Walk in the park

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Posing on a rock


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We took the girls to Buffalo State Park today to walk on some trails. The weather was gorgeous and we wanted to get out and enjoy it. Well, me more than anyone else, I think. The girls thought it was too hot out [seriously....the things they whine about] and I was trying to make them understand that it wouldn't be too much longer before it was freezing cold out so we should enjoy the heat while we could. They didn't agree.

But they were pretty good. I mean, they are kids so you kind of have to expect some level of whining. They were really short trails too. So it's not like we were dragging them all over creation for hours. An hour tops. And there were a couple bonuses along the way. Like seeing a giant toad and stopping to buy fresh produce.

A great relaxing Sunday before another busy week. The only down side to the day was when I tried cutting my thumb off while slicing some jicama, but I didn't succeed so it wasn't all that bad I guess.

E & E

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This is Eden. She's pretty much the cutest thing on the planet. Hey, I calls 'em like I sees 'em [whale biologist]. (If you were a Futurama fan, you'd get that joke)
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This is Emma. She's pretty much the cutest thing on the planet, too. Here she is on her first day of preschool. She loves her school, her teacher, her new friends and everything else about being in school. Every day she asks me if she has school. On days that she doesn't have it, she is bummed. On days she does have it, she is asking me every 5 minutes if it's time to go yet. And I always tell her, "We will go after lunch." Then she says, "Ok, mom. I'll have lunch now and then I can go to preschool." (it's 9:00am) haha...smart way of thinking. I'm glad she likes it so much. I was a little worried she might be a terrible "mama's girl" and hold onto my leg screaming at me not to leave her. Fortunately I didn't have to deal with separation anxiety with any of my kids (at least not when it came to preschool).
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Funny story about Emma...Today we were at the grocery store. In one of the aisles, there was a sponge hanging on a clip. Emma gets all excited and says, "MOM! It's Spongebob!". Then she leans in close to the sponge and whispers, "Speak to me Spongebob". It was pretty much the funniest thing on the planet. Except for when she asked me if Lizzy had money in her fur. You know, like instead of a wallet, she just kept it stashed in her fur. In case she ran out of treats and had to go to the store to get more. Hard to use a wallet when you have no thumbs.

hey party people

Pictures from Eden's party....

J.J.

Sara

William

Andra

Eating pizza and cake (this was before the food fight and face painting with frosting)

Opening gifts



And some swimming - 4 hours-o-fun



Later, when her friends left, Eden opened her gift from Jeff & Kathy. ZhuZhu pet with a car and surf board...big hit!

success

Here are the final pictures of Eden's finished room. All the cute little details really add something. Well....she LOVES it. I am so happy. She keeps telling me over and over how much she loves it and how I shouldn't have and how I'm the best, and on and on.... haha...I could get used to hearing that! I'm so lucky to have such an appreciative little girl! And it was so much fun. I think I enjoyed putting it all together just as much as she enjoyed the surprise. Right now we are at the Holiday Inn. P-Bear is swimming with Emma. Eden is on her bed, enjoying some cold pizza and playing with some of her gifts. I am on the other bed with my laptop, enjoying some precious down time.
(look at all that grease. Blech! lol Tonight it will be just Eden, Emma and me at the hotel since P-Bear is going to stay home with Lizzy. The joys of being a dog owner I guess. But that's ok. It'll be kinda fun with just my girls (minus Hanna who is with her dad). Like a little sleepover! What a great day!!!!!!

Sneak Peak

Yesterday my middle child, Eden, turned 8. Happy birthday to my sweet beautiful girl! We didn't celebrate though. She wasn't home. She was with her dad.

So while she was away, Andreas and I did our own little "surprise by design". We totally made over her bedroom.

I've been planning and scheming all last week. Since painting her room the fabulous grape crush color she picked out, I've been picking my brain trying to decide what to do with her room. I didn't want to just randomly hang the same old crap on the walls like always. I wanted to show off those newly painted walls and give her a space she would really enjoy being in, and therefore, not always pestering us ;)

So I went to Hobby Lobby (cuz I knew I could score a lot of cool new decor for a pretty reasonable price) and scored big! Last time we went there to purchase our floor mirror, Eden saw this really cool wire bodice thinger and she really loved it. And that was the "primer" for our design.

I don't know what you'd call it, but it's very girly. Sort of vogue chic boutique meets princess.....or something. Anyway, it's totally cute!! And I'm jealous. I want to be 8 year old Eden.

And here's a sneak peak (you'll get the full effect after it's all finished and Eden sees it, which will be today).
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Some pictures that still need to be hung on the wall
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A cool chandelier wall sticker
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A wall desk, with shelves that Andreas and I made out of really simple and inexpensive materials. Also a couple home-made bulletin boards by moi and a small wire bodice which was our theme inspiration.
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I can't wait to show you the whole finished room! And I am sooooo excited to see Eden's reaction!!

Food For Thought

How amazingly and incredibly hard would it be to be a vegetarian? Especially if you lived with carnivores. Like, you had to cook them bloody dripping steak everyday. How would you cope with that? I guess it would sorta depend on the reason you became a vegetarian in the first place.

What are the reasons anyway? Don't like to think of eating something that was grazing in the fields last week? Want to eat a low saturated fat diet for health? Everyone is doing it?

I could never be a vegetarian. It would just be too awkward at family get togethers. It's hard enough to attempt to say no to someones home made key lime pie, for instance, when you are trying to really limit your sugar intake. I am afraid to offend anyone so I just eat up. Plus, when I try to explain why I'm cutting the sugar, I get the whole "oh you could stand to gain a few pounds" speech. And it makes me uncomfortable.

Besides that though, I like the taste of meat. Boca burgers are good and I love vegetables but since I know how mouth watering a nice juicy medium-rare steak can be, I don't think I could say no to it the rest of my life. That would take an insane amount of willpower. I think we are born with a pre-determined allotment of willpower. Mine must be like 95% gone by now. I need to save what's left for when I'm tempted to eat something deep fried, smoothed in chocolate and 3000 calories.

Drip

Getting a decent picture of a water droplet is a lot harder than I imagined it would be. After setting up a water bag to drip constantly into a bowl of water so that I could take about 400 or so pictures, only about 2 or 3 came even remotely close to what I was hoping for. :( Anyway, here was the winner.