twittering

I haven't really figured out what I'm doing, but I've started twittering. Anyone else? I'd love to find others to follow so I had a better idea of what I was doing! :)

The Dynamics of Two

I know it's unfair to try to figure it out, because the girls are so completely different in personality that it's impossible to know how they'd be if their birth order had been reversed.
But I do know for sure that Bekah has picked up some things that Jasmine didn't pick up until recently, thanks to her excellent mimicking skills!
She says a very (very!) clear "no" ("Nah!") and means it. Which is good, I guess, when she tells me she wants to eat something, so I can ask her yes/no questions and get "Nah! Nah! Nah! Mm!" and then I know I found it.
The most fun, though, at this moment, is that she knows how old she is. Or at least knows the correct answer to the question "how old are you?"
Jasmine's answer: "Free!"


Bekah's answer: "Wah!"

Jasmine and Bekah's Week

I made the girls another "mini-book." I had soooo much fun making it, and they love reading it. It's in the style of "Cookie's Week," one of their favorite books at the moment. Every time we get to the word "everywhere," I let Bekah say it. It's one of her favorite words! ("evvvv-ah!")

Here is what the book looks like:

Layouts, and more things that make me laugh

Here are the past few layouts I've made. You can click through to see the credits and comment(s) people made.





Today's additions to "what makes me laugh"

1. Josh.
I got my first email from him on a Monday morning. Wednesday morning, my sister Amy came in to the room and saw me laughing as I looked at the computer. She knew: "is it him making you laugh again?" Yup. And 5 years later, he still makes me laugh on a regular basis. I think he's one of the funniest people I know.

2. Calvin and Hobbes.
Definitely my favorite comic strip, hands down. I love Dilbert, and Cow and Boy makes me laugh, but C&H is consistently my favorite thing when I need a laugh. I'm glad he retired when he was still at the top of his game (unlike a few others, whose names I won't mention in case you still enjoy reading them), but his humor is sorely missed.

Things that make me laugh, part two

Jasmine.
Jasmine makes me laugh.
Hard.

Here's her side of a conversation on her toy phone just now:

OK, I talk to you again!
See, pizza for dinner?
and watermelon
and that's all
Okay?
oh yeah, and chocolate milk too.
And water for Bekah.
Fanks!
fanks.
bye-bye.

Things that make me laugh, part one

I thought it would be fun to focus on things that make me laugh.

This is something I got as a forward years ago, and just thinking about it still cracks me up. It might not mean as much to people who didn't play in marching bands, but hopefully you'll still enjoy it:

THE STAR SPANGLED BANNER FROM THE PERCUSSIONIST'S PERSPECTIVE

Oh, say can you BOOM, CRASH

By the dawn's early BOOM, CRASH

What so proudly we BOOM, CRASH

At the twilight's last gleaming?

Whose broad stripes and bright BOOM, CRASH

Through the perilous BOOM, CRASH

O'er the ramparts we BOOM, CRASH

Were so gallantly streaming? 3 &

1...2...3...

2...2...3...

3...2...3...

4...2...3...

5...2...3...

6...2...3...

7...2...3...

8...2...Oh,

BOOM BOOM BOOM

BOOM BOOM BOOM

BOOM BOOM BOOM

BOOM BOOOOOMMMM; BOOM

BOOM BOOM BOOM

BOOM BOOOOOMMMM; BOOM

BOOM BOOM BOOM

BOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!

*****

One of my favorite movies when I need a good belly laugh is Noises Off. Here are a few of my favorite lines:

"I thought I heard my voice!"

"I've had directors who were geniuses and some of them were bas***** but I've never had one who was so totally and absolutely, I don't know."

"Am I in Spain? No I'm not in Spain, dear, I'm in agony, that's where I am!"

Burm

I had never heard of a burm, but apparently the lump of dirt in front of our side yard is one .
When we first moved in, we had a row of bushes there. Josh didn't have the "landscapers" remove them when they "flattened and re-seeded" our yard. But the bushes weren't exactly in great shape, and they were hard to find.


So Josh pulled out the bushes a few weeks ago, leaving a big bunch of dirt.
We couldn't figure out what to put there, until all the lilies around us started blooming. I love daylilies. They're so happy and sunny! So guess what we decided to put in?
Yup, bushes. (just kidding)

Hopefully they'll take off!

Why?

A couple months ago, Jasmine graduated from the School of No. She still goes back for occasional visits, but I actually get "yes" or an answer now, not always "no."
But we're deep in the School of Why right now. My favorite answer when I have no idea is "because it's fun." So now, if I have no answer for her, I'll ask her "why do you think?" and she'll say "because it's fun?"
Sounds like a good answer to me!

So my question for you, my readers, is:
WHY are crayons not flavored with something nasty (but completely harmless)? Children always taste them. Nay, devour them. Bekah thinks "coloring" means "scribble for one second, eat for three." My brother Kenny's very first sentence: "I eat crayons." And I wanna know why!!

Couch!

It's been a loooong time (they said 8 weeks; it ended up being 11), but we finally have our new couch and loveseat in!
That reminds me; I still haven't gotten pictures of the "finished" living room. Maybe I'll get those today and update this post. But at least you can see the main wall color and the funiture!
They're bigger than we remembered, and a grayer green; we both had it in our head that they were greener than this. Not a problem; just means we painted both rooms using a different color as the inspiration! It's because they had a brown couch on display too, so next to that, these do look green!

And my "huge" chair doesn't seem nearly so enormous anymore. It's also not the most comfortable seat in the room; they're all about even.
Bekah can't get up in them yet; give her a week. I'm sure she'll have it figured out.

To remind me, I'll put this here too.
Yesterday we bought daylilies to replace the ugly bushes in our "burm." I'll try to get pictures of those and do some before-and-after shots!

Father's Day Present

Well, Charlene said that I would be posting about the awesome Father's Day present she gave me, and I hate to make her a liar!

Today was another of Charlene's "Anti-Procrastination Days", and she invited me to partake as well. And after putting it off for most of the day (oh, the irony!), here goes...

Charlene made a beautiful, spectacular layout of, and had it turned into a canvas to hang on the wall! Pretty gnarly, huh? Have you ever heard of such a thing? Yeah, I know. We're so far ahead of the curve.

The layout uses a picture of when we had a "picnic" at home on our dining room floor. She took it and made it appear that we are in a much more tropical setting. She's so amazing, huh?

Thanks so much, Sweetie!

(If you are reading this in a FeedBlitz email and the pictures don't show up, try visiting the blog. Whatever you have to do, just make sure you see these pictures!)

Just a quick post

I wanted to show this off :)

Create your own family sticker graphic at pYzam.com

Fireworks

I learned on the afternoon of the 4th how to take pictures of fireworks. So we went, after telling Josh's family we weren't going to see any, armed with my camera and tripod.

The girls loved it! We were far enough away that the noise wasn't too bad, and we could see three "official" shows and various (illegal) home-shows too! Here are a few pictures I got. I'm hoping to play around with my camera in dark-situations like this again before next year, but I'm pretty excited about how they came out!




Oh! And I totally forgot! My friend Dani at TDC made me a layout of my beautiful girls. You can see it here.

A Pictorial History of our Week

Last week was so much fun! Josh took the week off, and we had a week's worth of mini-trips. It worked so well last year that we decided to do that again this year. We'll decide about next summer when it gets closer...see what we think they (and we) are up for!

Jasmine, Bekah and I went to my parents' to see Sheila, my Sister-in-Law (Kenny's wife)

Saturday we went swimming and enjoyed some summery treats:


Then went home and built a tower. Bekah's figuring out how to build and not merely tear down!

More swimming...

Monday we went to Chuck E Cheese's. I wanted to go while it was still quiet, so even though the weather was fine, we spent the afternoon inside. The girls had such a fun time!

Tuesday we went to a State Park that is/was a farm. It's so peaceful and beautiful...and free!

Jasmine thought she should help:

And Bekah had a blast:

My budding Rock Collector:

Trying peach for the first time. So juicy...really early in the season for that, but you won't hear us complaining!


Wednesday we met my Grandma and two of her close friends. First a picnic:

And then to the Botanical Gardens. Here they are (left to right): Marjorie, Grandma, Freda:

Bekah made a friend!

Jasmine loves waterfalls :)

Thursday we went to the Butterfly Conservatory with Josh's mom. I'm making a mini-book for Jasmine with all the pictures, but this is the most important moment of the day. She's been talking about it since it happened (in a good way):

Afterwards we went swimming and then to ice cream:


Many, many layouts coming over the next few days....