What we do with a little sunshine

Last Saturday was warm. We started out the afternoon something like this:

 We quickly progressed to this:

and ended up something like this:

It was a good day.

Ah, the smell of my own fresh-cut grass!
(And a great man to cut it for me.)

Have I mentioned that I love my house?

Girl Power

Lizzy is confident, smart, sassy, and charming. I find this a dangerous combination at times. While getting the boys ready to go somewhere, I noticed her performing an interesting dance the other day, so I thought I'd share, since it seems to be a little peek into the workings of her mind.

I sure hope she still feels this way when she's sixteen.

Changes

Am I the only one who is sick of things constantly changing? I can't turn on the computer without demands for upgrading this and getting the new format of that. I have had the same email address since high school, but every time I log in the site looks different. It's not that I don't appreciate advances in technology. I just would like things to calm down a little so I can catch up. Maybe if nobody tinkered with these things for a year or two I would be excited for a change.

House

The last month and a half have been full. We moved, we drove to Colorado and back, we celebrated Christmas a couple times, and we finally closed on the house.

We love our house. It is not a big house, but we have so much more space than we used to have. We have a little yard to romp around in and a garage to keep our clutter mostly out of the way. We can walk to church again, and we are actually in a neighborhood, instead of living surrounded by university students. There is room to walk all the way around our kitchen table. We are really happy here.

Finally taking down the "Sale Pending" sign. The car in the driveway? It's ours. Dirty dishes in the sink? Also ours. Because we live in our own home now!

Lots of boxes to unpack. We still have a bunch in the garage, but I might just wait until it's not freezing out there before I unpack them. Plenty of space to play in front of our cute fireplace.Fun on the deck. A panorama of our backyard. (The deck's not actually wonky. It's just the way things got spliced together.)

Thank you, Your Highness

I offered Lizzy two options for lunch today, and she didn't like either of them. She turned away with a toss of her sassy head and said, "I'm not coming. You are dismissed."
Maybe tomorrow I won't give her options.

Good Food

Barak is a pretty easy-going little guy. He plays on his own, with his siblings or with friends equally well. He likes to play rough and tumble "boy" games, but he is also happy to join his big sister for a tea party, dressed as Cinderella. But - the boy knows his own mind. He surprises me on a daily basis by knowing exactly what it is he wants.
For Thanksgiving we go to my parents house, where we spend the day stuffing ourselves with candy, cookies, fudge, and other snacks. Then we sit down to turkey, and ham, and stuffing, and mashed potatoes, and rolls, and deviled eggs, and fruit salad, and cranberry sauce, and, and, and....
I had the pleasure to sit next to little Barak at dinner, and help him fill his plate. Right away he let me know what he wanted. He was not so interested in potatoes or stuffing or any of that stuff. He pointed to the platter of meat and kept pointing, saying, "I want that! I want that!" Not a piece of turkey. Not a piece of ham. He wanted the drumstick. So we gave it to him.



And he was very happy.