Ballet Class

Remembering

Remembering 10 years ago.

Evangelyn's 3rd Birthday

Evangelyn turned three a few weeks ago and we celebrated with a princess party. It was less than a week after we returned from California so I was still pretty jet lagged when putting the party together. Therefore, we had a store-bought cake and decorations that required little imagination on my part. I felt a little bad that it was all rushed, but Evangelyn didn't care a bit and loved her castle. She was so excited for the party and helped me buy last-minute party favors the morning of. I loved having her involved in the party planning and watching her excitement over it all. She chose a treasure hunt for one of her games (digging for treasure in the sandpit). It was a favorite, but not pics. I was busy leading the party. Here are a few other highlights...

BFFs

What? Me? I didn't just inhale a chocolate cupcake. Really. I'm innocent.

Tearing the presents apart. Her favorite was some princess lip gloss.

Sharing a new story.

Frog Hollow

A new school year has begun, but not just for me & Mr. Chong. Our little Evangleyn (now 3 years old!) had her first day at Frog Hollow last week. I guess it's more of a pre-school than "real" school, but it's exciting just the same! It was quite a job to get all the bits and pieces for her uniform. She loves it and wants to wear it all day long even though she's out of school at eleven. So far, her favorite part of school is that she gets to go with her "best friend in the whole world" and that she gets to dance in P.E.

Spring 2011

Kiss

Canaan's kissy face (pre-haircut).

Remember this shirt, Aunt Mary??

It's being put to good use as Evie's crafting smock.

Happy Bell Pepper

This was months ago and I can't remember if I ever showed it. I was looking through some old pictures and found it again. I sliced off the top of a bell pepper that I was using for dinner and there was a happy face inside it! How cool is that?? I wanted to keep it forever but that would have been gross.

Better late than never...

Here's a little video of Canaan's first birthday on Christmas. I finally got motivated to put it together, thanks to recent reminders and requests from Canaan's loved ones. I also had an opportunity to put it together thanks to a rainy day in Washington, D.C.

May the Force be with you...

...actually, with me, when I'm making cookies with a 13 month old and a 2 1/2 year old. 

The other day, Evie and I wanted to make cookies. We wanted to use some new cookie cutters that were a belated birthday gift to Chonger (that's what Evie knows as here dad's name). We put on our aprons that Mary made us with her amazing seamstress skills and began to pull out the ingredients. 

Eggs - check.

Flour - check.

Baking soda - check.

Butter - ummm...not enough butter. That's okay, we can just make half the recipe.

Sugar - ummm...shoot. Not enough sugar. Sad. We'll have to wait until tomorrow.

Tomorrow came and I ran to our village post office to pick up our missing ingredients. I made the dough and put it in the fridge to chill and then remembered it needed to chill overnight. Oh, well. It was a good lesson for Evie in being patient. She didn't mind too much. The next day came and we pulled Evie's little table into the little kitchen which is our little routine for baking together. We put on our aprons again and got to work rolling the dough and trying out the cookie cutters. Canaan, of course, wanted to be in on the action and had a blast pounding the table, spreading flour around, and sneaking bites of the dough. He learned that from his sister.

We had so much dough that we used our heart cutters from Grandma & Grandpa Chong to make Valentine cookies that are still in the tupperware waiting to be decorated and given to Evie's little friends. Maybe tomorrow.

I'm a Fairy, I'm a Bee

 Since Evie's been into dressing up more lately, I decided to make her a fairy skirt to wear with her wings. I got inspiration from two blogs that I love (Happy Together and Samster Mommy) and created something that's sort of a mix of the two. I used a scrap of fabric I found in the remnants box for £1, bells from the charity shop and some ribbon that's been floating around our house for years now. I think the silver might even be left over from my wedding 7 years ago!

 As you can see, Evie loved it. She didn't want Canaan to be left out and kept asking if I made him a fairy skirt.

 Instead, we decided to make him a bee and pulled out Evie's Halloween costume.

They had so much fun flying around the house...

...and then decided to get just a little crazy by becoming 

a monkey fairy and a lion-bee.

Dancing with Daddy

Aaaargh!

Evie's really into dressing up lately. Sunday she was a bee. Monday she was a fairy. Tuesday she was a super dog fairy. Wednesday she was a super Mexican wrestler. She took a break on Thursday and Friday. This morning she was a fairy monkey. This afternoon she was a pirate and built her own ship!

"Aaargh!" she says.

Valentine's Crafts

Here are some of the festive hearts that Evie's made with a little help from me. Two of her favorite things to do lately are cutting and gluing. We love the glue stick and scissors from Nanny, as well as the heart mobile kit she sent us in a special Valentine package. We were able to use the extra parts from the kit to make a second mobile. We glued on sequins that I found for 50p at a charity shop the day before. Perfect! Evie's Daddy even got a little influenced by the hearts and helped her do a bit of cutting and gluing today.

Now in a Daze from the Holidays

We're back in the UK and struggling to beat the jet lag. According to our notes from past trips, it should take about a week until we are somewhat close to normal in our sleeping patterns. Here is an approximation of what last night was like: Evie and Canaan went to sleep at 8:50. Both woke up at 10:15. Back to sleep at 2. Evie woke up at 2:40. Back to sleep at 4. Woke up at 4:15. Back to sleep at 4:20. Me wide awake at 4:20 for about another hour. Yawn.

It took two very large cups of coffee and one small one to get me through today and now I'm wishing I had another to help me keep my eyes open for another hour while I sit in the dorm and make sure the students are studying diligently. They are. I almost wish they weren't so that I'd have to be active instead of just sitting here.

I gave up on shopping ebay for a Kindle cover and thought I'd write a little about Christmas here to help me stay awake. We spent two weeks in San Clemente.

Okay. I'm now too tired to write and just got distracted by facebook, so I'm going to post some pics instead of writing.

Just kidding. I don't have them with me here in the dorm, so I'll post them later from home.