It Snowed! It Snowed! It Snowed!

Where we live, we get snow one day every winter. If we're lucky. We've been super-lucky this year. So far it has snowed at least three days on our little postage-stamp yard. Of course, all three times it was gone before noon and it didn't stick on any of the cement or asphalt once the sun was shining, but it snowed nonetheless.

And what do you do when it snows? Well, by golly, you make a snowman. Even if you have to roll that darn ball of snow over every patch of available snow to get enough.

The kiddos originally set out to make a snowman, but then when it came time for the eyes and arms and everything, they decided it was a snow-elk. An snow-elk?! Well, I can't complain, I'm the one who is always urging them to use their imaginations. For a larger image, click on the picture below. You'll see the antlers and if you look closely, the snout.

The elusive snow-elk

Who can resist tasting the snow?

Teamwork!

Scoochy was the most dedicated snowball roller. She chased every patch of snow to grow the base from that little ball in her hands.

Dodge finished the base when it grew too cumbersome for Scoochy.

A moment of Tank's snow dance.

We're awfully prepared for snow, aren't we?

Snowmen aren't pretty when you're scraping every bit of snow you can. But I promise, we did not complain.

It's time for another video!

We went on a walk the other day and I brought my camera. I was messing with the continuous shooting option and took some action sequences. Of course I had to make a movie, but then the Windows Movie Maker had all these cool options. So, naturally I had to keep fiddling until I came up with the video below. I can't help myself. I take something fairly simple and have to make it as complicated as possible. Plus, you get to hear a snippet from one of my most favoritist bands, The Housemartins. Unfortunately, Princess Cutie Pops didn't participate in any of these daring stunts.

Taking after her Nana*

Scoochy has a new passion. She's an avid cook, aspiring artist, and now has turned to sewing. I just asked her how many sewing books she checked out from the library and she replied, "Not that many, maybe six." I love that she thinks six books isn't that many.

She ripped a hole in one of her favorite pairs of jeans recently. Coincidentally, in one of the books are instructions on how to turn a pair of jeans into a skirt. She jumped right on it and with a little help from Mom, chugged out her first self-made piece of clothing.

First, the front:
Now, the back:
Bravo! Scoochy.

*Nana, Scoochy's maternal grandmother, is an excellent seamstress.

S'mores in the winter!

Grandma Teri gave the kids a hot chocolate/smores gift set for Christmas. The hot chocolate went fast, but I was a little more reluctant to break into the smores. But then I realized I could cheat. I got the kids together, we assembled the little treats and popped them into the microwave. Horrible, isn't it? Oh well. It puffed the marshmallows, softened the chocolate and warmed the graham cracker. Scoochy and Dodge downed theirs so fast I didn't even have a chance to snap a photo. Princess Cutie Pops and Tank, on the other hand, know how to take their time. Theirs isn't the cleanest way to eat them, but I'm sure it's the funnest.

Tank sucked down the chocolate and marshmallow. Now he's working through the graham crackers.

Fascinated by how his fingers stick together when he tries to pull them apart.

She's got chocolate all over her face and she's still beautiful.

Homemade sushi night

We had a little sushi night, yesterday. It was delicious! Princess Cutie Pops seems to have gotten the hang of chopsticks. Her ability to grab an entire piece of sushi is pretty impresseive.Tank held the chopsticks at times, but pretty much just stuffed his face with his bare hands. I'm all for the "whatever works" approach.Here is Scoochy, full of pride. She just made her own roll with no help from mom! (Well, I did slice it up for her, but that's it!)

If you have ever thought I was a nerd...

This post should clear it up for all of you who are on the fence about my nerd level.

We have a spot on our wall by our stairs that we have been marking how tall the kids are from the time they could stand still and straight. The area is a narrow bit between a door frame and the corner. Not only are we running out of room to mark new heights, but the markings are fading from cleansings, rubbings, extraneous marks, etc. Bearing this in mind, I decided to record the heights of our kids so this bit of history wouldn't be lost.

Last night I did this. I sat there with a clipboard and a measuring tape, recording columns of numerical information. Then I sat there, thinking, "Paper is so easily misplaced and/or destroyed, I should put this into the computer."

I got out my laptop, clicked on the start button and a little green icon flirted with me. "Here I am! Excel spreadsheets! What amazing things could you do with me?"

Before I knew it, I was entering all the information for each of my kids, even digging through their birth certificates so I could add their lengths at birth. (No, I don't have that info memorized.) I experimented with different chart styles before I settled on a basic line graph, showing their growth over time. I wanted to be able to compare them at the same ages so I messed around with different colored dots, signifying years, but it just wasn't easy on the eyes. I finally realized I needed another graph. The original would show their growth as a line, showing how they've grown over time. The second one would need to focus solely on what height they were at specific ages making it possible to compare different kids. After a length of time I am ashamed to own up to, I ended up with what you see below. Now this isn't the pretty one because the nice one didn't transfer well. I had to save the chart, shrink it and then fix the yucky parts that didn't shrink right. (Like the inch measurements, oh well.) But this one is good enough for you to get the gist. Now at a glace you can see how my kids "stand up" to each other.

Dodge = blue; Scoochy = green; Princess Cutie Pops = purple; Tank = brown

Interesting things to note:

• For some reason we didn't measure Dodge or Tank when they were two.
• Princess Cutie Pops is a giant! Well, not really, but she is noticeably taller than anyone else has been at each age except birth.
• Scoochy seems to be the runt of the bunch. We'll see how that progresses.