Pirates, puzzles, and marshpillows

So I'm kind of glad it's going to snow this weekend... I don't like this grey and brown and no sun. 

We bundled the girls up and took them outside last weekend when it was so sunny and not as cold.  Emmy's coat and boots are a bit big... but whatever.  She was thrilled to be outside.

 And little miss got to ride her bike and wear her princess rain boots and swing... plus it was just cold enough that she got cocoa and marshpillows when we came inside.

 On Sunday we went to W-ton for church because we hadn't been there in a while.  And it just so happened that Amy got engaged!  Woot woot!  So fun, and so funny to see her all twitterpated.  We went to the farm for a snack and controversial conversation... good times.  They were all talking about the books they've read recently and yeah... I've been reading "Bread and Jam for Francis," and "Bedtime for Francis."  Between that and not sleeping it's no wonder I can't string two coherent thoughts together.  *sigh* 
 
Little Emmy-girl likes to bang on the xylophone.

Cecily was looking over my shoulder while I was on pinterest and decided she wanted a butterfly.  So since we really didn't have anything else pressing to do, we I made two toilet paper roll butterflies. 

 On a whim I took the girls swimming at Five Points on Wednesday.  I didn't take my camera, so I don't have any pictures except for a blurry cell phone picture.  Mom was kind enough to meet us there, which was fun.  Cecily was more timid than she was last summer and I don't think Emmy liked the noise, but they warmed up and had fun.  Emmy was having a great time trying to grab the little jet fountains...
This is her boat.  She's sailing.

 It's a good thing this little stinker doesn't crawl yet...  nothing would be safe.  She can scoot/slide herself around on the wood floor pretty well though, and discovered the computer ink refills.

 I have to do this puzzle all the time.  She is getting better at doing it herself, which is great, because I don't love puzzles.

 Aw look, they just made their first standard curve (for colorimetry).  I'm so proud!  Haha.  This lab actually went really well and I think most of them got good results.  Even though their scales are not quite good enough for really accurate concentrations, they could still figure out the concentration of their unknowns just based on the color of the standards.  Brings a tear to my eye. 

 She wanted to help me make biscuits...  so I let her.  She was pretty pleased with herself, even though she didn't want to eat them.  They really didn't turn out very well, so I either need to find a new recipe or actually remember to buy a couple of cans when I need them. 

 She did not want to be down on the floor alone while we were mixing biscuits.

 Daddy built a duplo tree house, which they loved.  And then they built his old Lego pirate ship.

And then we built a screen/wall by our furnace.  Our older furnace has a lot of exposed wires and hoses right at kid level.  So we used pegboard to hopefully make it a little bit less accessible to small hands- it's removable so we can still get to it when we need to.  Now I'm going to paint it- yay for projects!
I finally started cutting up old t-shirts to make some t-shirt quilts.  My plan is to make three different throw size quilts because I'm not sure I would use a huge one.  Because I'm weird I've got them divided into vacation t-shirts (the few that were still extant), HS t-shirts (mostly band and scholastic bowl), and College t-shirts ( U of I and YG shirts).  So we'll see how long it takes to finish them, considering I have a pieced and quilted quilt still waiting for binding and it's been at least a year...
Blessings.

Life and death

If you're not part of the solution- you're the precipitate!   It's funny.  Really. 

Bob's Grandma Koch died last week.  She'd been in the hospital for awhile... Bob got to visit her in ICU before she died.  We will miss her.

Random aside-  I dislike the term "passed"  or "passed away." It's too benign. Too nice.  Just say they died. Using a softer word doesn't make the loss any less.  Isn't it better to acknowledge the hurt and the loss?  Even if they are Christians they still aren't here anymore and there's a void....  that and "passing" just sounds new-age-y.  Ha.  Anyway.

Friday evening we went to potluck and Cecily went to the farm.  She got to spend the night and slept in Grandma's Cinderella sleeping bag.  She was sort of happy to see me in the morning though...  although I made her leave in the middle of coloring... with the 'smelly' (permanent) marker.

Poor girl with her large band aid wanted to chew on a pizza crust.

 And little miss ate pizza too- and didn't pull all the cheese off.

 Sunday was the visitation.  The girls did pretty well.  Cecily was dubious about the whole thing.  She just seemed nervous... new experience for her, and she doesn't really understand death.

Monday was the funeral and mom came and watched the girls in the baby room at church for us.  We spent the afternoon/evening at the Taj-Mah-Dill (Jamie's description- it is beautiful!) with Bob's family.  Cecily had a great time playing with the girls. We ate lots of good food and it was good family time. 

Daddy gave her an oreo... 

 They are good at making messes.

Especially when I'm trying to get ready for rotating potluck and making Sodium acetate on my hotplate on the stove in an attempt to make a home made hand warmer for a chemistry demo.  What?  You don't run smelly reactions on your stove while you're getting ready for company? Unfortunately I messed it up... I was a little distracted.

We had a good group- even though Dawn and Janet weren't feeling well.  Boo.  Camille came and brought Craig, of course.  *grin*  That announcement made my week!  It was a good evening, although it felt really weird to have Frippie at my house, with Camille.  Since I've known him forever... it brought back lots of memories of middle school and high school. Our paths haven't crossed much since then, but here are some old pictures I dug out.      

Eighth grade scholastic bowl- it was hat day and he stole my hat.

And there's this gem...  my performance was abysmal.... 



Today was school.  We talked about solutions and precipitates.  The precipitate demo that I did worked well.  Two different precipitates with two different densities and four different colors all in one test tube- it was pretty impressive looking. 

Blessings.

January

This is not my favorite month... so cold... so dark... so much required clothing... 

Well, if you're not a chubby baby.  

We haven't done much lately.  Staying inside on the cold days.  Cecily has played outside a few times when it isn't frigid.  The snow is too powdery for a snowman, but we made lots of snow angels.

She helped herself to a snack. 

School started up again.  I was tired, they were tired, good times.  Emmy was pretty sure that she needed to read my chemistry book one afternoon.

So this was funny:  Cecily talks pretty much non-stop all day long.  I was busy making supper and saying "what" and "uh-huh" in the appropriate places.  I heard her say something about "the sink is dripping, I will fix it."  But... I wasn't really paying attention and figured she was just exercising her imagination.  After supper Bob noticed this- my flower pot cracked and was dripping water down onto her kitchen.  She set her pitcher under it to catch the water...  

Sprout got home from France and cooked a French dinner for us Saturday evening.  It was good and made me hungry for crepes, so I made a batch.

The girls and I went to Famous Dave's with my family Sunday night.  They brought our gifts from the California box- Cecily got a frozen camera. We had to smile and say cheese all night.  *grin*

 Playing dress-up on a cold day.

We watched Grace and Eden this evening.  And Little miss I-don't-pay-attention-to-what-I'm-doing-when-I'm-excited tossed an old keyboard at Emmy's head.  It bled really bad.  And it's right in her hair so bandaging it has been unpleasant.  Poor baby.  *sigh* At least, "Cecily doesn't want to be the wild girl."  Ha.

Blessings.

The rest of Christmas and a Happy New Year and to all a good night...

So it appears we have a carnivore on our hands.  *grin*  She really likes brisket.  

Wyss Christmas was last Monday.  The day of days.  Bob was under the weather so the girls and I went by ourselves.   Cecily had a great time eating hot dogs (little smokies) and cinnamon rolls for brunch and running around like crazy with Cliff.   She was also pretty happy to wear her new "jaguar" shirt.

 Jumping on the couch in the basement...

 Setting up for the multimedia event.  Haha.  I didn't take any pictures, but it was pretty amusing.  Shelly had a bunch of old, unflattering pictures of the family through the years and who ever (whomever? I don't do grammar well...) was in the pictures had to recreate them.  I laughed a lot.

 Somebody liked the "baby" water bottles.

 She got duplos.

 And candy.

 I feel like the caption for this picture should be "...lonely, I'm mr. lonely...."  hehe. 

 Emmy was pretty sure this cool collapsible funnel was for her to chew on.

 Just chilling in Kandace and Carli's new chair.

 Nothing quite like Wyss Christmas.  It makes my heart happy.

 New caterpillar toy... 

 Hanging out with Kacie.

 And enjoying the quiet at Pearline's.

 New Year's Eve we didn't do anything.  After church I pulled out party hats and noisemakers for the girls and we had snacks...

 Cecily is afraid of the noise, but doesn't mind bugging Emmy with the streamers.

 We let Cecily stay up a little bit late, but she was getting tired and grumpy so we put her to bed at 11.  Exciting times.  Ha.  We're so old and boring. 
New Years day was quiet.  In the evening my mom hosted Schlipf Christmas so we went to the farm for supper. Cristina gave Cecily an Elsa Barbie- she was thrilled.  AND she got a frozen cup and plate. 

 Sooo happy. 

 Emmy played the piano with Auntie Shelly.

 And played with Grandpa and Cecily's Elsa doll when she wasn't looking.

So anyway, Happy 2015.  We are all healthy at the moment.  I am very paranoid about sick people and germs... especially at church... yay baby room... At least there is a lovely dusting of snow!
Blessings.