Books Post

Ok, so I wasn't actually tagged on this, but I saw it on someone else's blog and decided that it was so me I had to do it too.

Five books I really love:
1. Twilight - and the others in the series - by Stephenie Meyer
2. Harry Potter 1-7 by J.K. Rowling
3. Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte
4. Shipwreck at the Bottom of the World by Jennifer Armstrong
5. Reading Magic by Mem Fox

Five favorite children's books:
1. Weslandia by Paul Fleischman
2. Wilfrid Gordon McDonald Partridge by Mem Fox
3. Lilly's Purple Plastic Purse by Kevin Henkes
4. Tell Me Again About the Night I Was Born by Jamie Lee Curtis
5. Make Way for Ducklings by Robert McCloskey

Five Juvenile / Young Adult books I love:
1. Junie B. Jones by Barbara Park
2. The Penderwicks by Jeanne Birdsall
3. Anything by Russell Freedman - Lincoln: A Photobiography, Kids at Work, Eleanor Roosevelt
4. Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis
5. The Devil's Arithmetic by Jane Yolen

Five Books I've recently read:
1. Dragonhaven by Robin McKinley
2. The Salem Witch Tryouts by Kelly McClymer
3. Witch Child by Celia Rees
4. Twilight and New Moon by Stephenie Meyer (again)
5. Fitzwilliam Darcy, Gentleman: An Assembly Such as This by Pamela Aidan (reading it right now)

I Tag: Everyone who reads this and has a blog! I want to know your pics!

First Visit to Santa

Last Saturday we went to Aaron's work Christmas party (they have a children's Christmas party in the morning with presents for the kids and everything!) and Sydney got her picture taken with Santa. Such a trooper! Although, you can tell she's a little mystified as to what's going on!

Funny Thing Happened at Walmart

People do weird things you know that? It's usually in a large public gathering place too. Last week I had a fun little experience that I thought I'd share. I was in Walmart hurrying around, in my jeans, t-shirt, and ponytail. I'm slinging Sydney around in her carseat on one arm and doing a real quick pace down the aisles while also talking on my cell phone. As I turned around I noticed this petite semi-middle aged woman looking at me and I immediately thought, "She looks like she's going to talk to me. Oh no, am I supposed to know her? Who is she? I don't know her - do I?" I had to walk past her to leave, and as I did I could see her lips moving and hear sound, but she was sort of mumbling so I didn't catch what she said. Then she spoke up and said, "You'd be a beautiful Mrs. Colorado! We'd love to have you!" And pressed the following business card into my hand:

Needless to say I was a little stunned and at a serious loss for words. :)

Silly Things About Me

I've been tagged by my cousin Amber, so you now all get to know 5 new things about me that you may not have known before! Lucky you!

1. As has probably been evidenced by many many previous posts, I'm truly about 5 years old. I love to color (I recently purchased a Curious George color book - Target $1 rack!), I love toys (Sydney has a lot she isn't old enough to use yet - the Snap n' Style dolls are my favorites!), Games, Silly Putty, etc. This makes it very easy when purchasing gifts for me or cheering me up. Aaron once bought me a color book and princess crayons as a gift and I was totally stoked. Karen just introduced me to a new cartoon called "Charlie and Lola" (on Disney) and I'm in love with it. Cartoons just take me back to a simpler time I guess. Peter Pan had a good philosophy you know?
2. Many people have comfort foods, I have comfort places. Places that consistently calm me down or cheer me up when I'm having a rough go. Fabric stores calm me down, as do book shops. Also small enclosed spaces. Seriously, I am the opposite of a claustrophobe. When I'm upset I like to sit in closets because I feel safe. Weird, I know, but true.
3. I totally prefer gummy or chewy candy to chocolate almost every time! I go for Snickers and Goo Goo Cluster Ice Cream just as much as the next girl, but I get tired of them too and need something chewy like skittles, starburst, gummy lifesavers (currently in my cupboard), gummy bears, worms, apples, peaches, etc.
4. I am an overly social person. I seriously LOVE to be around people! This is one reason I like to have lots of friends - so they don't get too sick of me! ;) Seriously though I love to hang out with people VERY frequently (say multiple times a week?). In college we even had some fantastic friends (Kevin & Michelle!) that we did stuff with at least 3 days a week, sometimes more, and that's not including weekends! We somehow all still had part-time jobs and got our homework done, but we got a lot of round of Competitive Solitaire (aka Nerts or Snarf) and Rage in while we were at it!
5. I am a dabbler - Big time. I love to have my fingers in many many many different pots, which always means that I just do fairly well at all of those things, but I have fun with it, so it works! In high school I was on 2 ballroom teams, 1 choir, 1 showchoir, Honor Society, AP Classes (yes I was a nerd - proud of it too!), school and community musicals, piano lessons (please don't ask, I no longer play), and voice lessons. Talk about ridiculous. As if anyone has time to practice for ALL of those extracurricular activities and still maintain a good GPA? It just meant that I didn't spend the necessary time on any of them, but still had fun. I've now replaced all of those activities with hobbies: sewing, quilting, painting, jewelry making, blogging, scrapbooking, baking, cooking, floral design, reading, etc. The fact still remains though that I have a ton of hobbies and not enough time to do half of them, so I do them each in spurts.

I now tag Jane, Brittany, Alli C., Jessica M., and Adrianne.

Putting Up Christmas

The Sunday after Thanksgiving we got to put our Christmas tree up! We're finishing the last few Christmas decorations inside and still need to do the outside, but it's fun to have the house all Christmasy! I love this season!

Sydney was having fun laying under the Christmas tree and getting in the Spirit

More Pictures

Here are some more fun pictures of Sydney that kind of show how she's doing developmentally. She can hold her head up really well now and is working on controlling her back muscles too.

She likes to sit up on the couch like a big girl after she eats.h
Sometimes she still falls over :)First time ever holding a toy on her own! She held this rattle for quite a while!
Also she keeps eating her hands - she loves them! As you can see, she's going for it (or the rattle) in the pic above. She loves that index finger on her right hand. I'm sure that's where the "everything I touch goes in my mouth" phase begins!

Pictures

While at home for Thanksgiving my brother-in-law took some great pics of Sydney. Thought I'd post them here for you all to see! Thanks Heath!

Thanksgiving Fun

These are a bit late, but I wanted to post them nonetheless. The night before Thanksgiving my two sisters and their spouses (and Aaron, Sydney, and I) were all at my parent's house. My parents ended up each having to leave for part of the evening, so we were left to our own devices. After having dinner and cleaning up, the boys all went downstairs to play on Haylee and JC's Wii while the girls started chatting. After a few minutes I decided we should do something fun, so I ran to the closet my mom keeps all her odds and ends in, and found in a stack of old color books (there was even a He-Man one!) 3 PAINT WITH WATER books! There was a Barbie one, a Snow White one, and a Beauty and the Beast one! Haylee took B&B, Jess took Snow White, and I ended up with Barbie. We had lots of fun being silly!

After an hour and a half of painting, we had a great collection going on!

Here we are with some of our favorite pictures! Mostly I love Haylee's since the one on the left is her first one she did (in true 4 year old style - whipping the brush across the whole page and making green chickens), and the one on the right (if you look closely) is a tad bit scandalous. ;)