Jubilee Monday

Jubilee Street Party 

Games

Lining up for a parade.

 Raise your hand if you are 2, 3, or 4.

It's getting cold.

 I'm 2! I'm 3!

 Hot dogs, veggie dogs, beer.

Pick a pocket for 50p.

Back home after the rain started.

 Playing in our own castle!

Happy Jubilee!

More Dancing

Evangelyn and Canaan took the "microphone," as Canaan calls it, out of their AbbyCadabby doll. 

It was their favorite toy of the morning.

Painting Faces

We've had a lot of cold rainy days lately, so one day we pulled out the face paints. A little while later, we had a puppy and a princess. They both wanted me to paint my face as well...like a witch (but a good one, of course).

Double Rainbow

Funny Faces

Who needs DDR?

If above doesn't work, click this link to see it...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jckrq8hCo74

Winter

Evie's and Canaan chose some pictures to share...

 Me and Canaan were jumping off.

 Me and Mommy watching the show of Princess and the Pea.

Our Christmas tree.

I feed the ducks and I saw a castle.

Me and Canaan

Canaan goes to school! 

Backpack! (says Canaan)

...and, yes. It really is that dark when the kids leave for school. Canaan seemed to love his first day at nursery school. No tears. I felt a little lonely the first half hour of the morning that I had all to myself but then I was used to it and LOVED it! I sat in front of my s.a.d. light for a half hour, planned the grocery list, put on my makeup, and got some laundry done with no interruptions...and then I still had time to go to the store, unload all the groceries, and finish up some more laundry before picking up my little monkeys from school. This is great!

Ballet Class

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).

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.

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.

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.

The (2nd) Best Christmas Present Ever!

It would be THE BEST Christmas present ever except for the fact that Canaan was born on Christmas, so he has to be the best one. The second best gift, I received today. It's in my kitchen and is going to add hours to my week. It's a dishwasher! It's a long story starting with how we asked for it but then did not think we were going to get it and finally encountered a situation that worked to our benefit and we got it. The work began about 10 days ago when the maintenance guys removed our tiny refrigerator, leaving an empty space just large enough to catch our kids' interest. Canaan managed to pull off a board that used to cover the bottom part of the cabinets. A couple days later, I was facing the stove preparing dinner and Canaan was hanging out in the kitchen with me. I suddenly heard a strange noise, turned around and only saw his feet sticking out of the cave. He was stunned but fortunately not hurt. We ended up sticking our rubbish bins in the hole to keep the kids out. It worked pretty well. So, after 9 days of protecting our kids from the cave of danger, Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum received a threat from their boss that made them eager to install our dishwasher. They finished at noon and I finished my afternoon washing up in 5 minutes as opposed to the usual 15 to 20.

I love my dishwasher.

Snow Day!

Yes, we had a snow day! It's the third year in a row that school's been closed because of the snow. We love it! We, including the kids, slept in, played in the snow and then headed over to make sugar cookies with some friends in the neighborhood. I ended my no sugar until Christmas by indulging in some delicious homemade fudge. Oh, well. I can always do no sugar as my new year's resolution. We ended the day at the Red Lion having dinner with friends...and then got a text later that we'd have another snow day on Friday!