wow, what a day!

Emers kept me up until 2a.m. and then woke me up at 530a.m.!!!!

i have been walking and bouncing this teething cranky boy all night and day!

its a good thing that I can knit whilst walking and bouncing though- i was able to finish the most labor intensive portion of one of ira's solstice gifts.

it was an easy going day today, I scrapped all our plans and followed the girls' lead.

We went for a couple walks...

the girls bring their new buckets with us everywhere... they have brought home so many leaves and twigs- we really need to get on that craft...
here is liv at the finish line... who is racing you might ask?
team zhu zhu....ira insisted on serving up tea today... she wanted me to relax- but then liv said, "i help too!" and she kept dumping it everywhere.

ira started getting frustrated at how clumsy a two year old is... i am always impressed when she interacts in this way though. She didnt yell at her sister. She said, "liv, you are spilling it, can you wait until I can help you"

i eventually had to step in because liv is determined. but I thought it was a good teaching/learning moment and was proud at them for trying to work it out.

she even frothed my tea- she said, "just like you like your coffee!"

as I scrubbed the hibiscus tea off the kitchen- the girls went off to the play room....

liv set up the barn in the kitchen...
liv set up a castle in the playhouse...

man, I REALLY need to sand and beeswax that play furniture!!!! its so worn and beat up looking! (and drawn on)

we made some chocolate chia seed pudding...

I thought at this point it was for sure almost time for jared to be home! NOPE!

it was only 3!

we got out the play clay- the lemongrass was mine!
liv creating a masterpiece on the whiteboard- mixed media- whiteboard markers and whiteboard crayons! she turned the bag into a puppet too.... note the crayon on her face....then note why I took off her beautiful dress before she can play with whiteboard materials :P

ira set up an excer-tripod... to take the place of a hamster wheel.

the zhu zhus will go around and around and around....
then we had more tea with watermelon....
the girls were upset that it was seedless....
so they added their own with raisins...

liv said she needed her hat and phone to go to dinner...

store bought play-doh

OVER 3 HOURS OF QUIET PLAY = WORTH EVERY SINGLE PENNY!

man, we are not used to this much rainy weather- we needed an activity to distract from not going outside much... what WILL we do in a "real" winter lol

monday, monday

Yesterday was a doozy.

I ate cheese on sunday, and paid dearly.... I tried to offer up an apology to my stomach....
[that there is two key limes juiced, an inch of freshly grated ginger and sea salt in some water]

it didnt work.


We made a kitty bed, and pretended to be kittens.....


Ira went into the kitchen to wash her hands and then I hear, "mama, I am going to clean so you dont have to while you are sick"
I think... that sounds like trouble.

I walk into the kitchen to find that she has emptied about 1/4 of super concentrated DAWN into the sink and on to the floor.

We take this opportunity to pretend to be maids and scrub the floor and dishes and walls.... anything to use up the dawn instead of just rinsing it away.

[no pics of that... it was a "mama is barely able to stay in the moment and gentle with her loving helpful and sweet sweet sweet daughter" moment]

After many attempts at pretending- mostly me pretending to be okay... I made the girls playdough and laid on the floor until my husband got home.... lucky for me, playdough is a sure fire way to keep my girls completely happy and involved for a long time.

Its in my emergency arsenal bag of tricks.

my recipe is
1 1/2 c. flour
3/4 c. salt
1 1/2 c. water
2 tbl cream of tartar
1 tbl veg oil

combine in pot


stir over medium heat.....



keep stirring until it starts to come together into a ball....


i leave it in the pot and spread it out a bit for about a minute after it turns into a ball... then I knead it for a couple minutes until its at a good consistency.

we added food dye.....





but I couldn't find my rubber gloves and we don't really use plastic baggies, so we only had 3 left from the last playdough session. This pic in no way shows how really really really hot pink my hands are.


Liv decided she was really into cleaning up.



When my husband came home, I was lying on the floor next to them crying a little and snapping pics.... it was by far the funniest scene he has walked into in a while.

His words were, "Why are you on the floor crying and why are your hands neon pink?"

classic.