Minus One

Today is Eva's first day of preschool. Kind of. Last year she went to preschool at Rockwell for 2 1/2 hours, two days a week. This year she goes from 8:00 - 3:30. Doesn't that sound like a long day for a four year old? She is still only going two days a week, but this year she is riding on the school bus. It felt very weird to put her on the bus and watch her drive away without me.



Normally we'll walk her up to the elementary school to get on the bus. It's nice because the school is just around the corner from our house. Of course, this morning it was pouring down rain. So, we drove up instead.




She, of course, was super excited. She didn't really seem nervous, but she was a little quiet this morning when we were getting ready. Quinn, on the other hand, is ticked. He screamed, cried, and generally had a giant fit when he realized that he wasn't going on the bus with Eva. I'm not sure if he's that attached to his big sister, or if he just wanted to ride on a bus. Probably a combination of both.

The house seems quiet this morning, though. It's not that Eva is that noisy or anything. It just feels different when any of my kids are not here. I hope she has a great day, though!! I'm really excited to pick her up this afternoon and hear all about it.


It other news, I finally painted my kitchen. John and I estimate that this house hasn't been painted in about 15 years. We are basing that on when the previous owners did a lot of restoration and such. The walls are dirty and gross. We have been slowly painting one room at a time.

I made some news curtains. I think they turned out pretty cute. They are pretty country looking, which is not normally my aesthetic. But, this house is kinda old-fashioned and country looking, so overall it looks nice. It's just a relief to get rid of the horrid lace valences that were hanging in there. Lace is definitely not my thing. (I do still have lace curtains in my living room :( Hopefully they'll be coming down soon. The previous owners must have had a real affinity for very old-fashioned lace curtains. They were in the kitchen , dining room, living room, hallway, bathroom, and the extra bedroom. Yikes!!!




Anyway, I'm pretty happy with the kitchen so far. I'm going to buy or make some new rugs and hang a pretty shelf that I can hang my aprons on. It's coming along. One room at a time :)

Texas review

So, we've been home from Texas for over a week and I still haven't written a thing about it. I keep meaning to sit down and write a nice, long description of all the things we did and how much fun we had. But I just haven't had the time (or the inclination).

So, I'll do this briefly. We saw lots of family and friends that we haven't seen in a long, long time. We had one spectacular night out with friends at The Melting Pot. We had a fun party for Micah's graduation (Congrats Micah!!) and John's 30th birthday (a little early). And mostly we just hung out and relaxed- which is really my favorite part of vacation.

I had the opportunity to do lots and lots of sewing, because John's family is awesome. They spent our whole vacation taking care of and entertaining my kids and I sewed and relaxed and slept in (at least a few days:). I made a quilt top for John's grandma and I've brought it home to quilt it for her. I also got about half way on a quilting project I brought from home.

That's our vacation in a nutshell. The kids were awesome in the car and we had a really wonderful time. I have lots of good pictures, so check out my website to see them.

To save myself some time, I'll just include one of all of us. Our family, John's mom, his brothers Ben and Micah, and his sister Randa. It's a pretty good picture of all of us :)

Happy 4th of July

Happy 4th of July, everyone! I hope you all have a great, relaxing weekend full of wonderful weather.

Last night we met my sister and her family in Dyersville to see some fireworks. It wasn't until we got there that we realized they were charging admission and there were no carry-ins into the seating area. Umm, seriously? Here we come tromping with our coolers and 50 bags of snack food. So I'm thinking, this is total crap. It's like $3 for a hot dog. I thought fireworks were free!!!

So, we all sat at a picnic table outside the seating area and ate our prepacked dinner (Jimmy John's for John & I; PB&J for the kids). Then we sneakily (and apparently, illegally), stuffed some juiceboxes and cokes into the basket of Dex's stroller with a couple ice packs and covered it with a blanket. Then John took the cooler back to the car. Luckily, I had all my snacks in the diaper bag. I figured once it got nice and busy no one would be patrolling for a contraband juicebox.

We claimed our space with blankets and chairs and our red wagon and then went to play. The reason we like to go to Dyersville is they set up a big field with kids' stuff. They had lots of bounce houses and inflatable slides and a rock climbing wall and all sorts of cool stuff. I think it really helps to have something fun to do while you wait for it to get dark. I can't imagine trying to keep 6 kids entertained on a blanket for like 4 hours.







We had such a great time! The kids loved all the toys. There were some long lines, but the older kids were pretty patient. Quinn however, does not get the concept of a line. He kept running to the front and diving in, whether it was his turn or not. Several times John had to run after him and grab him by the ankle and pull him out! It was pretty funny. He was obviously having a very good time.




After all the rides we went back to our blanket and waited. We fed the kids snacks to keep them reasonable quiet. They had some music playing and it was nice to just sit and relax.




The fireworks were really good this year. They were set to music (my favorite part. They even had a few new types that I've never seen before. Eva laid in my lap and sucked her thumb quietly, just watching. Quinn laid across my chest and kept shouting "another" after every single one. It was hilarious. I think of all the kids he enjoyed them the most. Dex sat in John's lap and just stared at the sky. I was so surprised that we didn't cry because we were really close and things were pretty loud.

Needless to say, we are all a little tired today after such a busy evening.

Weekend Review

We had a pretty busy weekend. My friend Allison and her husband Tim stopped by on Friday to see me and the kiddos. They have never been to my house. We had a really nice visit and I gave them a quilt that I made for their first baby, due in September. The quilt was really fun to work on. I chose colors from their nursery theme and made a curved nine-patch design.




The second picture is of the back of the quilt. The picture did not turn out as well as I had hoped, but you can see the quilting design that I used. I used my new machine to do some free motion quilting, which was very challenging!! I think I need more practice, practice, practice.

Saturday we headed up to Dubuque and visited my Grandma. My aunt Tam and my aunt and uncle from Minnesota were there and we got to see their little girl, Anna. She was one on Valentine's Day and is a real cutie! I forget to take my camera in though, so no pics.

After that we headed to my sister's house and just kinda hung out. We had a great dinner and the kids ran around until they were wiped out.



Sunday was my nephew Matthew's first birthday party. We had fried chicken (yum).



We also had a Sponge Bob (is that one word?) cake, which Matthew demolished.

Overall a very good, but busy weekend.

BTW - I finally figured out how to upload pics. Pretty cool, huh?

What's In a Name?

So, today I'm sitting at the kitchen counter cleaning a pineapple while the kids are playing on the swing set. Quinn comes in the house and sees me busy.
"Mommy, picky up me".
"Sorry buddy, Mommy busy."
"Mommy, picky up me peeeeeeeeeeeease."
"Com'ere buddy, you can sit next to me and have some pineapple."
"OK Mommy"
I love the way he says OK. It's the cutest thing to come out of his mouth. He very carefully pronounces each letter, just to let me know it's really okay. Also, if he has a question he says "Go outside, OK?" You can totally tell if he's agreeing or asking by his tone. Very sweet.

Anyway, Quinn comes and starts eating pineapple. Now, he is not a very neat eater yet. So, he's got sticky hands and pineapple juice running down his chin onto his shirt. Oh well. Also, he's having a hard time really chewing the pineapple, so he decides to just suck out the juice then spit the piece back into the bowl. The community bowl that I'm adding pineapple to as I clean it. Hmm. So, I get him his own plate to masticate his pineapple on.

Next Eva comes in. I get her a plate and some pineapple, too. All right, here's the mean mom part of the day. After 10 minutes of solid pineapple eating....I put it back in the fridge. It's almost time for lunch guys, no more pineapple. Yikes. This was not a popular idea. Especially because Quinn has finished his pineapple, but Eva still has a few pieces left.
Quinn:"More apple pine Mommy!"
Eva: "No Quinn, it's pineapple."
Quinn:"MORE APPLE PINE, MOMMY!"
Eva: "Qwwwwwinnnnnnnnn (add slight yodel), it's PINEapple"
Quinn: "APPLE PINE, EVA"

****SMACK*****

Yep, that's right. Quinn smacked Eva right in the face for arguing with him. I know it's wrong, but I had to turn around and laugh a little to myself. Then I cleaned them up and sent them to watch TV while I made lunch.


-------------------------------------------------------

I was just getting ready to post this when Eva came in and said "Mommy, I don't have a life." Isn't that what she's supposed to say to me in 10 years??

Happy Father's Day

Yesterday was Father's Day. In preparation for this event I took the kids shopping with me for cards. Eva and Quinn got to pick out a card for John and one for my dad. They were both drawn like moths to a flame to one specific card. It was one of those musical cards AND it had the Simpsons on it. That's right folks, my 2-year old knows his daddy's favorite cartoon. But does John know his 2-year old's favorite cartoon??

Anyway. Sunday morning I kept reminding Eva and Quinn to tell John "Happy Father's Day" as soon as he came downstairs. I knew Eva could do it. I said "Quinn, say Happy Father's Day." To which Quinn dutifully replied "Happy Daddy Day." Close enough. So, here's what actually happened.

I gave the cards to the kids to give to John. Kids bust into room yelling and jumping like monkeys. Eva actually does say Happy Father's Day. Then she adds, "Here's your card, Daddy. It's the Simpsons, and it talks. Can I open it?" Quinn doesn't want to be left out of the action. So he adds, "Here card. Happy birthday Mama day" Yep, read it again. Happy birthday Mama day. Apparently those are the events that have stayed with him. All day long he said that.

I hope all you dad's out there had a wonderful day.

Mommy, interupted

I can't imagine a world with no kids. And by no kids, I mean no kids of my own. Isn't that strange? It wasn't so very long ago that I didn't have kids. I spent the first 24 years of my life without children. Of course, I myself was a child for much of that time.

Anyway, I was sitting on my couch this morning thinking of all the things I could accomplish in a day if my kids weren't here. And then I thought "what would my day be like if I didn't have any kids at all". I absolutely could not imagine it. I can imagine going on vacation without them, or having a day without them, but I can't imagine having my life, but not having them.

I like to think I'd spend my days sewing, running errands, sewing, reading, sewing and so forth. Even the tantalizing idea of showering everyday crossed my mind. Ah yes, those were the days. Isn't that sad? My most precious memories of being single involve showering each and every morning. I know that is the single biggest cliche about motherhood - the not being able to shower thing. But it is so true!!!

Anyway. I do, in fact, have my kids with me all day today. The weather is absolutely gorgeous, so they are out playing on the swings. I should be doing some laundry, but I thought I'd sit down at my computer for just a minute.

As you may have guessed from the above paragraph, I haven't been getting much sewing done lately. This is causing me great frustration. I have a bunch of projects going and I'm motivated about all of them. They're all at a stage where I can see them really coming together if I could just sit down and work at them, uninterrupted. Uninterrupted. Hmm... interesting thought. I wonder how you accomplish that?

Ok, ok, enough whining. If I didn't have kids, I'd probably have some other demanding, time-consuming job that didn't allow me to go to the bathroom with the door closed. What? No? You ARE allowed to close the bathroom door at most adult jobs? Hmm...maybe I should reconsider my options.