The Great Eascape and other adventures

I've been busy creating. Well, with what spare time I have (which isn't much, but it will have to do). My friend Sarah put me onto a site called Pinterest and we've gone hog wild with "pinning" all the how-to things we want to make before we die. This includes head bands and fabric flowers. Cash is my model- what a good sport.
Our great escape came the weekend before Easter. The kids and I had been sick the whole week- to the point of debilitation for me- and then having to nurse everyone else back to help... well, it took the mickey out of me. So Saturday, while poor Clay (who had just sweated through a fever the night before) worked a wedding I packed up the kids and headed out to the beach. Cash ran his little heart out singing the Sandpiper song and flapping his "wings". I managed to talk him out of taking shoes and socks off even though he insisted it wasn't cold (it was REALLY cold).
We flew his $1 Buzz Lightyear kite. Thanks to the wind it required no skill at all to do so :)
After the beach we headed to Occidental to see their plant sale. I didn't realize it was a hike into the woods to get there and ended up carrying Tupp in my sling on the front and giving Cash a piggy back ride since he had started getting blisters from his shoes. On our way back toward home we treated ourselves to Screamin Mimi's ice cream- we each had a mini cone (it's the size of my thumb- just right). So we escaped to the beach and had other adventures, but it was so nice to have a change of pace, out of the house, and enjoying the beauty of nature.

It was also a great opportunity for me to see play as learning in action. I've been reading a book by Lisa Murphy (the Ooey Gooey Lady). It's inspiring me and giving me confidence in the face of all those people asking me if and when I'm putting Cash into preschool. Now I can boldly say, "no, I'm not putting him in preschool." Because I know I can teach him everything he needs to know for kindergarten here at home. It's been my plan all along, but I feel like there's been growing pressure from society that preschool is the "thing" to do. It's not for us though.

With Oma and Opa out of town a couple of weeks ago, Cash came with me to Scottish dance. An hour long class is WAY too long for a three year old, but he was a good sport and tried everything asked of him. Here he is stretching with Ron.

My last adventure to mention before I get to talking about the kids and the house is the building of Cash's bed. We bought this before Tupp was born, but Clay just never had time to put it together. When he went out of town the weekend before we got sick I decided that I was going to do it- all by myself. For the most part it worked out well, but the box spring mattress was almost the death of me. But.. tada!! So now we have additional storage under the bed and it's parts aren't lying around and cluttering up my house any more :)Onto the kids! They're darling, funny and soooo amusing. Tupp is really grabbing and holding things. She loves her rattle, there's a couple of hammers that she likes to chew on, and then there's Mr. Kute Katapillar. She pretty much gnaws his face all day long. She wants to sit up so bad. She can sleep a 6 hour stretch when forced but prefers to wake up every three hours. We're working on that. She's come down with another cold, but that's just how you roll when you've got an loving older brother. We just had her 4 month well baby visit and she is 13lb 1.5 oz and just under 24 inches long. I think that puts her in the 25% for weight and 50% for height. For comparison, Cash was 95% for height and 75% for weight.
Speaking of Cash.... he's such a character. He talks incessantly, but it's fun to listen to him (usually). He sings songs all day long, recites movie dialogue and books, plays pretend. Opa has introduced him to "Daniel the Boone" as he calls it. Thus we are now playing cowboys and Indians. He loves to play with water- preferably running water. He came with me to the dentist the other day when I got my teeth cleaned and it turns out he has all of his twenty teeth.
Cash has been helping me in the garden. We have carrots sprouting and four squash (not sure what kind though) and either peppers or spinach (labels got misconstrued when he was helping me). Our strawberries have flowers on them and our sunflowers are growing strong. I've decided not to do corn this year. It's not really practical given the amount of space we have. So if all continues to go well we'll have carrots, spinach, peppers, lettuce, strawberries, onions, zucchini, pumpkins, crooknecks and sunflowers.

We had a packed Easter. But we'll save that for the next entry. Loves to all.