Halloween 2011!

Eek!  I meant to have this post up Monday night, but we've kind of been in sugar comas around here since then.  Hehe.  So Halloween was a blast this year!  Victoria* dressed as a princess, and boy, does she have the attitude down for that one!  She got more candy than we know what to do with, and had a great time doing it.

 *Tori has informed us (numerous times, because it hasn't sunk in yet) that she would prefer to be called 'Victoria' now, because it's prettier.  Her words, not mine.  Heh.

Photography and the five year old

Tori and I took our old, junky, thrift-store 35mm cameras downtown to the 'Market on Main Street' farmers' market today.  She just loves taking pictures, and I love that she's so interested in something I love.  I'm trying to teach her about composition and framing her shots, and I figured a busy street market would be a great place to practice that.  After we were done, we dropped our film off at CVS, to be picked up later.  We picked them up a little while ago, and I've got to say, I was pretty impressed with some of her shots.  Of course, there were a few blurry shots, and a couple of her finger, but on the whole, I was impressed.  I'll try to get some of them scanned and posted later. 
    In 'me' news, I just started a "365Project", which is pretty cool.  You take and upload a photo every day, for a whole year.  It's a challenge to myself.  If there's nothing interesting to photograph, I'll have to improvise.  It sounded pretty neat, so I thought I'd try it.  Ok.  I'll try to post those pics later.  Peace out!

Soccer and the average 5 year old...

Oh, boy.  Saturday was Tori's soccer game, from the YMCA after-school, six-week soccer program.  It was for K-3rd grade, and these kids were adorable!  Tori was the youngest one, being the only kindergartener in the program, and it... kind of showed.  She did pretty good, for her age, but, well, there were times she sort of forgot she was in a soccer game or got bored or something.  Hee!  At one point, she started doing somersaults on the field!  But, she did good, running after the ball.  And at least she didn't get hurt!  I've got to say, though, that the guy who coached these kids for six weeks + game day must have the patience of a saint.
      Peace out!

OMG! She's ALIVE!

So, yeah.  Kind of lost this blog in all the madness.  Update-in-a-nutshell time...
    So, Tori graduated from pre-K, Jimmy had surgery, I hurt my ankle, and Tori started Kindergarten.  Are we all caught up now?  Hehe.
    So, my baby's now a Kindergartener, at a real, big-kid, elementary school.  I'm finally starting to come to terms with that, I think.  She's learning to read, and she. is. amazing!  She was the first one in her class to finish the 'reading readiness' program, and she's almost halfway through her first reading folder.  This teacher she has?  Awesome!
    I can't even believe some of the stuff they're learning in Kindergarten, though.  Computers, science -- she can tell you ALL about invertebrates -- math, and logic... I didn't know some of this stuff until junior high!
    She also did the YMCA after-school soccer program, and loved it.  Her coach said she was faster than almost all of the other kids, which isn't all that impressive, until you realize that the program was for K-3rd grade.  Their end-of-program game is Saturday.  That...should be interesting.  Haha.
    Okay.  I'll try to remember to post here occasionally.  'Til then, Peace out!

New Photo Blog

Just a brief update for tonight, and I promise, I'll have a full post tomorrow.  I started a photo blog on Tumblr, just kind of a journal of my adventures in photography and digital photo manipulation.  Come check it out HERE.

That's complicated.

So, Tori and I were listening to my iPod in the car today, and the Glee version of 'Poker Face' came on.  Tori likes that song, so we turned it up, and she's singing along.  Then she stops, and says, "Hey, mama, what's a poker face?"  So, I launch into a five minute explanation about poker, and cards, and bluffing, and having a good poker face.  I get done, and she says, "Oh." ... Almost a full minute later, she goes, "Mama, that's complicated."  I'm fairly certain, however, that she'll remember some of the explanation later.  Like, the next time I tell her to do something, or else I'll *fill-in-the-blank*; she's going to bust out with, "Mama, you're just bluffing."

In other news, 'Courage the Cowardly Dog' is one messed-up show.  xD  We love it, though.  Peace out!

Little artist

So, I know I may be a little bit biased, but I'm pretty sure my kid is an artistic genius.  Okay, maybe not, but I still think that she's not bad, for a 4 year old.  Here's some of her recent artwork.

    This first one, she tells me, before she starts painting, "I'm gonna paint a summer scene.  With a palm tree and the ocean and the sky and the sun.  It's gonna be the beach."  The result:

    Next up, we have beadwork.  She got into my bead box, and made me a pair of earrings.  Very, um, freeform.

    Finally, she moved on to pen and ink drawing.  She knows that my favorite animals are penguins (followed closely by the duck-billed platypus).  She's drawing away, and finally says, "Here, Mommy.  I drawed this for you, 'cause it's your favorite!"

    Remember, she's only four.  I figure that's not too bad.  xD  Peace out!

ACK! What a couple of weeks!

Wow.  No time for blogging the past couple of weeks.  Tori's school closed, and we were very bummed about that.  But!  She's starting her new school tomorrow, and it seems like a pretty good one!  Okay, y'all.  I have a lot of cute to make up for.  So now, in no particular order, Tori:  Winter vacation edition.

We had a great Christmas, but nothing too exciting happened, other than pretty much everyone getting a cold.  Tori got some 'Zoobles', and let me just say, these are sooooo adorable.  They're little plastic animal thingys, that lock into the shape of a ball.  Then, when you put them on something metal, they pop open!  So cool.  So, Tori's outside with Jimmy, and she sticks the Zooble on the car.  Well, the car being metal, it pops open.  She yells, "Wow!  It even pops on the CAR!  Oh, I gotta put this on Facebook."  Yeah.  No lie, guys.  She's...yeah.

The little things lined up on the hood are the Zoobles.

Also, she likes looking through the scope.  xD

So, then yesterday, she's coloring with gel pens, and she gets done with a really pretty picture.  She goes, first to Jimmy, then to me, "There.  I'm done!  Log online and get your own picture to color!"  Yeah, we've really gotta cut down on her TV time.  *facepalm*  Peace out! 

What a weekend!

Our weekend started bright and early Saturday morning, getting up and ready to go to the Christmas Parade.  My dad, Aunt, and Uncle got there before us, and saved us spots.  We had a great time, even though by the end of the parade, we were freezing.  Tori had a blast, and got lots of candy and beads.  Of course, when my mom asked her later about the parade, all she had to say was, "The horses pooped!"  I took lots of pictures with my new camera, and I think it did a great job.

Later Saturday evening, we were on our way home from Wal-mart, and drove past some paintings on the side of the road.  Tori, looking out the window, says, "Mom!  Some of those paintings are paintings by Van Gogh!  Look, it's the 'Night painting'."  I looked, and sure enough, one of the paintings was a copy of 'Starry Night'.  Now, I know that she has the 'Baby Van Gogh' DVD, but for her to remember that painting and be able to recognize it from a moving vehicle, in near-darkness...?!  I...just don't know.  And when I asked her how she knew that, the first thing she said?  "'Cause I'm smart."

Fun with ice (or, guerilla warfare with frozen projectile missiles)

So my dad had this idea last year to leave the sprinklers on at night, when it was going to freeze.  Wow.  The result?  A really, really cool ice patch.  Especially since the grass in the garden area is pretty high.  Icicles and crystals everywhere.  We all had a blast playing in it last year, so he decided to do it again this year.  Last night was the night.  This afternoon, we frolicked in a wintery wonderland!  Well, right up until Tori and her Grampa formed an unholy alliance and started an all-out ice war!  Ice was chucked, bruises were received (okay, that one might be just me), and the battle raged on!  Or, at least until I couldn't feel my fingers.  So I did what any brave combatant would do in the face of out-numbered danger...I ran and hid behind my mommy.  My strategy was that my dad couldn't possibly be foolish enough to throw ice towards her.  Yeah.  Not so much.  He threw, she glared, and the two of us declared surrender and went inside to thaw out, leaving the two frostbite-loving lunatics out there to turn on each other.

For more pictures, check out the family album.

On a completely unrelated note, Tori, instead of going to sleep, is in her bed singing 'Funky Town'.  Whoever taught her that song, rest assured...some day, somehow, I will get you for this.  *Headdesk*  Peace out!