The Presidents of the United States of America

Ladies and Gentlemen, I present to you Ms. Drue Kathleen reciting the Presidents of the United States.

It took D all of thirty-minutes to memorize all 44 Presidents. 

I originally told her to only memorize 5 at a time and she could do 15 a night. 

Well, that got blew out of the water. 

She also loves to quiz us with Presidential facts.  When they were born, how many kids they had, how fat they were or how tall.  It's so fun seeing her so excited about it.

Drue also loves to say who was born during which President. 
For example, Laura Ingalls was born during Andrew Johnson, Mary Ingalls- Lincoln, Carrie Ingalls- Grant, Pa Ingalls-Andrew Jackson, Ma Ingalls- Van Buren and Grace Ingalls- Hayes.  Why she knows this I don't know, but it helps her memorize them.  She also knows which President was in office when we were born (Ford) She also knows Grandmas' and Grandpas' and Great Grandmas' and Great Grandpas' Presidents. 

Drue is just soaking up all of this new found information and loving history...which I'm loving, too!

I sure hope her 4 years of required Confirmation memorizations go that smoothly!

Watch the Clock!

The morning of Mom's birthday, we went over before school to give her her birthday present.  Lane gets nervous thinking I'm going to make him late for school.  He's never been late before, but doesn't want to know what that feels like. 

Every morning he reminds me to "watch the clock, Mom!"  It's especially concerning to him on days when he wakes up earlier than normal.  It just seems like he has too much extra play or t.v. time in the morning and he thinks we must be running late or that I have forgotten he has to go to school.

The morning at Mom's he kept looking at the clock on the kitchen wall.  The clock with hands.  I assured him I was "watching the clock." 

"What time IS it, Dig?"

{Pause.  Pretty long pause, actually}

A couple minutes later, Lane comes to the table with a drawing of "what time it is" (or at least WAS when he drew it!)

"This is what time it is Mom! And we need to be to school by the 12!"

The second hand kept moving! ha!! Nanny's clock is a little fast and it showed the time as being about 7:50...all that work to tell me the time!

Reminds me of what my brother, Shawn would say when Dad would ask him to check the time (you know, waaay back before everyone had a cell phone with the time on it in their pocket!)

When reading a digital clock Shawn would say "Seven. dit, dit, Five. Zero"  {dit, dit = : the colon}



Happy REAL Birthday!

I'm bummed I didn't post on Mom's actual Leap Day birthday, but better late than never. 

My mom turned 14 this year! We went to her parents' house for dinner the weekend before and out to eat with Shawn and KK on her real birthday.

It was always a weird concept for me and I always thought it was kind of sad that, as a child she didn't have a real date to celebrate her birthday.  But, the older I get, I think I'd be ok with only having a birthday every four years!

We also figured out that DD and Nanny will turn 16 the same year! How fun will that be?! I forsee a picture in the paper...DD sees new cars for her and Nanny! We'll see, DD!

Happy Birthday, Mom!

Ubba!

Aren't You Funny

Dig's usually the one looking for laughs around here, but his sister's pretty stinking funny, too!  However, her idea of humor is a little different. 

She has math homework nightly and parents are supposed to correct it.  Drue hardly ever gets a problem wrong and to be honest, she's bored with "easy" math.  I guess I've also become a little lackadaisical in my correcting, she tries to catch me and thinks it's hiliarious!

Funny Girl!

Quiet Time

Is your house like ours?  While I'm preparing supper, D & Dig usually decide it's a perfect time to get after eachother.  They run around the kitchen pinching eachother or grabbing eachother's arms.  They yell, they cry.  You know all the things kids do when they've had a long, hard day at school, are hungry and tired. 

A few nights ago, I found myself in a quiet, calm kitchen.  Hmmm.  Better investigate.

I melted when I found this.

Don't worry...when the books were done,

so was quiet time!

And everything was back to normal.



Like Momma??

Ok. Here's the deal.  Rarely does anyone tell me DD or Dig looks like me. If it does happen, that person usually doesn't know Ryan's family.  There's no mistaking it.  My babes look like their daddy...which is a good thing.  He's a cutie. 

But, really.
I'm olive-skinned...they're obviously not. 
I'm brunette...they're, well...not.


I've got freckles, tons and tons of freckles...
Wait a second...

This is a picture DD accidently took of herself with her iTouch.
She won't like that it's on the blog.

I've got curly hair.

What's this I see?

Dig likes to wet his hair down before school to curl it up!

Ok, I'm grasping for straws here.

At least I've got the stretch marks to

prove they're mine! 



Random Rewind

Welcome to a new, and soon to be a regular, blog segment I'd like to call Random Rewind. It will be a good way to post those random pictures I find on my computer and the little memories that go along with them!

This picture is from last winter. After dropping DD off at school, Lane and I would run errands, most often this meant grocery shopping.  He was a trooper and never complained.  Probably because he always came home with some kind of treat.

Every time he'd walk by the newspaper stand at Fareway Lane would say, "hi my little robot!" Then point out how he sees a robot and would say, "mom, you need to bring your camera and take a picture of me and my robot someday."  Then one day it hit me, 'duh, I have my phone!' So here ya' go...

Dig and his robot.  See his eyes and nose and mouth? 

And there you have it,the first of many, Random Rewinds!