February 2010

How Many Outfits Can One Girl Wear?

February 25, 2010

My girls, especially my youngest, love to change clothes. And often. It borders on ridiculous. I knew if I didn’t document it, no one would believe me.

So, take a look at Thursdays attire here at the circus. (I will mention that we never left the house today).

The day started at 7:00am, didn’t have the camera ready then, but here she is at 8:30am. (wearing the clothes she wore last night plus a coat)

11 minutes later at 8:41am she is sporting her “bubble bathing suit” (so named b/c of the polka dots on the ruffles)

This lasted all of 18 minutes because by 8:59am she traded swim suits with her big sister

By 10:57 am, she added her winter boots, hat, and mittens. She was determined to go outside, but didn’t make it past the door. (hmmm… wonder why)

At 11:17am (20 minutes later) she discovered the too short Winnie the Pooh sailor dress from last summer that I keep trying to hide and she keeps discovering.

Thankfully the scandalous dress didn’t last long as she changed into her lady bug pajamas at 11:42am.

15 minutes later at 11:57am she again had donned the hat and boots and was ready yielding a rather dangerous looking light saber.

She then changed into her leotard and accessorized with my high heel shoes at 12:33pm.

She napped in her leotard (hence the 3 hour reprieve on outfit changes). Upon waking up at 3:33 she decided to change back into her lady bug pajammies.

By 5:20pm however she was back into her sisters bathing suit and they were having swim class on the living room floor (note her sister is wearing her brothers bathing suit…apparently all bathing suits are up for grabs here).

At 5:40pm, I discovered her sporting her Dora and Boots undies, but decided it best not to post such a picture on the internet.

Since Daddy was coming home soon, I prompted her to put on some clothes. Here she is helping with dinner at 6:10pm in an actual shirt and pants!!

But, Daddy didn’t get home in time to see his daughter in real clothes because by 6:38pm she was back in the “bubble bathing suit”

She ate in the bubble suit and kept it on until bedtime when she changed into her “footie pajamas” at 8:04pm

13 hours and 13 outfits changes…seriously, this kiddo has more costume changes than a Broadway star. And I promise, this is a normal day…including the multiple changes and the preference for swim suits and pajamas…

{ 15 comments }

Preparing for Easter

February 25, 2010

in holidays

I love Christmas. One of the things I love most is that it is celebrated for an entire month. I love the time of preparation and the focus on Christ’s birth.

But without Easter, Christmas truly is meaningless. As awesome as it is that God sent his only Son to earth, it is only the first part of the story. His death on the cross for our sins and the fact that he rose from the dead 3 days later is what gives not just this story, but every life story purpose and meaning.

And yet it seems Easter gets so little of our focus. Sure there are Easter baskets and egg hunts, and egg dying and beautiful spring dresses (none of which have anything to do with the true meaning of Easter) but all of that takes place pretty much on Easter.

I don’t see much preparation and focus for Easter like I do for Christmas.

This year I am going to try to be intentional and spend focused time as a family preparing our hearts for Easter. I want to carve out some time each week to bring out focus on the cross and on His resurrection.

So, I’ve done some planning. I’ve pulled out the Easter board books from the overstuffed bookshelf in the kids room, and plan to set them out in the living room in a basket for the kids to look at and for us to read to them over the next month.

I am planning one craft a week for the entire month of March that focuses on Easter. My hope is to make things we can then use as decorations around the house. I’m going to do a paper mosaic of the cross with the kids to hang on our wall the first week, “some stained glass” (tissue paper) window hangings for week two, and I am still hunting down an idea for week 3 (any suggestions?) For week 4, I bought these coloring books from CBD.com (at $1.49 each, I got one for each kid) and we are going to work that week on coloring in the pictures and retelling the story. And on the week of Easter we are going to make resurrection cookies. I also bought this book which has some mazes, connect the dots, and other paper projects we can work on throughout the month.

I have a set of resurrection eggs, which I have used in the past, but not really. I haven’t gone through them day by day with the kids like they are intended. This year, I have it on the calendar. We will start on March 24th and do one egg each day, thus retelling the Easter story for 12 days leading up to Easter.

By Good Friday, I hope that our family will be prepared to truly worship and grieve our sins at the Good Friday service at our church that evening. It is my favorite worship service of the year, as it is such a precious time of meditation and reflection of Christ’s death on the cross, but in such an intimate and personal way. Saturday we will most likely have an Easter egg hunt with both sets of grandparents and dye eggs with them as well. (It’s become a sort of tradition here to do that on Sat with the grands and it always a ton of fun). In my opinion there is nothing wrong with Easter eggs, it’s just not what it is all about. And Sunday, we will worship our Lord together as a family at our church as we celebrate His resurrection.

It is my prayer that by making Easter a month long celebration, we can all more fully internalize the true meaning of not only Easter, but of our life. We were created to bring glory to God and without comprehending the depth of our sin, the sacrifice of the cross, and Christ’s conquer of death as he rose from the dead, we can’t truly bring Him glory.

My prayer for my family this Easter is taken from Ephesians 3:16-18.

“I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, ¹⁹and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.”

Do you have any Easter traditions, crafts, ideas, you’d like to share? Please share in the comments below. I am always looking for new ideas to incorporate here at the circus and would LOVE to hear from you!

{ 8 comments }

Our Valentine’s Tradition

February 23, 2010

in family,family dinners,Friends,holidays,Works For Me Wednesday

I know that many think Valentine’s day is just a day created by Hallmark. Others think it’s a cheesy holiday for saps. Say what you will, I’ll jump at a chance for a date night with my hubby. And I don’t mind a sweet card and some cinnamon heart candy either.

But, after having kids, Scott and I found it rather difficult to go out for Valentine’s day. Since we don’t hire babysitters, we typically rely on friends or grandparents for babysitting and you can’t ask another couple to babysit for you on Valentine’s Day. So, for a few years we just did an in home date night after putting the little one (and then ones) to bed.

But, then one year we got an idea that we both LOVED and a tradition was born.

We decided to celebrate Valentine’s day on the 7th instead of the 14th. This way, we weren’t asking anyone to skip out on their own Valentine’s plans. And the best part is, it also frees us up to babysit for a friend so that they can go out on Valentine’s day. We love it!

This year we babysat for our very dear friends. Since we had 5 young ones at our house on Valentine’s night, we decided to throw them their own party. We had heart shaped meatballs and spaghetti for dinner.

Then we did a fun painting craft after dinner. I asked the kids their favorite craft and they told me painting. So, I found these wooden hearts at Michael’s for $1 each. Throw in some acrylic paint and some old tee shirts and we were set for fun!

We topped the evening off with a heart shaped cake. (check out the recipe here…it was so fun to make). Mental note: need 2 tubs of icing next time!

Unfortunately, we weren’t able to go out on the 7th due to one of our many snowstorms this month. But, we do have plans to go out tonight and I am greatly looking forward to a nice evening out with my man!

Celebrating Valentine’s day, not on Valentine’s day so that we can babysit for our friends is a tradition that totally works for us. Visit here or here for more fun picture posts!

{ 17 comments }

Bird Watching

February 23, 2010

in God's handiwork,growing up,home school

When I came out to the kitchen to make breakfast this morning, I felt a cold draft. I then noticed my son sitting in the sliding glass door.

He told me he was listening to the birds in the backyard. They were offering up a beautiful melody. One thing I love about life with small children is that they help you to stop and take notice of the everyday miracles in the world around you. How often do we just sit and listen to the birds?

After awhile though, I was cold so I told him to put a coat on and sit outside to listen. He made some toast and took his breakfast outside on this cold February morning to spend some more time with his beloved birds.

As is often the case, it didn’t take long for his younger sisters to follow his lead.

Check out their bird watching attire.

On mornings like this, I love the flexibility of home schooling. I love that we can just start our day a little later and let them follow their whims a bit. We can’t let their whims direct our entire day, but it was a sweet start to our morning.

{ 7 comments }

My Own MacGyver

February 18, 2010

in Circus Dad

Thought I’d share a glimpse of our dishwasher with you all. Because it cracks me up. Last week I called Scott at work to tell him the dishwasher was gushing water out the sides. One thing I love about Scott, is that when something appears broken, he almost always finds a way to make it work. Seriously, he is not afraid to tear anything apart and “macgyver” it. Which has saved us tons of money over the years… He’s torn apart computers, the washing machine, the dishwasher, our oven, the toilet…

He has managed to baby our dishwasher for quite awhile now. I have thought for sure it was a goner (and sometimes even secretly wished it was b/c I would love a new one with a timer) many times as it’s leaked water all over our kitchen. But Scott would just grab a screw driver pull it out and find a way to make it work.

This time the gasket was broken, which keeps the seal at the top closed, thus preventing water from gushing out the sides during the rinse cycle. Scott went online to find the cost of a new gasket..$45. Which is MUCH cheaper than a new dish washer and MUCH more pleasant than the thought of hand washing all of our dishes. In the mean time, he went downstairs and found a C clamp to keep the door closed while I run it. Unfortunately, the only C clamp he could find was this industrial sized one. Seriously, talk about over kill for the job.

It’s been over a week with this big guy on my dishwasher. This is partly b/c our washing machine was also broken and I wasn’t sure how much we’d have to pay for one on craigslist. Thankfully though, I found a free washing machine on craigslist, so we can order the gasket. (a big yippee for craigslist)

Until then I simply screw on the world’s largest C clamp when I want to run my dishwasher and give thanks for a husband who always finds a way to make things work.

{ 6 comments }

Through the Eyes of a Child

February 18, 2010

in family,Olympics

We’ve been recording the Olympics and then watching portions of it the following evening with our kids. I have loved their enthusiasm for the events. They wave their American flags and pound their fists in their air chanting, “Go USA, GO USA, GO USA!” My son has had lots of questions about the countries and flags and which ones are our friends. We’ve had many teachable moments to discuss hard work, practice, and never giving up. And I couldn’t help myself, I teared up when Alexandre Bilodeau became the first Canadian to win Olympic gold on home soil and got chills when China’s Shen and Zhao won a gold after 18 years of skating together. But my favorite Olympic moment thus far this year was watching my girls imitate the figure skaters.