Thumb Guards Are A Go

We have been working on life with thumb guards now for 3 days. Things are great till bedtime. then it breaks my heart to hear A plead for me to take them off. I actually caught her with her pointer finger in her mouth last night. So help me if I take away her thumb and she starts on a finger! B is ok, she found out she could take her thumb out the first night, and I think last night she sucked the thumb with the guard anyway. I don't say much since I know this is hard and we are only on day 3, but come week 2 things will get said if this continues. I am looking forward to the day I can take them off and the thumb stays out. the next challenge will be B and the guard at school. Not really looking forward to this fight. She seem to think sucking her thumb at age 6 is less embarrassing than wearing the clear thumb guard. I don't really understand that one. Come to think of it I really don't understand most of her thought processes.

Art Anyone?

My husband and I went out on a date night Saturday. our first choice babysitter is of course my sister Aunt V. the girls were so excited to see her now that she is home for break. one if the first things A did was to start some art work for her. Whenever Aunt V comes over she always leaves with plenty of new pieces of art work. this time however A took a little different approach to her work.

A: (showing her paper) Here Aunt V. Do you like it?
V: I do, but it needs a little more color. (it only had a few lines of marker on the paper)
A: You know what? I think I am finished with it.
V: What do you mean?
A: Here, you can take it home and finish it.

Yes, my daughter is now handing out half finished art work that you can finish on your own. Any takers?

Baby It's Cold Outside

My husband loves this photo. We seem to take one like it every year when it is super cold. I'm not even sure it got any warmer outside today. I was thinking of hitting the mall figuring that others would be home, but after stepping out for a few seconds, I decided -10 was not the time to Christmas shop. Plus, what do I really need to still buy? Not much, but a sale gets me every time. I spent my day with a surprise visit from out of state friends, and decorating cookies that I have been putting off for a few days. I even busted out the gingerbread house to finally have the girls decorate. I figured with only 3 days left it would be a good time to do it.

Not the best decorating job, but they taste good.

B is the official icicle maker. A's side is the one you see, not too bad for 3.

Quick Comments

At dinner tonight...

A: I'm a chicken.

Me: Great, eat your dinner.

A: I'm a chicken and laying babies out of my bottom.

M: Even better, now eat.

Away In A Manger...

I finished putting up the Nativity scene while the girls were at school. I know there was no snow in Bethlehem, but I needed a little something. B noticed it was up right away. She has a real thing for the manger display. I walked by it after the girls went to bed and noticed that there had been a small adjustment to my original set up.

You might not see it just yet so, let me get you a little closer.

There! B placed a little blanket on the baby Jesus. She is so cute :)

Teacher Gift Finished

I decided this year to make B's teacher an I Spy Jar. I found the general idea online and changed it a little to work for me. I was thinking I would do the I Spy Pillows, but when I found these plastic jars I knew this would be better.

B was so excited about it as well. We hit our local Michael's with coupons in hand to pick up needed supplies.

1. You will need an empty jar. I picked plastic in case of dropping. Any size will do, but you probably don't want it too large if for young kids.
2. Different small items to put in jar.
B and I hit the button section and found lots and lots to pick from. The best part is that many button packs are a theme so they have many different buttons in one pack. I also looked around the house and found beads, coins, paper clips...
3. Poly Pellets or Rice to fill jar.
4. Hot Glue and Ribbon for finished jar.

The jar is super easy to make. Put all items in jar after you write the list. Then fill jar with beads or rice. I filled about 3/4 of the way so the objects would move around nicely. This is geared towards a 1st grade class so I didn't want it too hard to find the items. The more you fill the jar the less room the items have to move around. This makes the SPY part harder.

I then printed a list of things to SPY and laminated it on card stock. Added the ribbon to the card, hot glued the ribbon to the inside of the lid so the tag will hang.

Hot glued the lid on, and added the final ribbon around the outside of the lid. All finished! A different, inexpensive, useful teacher's gift.

Now to make one for B. She picked all the items for her jar. I figure it will be a good thing to take on a car trip. Could keep them busy for a while.

Sticker Fun

What does one do when it is 10 degrees outside and you just found the container of stickers? Well if you are A you will do this...

And there were more but they fell off around the house. Nothing like peeling stickers off a hard wood floor :)

Jingle Bells

Today was A's first Christmas show. I am not sure if B was more excited than A or not. We had a number of people there for A. She was super excited to perform on the stage for all the Mommies and Daddies. Even B got to miss some of school to come watch the show. It was just perfect. Cute, funny, and super FAST. They sang 4 songs and then time to go. If we blinked we would miss it completely. I was all set in the first row with my camera and flip video. All was great till the middle of the first song and I noticed that my batteries were low on the video. So needless to say I was only able to get just a bit of this song since it was their second one. No gold star for me today. I'm sure this will be enough for most of you. Enjoy!

Tea Time

For those of you who do not know I am not a coffee drinker. I love the smell, but hate the taste. I never drank it to stay up in college, nor do I start my day with a cup. I tend to drink water. However a good cup of tea every now and then works well too. I do have to have my lemon tea with honey when I am sick. I find nothing works better to make me well again.

I recently came across a blog that mentioned a new holiday tea by Celestial Seasonings called Sugar Cookie something. The blogger stated that it tasted like a sugar cookie and one should buy some. Well I have been looking in many stores with no luck. I am all game for a hot liquid cookie right? The other day at Whole Foods I came across an entire display of holiday teas by Celestial Seasonings. I quickly grabbed the Sugar Cookie box and continued to look at the different varieties. My eyes fell on this one. Candy Cane Lane. Sounds yummy. I love a touch of mint in my hot chocolate and I do like other teas with mint. I guess I will try it.

I LOVE it! I have been drinking a cup each morning. In fact I have one here now as I type this. It is the perfect amount of mint. Not so much as I sip, but as it travels down my throat the mint pops up. Plus it is green tea and decaf! What more could I ask for? I even gave my mom a few tea bags to try. Perhaps this is what coffee drinkers feel when they sip their perfect cup. I don't know but I do think I will be getting a bunch before the holiday line leaves the stores.

The Sugar Cookie is not bad either. The smell is better than the taste, but still a nice cup of tea.

Catch -Up

So much is going on that I just can't seem to find the time or energy to blog. The girls have been exchanging germs constantly. Makes it a little scary with B's cold induced asthma. I am trying to keep outings down to a few so that my thumb suckers are not putting germs right into their mouth. This means I stay home more. YUCK! I did get their thumbguards by the way. Hope to start theses over break.

Winter has caught me be surprise this year. I have not done most of my pre-winter list. So now I am playing catch up. I finally got around to putting plastic on the windows. Yes, old house=plastic to keep out the wind. I hate doing this. I have been doing it for the past 8 years and even Tom noticed that I am getting really good at it. It is not that it is hard work, just a pain in the butt, plus I have to cover about 9 windows. I actually ran out of the plastic so I didn't even finish. More fun tomorrow I guess.

On the plus side I am just about finished with Christmas shopping. I have not wrapped, but I have gone through all the loot and even found things to return. Some out of town gifts have been shipped too. This is really just to prevent me from buying more stuff. Once I am finished I just stop looking at adds and thinking about it all.

As for decorating the house... not there yet. I tried to do it today but, not so much. I just kept finding other things to do (like the windows). I did move furniture around to make room for the tree. I still might tackle the mantel tonight since I am tired of looking at the fake fall leaves that are on it now.

I have also been working on teacher gifts. As soon as I finish I will post.

Funny moment:
Driving yesterday past a strip mall and A asked me if we could eat lunch at Bellybuttons. What is bellybuttons? I looked around to see that I drove past a Potbellys. Bellybuttons, Potbellys totally get it now. I laughed and told her it was Potbellys.

So Clean!

My husband over bid on a full car detailing at his last silent auction a while ago. Since no one was crazy enough to out bid him, the detail was all ours. He has been hounding me for months and months to set it up and take my car in. Well an entire weekday without my car is not easy to get. I have lots to do in a day with my car. I knew I could have his car, but that just adds dropping him off at work, bringing him lunch (he usually comes home to eat) and picking him back up.

I thought over the Thanksgiving break would work since the girls didn't have school and he did not have work. Well we all know what happens to the best plans, right? They never work!

We finally took the car in yesterday. Yes, the day it snowed 3 inches was the perfect day for me to bring my car in for a full inside and outside detailing. (Yes, I am being sarcastic here) Well the day went on and this morning I picked up my very clean car.

I was not all for the detail thing. I mean the car is just going to get all dirty again, and I'm not so sure it was all that dirty. I mean besides the occasional spill of milk in the back, or the dirty shoe prints on the seats. But holy cow! I am so loving my clean car. The carpets were even cleaned!!! I really had a hard time letting A get in the car today after school with her boots on. I'm not even sure I want them to bring food in there let alone eat in it ever again. I have to give props to my husband for giving me this special treat. Perhaps he is not so bad after all :)