Today's is the first sample of Katie's freehand handwriting. Sunday school teachers traced hands and cut them out. Kids were then asked to draw someone to pray for on their prayer hands. With three-year-olds, this can produce wildly varied results. Most kids drew pictures of their mothers which vaguely resembled stick figures. Katie took a different approach. Cathie was one of the teachers today, and Katie asked Cathy for each letter of her name in turn, and wrote the letters on these "prayer hands." And Katie wrote entirely backwards! Evidently, Katie was made to write in the mirror.
Sunday, February 21, 2010
Hand writing
Today's is the first sample of Katie's freehand handwriting. Sunday school teachers traced hands and cut them out. Kids were then asked to draw someone to pray for on their prayer hands. With three-year-olds, this can produce wildly varied results. Most kids drew pictures of their mothers which vaguely resembled stick figures. Katie took a different approach. Cathie was one of the teachers today, and Katie asked Cathy for each letter of her name in turn, and wrote the letters on these "prayer hands." And Katie wrote entirely backwards! Evidently, Katie was made to write in the mirror.
Monday, February 15, 2010
President's Day Gumbo
There was a time when we didn't get any time off. President's Day was the first holiday (after Veteran's Day) to be cut from the holiday calendar. This year, schools have a make-up day on President's day (it would have been a work day), and day care has the day off. Daddy, fortunately, also has the day off - but not like it makes much difference since he's paid hourly.
First on the agenda for President's Day (after the usual exercise and breakfast) was a trip to the back yard so Katie could jump on the trampoline while Daddy raked leaves. A million MORE leaves fell thanks to the 50 mile-per-hour winds we got last Wednesday. I thought I'd already raked enough! There are a few fallen branches, but nothing serious.
After the trampoline (which involved sweeping snow off and jumping), we went over to the swing set where Katie pushed me on the swing, then I pushed her. I climbed up top and cleared some pine needles from the bridge above the swings - which turned into a bit of a target practice game - to see if I could hit Katie with just a little of the detritus while she was swinging. She loved it!
Then we went for a little nature walk out the back yard. Usually, we just cut straight across from the north gate in the back yard to the greenway, but this time we went out the south gate and walked along the west bank of the stream, trespassing in a few neighbor's yards along the way until we got to the HOA stream bank. Katie got to see ferns, moss, vines, thorns, and other cool nature stuff you can see in the winter. Daddy picked up trash and had two hands full upon return.
The main stream has a channel of varying width, but it's about 5 feet wide where the water flows about 6 inches deep at a relatively brisk pace. We were walking upstream and came to a fork where we chose to cross a small (foot-wide, 3 inch deep) tributary. Katie walked across on a root while Daddy held her hand and straddled the stream. It was beautiful.
Then we came back. Daddy found an easier place to cross and took that, but Katie wanted to go back by way of the root. And Katie managed to put both feet in the stream along the way - and cry for the next 10 minutes home. Even still, she enjoyed the walk. Time for cookies and hot chocolate by the fireplace!
Nap was long, affording good time for scanning of tax papers in preparation for going paperless. We hung the costume hook in the playroom and afterwards went to the back yard to burn off some steam. We raked leaves - Borrowing Lulu's rake so Katie could participate, then played on the swings.
First on the agenda for President's Day (after the usual exercise and breakfast) was a trip to the back yard so Katie could jump on the trampoline while Daddy raked leaves. A million MORE leaves fell thanks to the 50 mile-per-hour winds we got last Wednesday. I thought I'd already raked enough! There are a few fallen branches, but nothing serious.
After the trampoline (which involved sweeping snow off and jumping), we went over to the swing set where Katie pushed me on the swing, then I pushed her. I climbed up top and cleared some pine needles from the bridge above the swings - which turned into a bit of a target practice game - to see if I could hit Katie with just a little of the detritus while she was swinging. She loved it!
Then we went for a little nature walk out the back yard. Usually, we just cut straight across from the north gate in the back yard to the greenway, but this time we went out the south gate and walked along the west bank of the stream, trespassing in a few neighbor's yards along the way until we got to the HOA stream bank. Katie got to see ferns, moss, vines, thorns, and other cool nature stuff you can see in the winter. Daddy picked up trash and had two hands full upon return.
The main stream has a channel of varying width, but it's about 5 feet wide where the water flows about 6 inches deep at a relatively brisk pace. We were walking upstream and came to a fork where we chose to cross a small (foot-wide, 3 inch deep) tributary. Katie walked across on a root while Daddy held her hand and straddled the stream. It was beautiful.
Then we came back. Daddy found an easier place to cross and took that, but Katie wanted to go back by way of the root. And Katie managed to put both feet in the stream along the way - and cry for the next 10 minutes home. Even still, she enjoyed the walk. Time for cookies and hot chocolate by the fireplace!
Nap was long, affording good time for scanning of tax papers in preparation for going paperless. We hung the costume hook in the playroom and afterwards went to the back yard to burn off some steam. We raked leaves - Borrowing Lulu's rake so Katie could participate, then played on the swings.
Monday, February 8, 2010
500 in 2010 Update
We are into week #5 of the 500 in 2010 challenge and I'm a little behind but I'm feeling really good about my progress. In order to walk 500 miles in 2010, I have to average about 10 miles a week. For the first three weeks, I did an awesome job getting almost exactly 10 miles and a few extra tenths here and there to help me fee like I was awesome. Last week, not so much. I ended up with a lot of back pain last week as a result of a sleepless/restless night, so I didn't end up walking much. In fact, instead of the 10 miles I needed for the week, I only did 2. That was depressing.
This week, however, I started feeling better and I was determined to get back on track. We had snow and sleet here in NC last weekend so school ended up being canceled for 3 days (solid ice is hard to get off the roads) and delayed for 1 so I had some extra time to get on the treadmill. On Monday, Katie was home with me because, with schools closed, so was her daycare. Jim, of course, went to work as usual. That did not deter me. I turned on Sesame Street really loudly on the TV I have in front of the treadmill and she sat in one of the recliners with her lovey and watched Sesame Street while I walked. Because of the pain I had last week, I didn't want to push the speed very much so the only way I could do the miles for this week AND start chipping away at miles for last week was to increase the duration. ie, I stayed on the treadmill for a veeery loooong time. Well, an hour, which isn't forever but seemed long enough to me!
It has payed off and I was able to put in almost 12 miles by Thursday. I took Friday off to rest a bit but still managed to blow my miles away this week.
I should have about 50 miles by Sunday night in order to be on track. YTD miles: 46.2!
This week, however, I started feeling better and I was determined to get back on track. We had snow and sleet here in NC last weekend so school ended up being canceled for 3 days (solid ice is hard to get off the roads) and delayed for 1 so I had some extra time to get on the treadmill. On Monday, Katie was home with me because, with schools closed, so was her daycare. Jim, of course, went to work as usual. That did not deter me. I turned on Sesame Street really loudly on the TV I have in front of the treadmill and she sat in one of the recliners with her lovey and watched Sesame Street while I walked. Because of the pain I had last week, I didn't want to push the speed very much so the only way I could do the miles for this week AND start chipping away at miles for last week was to increase the duration. ie, I stayed on the treadmill for a veeery loooong time. Well, an hour, which isn't forever but seemed long enough to me!
It has payed off and I was able to put in almost 12 miles by Thursday. I took Friday off to rest a bit but still managed to blow my miles away this week.
I should have about 50 miles by Sunday night in order to be on track. YTD miles: 46.2!
Wednesday, February 3, 2010
A typical conversation
Daddy had this conversation with Katie on the way to school this morning. This is a very typical conversation that we have with Katie about any topic these days.
K: Daddy, why is it foggy?
D: It just is.
K: It jus dis?
D: It just... is.
K: Daddy, why is it foggy?
D: There is moisture in the air.
K: What?
D: It's a cloud on the ground.
K: What's a cloud?
D: It's a puffy white thing in the sky.
K: What's puffy?
D: Soft, with no particular shape. A marshmallow is puffy, too.
K: But puppy is a pet.
D: Yes, "puffy," not "puppy."
K: "Puffy." Why is it puffy?
On the way to Chick-Fil-A from daycare this evening, I had something approximating this conversation with Katie.
M: We're going to meet Uncle Chris and Aunt Manda at Chick-Fil-A.
K: But I want to beat them Mommy!
M: We're going to meet them. Mmmeet them.
K: What's meet?
M: Meet is when you go to a place and someone else goes to the same place at the same time. You mmmeet each other there.
K: When we go with Chris and Amanda we meet. When we go with Daddy we beat!
M: No honey, we don't ever beat. When two people go to the same place at the same time, they mmmeet each other.
K: Yay! There's Chick-Fil-A!
This is why we love Chick-Fil-A's current kids meal toy. An audio book that everyone happily and quietly listens to on the way home. (We also make regular trips to the library for audio books so we never run short.)
Monday, February 1, 2010
It takes a village and our first bloody accident
I really wanted to share this picture. One of our neighbors is helping situate Katie on the sled while Jim was shoveling our driveway. It really characterizes for me the family feel of our new street and neighborhood. All the cul-de-sac kids congregated on the neighboring houses' driveway (which our neighbor helpfully did not shovel) to sled and they had a great time. Katie, who would usually be very hesitant to participate in something as potentially scary as sledding, watched the other kids and then jumped right in. She even went fast enough to get some air over the ski bump the older kids put at the bottom of the hill. In keeping with the friendly nature of our court and the fact that I love to bake (especially to feed people goodies!), I made cookies and Jim and Katie delivered about 6 dozen fresh out of the oven chocolate chip cookies around the cul-de-sac. I understand they were quite appreciated. :)
The other thing that happened on our wild sledding day was Katie's first bloody accident while playing. It was almost comical to watch. She had gone down the sledding hill very fast but had slowed down considerably at the end (the "hill" is well designed to allow for stopping at the bottom) when she started sliding toward a woman who was walking away from the house. Katie wasn't moving very fast by the time they collided but there was nothing we could do to stop it as the ground was solid ice where they were. The woman went down on her bottom but, since Katie wasn't going very fast, I didn't expect there to be any problems. Somewhere in the shuffle, Katie's face must have been pushed into the ice because when she looked up, she was crying and blood was coming out of her mouth. Fortunately, it wasn't much and stopped quickly. When I looked in her mouth I couldn't even find where the blood was coming from. When I asked her if she was hurt or scared she replied, "Scared." A day later, her face is definitely all scraped up with red scrapes on her upper lip, nose, and right cheek. Jim, of course, happened to have the camera in hand to document the crash.
The air.
The slide.
The collision.
"No, Mommy! I am NOT okay!" Poor baby.
The other thing that happened on our wild sledding day was Katie's first bloody accident while playing. It was almost comical to watch. She had gone down the sledding hill very fast but had slowed down considerably at the end (the "hill" is well designed to allow for stopping at the bottom) when she started sliding toward a woman who was walking away from the house. Katie wasn't moving very fast by the time they collided but there was nothing we could do to stop it as the ground was solid ice where they were. The woman went down on her bottom but, since Katie wasn't going very fast, I didn't expect there to be any problems. Somewhere in the shuffle, Katie's face must have been pushed into the ice because when she looked up, she was crying and blood was coming out of her mouth. Fortunately, it wasn't much and stopped quickly. When I looked in her mouth I couldn't even find where the blood was coming from. When I asked her if she was hurt or scared she replied, "Scared." A day later, her face is definitely all scraped up with red scrapes on her upper lip, nose, and right cheek. Jim, of course, happened to have the camera in hand to document the crash.
The air.
The collision.
The crash.
Are you okay?
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