A budding artist

I have loved nearly every stage our kids have gone through, though I could definitely do with less of the whining and crying over nothing. Tommy is so smiley and happy and mobile. Lexi's laugh is contagious and she's so smart and loving. Stasa is so inquisitive and eager to learn. Pre-K has really allowed her to bloom. Along with pre-K, we enrolled her in an enrichment program to focus on phonics in a smaller setting. We've been amazed with her progress in her penmanship and spelling and drawing. She comes home every day with more and more artwork, but now she almost always adds her name or writes what she's drawn. Yesterday she came bounding over with a piece of art just for daddy. In fact, daddy was the first word after her name that she learned to spell.

After posting some scanned artwork on Facebook, a colleague just recommended I try the Artkive app. You take pictures of the artwork with your phone and save it and can make a book with all of the pictures later. I can't wait to get started with it and will definitely share how it works out.

Here's some recent artwork by Stasa.

Babywearing and a quick and easy craft

I am such a huge fan of baby wearing and have used a few different baby carriers to do so. With Stasa I used my stretch jersey wrap a lot and got pretty good at getting it on and her in it. Every time I wore it in public I would get stopped and asked about it - where did I get it, how do I use it, etc. We got a couple of new carriers after I had Lexi - the Babyhawk, which is my absolute favorite carrier, and a Bjorn. The Bjorn has been so great since it's the easiest to get on and off and Tom will actually use it to wear Tommy now. The only issue I have with the Bjorn is comfort. It works well for me for a bit, but after a couple of hours wearing the baby in it my back starts to ache and I think it's because all of the weight is being carried on your shoulders.


The Babyhawk is fantastic. It's got the comfort of a wrap, but the structure of the Bjorn. AND you can carry older children in it, which has been helpful lately. The girls have been really into taking care of their baby dolls lately, both of whom are named Tommy, and like to bring their doll strollers everywhere we go. Unfortunately the strollers are sometimes just too much for us to bring so I decided to make baby mei tei carriers for them. It took me maybe an hour or so to make them and get this - they only cost about $2 a piece to make. The girls love them and they were soooooooooo easy to make. A couple of rectangles of fabric, some thin quilting batting, and a few long tubes for straps. I could have made these with fabric I already had, but I took Lexi to the fabric store and let her pick out something for her and for Stasa. Now they can wear their babies like we wear Tommy. So many baby Tommys. I might make some extras since I have additional batting and if I do I'll take pics for each of the steps to share here.

Surprise, surprise. I got crafty.

Before our drive out to Chicago, I made a list of things to keep the girls entertained in the car. I was THISCLOSE to making a quiet book for each girl, but after pinning a million and one ideas and only have a week left before our trip, I scraped that idea and came up with another one: magnetic face board.

I'm sure I'm not the first one to come up with this, but I figured it was something I could make in a couple of days and that it wouldn't cost all that much. In fact, all I needed was magnetic paper from Michael's and a cheap small dry erase board from Target. Then I just googled some funny eyes, noses, and mouths and got to work. 

I sketched each piece out with a pencil until I was happy with the shape, outlined it with colored Sharpies, then filled each piece in with crayons. Then cut each piece out.

After I finished making all of the eyes, noses, and mouths, I drew an oval on the dry erase board for the face. Then packed everything up for our trip. Stasa was excited about her new toy and enjoyed making different faces on the drive.

Solar system and other play things

Our planets look like they're out of order, but they're hung in a circle, surrounding the sun. They are a *bit* off in terms of how far away they are, but we had limited space. So from left to right, here's what we've got: Neptune, Jupiter (the sun spot is on the other side, and it's glorious), Earth (with one of the ten red moons Stasa insisted it should have), Mercury, Sun, Venus, Mars, Saturn, and Uranus. No Pluto.

I got a gift card to Michael's as part of my Christmas gift from Matt and Loula. I went to Michael's intent on buying scrapbooking supplies and walked out with the makings of a solar system instead. It took us a few days, and Stasa obviously had help on the painting front, but it was a fun project and it's now proudly displayed in the playroom.



Stasa started off painting the sun and got most of it covered before she spied the tiny styrofoam balls and the red paint. After that all bets were off. She insisted on painting like ten moons for Earth. All red. Since she was hell bent on using red, we had her work on Mars and some of Jupiter. After a couple of days, I finally convinced her to try white and yellow to paint Saturn. Then it was back to the moons.



I think I might make a little poster with velcro planets so she can learn their correct order, not that it's urgent she know that this very minute, but it would be an easy DIY project to make. And she loves the one I made for learning the shapes.

So far we've spent the majority of 2012 playing. Tom and I have become obsessed with Words with Friends and spend a lot of our down time playing it. Against each other. While in the same room. Really we should just break out the Scrabble board.

Lexi took her first steps right before the New Year and will occasionally take a few steps here and there, but only when my camera isn't around. She *will* stand on her own all of the time and walks with easy if she's holding on to something. Even if she has to hold that something up, like the baby doll stroller. I guess she just needs that safety blanket. I did manage to get a video of her taking few tiny steps and will upload that soon. She's shaping up to be just as headstrong as her big sister.


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Cat and mouse


Sink baths


Driving, already


Little Miss Attitude




Miss Blue Eyes


And the BrownGreenYellow Eyed Beauty


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Of course the dollhouse is still a bit hit. And the strangest things happen in that dollhouse. For instance, check out the feast going on here.


I love seeing how imaginative she is when she plays with the house.

Catching up

Aunt Jennifer and Uncle Josh came to visit the weekend before Thanksgiving (and Uncle Mattie, but I don't have any pics of him). Jennifer came to dance class with us on Saturday and then Josh, Jennifer, the girls, and I went to Reston Zoo on Sunday.







And then there was Thanksgiving, which included the annual turkey fry. The turkey derrick goes up:


The turkey went in:


We all hung around and "supervised":





And the turkey came out, with a new tan:


Other than that, we've just been hanging out at the house and doing some winter crafts.







Best looking snowman EVER.


Oh! And we started decorating for Christmas.