Inactivity

Needless to say, this blog has been sadly inactive since 2011. We've been busy though! My goal is to update this blog at least once a week with stories, photos, etc. Stay tuned.

Mobile Blogging

I downloaded an iPhone app that allows me to blog from my fone. I am yet to decide if this is a good thing or not, but at least I have fewer excuses now. It may take me longer to tap out these mobile posts, but I will try.

We took the girls back to the library for Mother Goose Story Time again. Because we borrowed books we had to return them and the girls brought them back in their backpacks.

They were waiting by the door when their mum came home from running and then we walked out to the car and went to the library.

Look At What We Can Do!

I am the worst Dad blogger ever. I had a whole post written with a video starring Matilda and then tacked on a cute foto of Olivia so she wouldn’t feel left out. Then I realized that Olivia was doing new fun things too and I would have to rewrite the whole thing.

The girls are growing up really fast and seem to be learning new things every day. When asked “Where is your nose?” Matilda will touch her nose. She learned that from Nana. Of course Dad had to try and get in on the action as well and started asking “Where is your tummy button?” She quickly figured out where her tummy button was. Now this request results in both girls lifting their shirts and pointing to their tummy buttons. I think I had help with this because Matilda is always bringing over the Belly Button book for us to read. Of course we were wondering what new thing we could have them point to. Caroline decided that Matilda was smart enough to recognize other things in the playroom and asked “Where’s Kanga?” I’m not sure what we were expecting her to do but she walked over and picked up the kangaroo her Australian grandparents sent and brought it back to us. This has now evolved into this -

Olivia, while able to find her belly button, doesn’t seem too interested in much else when it comes to listening to adults and performing tasks. She does enjoy pushing her little sister down for no reason, and has yet to connect that with Mum and Dad scolding her. She likes to climb on everything, the couch, the chairs and the stairs. She even tries to climb the tent we have set up in the playroom. I keep telling her that she can’t climb the tent but she keeps trying and getting her leg stuck. They are just tall enough now to get down anything on the shelf in the playroom which means everything has to be moved up a level. The bottom two shelves of books in the hall have already been moved so that they don’t destroy them.

We bought a wooden tower for the girl’s birthday and until recently the only interest they had in it was racing to pull it apart after I put it together. The other day I noticed that while it had been mostly taken apart there were still a couple of rings left on it which don’t normally go together. I assumed that one of the other adults had put the rings on there. Then later in the day I saw Olivia lifting rings off and putting them back on. I had to try and capture this so I put the tower together and showed it to Olivia.

I think I may have stopped recording a little too soon because this was the final result of all her work.

Each night when I have to stay at school late Caroline sends me fotos of the girls playing and we say goodnight over the fone. I like to be the last person to tuck them in and give them goodnight kisses.

“See you in the morning girls”

Race for the Cure

We made our annual trip to the Pumpkin patch, but I will let Caroline write about that, mostly because she was the one who started the tradition and I don't think I will do it right. I will however tell about what we did in the morning preceding the trip to the Pumpkin patch. Once again I volunteered to be the Team Captain for the KE Race for the Cure team. There is not too much to do for this other than recruiting and then organizing everyone to meet before the race. We only had 4 team members this year which was a little disappointing, but I recruited some junior runners to go with me. The girls were very excited because they were able to wear their new pink tracksuits that Mum got them on sale (i.e. very cheap).The pig and monkey were gifts from Nana's trip to West Virginia and have been constant companions. We arrived at the fairgrounds and collected our race number and then waited for the rest of the team to arrive. Olivia was very eager to start (you might notice she was taking Monkey with her).

I managed to corral her and get her back into her seat before the race started. All the waiting around proved to be a little much, but I decided we needed to hydrate before the start and that calmed the nerves a little. Monkey was hiding on top of the stroller.We started at the back of the group because we didn’t want to slow anyone down. This wasn’t the best plan as there were a large number of participants who just wanted to walk. We spent the first mile slowly trying to navigate through the crowd to be able to run properly. Once the pack thinned out some we were able to speed up and the race was much more enjoyable. We slowed to a walk at the second drink station to rehydrate and then Matilda decided she was ready to be done at about the 4.5 km mark. We “sprinted” across the line in 41 minutes and then took a ‘finish line’ foto over on the grass away from the crowd.

Of course Olivia was still in running mode.

Then we drove home for a nap before the Pumpkin patch adventure.

New Clothes

I am trying to do better at blogging and so two posts in two days is pretty impressive. I have decided to change my posting picture to an actual photo of me. I had bought a jumper at Target and after washing it the first time I dried it. What I didn’t realize was that the jumper was Dry-Clean only. Caroline was kind enough to take a foto of me wearing the jumper after it had shrunk. This was taken a couple of years ago but I like it. That is not the main point of the blog though.

While she was away at her conference Caroline bought presents for everyone. I got this t-shirt

I’m not sure if the quote refers to something in particular, but it is a good description of me. I like tomato sauce (ketchup) on everything. She also got presents for her parents, but I’m not sure of the specifics. What I do know is the present she bought for the girls. She got them t-shirts and jeans. One pink t-shirt with an elephant, and a blue t-shirt with a pair of birds on it. Then yesterday while I was at school studying all the girls went down to the Outlet Mall at St Augustine and did some shopping. The girls got a pair of pink Crocs and some running shoes because now they are running (see the video of them at the track). So today the girls got dressed in their new clothes and we went to the supermarket. Matilda helped me pick out sweet potatoes. I would pick up a sweet potato and ask “Do you like this one?” and if she smiled I would put it in the bag. I think she chose four and rejected two, Olivia might have picked one as well. All of this leads up to the whole reason I am writing the blog, an excuse to post another video. When we got home from the supermarket, I let Olivia walk to the house like a big girl and she did pretty well.

What happens on Saturday Mornings?

I know I am the worst blogger ever and I really should try to do better. That being said this post is mainly an excuse to put up a video I took this morning. I tried sending it via text message and email but it was too large. It is a minute and forty five seconds long and I think its the best. The sound is what makes it so fun. Enjoy

Coupons

So ever since money has been tighter with the addition of O and M, I've started clipping coupons. People laughed at me at first - but I've got the last laugh! Now, don't expect to see me on Extreme Couponing or anything...I'm certainly not building a stockpile...but getting things for cheap/free is nice - especially when it's stuff you'd buy anyway.

Example:

CVS today I bought

4 Axe Deoderants - $5.49 each (on sale at 3/$13) - I had two buy one get one free coupons and there was a promotion to get $3 Extra Care Bucks when you bought 3.

4 Suave Bodywashes - $2.77 each on sale for $2 - I had two BOGO coupons and there was an extra care bucks promotion for $4 ECB when you bought $10 of Suave stuff

2 Suave deoderant - $1.37 each on sale for $1 Also had a $.50 off coupon

So what WOULD have cost $35.78 cost $14.11, plus $7 ECB leaving a total cost of $7.11.

Now THAT is savings...