What Did She Say?

Jane has been learning new words and talking a lot lately!  She loves to jabber and leaves us wondering what she is talking about, but every once in a while we understand what she is saying.

The first word she said was "bye".  She loves to go places!  I complied a list of things that she says.  Most of this list she has said over the past two days! Of course, she doesn't pronounce everything clearly, but we know what she is saying. 

• bye
• go
• sock
• stuck (she uses this word when she can't open a door, is done eating and can't get out of her highchair or when she can't get her shirt or sock off, when she is ready to get out of her crib, or when a toy is somewhere she can't reach!)
• shoe
• Paul
• Seth
• baby
• Binky
• stinky (she is very aware of her diaper lately and tells us when she needs a diaper change!)
• owie
• no (I really could have waited a lot longer for her to figure this one out!)
• yes (but at least she knows yes too!)
• cheese
• bath
• hi
• tada!
• see
• thank you (sounds like ayou)
• outside
• here you go
• where it go
• movie (she says "kiki" for Kipper)
• you okay? (sounds like youkay)
• let's go
• give it back (I was a bit shocked when she scolded Seth and told him to give the toy back that he had taken!) 

Jane has been removing her clothes a lot lately.  The other day she climbed onto the air mattress we had set up in the basement and she climbed under the blanket, took her shirt off, then came out of the blanket and said "tada!"  We would put her shirt back on and she would climb back under the blanket to remove it.  I'm trying to not make a big deal out of it, but I really don't like her taking her clothes off!  Sometimes she pulls her shirt over her head, but can't get her arms out, so she will call out that she is stuck!  She is quite the character!

She was not happy that I got the camera and took her picture before getting her out of the crib.  I'm not surprised to walk into her room after a nap and find her this way, but the first time I thought that it was picture worthy!

March

March is here and almost over.  Where did the month go?  What have I been doing this month?  I have been busy doing projects around the house and in my craft room.  I've been planning things for my Dad's 70th birthday party that is coming up in a few weeks.  I've been recuperating from a nasty head cold.   
I took Mark, Paul, Seth , Mieren and Alys swimming at the Herriman Recreation Center.  They had a great time playing in the water. 

Paul, Mieren and Mark

Seth

Alys and Seth in the center

 St Patrick's day around here is getting to be a big event.  Since it landed on the weekend, Seth's class brought leprechaun traps to school on Friday and left them over the weekend.  Paul built a trap at our house and the boys found some chocolate in their traps.  I also gave them a few little toys and their own box of Lucky Charms.  Since we have never done Easter baskets in our family as I find them to be extremely distracting from the purpose of Easter- even more distracting than Santa Claus- (I just don't understand the Easter Bunny phenomenon) I decided that we could still have a fun spring basket, so St Patrick's day is when I spoil the boys a little bit. 

Seth's leprechaun trap

IFA has their baby chicks and ducks in the store right now, so I took the kids plus two friends to the store after school one day.  The chicks are really noisy, but they are so cute!  Jane was really excited to see the chicks.  The first time she looked into the cage, she squealed and clapped her hands!   All of the boys were super cute with her.  You wouldn't know from the pictures, but Mark and Paul came along with us too!  They were a little camera shy, I guess!

Parker and Carson liked to wave hello to the little ducks!  See that dog behind them?  It was huge!  It stood as tall as the boy's heads.  I wasn't terribly comfortable with the dog so close to the kids, but luckily the owner didn't stay long (what she was doing with such a large dog in the store I'll never know!)

Seth, Carson and Parker 

The boys found the toy section and Parker located a bunch of cheetahs to play with!
(Shelley, if you want better resolution pictures just let me know and I'll send them your way!)

Mark earned his orange belt at Tae Kwon Do!  Mister Lee is a wonderful instructor! 

 Madeleine and I went to the new City Creek Center mall on Friday.  It was a lot of fun!  The concept of the mall being an indoor/outdoor mall is awesome!  The weather was beautiful, so the roof was open.  I'd like to go back to see how different it feels with the roof closed (with the weather being colder, windy and rainy, I wonder if they have it closed today!).  For the opening celebration they had musicians playing throughout the mall and other kinds of entertainment.  The architecture of the building was amazing and it was a lot of fun to explore.  I feel lucky to have gone with Madeleine because she noticed details about things that I overlooked.  We didn't really go to see the stores, but to marvel at the building!  The mall is a bit too upscale for my budget, but it is a wonderful place!   

While at the mall, I went out to eat for the first time since last November.  We ate at a Greek restaurant in the food court.  It was delicious!  I still stick to my no-sugar-corn-wheat-dairy-potatoes-diet more than 80% of the time, so it was a fun adventure for me to eat out at a restaurant!  The food I ate had a little bit of feta cheese (it seems that almost all Greek food has some feta thrown in or on for good measure!) but other than that, the meal was on spot for my restrictions!  I didn't feel sick or bloated at all after I ate there! 

Last night for dinner I made steak, baked potatoes, broccoli, salad, and garlic cheese bread.  (I ate everything but the bread).  The meal was delicious and very satisfying  I broiled the steak and it was perfect!  The other day I broiled hamburger patties and it was so easy and not nearly as messy as making them on the stove.  Alton brown said that broiling is just grilling upside-down.  I am falling in love with my broiler.  Now I need to get a proper broiling pan because our oven didn't come with one! (I have been using a cookie sheet with a cooling sheet on top.) The meal for my family cost us about $12 to make, but if we had all ordered it at a restaurant it would have cost us more than $60!   I told the boys that when they date, they can save a lot of money by making a meal at home.  Not only will they save money, but the girl be impressed with their awesome cooking skills! They just roll their eyes at me when I talk with them about dating!  I know that they have a few years before they will start to date, but it doesn't hurt to start preparing them for it, right?!

Waste of Paper

Mark brought home a note from his teacher that was attached to a class assignment.  The teacher's note stated that Mark had written "WASTE OF PAPER" on an assignment and she required a parent signature on the assignment before she would record it. 

The assignment was easy, Mark knew the answers, but he felt that it was so easy that it was a waste of his time to work on it.  He did the assignment but had to write his attitude down before turning it in. 

Seriously? 

I am glad that the teacher made a big deal out of this.  We had a talk about attitudes, staying on the good side of people, how the teacher felt when she saw this, how I know that he is smart and that he knows that he is smart, but it is appropriate to do assignments or express your reasons not to do it constructively, and more.  I made him write an apology to his teacher before I would sign the paper.  His apology went like this:

Ms. Rasmussen,
I am sorry that I was rude and disrespectful. I can't make any promises, but I will try my best not to do it again. 
Mark

I accepted the 'apology' and moved on.     Hopefully we don't have any more issues like this (but he can't make any promises, so....)

Random Mode

Last night during dinner Seth was giving everyone a label.  The label stood for what the person likes to do the most.  Daniel was "computer games", Paul was "jumping on the trampoline", I can't recall what he gave Mark, Jane or himself.  But when he came to me, he thought for a while and then said, "Mom, you are on random mode". 

Do you know what?  That fits me very well.  I have been struggling with getting things done.  I have quilts waiting to be finished, quilts ready to be started, projects in the middle, projects nearly done (just waiting for the finishing touches- for 6 months!)  In February I signed up for an online quilting class.  I did really well for the first week, but then I had a different project come up that had a close deadline (today is the deadline and I am just about done, just needed a break from working on it.  More to come about this project in a while). 

I do feel as though my energies have been random.  I can't quite put my finger on what it is that defines me, so random works!  I guess that with me you never know what to expect! 

Mr. Brown Can Moo

Today the 6th grade performed "Seussical the Musical".  Mark was chosen to be Mr. Brown from "Mr. Brown Can Moo" and he did a great job!  He loved being up on stage and had a lot of fun (but he openly admits that he didn't have fun during all of the practices and that he is glad that it is over!) 

I went to all three performances and I enjoyed watching all of the kids do their parts.  

Mr. Brown giving me a silly smile.  (When he smiled like that a group a girls squealed with delight! Mark thinks that it is weird that they got so excited with his silly smile, I told him that the girls like him, and he sighed, said "I know" and rolled his eyes- I'm sure that reaction will change pretty soon!)

Ms. Harvey (5th grade teacher) Mark, and Ms. Rasmussen (6th grade teacher)

Mr. Brown and a Sneech with a star on thars (Aaron)

I am so glad that I went to the daytime performances because this was my view of the stage in the evening.

There are several kids who aren't in Mark's class this year, but have been in previous years classes who I barely recognized because they are so tall! Mark has hit a growth spurt and is pretty close to being as tall as I am.

I cut my hair short and I only regret doing it because my neck is exposed and I have been super cold all day!

I had to take Mark down because he was trying to tip-toe when we took the last picture! 

Madeleine came to the afternoon performance and brought us some "Happy Leap Day" cupcakes!  The boys decided that the raisins were actually flies with their wings pulled off. Boys! 

 At the evening performance, I saw Paul's kindergarten teacher, Mrs. Lovell (he went to kindergarten at a different school). She lives a few blocks away from us now and has a 6th grade daughter. We talked for a while and finally exchanged first names! She always called me Mrs. Paul! Througout the evening I had several kids say "Hi Mark's mom!" or "There is Seth's mom" or "Hi Paul's mom!". I love those titles! I am so glad to be a mom, especially to these great boys. I can't think of a better title!