My Little Author

On Sunday night Tralee told me she wanted to write a book for our library.  She found the paper, drew the pictures, handed me the pen, and told me what I should write for her.  She titled her book, Girls Around the World are Great.  Tralee informed me she decided to write about girls because she is a girl, and so she knows all about them.  The little stinker already knows one of the most important rules of writing:  write what you know.

After we "pinned" (stapled) her book together it DID NOT leave Tralee's side.  She slept with it next to her.  She walked into our room in the middle of the night, book in hand, and asked me, "is it time to go to the library?"  When I told her it was still time to sleep, she crawled into bed next to me, and kept her book safe under her arm.

The sun rose, and Tralee rose right along with it.  Every few minutes she asked again, "is it time to go to the library?"  And every few minutes Tralee walked away disappointed that it still wasn't time to take her book in.  It got to the point where Tralee found her pink Hello Kitty watch (something she NEVER wears), brought it over to me, asked me to put it on her, and point out when it's time to go to the library.  I showed her where the hands need to be pointing, and right at 10:00am Tralee sprinted up the stairs to find me.  As soon as she found me putting on my make-up, she shoved her watch in my face and announced, "Mom!  It's 10!  It's 10!  It's 10!  It's time to go to the library!"

All the way to our library I prayed that a nice librarian would help us.  I hoped she/he would understand the excitement that had been festering in Tralee's little body for the past 12+ hours.  I hoped the librarian would humor my little girl, and tell her how special she was for writing a book for the library.

When we arrived, we waited in line as Tralee's proud little smile stretched from ear to ear.  Her hands clutched her special book tightly.  Her eyes twinkled underneath the pink princess sunglasses she chose to wear for this "fancy" event.  When the librarian said, "I can help whoever is next."  I thought, "well, here we go!"

I watched Tralee march up to the librarian behind the desk -- so self assured -- and place Girls Around the World are Great on the counter that was just a few inches shorter than herself.  I listened to Tralee tell the librarian that she wanted to give her book to the library so everyone can read it.  I held my breath and waited for the librarian's response.  Would she scratch her head and wonder how to respond or would she sense how excited the five-year-old standing in front of her was about the experience?

To Tralee's delight (and mine) the librarian made a nice little fuss over Tralee's book.  She asked if she could be the very first person to read it.  She pointed to a specific page and told Tralee that was her favorite part.  You could feel Tralee's happy energy bursting out of her little body.  The librarian then thanked Tralee for bringing in the book, and assured her it would be well read.  I sighed a sigh of relief, and thanked the librarian several times for making my daughter's day.

We then continued on our way, and checked out some new material -- none of which, I'm sure, was writen by a cuter author than my Tralee.

If you're interested, here's a video of Tralee reading her book.  I took pictures of all the pages before we took it into the library, because I didn't want to forget it.

Sail Boat Races

We had really warm weather the beginning of this week.  On one of the nicer days the kids and I made a little tin-foil sail boat regatta station.  We found the idea in Family Fun magazine.  The sail boats were made from jar lids.  A piece of clay was placed in the middle of the lids so the toothpicks dressed with paper sails could be pushed in.

After our boats were ready to sail, we took out the tinfoil and made a little race track for them to sail on.  Family Fun didn't use cardboard on the bottom of their track, but they did recommend using the heavy duty tin foil.  Ours was a little flimsy, so we used cardboard to make the foundation a little stronger.  We also placed rocks on the foil, otherwise the wind did a number to our stream!

Once everything was set in place, we turned the hose on to just a bit stronger than barely-on and let the regatta begin!  The end of the stream dripped into a thirstier patch of our lawn, which made the grass blades quite happy I think!

At the races

Hunty and his boat

Tralee with just the sail of her boat.  The kids kept pulling out their sails and repositioning them throughout the regatta.

Hunter's sail boat floating down the tin-foil  channel.

Our home-made regatta was a fun little activity to keep the kiddos occupied for a bit.

Conversation with Stinks

"Mom, why does it rain?"

"Well, water evaporates into the sky from all the lakes, rivers, ponds, oceans, and other places with water.  The water that evaporates gathers and becomes clouds.  When the clouds can't hold any more water, it starts to rain."

"Oh. . . so the sky is peeing."

(Laughing) "I never thought of it that way.  I guess so." 

Guppy Bears and Cocodots

I love some of my kids' words for things.  Here are just a handful of words my kids say that make me smile without fail:

Back in the day Tralee used to say, "don't make sad, make happy" instead of don't be sad.  We made a whole song about it.  Jim and I sing it every time the kids act grumpy.  It has it's own melody that doesn't sound like anything familiar, so you'll just have to pretend you know it, but here are the lyrics:

Don't make sad make happy

That's what we're gonna do

Don't make sad make happy

Others will love you.

Both chiddlers (can you tell we've been reading The BFG?) say pupcake instead of cupcake.  This morning Tralee informed me that she ate the last pupcake. . . it was a healthy muffin by the way, but it was in the shape of the ever-enticing pupcake, so she ate it!  Hooray! 

While in Hawaii (ah. . . remember Hawaii?  When can we go back?) Hunter called coconuts cocodots.  Imagine, if you will, a coconut who married a polkadot.  They would have little baby cocodots.

For as long as I can remember Tralee has called airplanes hairpains.  Hunter copies his big sister, so they both point to the sky and exclaim, "Look at the hairpain!"  It makes me smile.

Lastly, today I took Hunty on a date while Tralee was at dance.  On our date I let him pick out a treat.  He picked guppy bears.  Never heard of a guppy bear before?  They look A LOT like gummy bears, just so ya know.

That's all for now.  I'm sure there are more cute things my kids do that you're just dying to hear about, but you'll have to wait until I can think of them.

Until then, make happy while sipping on a glass of cocodot milk paired with a pupcake decorated with guppy bears.  If you should happen to see a hairpain fly by, hopefully we'll be on it on our way back to Hawaii!

Dreams

I had a horrid dream last night.  In the dream I kept forgetting about my Tralee.  She was a toddler again, and first I forgot to put her in her car seat.  Then I left Tralee in the car while I went into a store with Jim.  Once Jim and I were in the store for at least thirty minutes I turned to him and asked, "Where is Tralee?"  The worst part of the dream was I just kept shopping after I was told Tralee was left in the car alone.  I think Real-Leslie began to think for Dream-Leslie because the longer the dream lasted the more panicked Dream-Leslie became that Tralee was all alone.  I awoke from my dream whilst Dream-Leslie was running in the parking lot to get back to her daughter.  When my eyes opened at sometime-in-the-middle-of-the-night-o-clock, I began analyzing my dream.  My conclusion was I dreamt about forgetting Tralee, because I haven't been spending as much quality time with her as I should.  She's growing up and maturing so fast, and sometimes I get so busy trying to make it through the everyday, that I forget to share a special moment or two with my Stinks.  Guilt stricken, I jumped out of bed and rushed to my sleeping beauty's side.

I actually ended up crawling under Tralee's polka-dot covers with her.  I nuzzled up so close I could hear her breathe, and fell asleep with my arm cloaking her slumbering body.  My conscience must have been at ease after this, because my next dream was very Downton Abbey-ish.  It was quite fun actually.  I was trying to get a chubby aristocrat to fall in love with me.  There were fancy dresses, large houses, boating adventures, and delish food involved in that dream, but it was cut short when a little non-fictional finger woke me up with a poke on my cheek.  I opened my eyes and saw Tralee staring into my own.

"Why are you here?" Tralee asked me.

"Because I missed you at night, and wanted to spend some time with you."

"But don't you miss Hunty?"

Many mornings Tralee wanders into our bedroom and finds Hunter under the covers snuggling me.  We like to put our children in their respective beds at night, but many an early morning, Hunter crawls into ours for his final few hours of slumber.  Tralee used to do it too, but has sense grown out of it.  Hunter usually wanders in around 5am-ish.  Tralee wakes up and walks in around 6 or 7, and always finds Hunter snuggling me.  She usually just goes around to Jim's side of the bed, or if he's out of town, she crawls in on whatever side Hunter's not for a few minutes before we all get up to start our day.  When she asked me, "Don't you miss Hunty?"  It occurred to me that she probably thinks I rely on Hunter for my morning snuggles, and not her.

My answer to her was, "No.  I missed you."  A big smile stretched across Tralee's face, and her little body wiggled closer to me, grabbed my arm, and wrapped it back around her.  Her next question was, "Mom, is Pooh Bear allergic to anything?"

"I don't think so.  Why?"

"Because in my dream he was allergic to butterflies.  I ran around and tried to catch the butterflies so I could make Pooh Bear sneeze."

I smiled.  Oh the dreams of a five-year-old!  So sweet!  So innocent!  It re-affirmed my middle-of-the-night-post-dream-musings.  I need to spend as much quality time with Tralee as possible, because my time with her is fleeting, and I don't want to forget the sweet innocent girl I've been blessed to nurture.  She -- as well as Jim and Hunter -- are my real life dreams-come-true!

Easter

Every Easter Sunday, for the last three years, has been spent with the other Jacobs family that lives in the area.  We get together, eat a yummy meal, set up an Easter egg hunt for the wee ones, and then let them dye hard boiled eggs.  This year was no different, and as always, we had a lot of fun!  Here are some pictures from Easter 2012:

I curled Tralee's hair for the special event

Tralee and Hunty getting ready to hunt some eggs.  Hunty's expression is the one he pulls when I tell him to smile for a picture.  See the little dimple on his upper left (your right) cheek.  I love it!

Tralee, Hunter, Anson, Jovie, and Oakley getting ready to search for the eggs

The whole Jacobs gang

Hunter hunting

I can't believe how big she's getting!  Slow down my child!

Isn't she pretty?  She's also smart and kind and sensitive and clever!

Here's my husband doing what he does best: Acting like the big kid that he is!

Hunty was a grump during a lot of our events.  He went to bed too late the night before (my fault) and woke up way too early (I blame the Easter Bunny for that one).  I knew as soon as he woke up that he would be a little bear later on.  I was right.  In the picture above he freaked out because he saw some eggs across the yard he wanted.  Before he could get to them another child picked them up.  He flopped down in the grass and cried like it was the end of the world.  Don't worry though. . .  a few minutes later he was in fine spirits again.  Just check out the pic below for proof.

Hunty showing me all the eggs he found

Oakley eating some jelly beans

Joves was so cute.  I saw her re-hide some of the eggs she found and then run over to Tralee and point them out.  What a little sweetheart!

A mouth full of sugar

Counting out their loot

This is how Hunty wanted to do things

Easter egg decorating time!

Cute little Oaks made the best egg!  It was so colorful!

Trying to get two eggs in one cup!

Most of the kids didn't bother with the spoons.  Who needs spoons when you have two perfectly good hands to dye eggs with?

All our artists

We put them in some of Jim's old shirts so their nice Easter clothes wouldn't get stained

Cute baby Anson.  Maybe next year he'll be able to join in the festivities!  This year he did a pretty good job being his cute lil' self!

All of the kids' hands looked like this.  In fact, my kids' hands are still slightly dyed.

I liked Oaks' technique for egg dying.  They turned out very cool!  I don't think her hands were all that messy either.

As always we had a lovely time with our friends.  I can't wait for next year to do it all again!

"Stop It" Print -- Free

I liked Elder Uchtdorf's talk so much, I made a few prints of his advice for free!  

Print one off, and share it with your friends and family!

They're all sized to 8x10.  I also have some in 11x14, but didn't post them.  If you would like an 11x14 let me know!  Also, remember when trimming them to size, that I left about a 1/4 inch white boarder around the print.  I don't want them cut too small so they won't fit your frame.

            

Enjoy!