Group Ladybug Hug

Sometimes the preschool girls are just too cute!

The random, funny things they say

At the temple today I asked Jell if she agreed that the temple was beautiful. She said, "Yeah. Oh! I should have brought my paints so I could paint it!" Who's daughter is she?

And more proof (for me to remember) that they do love me despite intentionally trying to make me lose my mind daily: The girls were outside weeding while daddy was cleaning the car. He called them "weed-machines" and Jell said, "Yeah, we want to be just like mommy. She's a weed-machine too." So even though Jell has told me that I'm "frusterating" her frequently as of late, I guess we're still friends!

My daughter might have burst into tears when she didn't get picked to help in Primary today. Any ideas on how to make her a little less sensitive????

Lyric issues:
"I bray, I bottle" = "I pray, I borrow"
"Waffle fairies made I ever met" = "You're the fairest maid I ever met"

Coop taught Jell how to cheat today by clicking a hint button that showed you a match on a memory game on the Friend website. Is it worse when you cheat on a church website?? In his defense, she was getting quite "frusterated" at not finding any matches. From then on, however, she didn't even try. She just cheated ... and still wanted us to cheer for every match she found.

Meri pointed at a picture of a little, round, dark-haired, sombrero-wearing Mexican man in a book today, and identified him as Papa (Coop's dad who doesn't look a thing like him but does happen to be in Mexico right now - kinda weird).

In the store the other day Jell asks as loudly as she could, "Why is that lady not being modest? Did her mommy not teach her to be modest? She should put some sleeves on. Someone might see her." I'm blushing.

Jell might ask to listen to Enya in the car. She went through a phase when she asked for Jonny Lang, "the witch and the fairy (Wicked)" and she always identifies Norah Jones whenever and wherever she hears her.

Jell often asks us to call her Giselle. She's a little obsessed with Enchanted. Oh and the majority of the time, Jell writes her name backwards. Like mirror-image backwards. Each individual letter backwards, the whole word backwards. When I point this out, she usually says, "Yeah, I know. I like it that way." Hard to argue with that.

We spell words like "pet store" that we don't want them to hear until we have definite plans. However, Jell has taken to chasing us around the house anytime we spell ANYTHING, repeatedly asking (until someone gives her what she thinks could be the correct answer) "what does that spell?" "what word are you saying?" And you have to be really quick on your feet, because responding with an "I don't know" or "you tell me" or "I was just talking to daddy," doesn't cut it. And when you tell her it means some random, uninteresting word, she totally doesn't buy it although she'll sometimes give up and leave you alone. She so knows we only spell things we don't want her to hear. How do they get so smart?

I wish I could remember more!

Now that's the way to start a day!

What a sweet husband and girlies (Don't look too closely - I look terrible)! The girls sat there and drooled over my shoulder until I had Coop bring their own plates into my room and I allowed them to eat on the floor so we could all be together. That way I got to enjoy comments like, "HEY! Meri! Don't put your foot in my food!" Aaaah. Sweet motherhood.

Que esta arriba?

So I've been grading a lot of Spanish (mostly beginner Spanish from teens) the past week and I feel like I'm either back in the MTC or back in 7th grade with Senora Olson staring down her glasses at us. Sometimes it's just painful to read, and sometimes it's hilarious! So despite the fact that this will only be really funny to Spanish speakers I just had to post it in hopes that someone else could get a few laughs. And by the way, I got all this from just about an hour and a half of work. I'll translate the ones that are funny without knowing Spanish.
Here goes:

mi dormitorio tiene dos corderos en cada lado de mi cama. (My bedroom has two LAMBS on either side of my bed - easy slip of the finger to type the wrong word in English but in Spanish one is cordero and the other is lampara)

Mi Madre es muy aburrido y facil. Mi hermano voy a rósado pantélones. (My mother es very boring and easy. My brother goes to pink pants.)

Ella es trabajadora muchas. Juega la golf con ella pelotas de golf. Ella tiene en la falda y la sombero en la boca. (She is very worker. She play golf with she golf balls. She has in the skirt and the hat in the mouth - what does she have in the skirt and how and why did she get a hat in her mouth?)

En yo casa. Nosotros comemes en el famila roma.

Estoy mucho extadico para tu vey tu.

estoy me gusta cocinar es spicy food

Poner muchas las ropas. Los pantaones cortos, la chaqueta, la falda y la camisa es muy bien para el tiempo. Adídos!

Una ella es juego golf. Ella es usar un pelo de golf. ella es llevar una camisa y pantelones peqenos. el pelota fue en la sanda y ella hices usar el pelo de golf poder el petoa en verde.

En la cosia, tengo un refrigerador, un mesa en el centre, y otra cosas yo no puedo decir. (He meant to say: In the kitchen, I have a fridge, a table in the center and other things I can't say. I know he means he doesn't know how to say them but it makes me think why? are they bad words? would they hurt somebody's feelings? is somebody listening who shouldn't be?)

Mi casa es pequeño. Es mucha fúrnetura. Mi casa es muchas télevisíones. Es un referadora en la mochenta. ???????

Tú shoulda llevar cortos pantalones, camisetas, y camisas con zapatos. (if you don't know a word, you can just add an "a" on the end and it's spanish, right?)

No me gusta pop musica y muy exadroment personales.

Nosotrso son vamanos el parque. el tiempo es sól. Bring los shorts y camisteas. Nosotrso son vamanos a
Hope you had a few laughs. I just had to share!

So amazed by the Tulip Festival!!!!

I am ashamed to admit I have never been to the Tulip Festival before. I don't know how I've so missed out - I only heard about it last year for the first time and I've lived here my whole life. So sad. Because this is what I was missing:
Pictures so don't do it justice ... at least the pictures we are capable of taking that is. When we walked around the barn and the whole view was laid before me, I got teary-eyed I was so overwhelmed by the incredible, indescribable beauty! I gotta say, that whole Big-Bang theory just doesn't add up to me. Those tulips are just further evidence of our loving Heavenly Father. I'm so grateful that he cared enough to not only give us a world to live in, but to make it so amazingly beautiful!! He didn't have to do that, but He knew we'd enjoy it, and I imagine He enjoyed creating it too. I'm so grateful He took the extra time or effort or attention to detail or whatever to grant us such visual feasts. I'm grateful for the hands that prepared such a meal!!
Here's a couple of pictures to sum up our day there:





Cute little girls are evidence too!

Fun with the Bernes

As is everything I post lately, this is a little late - but here's some fun pictures from Passover at Keith and Rosie's house.
Before dinner the girls had a blast outside with their older cousins. Meri loves hula-hooping, or whatever she can do with a hula hoop and a lot of help:
And when that fun wears off, there's always dandelions to spread around Uncle Keith's backyard:

Jell was a bit more adventurous and decided to take up skateboarding (we survived without any new owies - a major accomplishment I think:
But that gets tiring, so time to rest and reflect for awhile:
And be cute:
I love the color of her hair in the sun!
And when the skateboard is just too tricky, run sprints. Isn't that what you do for kicks?
We love Nana and Bopa!

The most important things:

Last night in Jell's prayer, she asked Heavenly Father to please bless her hair to grow really long (long = beautiful). She also prayed that Tayson (her friend that just moved to New York) could move back so they can play again. And even though it was 9 PM she prayed that we could go outside and play and that daddy wouldn't have to go to work, and that she could please play with Paige (her cousin).

Hunting for eggs!

And again, I couldn't choose between these sweet easter egg hunting pics so here's another slide (very late I know):

I love the looks on their faces as they find the eggs! And even better, this year they didn't make me re-hide the eggs for weeks after the fact. Yeah!

Loving the temple flowers!

And here's some more pictures for Anna. There's so many of them, I really don't expect anyone but her (and maybe Grandma and Aunt Patti) to watch them all :) Basically I couldn't choose just a couple pics because I love them all, so I made a slide show instead. Enjoy!

Boys are weird

(That is what I learn every Sunday from our CTR 7 class of 6 boys.)

Today we were learning about the Word of Wisdom (which is a revelation received by Joseph Smith that tells what things are good for man to eat and what is not - basically a code of health you could say with promised blessings for abiding by it). They were split into two teams for a review game, where they had 90 seconds to draw as many types of fruit they could think of, then vegetables, then meats, then the bad things that the Word of Wisdom teaches us not to consume.
The fruit and veggies rounds went pretty much as expected but then I went to tally up Team A's meat round. They had drawn red meat, a bull, a bear, a grenade, and a person (what?!). Needless to say, they did not receive points for all of their answers which led to a brief discussion on cannibalism.

Fast forward 90 seconds or so to when I went to tally up Team A's "things that the Word of Wisdom teaches are bad for us" round. They'd drawn a cigarette, candy, ice cream, an eyeball, eyeball candy, eyeball ice cream, and a person (labeled Brother Whitman) - which they reminded me, we are not supposed to eat.

We might have to re-visit this lesson sometime in the future. I'm just not sure they really got the gist.

Picasso was right.

He said, "Every child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an artist once we grow up."


By the way - the next two posts are new also. I'm playing catch-up.

Priceless

At least I think these smiles are priceless-


although I still don't think the Mona Lisa is Da Vinci's best work. It really wasn't that impressive to me in person, but Omsi's whole exhibit was fascinating - especially the parts I was actually able to read or listen to before realizing that my girls had again run off.
This was when we were still blissfully unaware of how many gazillions of people there were there that day! Note to self: NEVER go to Omsi during spring break!!!!
If our girls end up being scientists - we won't have any ideas were they got those genes!

Spring Break ... just a bit behind here!

For spring break (which was weeks ago, I know) we went to my parents' Bend house and had a blast! One day we head up to the mountain to take the girls sledding.

At the beginning, there was a lot of this:
(smiling)
And this:
(Enjoying the ride)
And this:
(Family fun!)
Then, unfortunately there was some of this:
(snow spraying in the face)
And more of that:
Which led to a whole lot of this:
(we'll call this crying and comforting)
And this:
And this:
And this:
So we gave up.
We headed up to meet all the family skiiers for lunch, and then Coop and I were persuaded (they really had to twist our arms) into swapping with my mom - she took our kids back home for naps and we skiied the rest of the day. The girls thought it was hilarious watching us on those silly skiis!
Despite my serious infatuation with powder, in the last 7 years, this was only the 2nd half day of skiing I've managed to fit in. For Coop - it was the first time in 12 years. I'm glad to say that we made it without any serious injury and had a blast!

Defender of my virtue

Last night I was exercising in my room. I was working really hard and was hot so I was just in a sports bra and pants. Shocking, I know. Jell came in and was very concerned, "Mom, why are you wearing that exercising shirt? I can see your belly button!" I had to laugh and then explain that I was really sweaty and since I was just in the house and nobody could see me, it was okay. She replied, "I can see you. I can see your belly button." Laugh again. Then, "No, I meant other people. You're family so it's okay. But it would be immodest for me to walk around outside like this where anyone could see me. I'll put more clothes on when I'm done exercising, I promise." I thought this was a pretty decent explanation for someone as out of breath as I. But then Jell went out in the hallway and when Coop tried to come down the hall to the room to tell me something, she stopped him with a "No!" She blocked the hallway - arms and legs spread as wide as she could so he couldn't get by. "You can't go in your room! Mommy's not modest! You would see her belly button!"

They're just so silly

I pointed out a potato bug to Jell and explained that when they're scared, they roll up into a ball. She studied it for about 5 seconds and then went, "Baaa!" with her hands shooting out to surprise the bug. Then, "mom, it did not work. He is not scared."

Meri likes to touch worms to make them squiggle. Jell eggs her on, laughing her head off, and urging, "Meri, do it again! Do it again!" (Although she refuses to touch them herself, because they're slimy) I called Meri a "worm toucher," and for the next few minutes she would walk around, throw her hands up in the air, and triumphantly proclaim "I da worm toucher!" She also likes to carry them in her hand.

While daddy was changing Meri's diaper I pointed out to Jell what a great daddy he was to do that. Jell, matter-of-factly stated, "Yeah, he's such a great poop-changing-guy."

Jell was playing with barbies, and said, "Oh, her dress fell off! She doesn't have any clothes on! HOW EMBARRASSING!!!!" (the girl is all drama and exaggeration!)

Have you seen the movie Enchanted? Both of my girls have taken to sticking their heads out doors and singing/calling to the birds and squirrels to come help them. Jell wants to know, "Mom, why don't they come like they do in the movie?"

In fact, Jell has taken to living in her own little princess-movie world. I've seen her "making her prince" like Giselle does when she's a cartoon (pronounced tar-toon in our house). She was getting rather upset with Meri the other day because Meri, who was supposed to be Sleeping Beauty, wouldn't fall asleep after Jell had her touch the "thing." She has informed me before that the mice and birds are making her a dress for the ball, often gets out a magic carpet to sit on, and on and on.

The other thing they like to pretend is that they're mamas. Jell has informed me she wants 6 babies when she's gets bigger and bigger. To avoid fights, everybody can be mamas at the same time, although I have to clarify that I'm the real mama, even though Meri likes me to pretend to be her baby. Yesterday I told Meri that you have to be potty-trained to be a mama (it's a rule). She said, "oh," thought about it for a second, and added, "and daddas too." Maybe now that she's got that understanding down, she will not only have some motivation to become so herself, but will also stop asking Coop and I if we have poopies.

Finding it hard to finish

So I haven't got to paint much lately, mostly because Cooper was suffering through finals and the girls and I were suffering from lack of Cooper, and our house was all out of sync, but hooray Coop for finishing the term! Hip hip hooray! And when I have painted, I've been totally unable to finish anything or feel successful at it. Here's some of the works in progress.

Attempt #1:

Attempt #2:

I like some things about both but think it'll probably take at least attempt #3 to get it right.

New subject.
Attempt #1 when I liked it:

Attempt #1 after I ruined it with the nasty background that I didn't want to add but went for anyway and regretted it so much afterwards that I didn't paint for days:

Sad.

Attempt #2:

Sweet but missing something - not a nasty background, but something. I can't figure out what else to do with it and I'm too scared of ruining it again to touch it for now.

Attempt #3 on bigger paper (requires more courage and commitment) in the line-drawing stage, which I was really happy with:

Attempt #3 in the I'm getting nervous about ruining it phase and so it's time to go to bed instead:

Time to go to bed and dream about being an accomplished, confident artist who knows what she's doing and doesn't care about messing up, because it so rarely happens and even if it does, it doesn't matter because she has endless amounts of patience, painting time, and money - so she can start over anytime and never worry about wasting money she doesn't have on watercolor paper.

P.S. I posted two at once. Don't miss the cute entry of the girls sleeping below.

Is this what they mean by "sleeping like a baby?"

These are my cuties sleeping like normal people:

And this is an example of a child unsuccessfully faking it:
And this position looks incredibly awkward and utterly unsleepable to me:
How does this even happen? Did she fall over asleep and happened to land on the bed?:
Let's play who can find the baby?:
And mom and dad probably should have checked on me sooner. Again though, did she just fall asleep mid-playing with toes and konk, her head's face down in the carpet? Isn't she uncomfortable????:
And my final million-dollar question: If they can fall asleep ANYWHERE, as evidenced by the pictures above, WHY is convincing them to sleep such torture?