Custom gift from John

Here's the deal.

The first five people to respond to this post will receive something made by me! From me, to you. Here are the rules:

1. I make no guarantees that you will like what I give!
2. What I create or give will be just for you.
3. It will be done this year (sometime, I don't know when)
4. You will have no clue what it is going to be.
5. you can count on me doing something extremely strange.
6. No blog posting necessary; pure freebie!

Homemade Gift

Here's the deal.

The first five people to respond to this post will receive something handmade by me! From me, to you. Here are the rules:

1. I make no guarantees that you will like what I give!
2. What I create or give will be just for you.
3. It will be done this year (sometime, I don't know when)
4. You will have no clue what it is going to be.
5. I reserve the right to do something extremely strange.
6. You must make the same offer on your blog, to make something for the first five people who respond!

Respond to this post after posting it on your blog (or facebook) , and anxiously await a unique handmade gift by yours truly!

Animals

We were about to read Five Little Monkeys with Nothing to Do, but got distracted with the cover art, and then, well, this.




There's a bit of background noise, some monkeys or something... Listen for it at the end: "My favorite Primary song is...I lived in heaven a long time ago it is true!"



Jeremiah made this elephant mask at school! He was so excited to be an elephant today!

Book Group!

I hosted our ward's first Relief Society book group tonight. Which means that my apartment is spotless, we have leftover banana bread, and everything is quiet--John took the kids to play at McDonald's and I'm not sure that they'll ever come back.

It also means that I know three people better than I knew them before and I met one new person in our ward. Which is really exciting, because I don't get out much. I play the organ every week during Sacrament meeting then rush over to teach Sunbeams for the rest of church, so I don't talk to anyone in our ward over four years old on Sundays, which makes meeting new people rather tricky.

Last Tuesday I went to a game night my visiting teacher hosted for me. I had mentioned feeling a bit isolated. Then Thursday I had Enrichment. And a full day on Saturday. So my Real Live People quota hours are filled through February! Yippee!

(We read The Scarlet Pimpernel this month and are reading To Kill a Mockingbird for March. For anyone that wants to follow along. :)

Seven Years Ago...

Long ago, when I was roommates with Bekah, we were cleaning our apartment for our monthly cleaning check. I remember her telling me that at her house, her mom had the younger kids clean the walls when their whole family was cleaning.

I remember thinking WHAT?! Cleaning the walls?! That's crazy.

Today, I was cleaning the walls. Isaac joined me. Those walls are filthy! All of our walls are filthy. I'm not exactly sure how that's happened. It makes sense that the walls around the kids beds, the outline of the couch, door edges and frames, light switch plates, that those all get dirty. But the actual walls...

It amazes me.

Disgusting. Now clean, but, disgusting.

Children...

I'm sure it's all them...

Crazy Kids, Parts 1-3

A few videos taken this evening. For those who miss our kids, to see the craziness in real-time.

The first two were taken by John as I was finishing up dinner, the last was the end of our FHE tonight. The beginning of the video is the end of our activity.

The first couple videos are each a couple minutes long; the third is around eight minutes. So, grab some popcorn and turn your sound up, and you're in for some quality entertainment!

The ZOO!!!!!

Okay, we love the zoo. I usually take the kids on Fridays because Jeremiah doesn't have school, which makes the day less crazy, and because the weekends are packed with families having family time and educational experiences. :) The Phoenix Zoo is only about 15 minutes away (I have to estimate--I'm not sure how far away it is without kids in the car!), and it's huge, and was voted the best zoo for children in the United States. We love it. Here are some pictures from this morning!

I tend to let the kids out of the stroller just a couple times to look at animals (I do it until they don't want to climb back in), so mostly we see the elephants, tortoises, and birds. :) Two elephants were out today--very exciting!


I did try to get a picture with three kids smiling, but this was the best I got. And then, after many tries, I got a picture to them making "scary faces".... Aaahhh! Notice Jeremiah's claws and scary eyes, and Danielle's, um, scary smile? These pictures were taken in front of the Galapagos Tortoise exhibit. As we were leaving, Isaac told me he wanted to ask the Glap-ghost Tortoise a question. "Glap-host Tortoise, do you like to eat lettuce?"





Then we went to Discovery Farm, which, if you have toddlers, is a life-size version of Fisher Price's "Discovery Farm." Very fun! A big red barn to play in, Farmer Bob, Fisher-Price animals to climb on and pet, a kid-sized tractor to stand in and drive, and a slide! All appropriate for 1 1/2 to 5 year olds! Perfect.





On our way to the petting zoo (an entire 20 yards), we needed to stop and climb on and explore the tractors.





Unfortunately, I couldn't get pictures of the kids while we were IN the petting zoo. I was a little more occupied with keeping track of three kids and what they were doing to and with the goats. Isaac enjoyed using the brush to brush one little goat who was lying down for a minute, and touched them gently. Danielle was very cautious and perhaps a tiny bit terrified. Jeremiah absolutely loved playing with the goats! He'd just walk right up to them and look at them and pat them fairly gently, he came over to one who was lying down and laid on his tummy in front of the goat and just looked at him and talked to him. He was easily the most comfortable child there. He just loves animals. This is the goat we spent the most time with today (and a corner of Danielle's pink coat--it was cold when we left--about 60 degrees).


Next up was Harmony Farm, a mini-farm with a vegetable garden, farm animals, and lots of things for kids to do! The boys loved riding "horses." Danielle wasn't so sure--I think she was a tad small for these horses.



Everywhere we walked around in the children's area, there were little things for them to do to wiggle and be more involved with learning. Here we learned about bugs. Important for decomposition and fertilization, as we were next to the vegetable gardens.






As I was attempting to get us out of the zoo (hard with so many distractions), Isaac really really really really wanted to climb this tree stump. It's really big and very fun to climb! So of course, Jeremiah wanted to climb too. (I told Danielle NO. She's still too little.)




Have I mentioned...We LOVE the Zoo?!