Mark’s pal Ronald McDonald was appearing at our local McDonald’s today, so Mark took the kids over there for lunch and the show. Kaylee came home with this strange sparkly star-shaped rash on her cheek. ;)
Almost immediately upon arriving home from school today, Kaylee announced that she was bored and wanted to make her Valentine box for school. So we went and found a shoe box, and I let her take over my computer and dig into my digiscrapping stash to make a design for the top. With a refresher of a few basic instructions for using Photoshop, she was off and running.
She quickly had a design she was happy with, but apparently this was an exhausting process. ;)
:)
The kids have each had one of these giant plastic balls for a few years. When sorting through some of the chaos in Matthew’s room recently, we came across his. He decided he didn’t want it anymore and gave it to Kaylee. Suddenly, what’s old is new again, and she has been constantly playing with them, which usually involves sitting on them in some form.
I know it’s somewhat common to sit on a large fit ball, but I don’t think those who do normally also use a ball as a footrest. Not the most stable configuration. ;)
Kaylee had been using this ruler for her homework and started playing with looking through the magnifying section. :)
Mark snapped this shot of Kaylee to post on his Facebook to try to help her sell some Girl Scout cookies. It’s her second year, and it’s lots of fun to see how excited the girls get about cookie time. :)
Another photo by Mark. He took the kids to lunch at Fuddrucker’s on their way to Bizarro’s regular lecture this afternoon. More quiet time for me. :) Matthew really enjoyed the lecture. Kaylee decided maybe she’d stick to the kid-oriented ones from now on. ;)
Bizzaro did a guest lecture for the Young Magicians Club this month and Matthew was called up to help demonstrate. He and Kaylee both really enjoyed the lecture… and it looks like the whole group had fun!
(Photos by Mark. I stayed home and took advantage of having the house to myself to get all kinds of super-productive things done be a big lump and watch a few hours of mindless TV. :p)
A quick trip to the park playground after school today. It was fairly warm but really windy (my issue) and someone with a dog showed up (Kaylee’s issue), so we didn’t stay long. I let Kaylee pick which photos to post. She picked these two in which she thought she looked happiest. :)
Mark and I went for flu shots yesterday, and the kids had theirs this afternoon. The kids are always a bit apprehensive about shots, but this year wasn’t too bad. We gave them the heads up about it last night, with Mark promising them a reward if they stayed calm and didn’t complain. Kaylee was still pretty nervous but did well. Matthew was happy that he managed to not freak out about it at all this time.
Kaylee chose to get a milkshake from McDonald’s on our way home from the doctor as her reward. Matthew, who is better with delayed gratification, opted to have Mark take him to see “The Hobbit” as soon as they can work it into the schedule.
The pose above was Kaylee’s reaction when I told her to show me her war wound. ;)
This is a total cheater pic. I completely forgot to take any pictures today. This one is an extra from yesterday that I just like. Kaylee spent almost the entire day today in her room reading “Aliens on Vacation”. It’s one of the Texas Bluebonnet Award books for this year. The kids have to read at least five books from the list to be eligible to vote for their favorite, and this will be the first year that Kaylee has done it. She was never interested in trying before, but she really developed a love of reading this past summer. I’m so proud of her and so glad she’s excited about reading! :)
Family game night – Sonic Sega All-Stars Racing. Intense competition.
I’m happy anytime I don’t come in last. LOL
For some unknown reason, Kaylee was playing with the Mungi Bands she got for Christmas and… a sock. She struck up a pose when I pulled out the camera.
Mark decided to jump in on the next shot.
Kaylee was not happy about having a co-star. ;)
More oh-shoot-the-day-is-gone-and-I-haven’t-taken-a-picture shots. ;)
We’ve had a tradition the past several years of each having a piece from a box of assorted chocolates every evening in December leading up to Christmas – sort of our version of an advent calendar. Not all boxes of chocolate are created equal, and some years we’ve run out and had to buy a second box. This year for some reason we ended up with half the box still left (I suspect it was mainly due to skipping nights here and there due to late schedules or other sweets), so the chocolate has spilled over into the new year.
In any case, choosing chocolate is serious business… ;)
So here we are again. Another new year. Another fresh start. Restarting this blog has been on my mind for a while. I took far too few photos last year, let far too many moments slip by unnoticed.
There were a lot of moments I could have captured today… the kids playing Wizard101 head-to-head (now possible thanks to the new laptop we got Matthew for Christmas… and his birthday… and…) … Mark watching his new Spiderman movie, insisting the volume be cranked up for the full movie effect (although I don’t know how photos would have captured the noise level of the battle scenes)… Mark making his annual batch of kumla… and forgetting that you can’t put potato peels down the disposal… Me getting sprayed in the face with potato water as I attempted to plunge the clogged drain… The mess when it became clear that plunging wasn’t going to work and we had to disassemble the drain pipes. Ah, yes, our new year got off to a rockin’ start! ;)
But the habit of grabbing the camera isn’t back yet, so instead you get these (hastily shot with blinding flash) – the result of me remembering as the kids were headed to bed that I hadn’t taken a picture and asking them what I should take. We had just finished a game of Uno, in which Kaylee had declared herself the winner, in spite of coming in last…
Yep. Siblings at their finest. One more week of winter break to go.
And that’s the way life in the Jensen house goes. :)
Grandma Karyl brought out some (mostly costume) jewelry that had belonged to my dad’s mom to give to Kaylee this morning. She had a lot of fun exploring it all.
The green shoe box was full as well.
I think she’s set for jewelry for a while. :)
Uncle Todd spent some quality time with his nephew, teaching him card games. And then Matthew taught him one that he and his friends have played. Todd swore he was just making it up as he went along. ;)
I’m pretty sure those cards they’re using are ones my parents brought back from their Vegas trip in the 1970’s.
Kaylee was watching that TV in the background…
She looks so excited. ;)
Up in Illinois, we slipped away for a few hours for a return trip to the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Museum. It’s a very cool museum, but mainly Mark wanted to see their Ghosts of the Library show again, which uses an old magic trick as the basis for its presentation. We all saw the show once, and then Kaylee and I looked at the gown exhibit and hung out in the kids interactive area while Mark and Matthew saw it two more times.
Done with her homework early, Kaylee volunteered to listen to Matthew practice his sax without even charging him one of the coupons she gave him for his birthday. She even sang and danced along.
The look on his face in this shot cracks me up. :)
Kaylee, at her class Valentine party, enjoying a sugar cookie (and refusing to look at the camera). The kids raced in groups to pass out their Valentines and then got to enjoy their treats. They frosted and decorated the cookies themselves.
