Spiders!
I am not keen on spiders. I don’t become a complete basket case when confronted by one but I don’t like them nonetheless. Jenna is not keen on spiders either. She and I have always agreed that all spiders must be squashed with a Kleenex and then double flushed down the toilet. Our husbands thing we are strange but you must flush twice to make sure that spider is gone and that the toilet is once again safe to sit on. Now that you know all of that, you will understand why I got such joy out of the following email from Amara!
She is very brave!
Poof!
Amara and I have started video chatting lately on Gmail. It is wonderful to have her call me when she gets home from school. Because Amara lives so close by we have never spent a lot of time on the phone or anything and video chatting has added a whole new dimension to our relationship.
Each conversation includes a Speedy attack. Speedy is her stuffed turtle, and school mascot, and he lives on Amara’s desk. He always has to attack the camera at least once while Amara yells “Speedy Attack! Speedy Attack!” The other day I attacked back! I love ladybugs and have at least 12 of them on my desk – various sizes and colors and many of them gifts from Jenna, Amara’s Mommy and my awesome daughter. So now my bugs are attacking Speedy! When I first did this Amara just started laughing and told me I was funny! Grampy is always bragging because Amara once told him “You’re a very funny boy”. He reminds me of it when telling me really lame jokes. SO now I am officially funny!
And as we always do we have already added traditions to our video chatting! I have been listening to the audio series of the Wake, Watch, Wonder trilogy by Robert Sawyer. I’m on the last book and I really don’t want it to end! In the book one of the characters uses “Poof” as a way to sign out of Instant Messenger. Amara and I now Poof!
My best video chat story so far was the other day when I was temping. I was signed into my Gmail account but was working and not paying any attention to it until much later when I noticed that Amara had been trying to get me to video chat. I typed a quick message:
3:42 PM me: hi honey. grandma is working and can’t talk right now. I will call you when I get home. xoxoxox
She quickly replied back:
3:43 PM Amara:bbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbb
bbbbbbbbbyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyeeeeeee
eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee
PPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPOOOOOOOOOOO
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
OFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF
FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF
Boy did this make my heart melt!
Amara’s Dresser
The other morning before Grampy went out to jump rope, he stomped around the house grumbling “Where is all the scotch tape?” When he came back in the office later he found this in his inbox.
Subject: The answer to the age old question
Where did all the scotch tape go?
Jenna, Queen of AwesomeLand
It was a wonderful week and Jenna really is the Queen of AwesomeLand!
Thursday the PTA had a special Teacher Appreciation Luncheon and Jenna went all out to show them how much she appreciates all that they do. And I got to help! I love it when we do projects together — the planning & the phone calls, the trips to ABC Cakes, JoAnn Fabrics and Michael’s for supplies, the texts and photos back and forth — the time together.
It started when Jenna found these cute little cookie bag tags online at an Etsy shop but they were all sold out. So she asked me if I could create something similar for her in Photoshop. Sure! I had so much fun finding all the right clipart and creating all the right backgrounds. I ended up making six different labels. This one is my favorite!
Jenna then did the hard part. She made cookies! Wow, did she make cookies — chocolate chip, lemon cookies with white chocolate chips and two batches of sugar cookies dipped in green sugars, the school color. I told you she was the Queen of Awesome. She and Amara then put four cookies into 60 little Ziploc snack bags, folding the labels in half and stapling them to the bags of cookies!
She even made little round labels for the back so that the teachers would know which flavor cookie was inside. She delivered them to the teachers’ lounge in a cute fabric lined basket.
But wait! There is more!
While I was busy creating cookie tags Jenna was busy modifying a template she had found for water bottle labels. The teachers needed special water bottles. There were 48 bottles and she made sure each one of them was different! They all had the school name but each one had a different background and background color, different text and a different font! She pays such great attention to little details. She then stripped the old labels off and glued the new ones on. 48 bottles!
I volunteered to make dessert for the luncheon. After just making Grampy’s birthday cake I was in the mode to bake. The cake came out beautiful and rumor has it the teachers really liked it. I made the bottom layer chocolate with chocolate filling and the top layer white. I then frosted the whole thing white. Grampy nick named it a black and white cake — like the cookie! Oh and making 2 different layers meant I also had to do something with the rest of the batter and frostings so I made cupcakes for Grampy to take to work. I really had fun baking and while I was busy doing that…
Jenna and Amara were busy making 100 Lucky Penny Cards. Jenna had printed and cut little green cards and Amara had hot glued a penny onto each one. Jenna even got small baskets to put them in and spray painted the baskets green. They gave them out to both the teachers and Amara’s classmates. They were so cute and it was so much fun loading the car with all of this and delivering it to Amara’s school – me and my girls!
It really was a wonderful week.
Blast Pad Rocket Launcher
Amara loves to play outside so for Christmas and Birthday gifts we try and get her things that will make her visits here more fun and more active. (OK, maybe I have ulterior motives and want to exhaust her so she will sleep well!) But I do love that she has all kinds of toys and things here to play with! This year for Christmas one of the things Grampy and I got her was a Blast Pad Rocket Launcher. You place the rocket on top of the launcher and then you jump on the bladder as hard as you can so that it forces the air up and causes the rocket to fly straight into the air. I knew she would love any game that meant running and jumping! I was right.
She would carefully place the rocket on the launcher.
It was just after Christmas but it was 75° out.
She would run across the yard and jump as hard as you could.
Stomping on it with one foot didn’t work.
She got lots of height on this jump
And the rocket went flying!
Amara loved it that I would jump on it, too and that I could cause that rocket to really fly! I blame all the extra Christmas fudge!
Happy Birthday Grandpa Richard!
Grandpa Richard turns 65 today. You can tell by looking at these pictures that Grampy and Amara are best buddies! Grampy looks even better now then he did then — and Amara has hair!
Then
Grampy: 58 years old | Amara: 10 months old
Now
Grampy: 65 years old | Amara: 7+ years old
Happy Birthday Hubby!
Fun in the Sun at AmaraLand
It was a wonderful Sunday – it really was just that — a beautiful sunny day. It was only about 65 degrees but I was thrilled that it wasn’t the overcast high 50s they had called for. We had made plans for the kids and Amara to come over along with some good friends of ours, their 2 gorgeous red headed kids and their dog Ber.
Amara plays hula hoop with a Ber!
Amara had become great friends with Ber before either Kylie or Dylan were even born. They’d had a blast playing tug-a-war with Amara’s little hula hoop when she was about 3 and a half. Kylie has been a guest at Amara’s last 2 birthday parties and she has been over to play with us before. But this was going to be Dylan’s first visit to AmaraLand. Amara was really looking forward to it especially because we had had to postpone it twice before! It is hard to get everyone healthy and together!
But we did and we all had a blast. Poor Ber didn’t get a lot of attention! The kids were too busy playing outside. They had so much fun and the three of them played so well together. Again we had fun with the hula hoops only this time it wasn’t with Ber! The girls hula hooped – or at least tried and someone rolled the hoop across the yard as Justin ran through it. I was glad that we still have the swing set. Kylie was just fearless when she was alone on the glider and even Amara told her she thought she was going too high! Dylan loved riding with Kylie on it. He has a great swing set at home but according to his Dad he doesn’t like the swings! And he sure loved that slide.
I was really glad we had gotten lucky and were having such a nice day to be outside and play. Of course the girls had to go play in Amara’s room for a while, too! Amara had fun helping Kylie put on her old Snow White costume that she had outgrown but isn’t quite ready to give up yet! They dragged out (literally outside) all of Amara’s jewelry so they could figure out what looked best. Amara found 2 of her magic wands left over from her birthday last year. Of course Dylan wanted to have one, too! Amara brought out the pink plastic guitars hoping to distract him from the magic wands and to turn him into a rock star while they played Princess! She even showed him how you play it behind your back. He was not distracted! So she ran to her room in search of another wand and found it. Crisis averted! Magic wands for everyone!
Soon they were back to the swings! Kylie remembered from her last visit that I always keep Popsicle in the freezer so it was Popsicle for everybody. It was so cute to watch Amara help them with their wrappers and to read the jokes to them that are printed on the Popsicle sticks. She is so sweet with younger kids.
Once the Popsicle were gone Amara remembered that her Flying Saucer Game was in her room. It is one of the outdoor gifts that we had gotten her for Christmas. She thought she was really funny when she asked me if they could play with it in the house. “No.” “But it keeps them from getting lost — they fly high Grandma.” “No.”
So they took it outside and set it up. The mother ship sends little colored plastic saucer into the air and you have to try to catch them. The kids had so much fun. They ran into each other a couple of time but there were no serious injuries. Just a wonderful day. The Elefun game came out next. And then back to the swings for more!
What a great sunny Sunday.