SJ Makes Me Laugh

It's amazing what SJ will do for fun. Today she sat her balloons around her table and shared her snacks with them!

A new friend

SJ and I went to visit my friend who had her baby last week. SJ enjoyed holding little J. and then tickling her. She also tested out all her baby books and approved all her baby bibs and dresses.

Girl Time

SJ got some nail polish in her Easter Basket. She read the bottle and it said, "No boys allowed." So, she and Grandma had some girl time and did their nails!

Contractors

As has been much discussed in this space, we're currently in the midst of a major home renovation project - or really nearly a demolition and start from scratch project.

While we've done little of the physical labor ourselves, the management of the project has been about 100X more time consuming than we ever imagined.

As DIY veterans from our current home, there has certainly been work done at our house that we were glad we didn't have to do and/or easily convinced the professionals did a better job than we could have done.

Then, you run into work like this...

This is supposed to be an on door spice rack that conveniently puts spices at your fingertips. Unfortunately, they installed the spice rack at the top of the cabinet, so all but the lowest spices would be unreachable by the person who does most of the cooking in our house. But, most frustratingly, they installed it so that we couldn't have any shelves in about 3/4 of the cabinet. While the cabinet is now perfect for all those 3 foot novelty olive oil bottles you see in stores but never buy, we were hoping for something a bit more functional. How does one install this and think "Yup, that looks right".

Happy Easter

Easter was a busy day for little SJ. We woke her up early to go the the 8am service at church. Later we drove up to her Gami and Papi's house in Newburyport for Easter dinner. While there SJ got to have her 2nd formal Easter egg hunt - more plastic eggs (I think we've accumulated about 50 of them this year!) and more candy! When she returned home she had her 3rd Easter egg hunt with the eggs she colored yesterday.

Decorating Eggs

SJ had a lot of fun decorating eggs this year. I saw little egg tongs at the store and picked some up for her. This ended up being the best $1 I've spent. Last year she insisted on using her entire hand to get eggs in and out of the cups, but this year she carefully lowered and lifted them with the tongs. The package actually said "Ages 5+" but she did great with them and I'm not really sure why they said that.

Easter (Egg) Hunt #1

SJ has been practicing finding Easter eggs all week ever since I got out the Easter decorations, but this morning was her first official hunt. Our local Star Market had an Easter egg hunt for kids - the under 4 group had to be there at 7:30! So we woke SJ up early and went egg hunting, which SJ likes to simply call "an Easter hunt."



The plastic eggs were all down one particular aisle at Star Market. The eggs were mostly just laid out on the floor - easy for the little kids to find, but some were also up in the shelves. SJ filled her basket to overflowing - really, the eggs kept all falling out and we had to put some back.

When we got home we all opened the eggs to see what was inside. She got a whole bowl full of candy - some Hershey kisses, some little Milky Ways, some Rolos, and many little chocolate eggs. I do not know what we will do with all that candy. Actually, I will probably send it with Nathan to share at work.

SJ's "Games"

SJ loves to make up these "games" that involve regular items and involves matching them, stacking them, or passing them back and forth. Since she's had a lot of playtime with a willing participate in these games (i.e. Grandpa) she has played a lot of them this week.

The first game was Candle. In Candle you simply get out all of Mommy's candles and stack them or rearrange them in boxes.

Then came Garden. In Garden you get out Mommy's display fruit and match them up with the smaller SJ play fruit to create mommy and baby fruit pairs. (This is after assuring Grandpa that you're allowed to play with Mommy's display fruit.) You have to put them in the basket and take them out again and then take the baby fruit to school.

Then came Baby. In Baby SJ acts like a baby and likes being held and being put to bed. Grandpa tried to be the one to be the baby but SJ insisted he was too big.

Welcome Grandma and Grandpa!

Today SJ welcomed her Grandma and Grandpa from Ohio. She was so excited all morning before they came and insisted on watching out the window for them. Friday they will take SJ to her first movie!

Gaming and Reunions

On Sunday, SJ enjoyed a game of Memory with friends, Isaac, Simon and Karla (Becca's mom, who graciously kept the kids busy while the adults enjoyed some good conversations! Thanks, Karla!) Unpictured are our good friends, Josh and Jill, who were visiting from Kansas. I am really regretting not getting the group together for a picture before we left. We had such a nice time visiting with them and it was great to have 4 of the 5 original Small Group couples all together again.

By the way, SJ is getting better with losing at games. If we play Candy Land now she will be happy for us if we win only once. Then she has to win. If she doesn't she gets upset. Some progress at least!

Daddy and Daughter

Here's a snip-it of a recent conversation between SJ and her Daddy:

Daddy: "SJ, whatcha doing?"

SJ: "Having some of your coke."

Daddy: "Just a little bit, o.k? Coke is just for fun, it doesn't help you grow."

pause as SJ sips....

SJ: "Daddy, they should make a Growing Coke."

Daddy, laughing: "Yes, that would be a great idea!"

SJ and her Daddy, Diet-Coke addicts.

An Experience

Today we visited Jordan's Furniture in Reading. We have been to other Jordan's, but this was our first trip to this one. It was pretty fun for a furniture store. This particular Jordan's is Boston themed. When you first walk in you are amazed at the back wall which has a huge Green Monster display who is "eating" a Yankees player.



Also in the front area is the Liquid Fireworks display which is a lighted water fountain show set to music. Every 1/2 hour you get the patriotic show and every 10 min you get another show set to current pop music.




There's also an indoor trapeze, but we just watched that. We'll leave the trapeze arts to my sister-in-law, Ruthie.



There was even an ice cream place and lots of chairs where we could sit and watch everything that was going on. SJ got a "kiddie" cone and it was large enough to feed all 3 of us!






Finally, we sat SJ in the taxi cab stroller (free, by the way) and strolled around the furniture store. She's a little sad because she wanted to stay in the fun area and not go look at couches!






I can really understand now why Jordan's theme is, "Not just a store... an experience." You should check it out sometime!

Take Your Daughter to Work

Today SJ got to visit my work. Typically I don't work on Tuesdays, but on this particular day we were having a baby shower lunch for a coworker, Shoba. SJ was super excited all day to visit my hospital. She was very well behaved and personable during the lunch and made everyone smile and laugh. She watched intently as Shoba opened all her gifts and didn't even try to open any herself.

After the party SJ had a tour of the PT clinic. She got to try out the leg press machine, which was her favorite:

As we were leaving we stopped by the book vendor who had set up in the main lobby for the day. We picked out one book to by and SJ thought it was "so cool" that my hospital had a "book store." I had to tell her it was just for one day, so it was special. Then one of our patients, who was a former pre-school teacher, gave SJ a little stuffed kitten. SJ loves "Marlene" the kitty and has carried it with her everywhere since then.

When we got home SJ kept saying how it was her "special day!" I had to remind her that we went there to celebrate a baby who was to be born, too. "Oh, mine and Shoba's special day!"

moving along....

It's hard to continually find new blog posting titles to describe the progress on our house. This past week the granite and sink were installed, the pendant lights went up and the french door went in, and the old radiators were taken away. We're still awaiting the plumbing and several other finishing touches. Today while SJ and I were at the Art's Festival, Nathan worked hard ripping up the wood floor in the new family room so we can put in new, cherry wood floors. Nathan says he had a big pile of wood in the front yard he was staring at thinking it was way to much for the Arlington trash collectors. Well, wouldn't you know it that just at that moment someone drove up and asked Nathan if he could buy the pile of wood! Nathan ended up selling it for $50. Not bad for something you were going to just toss. This is one of the few happy stories we have to share about this whole house renovation process. Most everything else has been a hassle, a problem, involved a disagreement, involved several phone calls and emails, and included stern tones of voice. I think we're going to have to live in this house forever after all this work. At least we will likely never take on another home renovation project again!

A Day of the Arts

Today SJ and I attended Park Street Church's Children's Art Festival. SJ got to lean about violins, guitars and painting.

SJ learned how to hold a violin, pluck it's strings, and take a bow when she was all finished.

In guitar class she learned how to strum and hold a pick.

And in painting class, she learned how to mix 2 colors to make a new one!