Meet the PBS Kids!

Here are the PBS Kids aka Luke, Myles, and Ella

It's kind of scary how proficient my kids are at using the computer. Luke's to the point now where he can pull his chair up to our computer at home, start it up, get into Internet Explorer, go to our Favorites, and click on www.pbskids.org out of a list of about 50 things in our Favorites. They enjoy going to Grammie's library where they can all play on the computers at the same time.

Graduation Day

The kids had their final Grammie story hour last week. The "teachers" have the kids sing the songs they've been working on all year as a part of their Story Hour Party/Graduation Day. Here is Grammie Hour's version of the ABC song. Ella is in the back, Myles is in front of her, and some crazy spaz of a kid is in front of Myles. Watch the spaz when they get to the loud part (and watch Myles' reaction to his loud spastic-ness).

The proud parents

4 going on 30
Who loves her Mom?

Ella noticed that some of the other girls were wearing makeup and she said something to me about it. I asked her what she thought about them wearing makeup. She said "It's ok for them to wear it but I don't need it." Oh thank goodness. I did let her wear a little bit of lip gloss (courtesy of Auntie T) and some glitter on her shoulders and cheeks. She was very excited about the glitter and lip gloss. There were many (MANY) reapplications of the lip gloss before the performance.

How cute is she??

For those of you who couldn't make it to the recital...

The girls did an awesome job. I think they did way better for the recital than I've ever seen them do in practice. When Ella got off stage after the ballet finale, I was there to greet her. She looked very somber and serious. I told her that she did an awesome job and gave her a high five. She looked me right in the eye and grinned and said "YEAH I DID!!" She skipped all the way back to our seats.

By the way, she's third from the left.

Sorry I cut off the dance a couple seconds from the end...I wanted to make sure I got a pic of their final pose.

Bun Me

I'm hair challenged. I admit it. I can't do Ella's hair to save my life. Sure I can do the basics like a ponytail, a braid, etc but something complicated and it's just not going to happen.

Last night was Ella's recital rehearsel so I had to try to get her hair in a bun. There was one emergency call to Aunt Robbie for tech support but otherwise, I think I did pretty well. There was a lot of hairspray and a lot of bobbie pins but we made it.

Hopefully, things go well again tonight for the actual recital (keeping my fingers crossed)

Chase and Grammie

Meet KiKi

I want you to want me

Meet Jane's new outdoor friend, KiKi. She just showed up at our house a month or so ago. I haven't been able to convince my friend, Amy, that she needs to take her so she' s been hanging out in the backyard at my house. She's very adorable and very sweet. Just don't tell my neighbor, Louise that I've been feeding her because she doesn't like stray cats. Shhhhhh!

The kids have loved having her hang out in the backyard but I'm afraid the large dog that lives behind our house will get her or she'll get run over in the street.

If anyone needs a little kitty love to live at their house, please let me know. She's less than a year old. She's mostly a creamy orange with a little bit of white on her throat and tummy and a very large poofy tail.

Sleepy!

Carry me!

The kids want to walk places and are always fired up to do this. Once we start walking, though, they get tired pretty quickly so we usually end up carrying them 95% of the way. Aron's always such a good sport and frequently ends up being the pack mule that carries them. What a good guy!

Flurry of Rochester Pix

Anyone up for some hand holding?

Hey Uncle K, lemme just poke you in the eye with my wooden car. Monocular vision's all the rage.


Baby and the Gang

Ella and her friend, Annie Do you know the muffin man? This guy loves some tasty hotel breakfast grub.

Rochester or Bust! 2008 edition

Some years ago (we'll call it 2006) we visited Aunt Annie in Rochester NY. We had such a good time then we decided to go back. Aunt Annie was graduating with her Masters in Organ (yeah, Aunt Annie!) so we were there to celebrate with her. The kids had a killer time. I'd like to say that we saw a bunch of new places and did a bunch of cool stuff but what the kids really wanted to do most of all was just hang out with AAnnie and UKevin. So that's what we did. Hanging with the fam...does it get much more exciting than that??

Good dental hygiene is a must!

Ella went to the dentist for the first time last week. She kept telling me that her front tooth hurt. I took her in, got some x-rays, got a cleaning, and she was all good. No cavities, no loose tooth. I snuck in a quick photo when the dental hygienist had her back turned (that's her in the background).

Park it!

We went to the park the other day. Luke wanted to slide down the big slide 10,000 times but he wouldn't ever do it by himself. So....that means I had to slide down the big slide 10,000 times. MyMy came along and good times were had by all.

Miss Lori a.k.a. the Pied Piper

Ella and her story hour buddy, Mason, hanging out by the ambulance. I know his father so I'm not sure how I feel about the holding hands part.

I think they're going to plow away the kids. YIKES! (Luke's in Ella's lap in this pic so you can't see her very well)

That's Miss Lori in the red. She's not much bigger than the kids...maybe that's why she's so darn relatable.

As I've mentioned several times during the course of this blog, my kids love Miss Lori who is the main librarian for story hour at the local library. I tell her all the time that I find her to be similiar to the Pied Piper. (You know, without all the death, rats, and putting the kids in the river and what not.) The concept is still the same. The kids all play around in the library until it's time for story hour which Miss Lori always starts with the same story hour song. Once she starts singing, the kids immediately put down what they were playing with, start to quietly walk toward the story hour room, and follow her in a line right into the room. It's kind of funny to watch, really.

Miss Lori had a special surprise for the kids yesterday. She had a guy from the Ohio Dept of Transportation come and tell them all about snow plows. She also had an ambulance come to show the kids what's in there and what the EMT does.

That Miss Lori...she's some sort of pint sized rock star to my kids.

Flower Power

Who loves the flowers from Daddy's white peach tree? THIS GIRL!