Zero to Eight in 3 Minutes 23 Seconds

Miriam turned 8 this month and is getting baptized on Saturday.  For this special occasion, we've been reflecting on what an honor and a responsibility it is to raise such a wonderful little girl.  In this video, we've taken one picture from every month of her life and shown them for two seconds each.  Some months it was hard to choose, and for other months, it was hard to find any pictures since it was three computers ago.  But every time we watch it we just hold hands, smile, and wonder at how fast she is growing up.

Clarissa's One!

Q: What do you get when you cross a happy one-year-old with a box of Cheerios?
A: A CheeriOne cake!

 'Miss Clariss' contentedly ate the Cheerios off her cake and left the good stuff for the rest of us!  She also learned that a fistful of ice cream shoved in your mouth all at once can be painful.

Roy G. Biv

From November through February, Miriam and Henry stayed after school once a week to meet with their "Destination Imagination" team.  (nine kindergarten through second graders).  They practiced teamwork and problem solving skills and worked together to prepare a play about Roy G. Biv's birthday party.

In addition to creating the play, they learned to solve 'instant challenges' together.  For example, "Using nothing but this stack of paper, build the tallest tower you can in 5 minutes."  Although they had an adult volunteer working with them, the script was completely written by them.  They presented their play at a competition at the beginning of March (their age group was non-competitive) and they solved an 'instant challenge' in front of a panel of judges.  It was a good experience for them.

This video does not include the full version of the play, just a few clips of their parts.  No pressure for anyone to watch - this one is just for their memories.

Marble Madness

While in NC over President's Day weekend, Grandma treated us to a fun morning at the Marbles children's museum.  All this exercise, on top of not enough sleep, tuckered everyone out fast.  The sign of a perfect outing!

Rule of Three

For Eliza's Goldilocks / Curlylocks party we played 3 games:

The "Go out of the room and see if you can tell which of the 20 objects we've moved" Game
(kind of like how the 3 Bears noticed differences when they got home)

Musical Chairs
(Because Goldilocks liked to sit in different chairs, and this game is a good way to break one)

The "Talk in a funny voice and see if the person can guess who said 'Happy Birthday'" Game
(Because Eliza can talk in a funny bear voice when she tells Goldilocks)

Then we did presents, candles, cake, etc.

Storytime with Curlylocks

Eliza's two favorite stories are "The Three Little Pigs" and "Goldilocks and the Three Bears."  While she enjoys looking at the pictures, no books are necessary for the many re-tellings that often fill our day.  We tell the story in the car, in the bathroom, in the store, etc.  In fact, due to her heavy interest, we decided to theme her 3rd birthday around Goldilocks.

Through all of this, she has become very skilled at telling these stories all by herself.  So, pull up a chair, make yourself comfortable, and enjoy a little storytime with Curlylocks.

Nothing's Safe

Put up the baby gate.  Shut the door behind you when you go downstairs.  Don't leave anything that shouldn't be consumed by a 9 month old within a foot of ground level.  Watch out, world, Clarissa is on the move.



The head shake is a new trick she's learned and enjoys performing.  Why do kids always learn "no" first?  Her laugh is developing into a sheep bleat.  Makes us laugh!  We love our little lamb.