Uh ohhhhh...

Alice is opting to potty train, and I am not up to it! She's only 2 and 3 months, and I prefer to wait until they are closer to three years. I don't know if this will be an option for me because she won't keep a diaper on! I even dressed her in overalls and she managed to take them off all by herself.

All day, she just appears with nothing on but rain boots, demanding to sit in the "potty chair." I abuse the television when I train because it is the only way to fool the kids into sitting on the chair long enough to have success, so Mickey Mouse Clubhouse did the trick...for a little while. It wasn't very long after this that I stepped in something fishy and really wet on the kitchen floor.

Sommer suggested that I duck tape the diaper on so she can't take it off. I'm definitely not opposed to this, but Chris suggested trying a Pull-up and telling her that they were big girl pants. I tried this, and it worked! She doesn't think that she's wearing a diaper, and I even put a pair of panties on top of the pull-up (because she insisted). So far, we've managed to do our usual running around with this arrangement.

Laundry Room=Play Room

The kitty usually hangs out in the laundry room, and often times is on top of the washer and dryer. The washer and dryer is on top of a pedastal that Chris and his dad built that puts the W/D 20" taller.

Anyway, both Alice and Ruby (complete with dress up clothes) can be found on top of the W/D petting the kitty.

The laundry room is the new hangout.

Sledding...

We went sledding a couple of weeks ago and in spite of the fact that we researched out the best place to go, it was a bit of a bomb. We picked Ruby's friend, Wyatt (Sommer's son) up on the way.

We found a place that rents tubes and has groomed, individual sledding runs and a great lift back to the top. We were so excited.

When we got there, it was sold out, with a two hour line of people willing to stand in cold with their children to have a chance at the fun.

There was an area to the side where there were lots of people sledding, but obviously, there were more people like us just standing around with no sleds and no sledding passes. We tried accosting people who were heading home with their sleds, but they weren't willing to sell!

While Chris was working on a plan, I was following the kids down the unpacked snow hill, sinking hip deep in snow with every step. I actually had to roll onto my back in order to get my legs out of the snow, and then the same thing would happen again with the next attempt at stepping on the snow. The kids were having the same challenge, and I had visions of needing to be rescued by dog sleds, as I knew the kids would expect to be carried out, and I wasn't having any luck moving myself three feet!

I don't know how we all got back to the top of the hill, but we did. That is when I saw two sleds resting against a tree. I thought that since no one was buying the sleds, I might have luck borrowing the sleds so that the kids could each take one run. The sled owner was hesitant, but alas, I convinced him to loan me one sled for one run for each of the kids. Chris took them each down one time, and though they each took a snow dusting in the face the whole way down, I was at least satisfied that they officially went sledding.

Ruby and Wyatt enjoyed eating the snow like dogs, with their face to the ground. It was a fun day to see the kids in the snow and let them experience something new.

Sewing Extravaganza

Didn't take any pictures, didn't hardly stop to call my family. Sommer and I sewed from 7PM-2AM on Friday and resumed kid-free around 9AM on Saturday and we sewed until like 11PM on Saturday night. It was quite the weekend. I got so much done, and I am in love with what I made, but I can't post about it because it is a gift that I won't be giving until the end of FEBRUARY! The torture! I have to hold in my thrill until then! I am a tortured gift giver even waiting over night. I hate it. As soon as I think of a good gift idea, I want to let the cat out of the bag. In this case, my friend is expecting it, but I can't post pictures in case she reads this!

Anyway, there's nothing quite like having solid, uninterrupted time to make major headway on a time consuming project...and to have that perfect friend with whom there is a steady stream of fascinating conversation to boot!

I wish I'd taken pictures of what Sommer accomplished so I had something to post!

P.S...

Though they do somewhat match her bedding, the two tone bold walls behind Ruby were an inheritance when we bought the house. I can't wait to get a weekend to redo her room. I am currently working on a new quilt for her out of this moda fabric collection (not using the solids and a few others that I don't like)

Breakfast in bed...

Ruby mentioned that she wanted to have breakfast in bed last weekend. We just chuckled and put her down to bed. Then in the morning, she said that she had dreams about it all night. Of course we had to fulfill her simple dream, so after she helped Chris make waffles (with food coloring, of course) and eggs, she ran upstairs and got in bed so we could bring it up to her. Where does she come up with this stuff?

A quiz because it's late...

I just took this quiz. I thought it was interesting because I'm a language person, and I could think of people I knew that pronounce things different than me for each of the quesitons.

What American accent do you have? Your Result: The West Your accent is the lowest common denominator of American speech. Unless you're a SoCal surfer, no one thinks you have an accent. And really, you may not even be from the West at all, you could easily be from Florida or one of those big Southern cities like Dallas or Atlanta.
The Midland
Boston
North Central
The Inland North
Philadelphia
The South
The Northeast
What American accent do you have? Quiz Created on GoToQuiz

Old news, but newsworthy...

Chris and I are DIYs at heart. Really. We just don't have the time to get things done on our own. I think we both suffer from wanting to get a project from A-Z with no interruptions, and so we suffer project paralisys because children are obviously not going to sit around and patiently mind their own business while we get stuff done...at least not mine (and thank goodness). Anyway, here is something we tried when we had a weekend to ourselves for our anniversary...

Before

After

Our house has a lot of recessed lighting, and I loathe it because the "cans" are black! When the lights are on, it isn't very noticeable, but during the day (well, really we need light all day most of the time in the NW) when the lights are off, we have black spots all over the ceiling. Anyway, we discovered maybe six months ago that the cans are easily removed and can be sprayed to match the celing, and we did one downstairs and left it at that. We will get around to doing the rest, but so far only one downstairs and one in Alice's room have gotten the updated treatment. I wish I had a picture with out the light on for the after, but it really makes a big difference.

One up on PBK...

So I can't take credit for this, but after we bought our house, I brought over a bunch of friends to do a thorough cleaning and found out that the bottom drawers in our bathrooms double as stools! I'd never heard of or seen such a thing! We'd already committed to the house and I would have bought it just for that one fabulous convenience! I show EVERYONE when they want the tour. I was really surprised to see this in Pottery Barn Kids, because so far, no one had ever seen it either. I must have friends in high places. Hmmmm...is this not the greatest invention ever? Well, second to Safeway.com maybe. Anyway, my drawers are convertible, so the wood insert that they now stand on is resting on this lip, so you just take the insert out and you have a regular drawer!

Don't take me off of your list!

I love getting Christmas cards. For this selfish reason, I love sending them out every year as well. If you didn't get one, don't take me off your list! I just didn't get to that this year! I really wanted to, I had the cards and the stamps and I even wrote out a little letter and printed it off on boring white paper. I didn't have a picture, and I just didn't get many sent. I maybe sent like eight to the first eight people I received them from. I got a heap of cards when I was on my way to my folks' house for the holidays, and I devoured them all for every detail I could, but once away for the holiday, I just flaked and didn't get more sent. Better planning next year!