Coming To Life, Part 2

Because I'm a sucker, I gave in when Spencer begged me to bring to life another of his three-year old drawings. This one was a self portrait. I don't know, do you think it looks like him? :) No, his legs have not always sprouted from where his nose should be, but when you're three, it's hard to know just where to put those things.

Coming to Life

Do you remember way back last March when I posted about Child's Own Studio and the adorable dolls inspired by kids' artwork?

I finally got brave enough to try.

I'm not a great seamstress, but I know just enough to be dangerous. Here is the result:

By Spencer, age 3?

If I had to do it again, I would have left more of an allowance in the fabric to compensate for the stuffing. It more closely resembled the original drawing before it was stuffed. Otherwise, I'm happy with how it turned out. Spencer loves it so we'll call it a success!

First Day!

The kids headed back to school this morning. We experienced quite a range of emotions - from pure delight and anticipation to sheer terror - but we managed to get them all out the door and on their way with only a few tears. Here they are in the order they left the house this morning:

2nd grade. School couldn't come fast enough for my Sadie-bug!

Sam, the big Junior! 

 I forgot to take a picture of Sterling and Soren before we left the house. Thank heaven for camera phones!!

Sterling - 5th grade, Soren - 4th grade.
I'm glad these two are in the same school this year!

Spencer - 8th grade, Savannah - Sophomore! These two could have waited
forever for school to start. Not as happy as they look!

 And what am I going to do all day? Bon bons and television, of course! I've got a long list of projects and books to keep me plenty busy this year. Don't worry about me!

Lucky 13

A big happy birthday to Spencer!

Three teenagers in the house. Heaven help us! :)

Love you, Spencer! I hope this is your best year so far!

Welcome to Woo Hoo!

I asked Sadie to run upstairs and see if Daddy could start making dinner. I was working on something and knew it would be a few minutes before I could get to it.

That's all it took.

Sadie hatched a brilliant plan to have a restaurant. Daddy would be the cook and Sadie would be the waitress. She was working on the menu when I came upstairs. I asked if she needed help and together we typed it up:

Not listed: Fruit of the day - Watermelon. :)
And those chicken nuggets were homemade! Yum!

Our cute waitress!

I would have offered to help in the kitchen, but it was Employees Only.

Sadie took everyone's order. She sure was concentrating as she wrote everything down!

The food was delicious and the service was top notch! The best part? I didn't even have to clean up. Sadie and dad took care of everything! 

Woo Hoo!

They Were Kidding, Right?

I am in the process of ordering a few things from Amazon.com, my go-to source for birthdays and Christmas since I refuse to set foot in WalMart...

Anyway, I like to read reviews before I make purchases just to see what others are saying. I had to laugh when I came across this one for a certain CD I was considering for Savannah's birthday:

They were kidding, right?

Right?

Holiday World

Earlier this summer, through two different promotions, we ended up with eight tickets to Holiday
World for the price of three. For those who haven't heard of Holiday World, it's a huge amusement park located in Santa Claus, Indiana. (No, I am not making this up.) The park is laid out by holiday with rides to match the themes and the appropriate holiday music playing throughout each section. Nothing gets you in the spirit of things better than hearing "Oh Come All Ye Faithful" in August. Many of our favorite rides were in the 4th of July part of the park, a few others in Thanksgiving. Holiday World is about a three hour drive from here, which makes it a day trip for us.

We spent the day there yesterday. Here are some highlights of our trip:

• Beautiful weather! Mid-80's for the high. Overcast and breezy much of the day which made it a little chilly when wet (and we were wet a lot!) but we weren't complaining.
• Free parking, sunscreen, and soft drinks (gatorade and lemonade included). Yay!
• Awesome water park - Splashin' Safari - included in admission. We loved the new Mammoth ride! 
• No lines! Because many Indiana schools are already in session and the weather was a little cooler, the park was not crowded at all. Sure there were plenty of people around, but we only waited in lines longer than 5 minutes for 3 rides. Most rides had no wait. On two of the rides, they let us stay on and ride again because no one was waiting in line.
• Dive! This is a new show within the park put on by professional divers. A couple of the kids weren't sure they would like it, but it was so cool!! Pretty impressive to watch someone dive off a tiny platform 80 feet off the ground.
• Closing time. Because this is the last week the park is open during weekdays and the number of visitors has decreased, they closed at 6:30 instead of the usual 8:30. Because everything was so accessible, we got to do everything we wanted and were ready to leave before the park closed. No regrets.

What we (I) didn't like:

• The Voyage. Rated the #1 roller coaster on the planet, I can say I've been on it...and I'll never go on it again! Yikes!!

It was a great day!

Friday Funny

Watch for a bit and then forward to about 3:10 and let it go. 

I'm speechless. 

Dear Dad,

I saved you a piece. I even burned the crust because I know you like burned stuff. (Okay, that was an accident, but still.)

Wish you were here!

Love,
me

Seeing Yellow

My poor, pitiful lawn.

We're seeing a lot of yellow around here. I'm being generous by calling it yellow, but it's a lot closer to yellow than green. It is so dry. This midwestern drought is apparent everywhere I look. The corn, usually way over our heads by now, is shorter than I've ever seen it. And it's dead. It looks awful.

Our lawn is dead, too - completely yellow and brown. A stark contrast to earlier this year. Don't feel too sorry for my neighbors. Their lawn is dead, too. No one waters their lawn here, it simply costs too much.

But yellow is not so bad. Not when it comes in this variety:

Then check out these guys having their little gathering outside my dining room window. At one time we saw no less than 7 finches at the feeder. Sadie calls the red one a "redneck finch." Ha! But we get mostly the vibrant yellow goldfinches this year.  

They sure are a nice change from all the other yellow we've been seeing!

Toothless

Sadie lost a tooth tonight. It's been ready to come out for a while now, but she wasn't ready to part with it so she's been babying that thing forever. Her first top tooth to go and she's looking more and more grown up by the second!

Don't grow up too fast my little Sadie-bug.

Right Now

The boys are playing Killer Bunnies.

Sadie is reading in her hammock.

Jeff is up to his armpits renovating the girls' bathroom.

Savannah is at Girls' Camp, hopefully staying hydrated and somewhat cool despite the unforgiving heat.

Life is good!