New Bike, New Hairdos, New Projects

So this morning Sydney asked me if I would be willing to braid her hair before church. Since I had the unfortunate chance to get up at 6:30 and stay awake, I had plenty of time to braid. So we checked out the SheDoeshair blog and found a neat pattern for a crisscross braid. So she sat patiently and let me do the most complicated hair style I have ever done. Amazingly enough she kept it in all day. She also ended up sleeping in it too, so we will see how it looks in the morning. Emily also got the same hairstyle but hers came out tonight.

This weekend we also decided to get a new bike for Emily. She has definitely outgrown her other one even though she has not really mastered riding yet. On the upside, she is so in love with her new bike, it may help her get over her fears of riding. It is shiny, purple and Hannah Montana. Yeah for Hannah Montana.



This last week I started working on a organization project with a friend of mine. She is taking a class on Professional Staging. One of her assignments is to declutter a home. Mine definitely qualifies. So we started in on the worst room in the house, the office. We hauled the the stuff out on the right side of the room, sorting it into baskets, we took down my sewing desk and drafting table, and set up an ebay basket, and and trash pile, and a donate pile. The trash pile ended up filing one of our large trash cans. The donate pile was not much smaller. It was hard going through and getting rid of many things. however when I thought about having things for 8-10 years for a project, and I still had not done anything with them at all. I figured it was time to unload. Karl is not excited about the unloading part. I was concerned about our home looking overstuffed to prospective renters. I also want to have the Place for Everything and Everything in it place. Since we are not moving into a 4000sq ft home any time soon, I better figure a way to make my stuff fit in our existing one.

So far we are about a third of the way through the office. I did not get as much done without her help over the weekend. I still have some homework left to finish before she comes tomorrow! The plan is to make an l shaped desk, swap sides of the room for the two of us, and have all my craft supplies in the closet so everything on my desks at least are cleared and put away when I am not working on them. Karl is getting excited about the desk but he was disappointed when I asked him not to put 5 monitors on his part of the desk.

Memorial Day Weekend

We got to spend a day and a half with April this weekend and celebrate her birthday and have fun with the family. The girls were so excited to be there for her birthday. They each made her a card which were very cute. Caleb was happy to see everyone too. We went for walks, went to the pool, and had a picnic on the playground. Josh really enjoyed playing peak-a-boo with Matthew too. He was also such a good sport in the car. And of course, the girls howled when it was time to go home. I love that they get so happy to see family it crushes them when it is time to leave, but it also is just so hard t know what to do with the tears.

We tried to get Josh to practice crawling on the carpet while we were there, and while it worked better than on the floors at home, he wasn't too happy to be on his tummy. I think he tends to gag and have more reflux on his stomach, because while he drools a lot all the time, when he is on his tummy he actually spits up. That is about the only time he does that.

I have been taking pictures of April and Caleb in front of there house almost every time I come to visit, but this time when we tried, we discovered how much harder it is to get a toddler involved in the picture taking process. His only desire was to get rid of me, and run over to Emily & Sydney. He did not want to sit on April's lap and smile. Such a shame. We had such a nice series going. My best shots are going up on Flickr though.

We had to cut the visit a little shorter than initially planned and come home Sunday night. I was just called to be the Activities chairman at church, and I had my first big activity on Monday. I had planned to skip it, but as the weekend approached, I felt really unprepared and decided to be here to make sure it ran smoothly. I am so glad I did because there were so many things i did not think of that needed to happen. Like bringing trash bags. Nope, didn't cross my mind. Luckily it crossed Karl's mind. Also, if you cook hot dogs, bring something to use on the grill. Tablecloths are also really nice to have. I also got too much food, but everyone really seemed to have fun, so I think that overall it was a big success.

Teeth

So, unlike 4 months ago when I thought Josh was teething, (that was an epstein pearl) he is finally teething. I can see and feel them now. Poor little guy. It definitely is bothering him. He is getting both bottom teeth at once.

Funny kids

I looked at Emily crabwalking across the floor with her feet up on eight lbs weights and thought, that is just so odd.
She asked me "Is this the coolest thing?"
I said " gee Emily, it is kind of strange."
"I'm not strange!" she said.
"ok, how about oddly peculiar?" I asked.
She thought a minute and said " yup that's what I am!"
And she kept on crab walking across the floor.