Sunday, April 30, 2006

Greyhounds

Amelia wrote her first "research" report this weekend. I helped a bit with prodding and suggestions, but it is her report.
She used three sources and notecards. The four paragraphs are, Description of animal, Habitat, Food, and Interesting Facts.

Here's the final text of Amelia's report: (she is in 2nd grade, by the way)

A greyhound has long legs. Some are white and have pointed ears. The tail is long and a little curved at the end. They have very fine and short coats.
Some greyhounds live in houses. Some live at race tracks and other places a hound might be happy. Some strays live in parks and big fields.
The fastest dog can reach up to 40 miles per hour. Greyhounds hunt by sight. The longer the nose the sweeter. They are very beautiful and whine when cold. If a greyhound goes outside in winter time he will need a coat.
Greyhounds eat regular old dog food, bacon and biscuits. Racing greyhounds have special diets.


I like the part about "The longer the nose the sweeter". I don't think that was in any of the texts we read.

Have a great week!

Thursday, April 27, 2006

Great Day...Part 3


I went bowling this afternoon. It was team building exercise for work. I bowled about as well as I ever have.
Fun. I work with great people.
I didn't get much work done today, however.

Great Day...Part 2


Lunch with friends at the Macaroni Grill was a nice treat. Here's a picture of Minda's tomato soup...it was too pretty to pass up.

Great Day...Part 1


Amelia singing at her second grade "concert". She is on the end of the front row.

Here she is bowing at the end of the concert. Mr. Hoffman, her WONDERFUL music teacher, is seen in the foreground.

Here's the line-up of camcorders recording the event.

Afterwards, Margaret played on the playground at school for a few minutes before I took her off to Krissie's. Groovy outfit, eh?

Wednesday, April 26, 2006

Bloomers


Smith College Basketball team of 1902.

Tuesday, April 25, 2006

Shoes...



Peter and Katie


Here's the beautiful couple. By the time I took this picture, they had been dancing for hours and had already posed for a million shots. They still look lovely, if not a bit tired. :-)


Here's a bunch of the little girls watching the bride and groom dance their first dance. And let me tell you, this bride and groom knew how to dance. It was heavenly.


Here's my little Margaret and her best friend for the day. The flower girl, named Marjorie. They were dancing together all night.


Here's Amelia dancing on her own in the the side studio. All the kids had fun dancing in that place.


Smile!





Here's Amelia with Pieter and Maria. Amelia was Pieter and Maria's flower girl two years ago. We like Pieter and Maria a lot.

Friday, April 21, 2006

Good Day...Sunshine



I'm going to buy the QuicKutz Sunshine set today. My first mini alphabet (I just haven't wanted to bother with these before). This one is soooo cute, I can't wait to use it!

And....
Here it is!!!

Wednesday, April 19, 2006

Future journalist?



I had out my typewriter last night. The girls had fun typing on it. I guess it seems weird to them that the letters go straight onto the paper.

I was trying to remember what all the different nobs and levers on the typewriter were for. In typing class in high school I remember doing all that...setting margins, even typing footnotes. This typewriter is the one I received as my present for graduation from high school. Pretty standard gift back then.

I guess they probably don't teach typing anymore...everyone already knows how to do it by Junior High as a life survival skill.

If you give a kid a camera...

Here's what happens.

I had the camera at church on Sunday. Margaret (age 5) had it for awhile. Here's a sampling of her pictures...



Sunday, April 16, 2006

Resurrection Sunday!!!!


Here's hoping you and yours had a blessed Easter Sunday.

We celebrated with two full church services (Charlie and Nancy sang at both) followed by a steak dinner at our home where 7 grad students came as guests (and potluck providers).

Hallelujah!
Christ is Risen!!!

He is Risen Indeed!!!
Hallelujah!

Saturday, April 15, 2006

Rivera Blows Save; Twins Win



Margaret had the digital camera pointed at us just as the 2nd Twin crossed the plate in the bottom of the ninth. Twins won 7-6. Beat the Yankees. Beat Mariano Rivera.

Yeah!

Pancakes and Parades






We started our Saturday with pancakes again. Margaret did all the mixing, putting on the griddle, and flipping. I just measured the ingredients, broke the egg, and supervised the turning.

Later today Amelia had a parade with our American flag. She was marching up and down the street with the flag, singing the national anthem at the top of her lungs.

It's a warm holy Saturday. We are preparing to host 7 graduate students for dinner tomorrow. We do the steak and cheesy potatoes, they bring everything else.

It should be a nice day.

Thursday, April 13, 2006

Here today...gone tomorrow


Here I am at work. Hi to everyone!

I will be taking off tomorrow to be home with my daughters since they have no school or daycare. We will likely go to the park, make egg heads (I've been saving egg shells this week), and hopefully do some scrapbooking.

I asked them if maybe they would like to get together with Andrew (my friend Minda's son)...I was thinking I would call her up and meet her at Chutes and Ladders park in Bloomington. Amelia said..."Oh no! You are NOT going to go scrapbooking tomorrow." They already know Minda as my scrapbooking buddy. Funny.

Back to work for a couple of hours.

Bye!

Wednesday, April 12, 2006

Nothing new today

Just a fun picture I found a while back.



Enjoy!

Tuesday, April 11, 2006

Tulips




We ate supper outside last night on our brand new deck. I bought some tulips on the way home, because they were just too hard to resist.

It was tough to get the girls up to the deck to sit down and eat. They were having too much fun playing!

Hoping for another dinner on the deck tonight. I guess I'll have to buy some deck furniture, 'cause moving the card table and kitchen chairs back and forth every evening could get old.


Amelia has a tulip nose.



Margaret gives me a really big smile.

Monday, April 10, 2006

Egg Heads


So, how cute are these?!? I think the girls will love them...an activity for Friday when I'm home with them.

If you can't read the directions here they are... you take an egg shell and wash it out. Then decorate it like a face with paints or markers. Put some dirt and grass seed in the shell. Water and put in sun. After the grass sprouts, you can cut and style it as you wish. Plants other than grass would be cool, too.

Let me know if you try it, and send me pictures with your results!

I found this idea in the Parent and Child magazine from Scholastic. My day care provider gives this to us every month (along with the book order forms :-))

Sunday, April 09, 2006

Tax Time



What did you do with your weekend? I spent mine with Turbo Tax and our financial records for the year. I still need to figure out how to handle the municipal bonds we sold, then I can file. I can't believe how OBTUSE the entire process is. I spent quite a while trying to figure out how to handle some stock sales. I wish it wasn't so complicated. I saved $350 from what it was costing us to have it done.

How much money is a weekend worth? Maybe we'll pay to get them done next year...


Friday, April 07, 2006

Links...Cool

I'm learning a bit more each day about this blogging thing.
I added some links to the sidebar of places I go. Three are my favorite bloggers. One is my family's website. (which does need some updating..hubby does that) One is the National Weather Service Radar site. Best radar site around. Good to have handy as severe weather season approaches.

And of course...a picture for today. Here is an older layout that is still one of my favs.


Wednesday, April 05, 2006

Orca







This cool picture is from my vacation this past summer to Alaska.

I so want to work on this scrapbook. Maybe it's time to dump everything else and work on it.

Tuesday, April 04, 2006

Where I want to be..

This is my scraproom. My own little slice of heaven.
The colors (and the stripe pattern on the wall) are from SEI's Serendipity line. Yummy color names like Indigo, Apricot, Lima Bean (OK, that doesn't sound too yummy), Oxford Blue, Tropical Punch and Butternut.

The window is a south facing basement egress window, so I get lots of natural light in the room.

I would like to be there RIGHT NOW.

OK, I really do like my job, and I have some fun things to accomplish today. But...I still want to be home scrapping.

Monday, April 03, 2006

Inside Day

Well, I thought spring was officially here when we spent Saturday outside playing and working.

Now I am struggling with a cold that feels mysteriously like it's allergy related. I may end up going home from work early today, as my head is all munged up and spinning. That would make today an "Inside Day".

I guess maybe spring isn't officially here until allergy season starts. I took an Allegra this am hoping that would help. We'll see.

Of course, now that I know how to do pictures, I can't do a post without them.




Hmmm. Perhaps this fun picture that a friend of mine took in Singapore last January.

Cheers!

Saturday, April 01, 2006

Outside Day



Yay!!!! We finally had a good outside day.

I took the girls to Hiawatha park. We played for about and hour and a half. I walked around the park several times to get in some walking.

We washed the car. (At Don's Carwash...not in the driveway)

The girls ate lunch outside and played with Zack on his trampoline next door.

I cleaned up deck construction mess so the yard wouldn't get any baldspots when the grass starts to grow.

Wow!!! How nice to finally get outside. And with the time change tonight, it will be light out until almost 8 tomorrow night.

WooHoo!!! Spring...here you are!!!

(Can you tell I'm happy?)