Imaginative Play

Shannon's really getting into playing with her little stuffed animals. She calls them her soft friends. This morning she had them bounce on a trampoline made of a blanket spread over the laundry basket; she took turns wrapping them like presents and giving them to me; she pretended some of them were babies; she put some of them on the top of a chair arm and made them say "help me!" until another stuffed animal (a duck with a cape who goes by the name of Bing-Bing at our house) flew up and rescued them; she likes to group them in families, but the families are often changing. She'll change her mind about who the baby is going to be or make someone a neighbor instead. Or she'll get distracted by another toy and forget she was playing house at all.

I love two and a half year olds!

Free e-books from Deseret Book!

As a part of his doctoral studies, John Hilton III is "studying what happens when books are made available for free." He worked with "Deseret Book and they have made 8 of their books available for free." They can all be downloaded at http://deseretbook.com/free. Several of the books are ones you might be interested in. The books are: 1. Please Pass the Scripture (by John Hilton III). 2. What I Wish I Would Have Known When I Was Single (by John Bytheway). 3. Women at the Well (by Richard and Jeni Holzapfel). 4. Digging Deeper (by Robert Eaton). 5. 10 Secrets Wise Parents Know (by Brent Top and Bruce Chadwick). 6. Growing Up: Gospel Answers About Maturation and Sex (by Brad Wilcox). 7. Saving Kristen (by Jack Weyland). (fiction) 8. The Hidden Path (by C.B. Andersen). (fiction).I recommend that you go download them all and save them for future reference as they will only be available online for free for a short time.Could you forward this information on to others who might be interested? I want to help share these great, free resources with as many people as possible. Some of the books help you get more out of the scriptures. Others are good for parenting. Some are just plain fun. Go check out http://deseretbook.com/free. I hope you like the books!

Three Hours of Church

We've all been sick the past week, so I've been working on my brother's late wedding present for hours at a time (It's taking forever!) and sniffling in front of the TV. We tried to break up the monotony by switching library DVD's from Blues Clues to Between the Lions and shaking in a little Cinderella as well, but the biggest hit was the homeade play clay. We didn't have any cream of tartar, so I faked it with baking powder. It was fine for about five days, then it melted into extreme stickiness. (Though it might be because Shannon kept licking it!) Oh, well. It was good while it lasted.

Anyway, we were blessed to be well enough to go to our wonderful friends' home for Thanksgiving. There were about 8 kids under the age of four and they had a blast! It was so much fun and the food was delicious (and gluten-free, except for the rolls!) I was still nervous that Shannon might have some lingering germs, so I kept dipping her hands in santizer. I confess the excitement caused her a bit of a relapse. On Sunday she had a runny nose that caused a cough, so while we were able to go to church, sending her to nursery for the last two hours of church was out of the question. Instead we had what Shannon called "nursery for two" in the hall. She ran in circles and climbed under the hallway side tables with another runny-nosed kid during Sunday School, then played next to us on the bench during a combined relief society and priesthood meeting. She was so good--for a two-year old! I was amazed to get a lot of spiritual enrichment, even while Shannon was by my side.

We're so grateful this season for cell phones and computers that have helped us keep in touch with some of our family this year. Wish we could see you all!

Get Along Little Doggie

Shannon and her friends had a great time trying on hats at Joy School! Shannon loved pretending to be a cowgirl in a pink dress. We had only one astronaut and three cow pokes, so it looks like the past won over the future.

We're all sick this weekend. Probably a light case of flu. Don't get too close!

How I Learned to Hit

I asked Shannon what she learned about in Joy School on Friday and her reply surprised me. "Hitting," she said in a matter-of-fact, no-big-deal kind of way, without even looking up. Since I know that the lesson was supposed to be about hats, that they were going to try on hats, and that they planned to read CAPS FOR SALE, I naturally wanted more details. When I talked with the mom in charge this week, I found out that the two little boys in the group were so enthusiastic about playing with each other they'd had what amounted to a smackdown. They decided it was hilarious to whack each other. They took turns. One boy had three time outs (his mom was teaching).

I'm supposed to talk about babies, since most of the group is expecting and the kids are still young. I'm wondering if I'll have to talk about why we don't hit little babies. This is going to be interesting.

Any advice about keeping two year olds from playing whack-a-mole with each other's heads?

NurtureShock

I'm reading a book about parenting and early childhood education called NurtureShock by Bronson and Merryman. They are trying to sort through the latest science on children's cognitive, social, and emotional development to debunk the myths we have about our natural parenting instincts and things we take for granted about childhood. It's fascinating. I also just discovered their blog at http://blog.newsweek.com/blogs/nurtureshock/default.aspx and I think I'll be a groupie. It's fascinating.

I especially liked the entry where Merryman told the kids she tutored that if a friend accused them of acting white they should say, "No, I'm acting Obama."
This is her story:

I've been tutoring poor minority kids in urban Los Angeles for more than a decade. In that time, more than one kid has told me that they refused to "act white." They've told me that only white kids did homework; they didn't need to go to school. I've been bewildered as middle school kids have insisted to me that they were proud of the fact they couldn't read, because that proved they were real blacks. (I argued with them on this, but they weren't listening.)
All of which is why, within hours of President Obama's inauguration, I had developed a plan. I went around telling all of my tutoring kids that if they were doing their schoolwork, and someone ever said they were "actin' white," I wanted them to say this in response.
"No, I'm not. I'm acting Obama."
When I first said this, the kids acted like I was from Mars.
"No, seriously," I insisted. "Do you think Obama is walking around the White House like," I started flashing gang signs, "Yo - yo, Con-gress, whassuppp??"
At which point, they were laughing.
"All right, then. How do you want to grow up to be like? The thugs on the street out there on the corner, or Obama?"
"Obama."
"Then let's start acting like him then."
I had no real illusions that I could singlehandedly change the kids' mindset on this, but, still, it was worth a shot. And I figured it couldn't hurt.
A month later, one of my tutoring kids came bounding into Tutoring ─ he's a Hispanic seventh-grader who really struggles at home and school, .
"Ashley! Ashley! I have to tell you something!" he yelled.
I'd never seen him this exuberant before.
"OK, what?"
"A couple days ago, there were these three boys at school. And they were all like, 'C'mon, let's ditch. Let's go do something fun. This is boring.'"
"Yeah?" my eyebrow raised warily.
"So I tol' em, 'No,' and they said I was actin' white, and so I said, 'No, I'm actin' Obama' ─ just like you told me to."
"You did!?"
"Yeah! And they were all like, 'Well, OK, then,'and left me alone. So I didn't ditch that day."
"I am so proud of you!"
"And the other boys didn't ditch neither! We all stayed."
"I am so proud of you! Of all four of you."
"Me too!"
Seriously, at that moment, I didn't care what the president ultimately accomplished with the economy or health care or anything else. Because, on that day, for those four kids, the world had already changed.

Shannon at Joy School

Shannon is involved in a joy school at the home of some of our friends. She got to learn about pumpkins last time and came home with toasted seeds and hands softened by squishing through the pumpkin guts. She loves it!

Anthony was involved in Friday Night Fights in NYC this weekend. He had a funky haircut for the occasion. Think faux hawk with celtic designs shaved into the sides. You can't wait for photos!

I'm so busy with work that I hardly have time to post. Most of my internet time is taken up with business. I missed my early bus today so I snatched a few moments to write.

Love you all!

Even more old pictures to wafer through

Pictures from our trip to the zoo in NYC's Central Park, except the one of the three of us together. That's at the airport when we arrived. I teased Anthony that he looked like a Vietnam veteran in that jacket. The beard was for Romeo and Juliet. Sorry about the sideways pictures. I'm strapped for time and haven't fixed their trajectory yet. Shannon in the stroller is from Victoria (our final weeks there. I loved that apartment). And the shadowy one is a shot of Anthony in front of the Plaza hotel. Yes, it's the one where Eloise lives in fictional infamy.

Explanation of Victoria Pictures

Shannon and I in front of the Legislature Bldg is sideways because the Kodak disk the pictures are on is read-only. It's a cute picture if you tilt your head like a curious bird.

The goats are at the petting zoo they have a Beacon Hill Park. I promised I'd put up the goat pictures a year ago. Here they are!

Shannon's birthday cake for her first year. We had it more than a month after her birthday because we waited to have it with Daddy. Shannon wasn't very messy this time and she wasn't quite sure what to think of the whole thing.

More pictures to come. This is for the grandparents who have been waiting for new footage. We have more recent pictures to put up, too. We're just going chronologically!

Backlog of Victoria Pictures

A Year and a Half Ago

Anthony wishes I hadn't put this this picture of our family up, but I like Shannon's enthusiasm and I like the composition. This is us one and a half years ago on our visit to Utah. This is the week after Christmas when Anthony flew in from Victoria and we camped out in my sister's guest room/boy's bedroom. It was awesome being with family.

Shannon Loves to Color

We bought Shannon a new coloring book and crayons in honor of back to school supplies going on sale. By the time we'd had it a week she'd colored nearly all the pages multiple times and all day she asks me, "Mama? You want to color with me?"

Purple Princess Sparkles and Her Magical Pretty Unicorn

Why is it that little girls go from loving horses, fairies, and ballerinas to obsessing over vampire books or series about gossipy, cliquey, it-girls and their shallow boyfriends? What is it with all these weird fads that publishers and their consumers go through? You would not believe how many sparkly fairy books I shelve every day. And how many vampire books besides Twilight are in existence. It's enough to bury Bram Stoker again, if needs be.

Errands with Toddlers

Here's a helpful website with easy games to play to get 2-4 year olds to see errands as an adventure:

http://www.babycenter.com/0_making-errands-fun-ages-2-to-4_65383.bc?showAll=true

Retail Frenzy

I appreciate all the parents out there teaching their kids how to clean up after themselves. The kids section at the bookstore overflowed with families browsing. Toddlers drove the books shaped like cars and pushed buttons on all the noisy books. Parents told their beginning readers, "I think that's too difficult for you, what about this one?" I don't know how many times I heard, "Are you sure that's what you want?" tonight. I spent five hours frantically putting books, stuffed animals, puzzles, and other merchandise in various shelves, bays, niches, displays, and piles. It was absolutely insane. What I don't understand is parents who encourage their children to open things like shrink-wrapped pop-up books and puzzles or who sit there chatting while their preschooler pulls all the stickers out of an activity book. Don't they understand that willfully damaging store property is tantamount to stealing? And that books deserve a chance for a good home, instead of life stuck as a broken display model?
I love it when I hear, "Put that back where you found it. It goes over there . . . see? By the other one!" Bravo to all those responsible parents out there. Give yourself a pat on the back. You know who you are.

Meanwhile, at home I need to learn how to better clean up after myself . . . make that "we need to clean up after OURselves" . I covered for the full time head of the kids department this week and home maintenance went to pot. Ah, well. When I'm not fighting pint-sized retail bandits, I'm fighting mite-sized sugar ants. Any suggestions for eliminating tiny, tiny invaders in the thousands?

Personal Pronouns

Oh, and I don't know why, but Shannon has sudden developed an overcorrection in her personal pronouns. She's had no problems with he, she, him, and her as she learned to speak, but lately she's been saying things like "You give it to I" or "Momma, I like she!"
I'm not worried. She'll figure out the rules and then the exceptions to the rules as she goes along. We all do.

Quick Update

We've been in our new house for a month and a half, but haven't had the internet running until today! We have reduced rent in exchange for some home repairs we're trying to help with. I'm not great at helping with the painting and roof replacement, but I have used brushes and rollers and shifted asphalt tiles a bit.

I'm working part time at Barneys and Nobbles as a bookseller. (I disguised the name a bit to protect the innocent.) It's been fun, especially the few times I've done Story Time. We did Llama Llama books one time and Mo Willems another time (Knuffle Bunny, Elephant and Piggie, and Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus). I liked the time I read bear books: The Big Hungry Bear, The Little Mouse, and The Red Ripe Strawberry; Bear Snores On; and Jamberry. Working at the register is a bit boring, except last night when it took me my entire four hour shift to reshelve half a rack of bookmarks between customers. I had one woman buy 15 books for her team from work as thank yous and then ask me to wrap them for her. She didn't mind that I helped other customers in between, which was thoughtful of her.

Most of the time Shannon goes to her Dad's gym when I have a shift at work. It's led to some timely conversations about how we don't hit people when we're mad, we use our words to talk about our feelings. We hit punching bags for exercise, that's it. If you asked her what Daddy did at work, she'd tell you "He exercise!"

So he's out of town this week, but it's possible to catch a few rounds of him if you look for USA vs Finland. You'll have to call me if you want more details. Which might mean sending me an e-mail to get my phone number, I know. Sorry!

P.S. Megan, have you read Kenneth Oppel's Airborn and its sequels? And you'd better have read the Percy Jackson books. Tell me you've read Percy Jackson.

Love you all!
Genny

Shannon's Birthday

She's two! She knows her colors, loves to open presents, loves packages from Grandma even more, and is okay with pink birthday cake. (It was her choice, but I think she would have enjoyed chocolate more.)

When I download the pictures, I'll explain how amazingly cool her big day was. She's been talking about her birthday coming for two months, and I think it lived up to her expectations.

She Has Her Daddy's . . .

Shannon has her daddy's memory.

I have a terrible memory, but my husband is excellent at remembering things. Today, Shannon proved she does, too. We got a book from the library last week called Clippety-Clop and she just "read" it to us tonight, almost word for word. I was stunned. She grinned as she recited the words to her speechless parents.

She is getting her 19th and 20th teeth now. Two bottom molars. Just in time for her upcoming second birthday.

She has had a couple of unpleasant dreams that woke her up recently. I heard her crying, "Grace took my bear away!" one morning and then the next morning she accused me, "Mommy, you drank all my milk from my Elmo cup." I was able to show her quickly that neither event had ever actually happened. This morning when she woke up she said, "Mommy, I want feed birds. Pleeease!" I'm not sure which birds she was talking about, but it was cute.

I love it when she is trying to get out of her crib. She says something new each time.
"Mommy, you need your shoes on!"

"Mommy!" No answer.
"Mommy!" No answer.
"Mommy?" Still no answer. Long pause.
"Daddy?"

"Wake up! Wake up!

She's been introducing herself to everyone she meets this week. "Hi. My name is Shannon." The security guards at the grocery store thought it was hilarious.

Petting Zoo Goats

I promised some pictures of Shannon and the Victoria goats this summer. Here they finally are.




She saw the picture today and said "I pet the goats!"

Old Pictures

Playing with the cousins.






Shannon wearing monkey pajamas from her Auntie. This was January, 2008.

Family Portraits

This is our family last January. I needed a haircut and a nap, but other than that it's a great photo!

. . .










And this is our family last September. You can see that Shannon has gotten taller, leaner, and longer-haired. Anthony was playing a swordsman on the streets of Verona. My summer haircut had grown out to the length I like.

A Familiar Tale . . .

We were having the missionaries over for dinner and a entire turkey dinner was spread out with buttered corn, buttered peas, buttered carrots, buttered mashed potatoes, Butterball turkey, and butter for the corn bread. (The people in this house like butter.) It was butyraceous (word of the day meaning "like butter.")

The best china was brought out, linen napkins were rolled, goblets sparkled, bread knives were aligned on bread plates, and the house was cleaned. The table looked posh.

Shannon ate dinner early so there would be more room at the table (plus, she was starving! All that preparation took too long!) When the guests arrived and were digging into their food, Shannon decided she was ready to go take a bath. So she started trying to take off her shirt. I wasn't too worried because clothing usually gets stuck on her head and her ankles, she was hidden by my corner of the table, and I was engrossed with the dark meat tenderizing on my fork. Unfortunately she figured out that she had to take her shoes off before she could get her pants off her ankles, and when I looked down again, she was bucker than buck naked. She'd even done the diaper. So I told her I would be saving this story for her wedding dinner. Then I gave in and gave her a bath.

Now we have a new family rule. "Don't strip in front of the missionaries."

Round One:
Shannon 1: Mommy 0

P. S. Yesterday she was playing with plastic birds and had two toucans. When she picked one up I did the instinctive Mom thing and named it for her, "Toucan!"
So she held it up and said, "One can!"
I'm so glad she's learning to count.

Shannonisms

Shannon's vocabulary and comprehension are amazing to me. She surprises me on a regular basis. For example:

I had to wash her favorite stuffed animals, Dog and Bear, and they weren't quite done at bedtime. She was miserable and kept asking about them. Luckily they only went in the washer on the 4 minute pre-wash cycle and the dryer for 15 minutes on low. When I rushed them up to her crib, she was half asleep, lying on her stomach. She reached out both of her arms for her friends, one on each side, and said, "Bear! Dog! You came!"

This morning she woke up at 5:40 am and asked for milk. 'Milk, please!" she demanded. I explained that it was still dark and too early for milk. "How 'bout juice?" She countered.

Later we were outside and the dog was on a zipline barking at the neighbors. "Bailey!" she called, "Barking is not allowed!"

She also quotes from her favorite books and is able, thanks to The Letter Factory DVD and the Fishcer Prise ABC's game, identify letters and their sounds. We were reading The Bernstain's
B Book, which she has memorized, and she can now recognize "BAM!" She also knows "Toot! Toot!" from Tugga-tugga Tugboat. I love this job!

Another blast from the past

This is an older picture of Shannon with her very first helium balloon. It was a freebie from the toy store. She loved letting it go and making Daddy rescue it from the high ceiling. She also ran back and forth with it.

In other random Shannon trivia:
She's been singing "My Bonny Lies over the Ocean" lately, but she sings, "Bring back, bring back, oh, bring back my mommy to me, to me!" I'm flattered so I egg her on.

I prompted her to say "I'm one!" and so now that's what she says when someone asks her age--or her name.

Camera Cords, Corduroy pants, and Corduroy Bear

There is a great reason why I haven't posted new pictures in awhile. I left the cord that attaches my laptop to my camera in another part of the country. I suppose I could go to Wally-world and get a new cord or make a CD of my pics. Or I suppose I could hotwire the thing--just like Han Solo hotwired the door in the last real Star Wars movie. But I'm not that techno-saavy. Anyone have any other ideas for ways I could transfer pictures from one machine to another? I left my sonic screwdriver in another dimension, too.

Oh, and I don't have any cords that I wear right now, but I love reading Corduroy to my daughter.

Flashback to the Past

I loved this hat! This is the hat sweet pea wore all summer until it finally disappeared to that place where gloves, keys, socks, and hair clips go.

We took this picture in March and besides a couple of haircuts and a few more inches, Shannon still looks a lot like this. Her face has developed, though not as much as her vocabulary. I celebrate because she can stop crying to tell me what she wants. She used to say "I'm" and "I"; now she's started saying "My poopy" or "My fall down" instead. She also talks about herself in third person like Elmo. "Shannon want pizza!" I find myself doing the same thing. "Mommy is sleepy. Lie back down, sweetie!"

Now, nobody except Grandma really needs to hear the diary of my daughter's growth chart, but I absolutely love reading the blogs written by my sisters, sister-in-law, and friends and hearing all the things they do to celebrate
the most important job in the world: nurturing children. Keep up the good work!

Keeping up the Pants

I have decided that one size fits all kids clothes aren't going to work. A taller than average toddler, for instance, will have saggy pants if she wears pants that are too big, and saggy pants if they are too small. There's only a small margin in between. Maybe adjustable suspenders are the only solution!

Christmas in the Southwest

At my parents house for Christmas we had a great time pulling crackers, making a snowman, and building a gingerbread house. Shannon loved Grandma's hands-on Nativity set. (I hope Joseph will be found soon!)





For all those decorator types who will be dying to know our secret, we made our house from a kit.

Notice that the snowman has weedy eyes and arms. And he's a bit short. His life was beautiful, but tragically cut short by rain that night. Then a shovel decapitated and disemboweled him to make way for a clear driveway. Oh, the snowmanity! It was a glorious snowbound day!