that's enough for one day:




Sincerely,
Skittles

When you're five....

....life can be a little twisty turvey. Like when you dress for church but put your underwear on backwards. There's a lot of twisting thru the day. Or when you go to Target with said underpants and then you pick up a hand held toy fan just to see how it works and it gets too close to your hair. Well, ok, it gets IN your hair and twists around six inches of it. Mom then becomes turvey as she laughs because she doesn't know what to do except ask for scissors :) Then she gets tired of holding the hand held toy fan while leading you around the store on what looks like a hair leash and makes you hold it - you might get a bit twisty turvey by the end of that ordeal! Finally waiting for the check out lady to finagle with the whole fan/leash because she doesn't want to cut such "pretty hair" but doesn't mind having a line form causes a Mama to get all twisty turvey knowing it just needs to be cut. Whew - yep. When your five life can be a little or a lot twisty turvey!

Space....

....the final frontier. Here we have Captain Chuckles and First Mate Giggles. Their space ship is circling the earth and they are loving the view from their cockpit :)






It is NOT them "helping" Papa Chanoli make raised beds for the garden. Nope - it's not.

From the mouth of babes...

Sorry no pictures - I'm on the conputer that doesn't have any.

But I have to record this: Today I'm blah. So we called in a pizza to be delivered. The Pizza Lady arrived and we all exchanged pleasantries and then we shut the door to gobble down the tender morsels.

Silliness, who's now 3 1/2, and I had this conversation:

Silly: The pizza lady sewes, mama.
Me: What do you mean she sews?
Silly: She sewed.
Me: She sewed? What do you mean?
Silly: She sewed herself.
Me: She sewed herself? (I suppose I need to rethink our conversations? I apparently just repeat all she says....)
Silly: Yup. She sewed herself right here (points to chin)
Me: She sewed her face?
Silly: Yup. She sewed her face.

I confirmed with Papa Chanoli that the Pizza Lady did have a face piercing - her lip! I love how they take what they know to describe things they don't! What's more is that Silliness hasn't been in on any real sewing activities - I wonder where she got that idea? Oh, nevermind she's just brilliant. I've known it all along ;)

Welcome....

.....Skittles!

Still here....

So, I thought you all, if there are any more left of you who read this, ought to know that we still exist! These three are the ones you wonder about - don't think I don't know that! :) Here they are a month or so ago riding bikes in the front.

I also thought it good for documentation for what our front yard used to look like. In some ways it looked better then. Green. It's been all killed now to get rid of weeds in prep for the next stage - tilling and grass seed. The plan is to seed it to make it look nice so we can take some time planting other things. That's the plan. Plans are subject to change so I look forward to seeing what really happens!

So, to sum up: we're alive but our front yard is dead.

Farewell!

A bit word-y

I usually like to attach pictures so you can see what I'm talking about when I write. But not tonite. I'm sitting on the couch watching the kids run. They are lined up in birth order clapping while they count to three or waiting for Chuckles to say, "ready, aim - go"! Silliness gets a bit confused when they turn around to face the other way. She thinks that means she needs to go to the back of the line.

Ah, now they are off to hunt for a fly. Chuckles plans to "freshaw" it. Which means to karate chop it.

The girls are wanting ice cream for dessert. He thinks dried mango is good. Oh, they've all decided both would be better.

Busted. They figured out we actually have ice cream.... I'm going to need to decide what to do about that situation.

I had high hopes for an early bed time but that would be in 10 minutes and I'm quite sure it won't happen.

Oh, now we have dancing with some air guitar. Ok, a bit of doe-see-doe with Chuckles going from girl to girl :) Silliness just called a time out.

Hm. They've left the room and now it's quiet. We all know that could be a bad sign!

Goodnite!

Giggles...

Yes, she's still here....

Lately you might have heard of her and maybe even see her in the background but I haven't taken the opportunity to write about my girl Giggles. Of course, I have no good reason except that she is the middle child and they always suffer from being overlooked - I think that is the theory. Well, there is no way to over look her! But there is a weird phenomenon as she has the fewest pictures that have been taken. I'm working on that.

But what I really want to share with you is the joy that she is! Oh, but she can melt this mama's heart. Just the other nite this girl very dutifully washed all her tea party dishes and after stacking them nicely in her play kitchen she very carefully laid her dish rag over the little pink sink. Big deal you say. This is exactly what I do! It really moved me that she picked up on that.

Ok, and I have to report on her love of dressing up! Right now it's all good unless I require that she wear bloomers. She's anti bloomers for some reason. In fact, when I tell her we are going somewhere and pick out what outfit she'll be wearing she tells me how great it will be to come home and then she won't have to wear them. This has spurred her on to wear pants more. However, she has inherited her daddy's long torso and most shirts run sorta short. Not a huge problem but when she wears the pants she MUST tuck it in. We've had long, painful discussions about how some shirts are tuck ins and some aren't... But I will ask that you picture this: Giggles in her shirt and pants with her too short shirt tucked in to her pants that she pulls up doubly extra high so that the shirt will not come out. Erkle has nothing on these pulled up pants! Oh, I love it!! Remember, the higher she pulls the pants the shorter they get at the cuff - are you picturing this?!? Oh, I love it!

And this girl is showing us that our talks and teaching of the Lord are rattling around and trying to land and take root in her sweet little mind. She often asks deep and profound questions that startle me. And make me think more than I expected I would have to with an almost 5 year old...

She tries so hard to build her vocabulary and improve her speaking! Often, she can't think of the word exactly but she tries so hard that she'll give it her best effort and say something and it ends up coming out funny because it's backwards. Take for instance a few days ago she was telling me if we were to walk to the park and hear loud noises from a truck or a motorcycle or a... a.... a mow lawner she'd just cover her ears . :) All of our kids pronounce the letter L as a W. So lollipop goes something wike wahweepop. That is until a few weeks ago when she just decided to start retraining herself to say L. So for a week or so she repeated every word with a L two or three times until she totally got it right and now it's just normal! She was so inspiring that now Chuckles has decided to change his speech and say his L's properly too!

Oh, and I hope she never changes in this regard - whether happy or sad she has to hug you. Or if you just happen to be sitting nearby she might reach out and hug you then. Or if she's excited. Or sick. Or if you compliment her. Or if you wink at her...

And please somebody help me when it comes to having a serious conversation with her only to have her look up at you so adoringly right before crossing her eyes then uncrossing to see the effect and then re-crossing because she sees the shock value - I can't help it but I love it! All three can cross their eyes and do so regularly whilst in the middle of conversations. It's the craziest when they do it back and forth to eachother!

Papa Chanoli was sick one Sunday. I asked if Giggles wanted to stay home and take care of him. I never want to forget the look she gave: There was no smile or excitement. A big hug was first and then just lots of thinking about how she was going to do her very important task. She immediately offered water since she can reach the cups and water dispenser on the fridge door and then told him she was going to "toast him some eggs". The kind daddy that he is, even though his stomach was upset, could see that this was very important to her and helped her to do it. She did a great job!

It's so fun to be able to jot down my life and times here. Recently I went back in the archives from a couple of years ago and did some reading and while I don't maintain this site well or even often it is so helpful to be able to remember things. I had forgotten the little stuff. The stuff that makes the days difficult, funny and long but somehow the years go, oh, so fast. So you may tire of reading about my activities but at this point I need to be able to write what hits me at that moment as I now know I will appreciate it later :)