Alice in Wonderland

I just finished up with another Fremont Civic Theater musical, Alice in Wonderland. I had rehearsals 4 nights a week and one weekend/3 performances. It's a pretty sweet gig for me; a fast, intense month of rehearsals and being gone in the evening for a pretty sizeable paycheck. It might not always work out for me to do it, but I have enjoyed the jobs (The Fantasticks and Alice).

Strawberry Jam

A few weeks ago, I got into a seriously good deal on strawberries - $0.99 per pound! Since pick-your-own strawberry patches are non-existent in Colorado, I stocked up and bought 27 pounds of berries over 6 days. WHOA. I made 7 batches of jam and helped Matt make the last two for a total of 9 batches. The jam seemed to set up really well this year! Obviously we ate a bunch, and I froze several pounds to use in smoothies, too. In one of the last posts about strawberry pancakes in the family room, those strawberries were part of the 27lb haul. We ate one pound between the four of us for dinner that night - they were so, so good. It wasn't just that the price was really low, but the berries themselves were really tasty! I should have taken pictures of the finished product, but I spread it out over a few days and never had a full table of jam like we have had in years past. A batch one day, three the next, three the next, two the next... our freezer is full! It's easy and so worth it for us. We'll see how long it lasts! :)

Mother's Day 2013

 

5-12-13

I had such a nice Mother's day with my family! After church, we took the bikes down to the riverwalk for a 90-minute ride/play at the park. I rode my bike with the trailer down to the river, and Matt drove the rest of the bikes and kids. When we got home, Matt made a super yummy brunch lunch; morning mix-up, toast, freshly-made strawberry jam, and orange juice. We played outside after naps and even ate supper outside. Matt and I had hotdogs over the fire and the kids had mac and cheese. Gourmet? Not exactly, but it was just what I wanted. Matt intended to grill chicken breasts, but neither of us were that hungry, so we settled for a late hotdog and a s'more. :) Our neighbor, Kathy, came over for the fire, too. It was a beautiful day! Beautiful weather-wise, but a beautiful time with my big (Matt) and little (kids) sweeties.

Playing With Water

The day before Mother's Day, Matt was working on a new bike for me. After putting on new tires and brake pads, I took it out for a spin. I headed down to Margaret Park and was waving hello to my neighbor when the back tire popped. Popped, as in burst. My neighbor told me that she thought someone shot at me. :( Anyway, I left my new bike in the park with my neighbor promising to watch it, and walked home. Of course, a quick spring shower came overhead for the entire duration of my walk. Bummer. It stopped raining about 2 minutes after I got home. Anyway, the kids took the opportunity to lay on their bellies and play in the water, and I had to snap a few pictures.

Matt took the new bike tires to the bike shop where the owner said that he didn't put the tire on properly, which is why it blew up when I was riding it. I figured that I just shouldn't be riding a bike. Once the new tire was on, I took the bike out for another spin that night for 40 minutes and it did just great! I really like it! I'll have to post a picture soon.

New Kitchen Floor!

A few weeks ago, the owners of the house we're renting replaced the nasty kitchen carpet with tile! I am so, so excited about it - even though it's not my house. Tile is just so much easier to clean! The kitchen feels lighter and brighter, and I can wipe up spills very quickly. For instance, Charlie tipped over a vase of flowers the other day (the flowers were from Alice in Wonderland) and there was water everywhere. In 3 minutes, I had it all wiped up. If it would have happened on the carpet, we would have been walking on soggy carpet for the rest of the day! Anyway, it was a bit awkward for the 3 days it took to lay the tile, but we managed. The fridge was in the living room, our table, chairs, and the stove were all in the family room... so here's a picture of Matt and the kids eating strawberry pancakes in the family room. :)

Charlie's Sayings

"This book needs a sticker."  :) Meaning, this book needs a band-aid for the page that's ripped out.

Charlie calls granola bars, gorilla bars. Dinosaurs are dime-a-saurs. Together is still geh-day-der. (So cute!) Sunscreen is somes-cream.

He says "another one" together like it's all one word: "Want to read anotherone book?"

Singing the ABC's: "...H, I, J, K, L, over to P."

Yesterday, when I got Alanna out of the crib, I put her down and Charlie came right over to her and took her hand. (So sweet!) They had a fast, cute conversation:
C: "Hi!"
A: "Hi!"
C: "How's my girl?"
A: "Good."
Then, the walked hand in hand out of Alanna's room. Simple. Sweet. :)

Alanna also has a few new words:
back-hoe
Nana (how she says her name)
bup (bird)
up
*there's more, but I can't think of them all right now!

EFree Kids Choir

Today was the kids choir's last time singing for church this year. It's been a fun year, but I'm ready for a break. Average attendance was 24ish kids; sometimes more, sometimes less. I'm missing a few kids in this picture. It was a nice run! We had a good time together!

Canon City Blossom Festival 2013

5-4-13

Sunscreen (Charlie calls is somes-cream), sun hats, and sunglasses... we're ready for the parade!!

Charlie kept announcing when he saw that there was another marching band coming up - he was so excited to hear all of the instruments. It's actually the Canon Music and Blossom festival; there's a band competition for a few days leading up to the festival where bands from all over southeast Colorado come to compete. There were several (12?) bands in the portion of the parade that we saw, and we only stayed for 90 minutes. Only. :) The kids had so much fun! I only saw one float hand out candy, and Charlie managed to get one tootsie roll. Thankfully we went to the parade for the bands and general entertainment factor - not the candy!

We had a short fire last night since the kids took late naps. Alanna got to sit in her new pink camp chair. So cute!

Coupon Brag

5-3-13

If you don't care about couponing, and don't want to hear me brag about myself (which I'd like to think that I don't do that often), skip ahead to the next post. I fully intent to take a minute and brag about myself!!

 

Safeway

3 Ivory hand soaps: $0.99 each

2 Plum Organics baby food pouches for tots: $0.99 each

1 box Crest toothpaste: $0.99

Total: $5.94

Used 6 $0.50 coupons that doubled leaving only the tax left to pay.

Total out of pocket: $0.11 (I literally handed the checker a dime and a penny!!)

My receipt said Your Savings Total...100%! I almost framed it. :)

Next stop, City Market.

2 bags Green Giant Sweet Potato Chips: $0.99 each (regular $3.49! I had $0.50 coupons that doubled.... so free!)

1 dozen eggs: $1.99 (free with an ecoupon)

1 tub lunch meat: $2.99 (free with an ecoupon)

1 Simple Truth energy bar: $0.99 (free with an ecoupon)

1.5 lbs of green beans: $0.99/lb (total of about $1.50)

2 snack mix bags: $1 each

Total out of pocket: $3.62

SCORE.

And THAT'S why I freaking love couponing.

Goodbye, pacifier! It's been fun!

5-2-13

I decided to see how Alanna would do without her pacifier on Friday afternoon. For whatever reason, I fully anticipated an all-out meltdown. I got nothing. She jabbered for a few minutes longer than normal and then promptly fell asleep! She didn't say a word (or cry or whimper or anything) that night when she didn't get the pacifier, either. Crazy!! She still has her blankets (her blankie posse includes her pink fuzzy one with white polka dots and her elephant ribbon blanket) which obviously made the transition super easy. Wow. I'm so impressed! I kinda wish I would have taken a picture of her the night before with her pacifier in, but it's too late now! I just decided on a whim to try it, not expecting such great results. We need to take her out for an ice cream treat much like we did when Charlie got rid of his pacifier!! Charlie was done with it at 22 months after he started biting and chewing them. Alanna never chewed hers, but I just thought it might be time to try taking it away. Thanks, kids, for making that super, super easy!!

Sharing... and Candyland

5-2-13

I took this picture to document what a nice job Charlie did at sharing with Alanna. He's playing with his trucks and beans and shared one with her (unprompted). Charlie also shared some dice (also unprompted)! It's the small things!!

Same day... later on... Charlie also shared the blame with Alanna in solving the mystery of who pulled all the tissues out of the tissue box. I went to the bathroom and came out to this:

Still later on...

Charlie and I were playing Candyland and the following scenario played out. I was the red guy and Charlie was the blue. I'm sitting on the last space before going out and Charlie draws a double red. Are you kidding me?? How does that happen? It was such a dramatic ending to the game!! Good thing I've been teaching Charlie to shake hands and say "good game" after each game we play - I needed to grit my teeth and show him what a good sport I was after being dominated in the last possible play. :)

The winner!

My Little Fashionista

4-28-13

Temps in the 70's meant that I busted out some new summer clothes for Alanna! Look at how sweet she looks in her giraffe capris!!