My Girl: 20+ questions 2013

46# (46% ile) and 45.25"(68th %ile)

1. What are your favorite colors?
Turquoise, purple, and magenta

At least it isn't just pink and purple. 

2. What is your favorite thing to eat?
Pizza, cake, and cupcakes

When it comes to the cake and cupcakes she really likes the frosting.  The cake is often left behind.  Mostly she likes decorating them with sprinkles of all shapes and colors.  We are getting quite a collection, which is fine since we go through them rather quickly.  She even likes sprinkles on banana slices.

3. What is your favorite candy?
Ring pops

She also really likes to go for walks to the gas station on the corner and get orange Tic Tacs.

4. What is your favorite drink?
Ginger ale

5. Where is your favorite place to go?
Happy Hollow

This is a mini amusement park/zoo nearby.  The kids still like it, but they are on the verge of being too old, or really too big.  Buddy Boy burst into tears last time we went when he was told he was too tall for one of the rides.

6. What is your favorite thing to do with your family?
Everything

She just likes to be with her peeps, whether it is her family or her friends.  It is all about being together.

7. What is your favorite toy?
Dollies

This surprised me a bit since they aren't real to her in the same way Buddy Boys animals are.  She does like to put them to bed and bandage them up when they get hurt.

8. What is your favorite thing to wear?
Dirty shirts and dirty pants

Yup.  She isn't that picky as long as it isn't long sleeves.  Although she does choose clean clothes on a daily basis, which is more than I can say for Buddy Boy.

9. What is your favorite animal?
Dolphins and starfish and sea horses

10. What is your favorite song?
The halls are decked with toilet paper...

She learned this one this Christmas. 

11. What is your favorite book?
Rainbow magic books

Oh the fairy books.  There are so many of them and at this rate we will probably have to read them all.  She likes them and they are cute, but they get a little repetitive.

12. What is your favorite game?
Don't eat Pete

We haven't played this for a long time.  She played it at a friend's house ages ago.  It involves candy.  That may be the appeal.

13. Who are your best friends?
Audrey, Quinn, Charlotte, and Rachel Faye, and Leila

A few from preschool and a few new friends from kindergarten.

14. What is your favorite thing to do outside?
Run away from my brother

Run away?  Do I need to be worried about this?

15. What is your favorite TV show?
Peg + Cat

A new PBS show that teaches basic math concepts in a fun, very hipster style.

16. What is your favorite holiday?
Christmas

17. What do you like to take to bed with you at night?
Isn't that rather private? 

She has a crew of bears and other creatures, but the favorite is always changing.

18. What is your favorite thing to do inside?
Watch TV

We need to do a little less of that.  She does like to play doctor with her dolls and animals and she likes to help me cook, especially if we are making cupcakes.

19. What do you want for your birthday or Christmas?
Dora Rocks guitar that has real strings, real music, real electricity, no plug in.

She got the guitar, but there aren't real strings.  If you push the buttons it does play music.  Maybe that will do.

20. What do you want to do in the next year?
Have more recess at snack recess.  Have more recess at lunch recess, too.

It's all about the friends and the monkey bars.

21. What do you like about school?
Monkey bars, free time, Post Office

Learning to do the monkey bars was top on her list of kindergarten goals.  She breezes through the academic stuff, so it is good for her to have a challenge.  Post Office is a center where the kids get to collect and deliver mail for the students.

22. What do you want to be when you grow up?
Paleontologist

This one seems to be sticking.

Buddy Boy: 20+ questions 2013

Here is the annual interview with the kids.  It's been a bit more than a year, but at least I remembered to do it.

Weight: 73#  (85th %ile) and height 55" (91st %ile)  Still tall and thin.


1. What are your favorite colors?
Cyan, light blue, and blue.

For stating three colors there isn't much variation there.

2. What is your favorite thing to eat?
Bacon

I'm not sure where this started.  I buy bacon a couple times a year.  He really love it.  Over the summer we stayed at a hotel that included breakfast.  One day he had a full plate of bacon and nothing else.  I figured it was vacation and he never got that at home.  After not too long, he wasn't feeling so good.  Maybe he learned his lesson.  Maybe not.

3. What is your favorite candy?
Nerds, gum

4. What is your favorite drink?
Sprite and Diet 7-up

5. Where is your favorite place to go?
McDonalds, Reno, home

How did McDonald's make the list?  We only go to McDonald's on our way to Utah and back.  Maybe it's the scarcity that makes it appealing.

6. What is your favorite thing to do with your family?
Hang out, play board games

I like playing some of the games we have.  Others, less.  Once a week we have some friends over.  Buddy Boy, his friend, and Dad have been playing Dungeons and Dragons.  Buddy Boy really loves the adventure and the story aspect of the game.  He also likes other adventure type games like Settlers of Catan, and Munchkin.

7. What is your favorite toy?
Stuffed animals near my bed.  Such as Teddy Panda, Tuff Tuff, Froggy, and Creepy.

Teddy Panda is now 6 years old.  He is showing his age, but is still the favorite.

8. What is your favorite thing to wear?
My Panda shirt

Buddy Boy has a tendency to wear a shirt until I tell him to change.  He would go days if he could and sometimes he does if I'm not paying attention.  His favorites are the Panda shirt of course.  Another favorite shows a picture of an angry looking unicorn with the caption "Fix Bayonets".  Dad got this for him.  I think it is pretty funny.  He thinks it is awesome.  Other favorites are Minecraft related.  His new one says "Powered by Redstone".  Another favorite is camouflage.  I'm not sure why I find his clothing choices so fun.  I guess it just says something about who he is.  He isn't doing it to be fashionable.  It's just because he likes it.

Almost daily he also wears a fleece lined flannel shirt he calls "Jacky", because it is a jacket-shirt.  He tops the whole thing off with a hat we got last summer at Dinosaur National Monument.  The hat's name is Wilson.

9. What is your favorite animal?
Panda

We are on year number two of panda calendars.


10. What is your favorite song?
Radioactive parody - Redstone active

Buddy Boy spends a lot of time watching YouTube videos Minecraft music and Minecraft and other game tutorials.  It's probably too much, but it is much better than most of the stuff on TV geared to his age group.

11. What is your favorite book?
Calvin and Hobbes treasuries

A classic.

12. What is your favorite game?
I don't know.  Minecraft.  Board games.  Dungeons and Dragons, or D&D for short.

13. Who are your best friends?
Everett and Ryan

14. What is your favorite thing to do outside?
My Survivorman thing

Survivorman is a TV show where a guy goes to some remote place and has to survive.  For Buddy Boy it involves going out to the back yard and playing under the lemon tree, setting up shelters with the kayak, and filling holes full of water.  He takes his survival tools (Swiss army knife etc.) out with him and has a great time with the tree and his imagination.

15. What is your favorite TV show?
Mythbusters, Survivorman

16. What is your favorite holiday?
Christmas

17. What do you like to take to bed with you at night?
Teddy Panda

18. What is your favorite thing to do inside?
Computer.  YouTube videos, Minecraft

19. What do you want for your birthday or Christmas?
Big bucks and spy stuff.

He wants to buy an iPad.  We are probably one of the few families that he knows that doesn't have one.  He uses them at school and at Grammie's house so there isn't any shortage of iPad time in his life.  We will get one eventually, but we are OK for now.

20. What do you want to do in the next year?
Get an iPad.  Go somewhere I haven't been before.

21. What do you like about school?
Fun stuff my teacher lets us do, like grammar zone, and Sumdog.

22. What do you want to be when you grow up?
Programmer for Minecraft updates.

Sometimes I wonder if he should be doing more programming with Scratch or other kid things.  He does some here and there.  Then I think that he is 8 years old and it's OK.  When he's a little older we will step it up a bit since it is something he really likes, but it's OK if it isn't happening right now.  It's good to play Survivorman in the backyard.

Merry Christmas

Christmas is always a favorite time.  We do most of our celebrating with family on Christmas Eve.  We get together with Grammie and GranDad and cousins.  This year my Sister-in-law came from France.  It's been six years since I've seen her.  The last time she say My Girl she was only a couple of weeks old.  A lot changes in six years.

 

On GranDad's request we had a little Christmas concert.  We took our keyboard over and the kids played a few of the songs they have been learning.  They have been taking lessons for a few months now and did a great job.  Buddy Boy's favorite was Carol of the Bells.

 

My Girls opted for the glockenspiel for one of her songs.  There may have even been a bit of a dance party once the kids started playing with the self-playing features on the keyboard.

 GranDad documented the evening's events.

After a delicious dinner we opened a few presents.  Anything sparkly is always well received.

Buddy Boy got vintage opera glasses from France.  They are perfect for the boy who requested spy gear.

 

Christmas morning was also nice.  Buddy Boy was pleased with his gift of cold hard cash.  He asked for either $600 or an ipad.  He didn't get either of those, but this was a start.

 

 

 My Girl requested a Dora Rocks guitar.  She still dreams of being a rock star.

The rest of the day was spent like this...

and this...

We stayed home since My Girl had a stomach bug that bothered her all day.  It wasn't any fun to have a sick kid, but at least we were able to spend a relaxing day at home.

Christmas preparations

We spent a bit of time getting ready for the holidays.  Buddy Boy helped with the lights, all five strings of them.

 

He proceeded to put on the Christmas stockings.

This wasn't the first time.

2008

 

One evening while Buddy Boy and Dad were watching the Empire Strikes Back, My Girl insisted on making graham cracker houses.  We had some frosting left from the Birthday celebrations and had a collection of sprinkles, marshmallows, and a few candy canes.  This is what we did.

 

We had a little party at church.  After dinner there was a fun program.  It started with Five Strummers Strumming.  The two on the right introduced the kids to Rawhide years ago at a summer pioneer program.  They still sing it.

 

Then the kids did a Nativity play.  It started with the younger kids singing as the stars.  Then the familiar story.

 

We had several mischievous shepherds and a flock of hungry sheep.  The oldest girls all wanted to be the sheep.  My favorites were the angels.  Such a cast of characters.

Painting Privas

Awhile ago I asked my Father-in-law for a photo of France that I could paint.  I think that this is one of his favorites.

 

This is what I did with it.  I cropped it a bit and eliminated the graffiti even though that gives it a lot of personality.  I think the idea of English graffiti in France is a little funny.  I straightened the vertical lines to correct the distortion of the lens.  This photo isn't all that accurate, but it is the best I could do.  The lighting is a little different, but you get the general idea.

This painting was a present for my Mother-in-law for Christmas.  I included this little card with it. 

In January, I won't be able to paint as much.  I'll be teaching on the morning of my painting class.  I'll go back when I can and keep it up between now and then as much as I can.  I also have other artsy crafty projects to work on.  I hope I can get to them.

Live Nativity

For years I've heard of friends visiting the live nativity sponsored by a local church, but we had never been, until this year.

The kids got to sign the census and pay "taxes".  Camels don't come cheap.

 

There was a metal worker, a pottery station, a jewelry station, and booths for food, wine making (plastic grapes, thankfully), wood working, perfume, spinning wool, and others I'm forgetting.

 

The first wise man rode a real camel.  Quite an impressive beast, but even outside you can sure smell them.  Every half hour the story starts again as the wise men, Mary and Joseph make their way to different parts of the city and finally to the stable.

The kids and I had a great time.  It earned an enthusiastic thumbs up.  It is already on the calendar for next year.

 

Merry Christmas!

Happy Birthday

We had a little birthday party for My Girl.  We colored and did mazes.  We played "snow" games with cotton balls, decorated snowy treats, made jewelry, and had a great time.

We started off with some snow coloring pages, mazes, and decorating goodie bags.  I love that for little girls coloring is a fun party activity.  I also love to hear them talk.  Their conversations are hilarious.

We played pass the present.  In this game little treasures are wrapped in layers of a present, one in each layer.  The kids pass the present while the music plays.  When the music stops you get to unwrap a layer and claim a prize.  We had hair clips and bands and snowman notebooks and pencils.

Then it was back to the kitchen for sugar cone Christmas trees and marshmallow snowmen.  It's like decorating gingerbread houses, but much simpler.  There are now marshmallows in three sizes.  The biggest one is huge.  Wilton makes food markers that we used for the faces.  I originally bought the orange and black for Halloween, but I've used them more for snowmen than I have for Halloween.

We kept it pretty simple with M&M decorations and fruit roll up scarves.  By the way, did you know that M&Ms are available in a new very girly set of colors?  Pink, red, blue, turquoise, and purple.  I had some big star sprinkles that we used to top the trees.  They turned out great.

After the frosting we played snow blower.  We taped a square in the middle of a blue blanket and used straws to blow cotton balls into the center.  After a few rounds of that they were ready for jewelry making.  I just let them loose with pipe cleaners and beads.  We got bracelets, necklaces, and tiaras in all sorts of shapes and colors.  It was fun.

You can't have a birthday party without cake, or in this case, snowflake cupcakes.

 

And with that we called it a day.  Happy Birthday!

Art and reading

You just never know what's going to strike the interest of the kids.  Buddy Boy has been reading the Origami Yoda series.  It isn't great literature, but the names are clever.  There's Origami Yoda, Darth Paper, the Fortune Wookie, Jabba the Puppet, Princess Labelmaker, and Han Foldo.  This series and a book on origami from the library have fueled a paper folding craze around here.  Each book includes some instructions for origami Star Wars characters.  Here are Buddy Boys efforts.  I think they turned out great.  I think Ewoks are next.

 

Buddy Boy also read Jedi Academy, another Star Wars take off.  He's really enjoyed these books, but hadn't seen the movies.  We solved that problem over the Thanksgiving break.  Hooray for the library that has the trilogy.  We watched Star Wars and made it through half of Empire Strikes Back.  My Girl doesn't like them and Dad wants to watch them with Buddy Boy, so that is slowing us down a bit.  Don't worry.  We'll get through.  In the mean time Buddy Boy is perfecting his Yoda and Ewok impersonations.

My Girl's reading the Rainbow Magic fairy books.  If you have a girl about this age I'm sure you know what I'm talking about.  It is a series of books about a couple of friends who help the fairies out of trouble, usually caused by Jack Frost and his goblins.  There are over 150 books in the series.  It feels like we've read at least that many and more keep coming home from the library.  She loves them and Buddy Boy likes them too.  At night we take turns reading.  I like to hear him read to her at bedtime.  He is great.  He even does different voices for the characters.

'Tis the season...

...for Minecraft pigs to drive sleighs through the sky above the snow covered roofs of the town.

By Buddy Boy

Mini Thanksgiving Baker

My Girl helped with the baking for Thanksgiving this year.  It's the first year she's been able to do a lot of things on her own.  It was great to be able to work together.  We baked rolls and an apple pie to go with the roasted Brussels sprouts and creamed onions we prepared as well.  Thank goodness we had the apple corer/slicer/peeler thingy to help out.  It would have been a lot less fun without it. 

She slaved away, wiping the sweat from her furrowed brow...

 ...or not.

 

The peels did not go to waste.  What didn't get nibbled on by the kids we fed to our neighbor's African tortoise, Lucy.  She really likes grape leaves as well.

My Girl also topped the dinner rolls with butter and cinnamon sugar.  With a topping like that there weren't many that actually made it until dinner time.

Thanksgiving dinner was a lot of fun.  We got together with family.  There was plenty of cousin wrestling for Jack.  We had a mini-concert of Scottish fiddle tunes.  For dessert we had the apple pie, pumpkin cake, and pumpkin pie.  No shortage of deliciousness.  The oldest cousin did an impromptu Santa impersonation for My Girl.  She played along and it was quite the conversation.  We missed Grammie, who was out of town helping her sister, but had a great time together.  Of all the things I'm thankful for, I am the most grateful for my family.