Wednesday, August 27, 2008



We have had a nice summer, but now back to school!! YEAH!!
Taylor is starting third grade and has Mr. Levy for his teacher. Because of overcrowding, instead of going to Hubbard Elementary that is K-3, he goes right next door about 200 ft. away at Teed Elementary that is normally 4-5 grades, but this year gets 2 third grade classes. It will be a nice change for him to have a male teacher and he was really excited to start (although the photos don't really capture that happiness).


Hannah started kindergarten and has Mrs. Saunders for her teacher. She was pretty excited to get to go to school like big brother-a little nervous in the beginning- and even more excited to ride the bus home. We are officially in a "walk zone", but morning kindergarteners get bussed home. So I now get from 8:00-11:30 a little time to get some work done, do errands, etc.


(This dragonfly was awesome, it was orange and its wing tips blended into a beautiful blue.)

We enjoyed our second annual trip to Idaho Botanical Garden on Saturday to enjoy all kinds of "bug fun". They are great clients of mine and I do the postcard and map that go with Bug Day.

Taylor has NO fear about touching all kinds of bigs, no matter how big they are.


Hannah got to go this year and while she wasn't too interested in the bug-a-mania, she did like all the crafts. She got to make a really cute butterfly out of coffee filters that she watercolored and then put in a wooden clothes pin. Then she did a pasta project that showed the life cycle of a butterfly.


They both really liked the "bug juice" they offered (really sweet blue punch).



We didn't get to stay very long but we had a great time and the gardens were beautiful.

Wednesday, August 6, 2008

My fabulous friend gave the family a tie-dyed T-shirt kit TWO years ago as a gift at Christmas. It was about time I used it, so yesterday the kids were very excited to make them. This month's Parent's Magazine just happened to have an awesome article all about tie-dying and how to make different patterns and so we all picked out our patterns and the kids picked out colors. Then we rubber banded around, rubber gloved up and dyed away. With only fushia, turquoise and yellow you can get every color in the rainbow.
It was so much fun, like every project we do I enjoy it as much as they do! Here is our results! We wore our shirts today and we all love them.


So here is each shirt and the pattern used. We've decided Taylor's "Bullseye" is the best.


Hannah's was the "rosette" and if she had done one color you could see the circles better, but Hannah could not do just one color, she had to do them all and some more!


I picked the "spiral" pattern and was only going to do one color-pink- but when you are at a table with two other children doing their shirts, it's hard not to get their colors on yours, so here is my attempt.


Mike was at work, so I got to do his shirt for him, he picked out the colors and pattern-this one is called the "diagonal stripe". I love the blue fading to green! I think his is a close second to Taylor's for how it turned out.



That was so fun I want to DYE some more stuff!

Hannah just loves to "do" my hair. I would love it if she loved me to do her hair but these things don't work out like that in our house. So today Hannah gave me pony tails and was so excited we had to get photos. She wanted to "do my make-up" but that only happens when I don't have to leave the house for any reason!


So I tried to use my negotiating skills to try something out new on her hair but all I got to do was more ponytails:

And fifteen minutes later when she got mad at me for something, she ripped them out. Good thing I got one photo.
When she was still happy she even thought that maybe Ginger, our very patient dog, would appreciate getting accessorized with a headband (she even does this to the cat).



Why is my daughter so stubborn about her hair? I am NOT looking forward to when school starts and I have to endure daily drama to get it done (and no I am not cutting it off, that does not resolve anything, she still has to have barrettes or something to keep it out of her face).