scrambled

wow! has this week snuck up on me.

two days ago I realized I had a week's worth of bible study homework to do. no problem! i'll just divide and conquer. half one day. half the next. well, two days went by and I showed up at bible study tonight with an empty notebook and a lot of blank paper. but the best intentions.

three days ago, I finally pulled out Davis' school folder to sign all papers and get ready for the upcoming week. new calendar. new month. first week BOLDLY states, "Teacher Appreciation Week!!!!!" oh snap. here I was, the night before the "big week" I had searched and jogged ideas of what to take each day for our two favorite teachers. but all those lists and great ideas were a month ago. old news. history. now, i had two kids to clothe and feed, a husband to bandage and chauffeur, a dog to walk, neighbors' kids to watch, suitcases to unpack, a house to clean, mountains of laundry & dishes to tackle and dinner to fix. now, I'm asking, "when did Teacher's Appreciation Day change to a Week?!!" and "how am I going to pull this together?!" we have no teacher's gifts. we have no money! all we have is a stack of bills waiting to be paid in US dollars and Great Britain pounds. sweet mother of abraham lincoln!

dig deep. there's got to be something. anything.

so as I'm spinning around the house in a panic attack, all I see are eggs. easter eggs. chocolate eggs. marshmallow eggs. eggs. eggs. eggs. how can I get away with giving our teachers some of the leftover chocolate from easter? am I REALLY about to do this? oh yes i am. and i promise to try and make it up to them tuesday through friday.

so after grabbing:

1. brown, lunch bags
2. kebob sticks
3. christmas ribbon
4. left over gift bag filler
5. chocolate eggs

we had Day 1 of Teacher Appreciation Week. phew.

where o' where has my little blog gone?

oh where, oh where have I been? well. let me tell you. we saw london, we saw france, we saw francois' underpants.

for spring break we went to visit aunt amy in london. bobo went too. and we saw more of london than we planned for. on saturday we slept for hours upon hours until sunday came. bobo arrived raring to go declaring the best most relaxed plane flight ever. so on a train we hopped to theydon bois for sunday dinner and afternoon at the bull. after a very relaxing day feeding the overfed stuffed duck, playing on a playground, and loving on daisy dog. we, too, stuffed ourselves at the local pub, the bull, on roasts, potatoes, scampi, chips, sausages, yorkshire pudding/circle things, bombs, tarts and ice cream. bobo managed to make it through the day though we all caught her dozing off on the train out to the village merely minutes after her arrival.

monday a.m. came around at a very early 4 o'clock wake-up call. off to the station to board a train to paris. cest la vie! two days of marathon walking, pigeon chasing, carb overloading, and tour de eiffel spotting brought zach back to old memories of living in paris back in 2000-2001.

back to london on tuesday night.

up and out again on wednesday to catch a bus to bristol, england. we haven't seen francois, severine and the girls since davis was 8 weeks old. we had mistaken emilie for her older sister joanne. they had mistaken davis and allison for two years older than they are due to the difference in height between families. the oldest (joanne) and youngest (allison) became fast friends and davis loved the attention of being the only brother and boy among 5 kids. girl crazy that boy is!

francois and sev arranged a babysitter and the parents ran out the door quite quickly for the evening. hooray for charlene! that brave babysitter taking on the three etchanchu sisters and davis and allison. it was a great time for all.

then came thursday. our first day back to london for three days to close out a great week of traveling.

and then came the great screech.

and then the call for an ambulance.

zach wrastled with a taxi and the taxi won. off we go for a trip in the ambulance to the royal london hospital for the next 24 hours. after waiting upon waiting from one queue to another we sprung zach from the nhs and rushed him to a private hospital for immediate care and reattachment of the toes. since then it has been one thing after another. but we are home and in one piece. and we have added "walking sticks" (crutches) to our way of living for the next few months.

well, we've learned where we stand on public healthcare. anyone who wants to support obamacare come sit next to me. i'll be more than glad to fill you in.

oh! and that thing about francois' underpants? well, he likes to eat breakfast in his underwear and he doesn't care who sees. i experienced it for the first time in corsica. and davis quickly pointed it out on thursday morning. "mom! he's in his underwear!"

"well, yes, davis. that's just francois!"

p.s. - i'll try to upload pictures to this post tomorrow.

for your viewing pleasure

once upon a pig

entertaining allison with a rock

hopscotch 101

and of course, you can always go here to watch the videos too.

deprived

i have deprived you, my loyal reader, from any sort of consistency in updating our blog. even now, as i look back at what i can upload.....all photos and videos date from 1-2 months ago. (and that's when i rounded up.)

so the photos i have chosen to share remind me of how we have deprived our children. yes, we take them to the circus. yes, we take them to disney on ice. yes, aunt amy spends her paycheck on snowcones, hats, spinners, and princesses and beasts. however, i have yet to purchase cotton candy for the kids. in fact, their first taste of the sticky, artificial blue fluffy stuff came from a lady sitting behind them at the circus which, i think...., was back in february.

so here are a few photos for the big event under the big top! if you do go to the circus again.....i HIGHLY recommend getting there for the performers meet & greet on the floor 1 hour before the event starts. it's not as insane as you think or it looks. very cool.

getting funky on a clown's pedestal in the ring!

a new addiction.

you've probably noticed allison's red dress/tunic lately. yes the child has more clothes than this. and i confess......this dress is size 24 months. what?! am i serious? yes. i. am.

originally purchased for her first trip to the circus in 2009, it was a little big. nothing stuffing a white onesie underneath and tights couldn't fix. now, two years later it wears as a tunic shirt over a pair of leggings or capris perfect for celebrating the cat and the hat's birthday or another trip to the circus. well, you can't say i didn't get my money's worth out of this "big blue box" store purchase.

by the way......the capris in the photos below are size 12 months. got to LOVE elastic and a very, skinny daughter!

fun in a box: revisited.

these things are fun and fun is good. - dr. seuss

today is dr. seuss' 107 birthday. well, if he lived to be 107. and when your child(ren) enters school, you learn that it's not just a celebration day, but a week. read across america week falls on the first week of march. and across america the schools are celebrating! i'm not sure if i have ever seen so much food coloring or considered using so much food coloring in my own kitchen. excuse me, my new seussical kitchen. red and white hats. thing one & thing two's blue hair. green eggs. green grinch. red fish, blue fish. the yellow lorax. pink and purple spirals. mr. brown. wockets. pockets. nink's in my sink. it's a never-ending story for playing with your food.

here are some cupcakes we made for davis's class and allison's playgroup today:

they kind of remind me of two little things of the past.

back to the cupcakes. feel free to copy. it would be wrong if you didn't. kids deserve cupcakes. you deserve to watch their excitement over these cupcakes. however i do have one warning (or two!):

warning!

1. do NOT put the cotton candy on until 1 (no more than 2!) hours before you are ready to serve. if you do not follow my advice, you will be left with drippy, blue, granulated sugar on top of your "once cute" cupcake.

2. i am not responsible for the ridiculous amount of sugar contained in this cupcake.

special playgroup delivery!

four hour sugar high.

walking home from school.

little hoops

our littlest hoop star. now if we can only get her to listen to the coach.

maybe

maybe i'll make resolutions this year. maybe i won't. maybe this year will be different. maybe i'll stick to them. maybe at least until february. maybe this year there will be time to ___________ (too many ways to fill in that blank). maybe, just maybe, if i get a post done today, i can still get at least one entry in per month. maybe. if i remember that the other 11 months of this year. word of the year = maybe. it still says, "anything's possible." much better than it's alternative, slacker.


it's also the year of the frog. it is, according to allison. two nights ago she declares to me, "mommy, if you don't be nice to me, i'm going to turning you into a frog." now here, you have to imagine allison standing strong towards me from about 8 feet away shaking a pink fuzzy wand in my direction. she is not taking a stand as a princess, but an almighty, powerful fairy. and she means business.

ribbit.

davis & rowan go on a snowy exploration. the younger siblings chose a warmer option.

waiting and more waiting

davis says he keeps "WAITING" on christmas. i'm currently waiting on daddy. waiting on daddy to get home. waiting on daddy's plane to get in. waiting on daddy's one hour commute from the airport to be over. waiting on my laundry to get folded. waiting on my presents to get wrapped. waiting on my dishwasher to get emptied. but they are not getting done by themselves.

one night without daddy throws everyone out of whack. i'm sure daddy's just waiting to get home and get to sleep. we are all "READY" for him to be home.

crazy thing happened to today at the store. standing in line (forever) at sam's to buy two things for office party and one LAST christmas present. look in cart. there are only two things for office in there. ooh! i have to get out of this line and go back for the present. that's not the crazy thing fore-mentioned. retrieve present. come back. get in line again. this time there are two parents and their two toddlers waiting behind us. the mom keeps calling out to the little boy, "william, come here." "william, come back." "william!" i whisper to davis to see if he heard that little boy's name was william too. still standing in line 10-15 minutes later, we get our turn at the register. however, parents behind me decide to split up and the mom takes the kids to the car while dad waits and pays. (been there. done that.) as the mom is walking off with the kids she calls out to the daughter this time, "allison! come on."

huh?!?!?! what? i look back over my shoulder at the dad and ask "are your kids william and allison?" he says yes. i point to my two in the cart and say, "same here. william and allison." he says, "really?" "yes, really. good taste."

we hear of a lot of williams. that's one reason we use davis. but we RARELY hear of any other allisons. but william + allison? that was crazy.

well now, i am ready for bed. and hopefully my little sugar plum fairy will be dancing in my head soon. but of course i cannot log out without sharing her little christmas dance with you, my devoted reader....

...and to all a GOOD NIGHT!

the real thing

santa came to church supper last night. i'm not quite sure which santa describes him best. disco santa? miami vice santa? jersey santa? you see, santa wore sunglasses to cover up his entire face due to keep a low profile amongst our youngest members. these sunglasses were red, plastic, and had a red, plastic grill across each side kind of like this.....

when i asked davis and allison if they wanted to go talk to santa, davis quickly said, "no." when asked why, he explained he liked the macy's santa better than the santa with sunglasses.

i don't see why?

little things i love

.....and i'm not just talking about the kids! i LOVE good things. martha stewart good things. luxurious good things. indulgent good things. simply good things and creative good things.....I REALLY LOVE!

tonight for dinner, i concocted another good thing. and when i find something good, i like to share with others. this is one of those things where you are just trying to come up with something to make for dinner. on a budget. on a dime. on a tight schedule. i'm sure someone, somewhere may have published this for credit. but nothing pleases me most when something so easy comes out really good.

what goes better with a very cold day than a warm bowl of soup and creamy grilled cheese? nothing. so tonight's menu consisted of cream of tomato soup and everyone's favorite toasted sandwich. no, i'm not going to share my recipe for grilled cheese. that could go one forever. but the next time you have change your pocket and no idea what to make for dinner, here is what you do:

1. Combine two 28 ounce cans of good crushed tomatoes with your basic boxed chicken stock. (just one.)

2. Add salt, pepper, garlic powder and basil to taste. I only used a wee little bit!

3. Simmer on low/medium low heat for as long as you can.

4. Right before you're ready to dive in, add cream to taste. I used as little as 1/4 cup.

5. Stir, pour and dip that sandwich!

It's so good, you'll be glad you did.

Now let me introduce to the other good thing we've grown to love around here. His name is Piper and he's our very own house elf! Piper reports to Santa every night at the North Pole to inform Santa of our daily behavior. He returns before we wake up and makes himself at home. Crazy little elf. Caught him going through my cabinets to make s'more soup for breakfast just the other morning. Last night he got his hands all in Zach's tools trying to help fix a cabinet. He has moved around toys and climbed to the top of our tree. And got into Dad's old tackle box to fish for a day. What will he get into next?