Hunting Season 2011

Yes, this one is a belated posting.  Ran across some pics I meant to post back in the fall but apparently didn't.  Michael had a fun hunting season with the highlight being a very successful sand hill crane hunt.  We still have 2 big frozen birds in our freezer in case someone wants to come cook them up!

 Lots of LARGE dead birds.  Yuck.  Lots of happy hunters though.

Zach and Michael at a Labor Day weekend hunt in Uvalde. 

Wolf Crawfish Boil 2012

Another successful mini-boil.  Big news from this year - 1) Addy held a live crawfish, 2) Ella held a live crawfish, 3) Addy ate a cooked crawfish, liked it and asked for more. 

 Addy got quite brave and was even picking live ones out of the big pile before they were cooked.  I'm not sure I'm that brave. 

 Ella kept on calling them ants.  We'd correct her, she'd call them crawfish for 2 seconds and then they were ants again!  She only held one for a few minutes then wanted to, but Michael would hand one to her and she'd throw it on the ground right away.  I think that she ended up eating one, but wasn't a fan of the meal in general.  Ended up with some chicken nuggets.

New obsession = lemons.  Both girls were a bit obsessed with licking the lemons. 

Kindergarten Round-Up

I can't believe we had kindergarten round-up today!  Here is Addy and her buddies in front of her new school.  They couldn't be more excited to go to their new big school.  Today was just a quick intro to the school, presentation by the current kindergartners, followed by some fun with a petting zoo and playing on the playground.  It was also a mini-reunion for me, as tons of my high school friends have kids there already.  Addy is growing up way too fast and could have cared less whether Michael and I were there today -  she was running around with her friends the whole time.  There are at last half a dozen kids she knows that are going to be there in her grade, plus some of the older kids in kindergarten this year.  Great thing about going to preschool in the neighborhood is a lot of those same kids end up at the same school for elementary school.

I was excited about the school stuff, but I think that the petting zoo was the highlight for me.  Most petting zoos have some goats, sheep, pigs, pretty standard.  This one was amazing with baby chicks, turtles, ducks, bunnies, pigs, sheep, goats, and I'm sure I'm missing some animals.   I seriously want to hire them to just come setup shop in our backyard for a while so we can play. 

 Addy looks like she is killing the poor chick, but I think that she is actually being gentle, and the chick could have cared less.  I did hear some peep really loud now and again, but the kids were quick to put them down.  They had a whole tub full of these guys and all the kids were holding them.  I didn't get close, but Addy said there was a bowl of food in the middle of the tub and the chicks were all just running around. 

  Maybe more crazy than the chicks were these turtles that were running around.  Not real fast, but there were probably a dozen of these guys in all sizes, out of their shells just cruising around the pen.  I'm not sure if they were on some drug or something, but I've never see turtles this social before.  All the kids were picking them up and carrying them around - Addy kept on holding them upside down and they were just hanging out, no hiding in the shell. 

2nd Annual Easter Beach Weekend

I certainly see there being more of these...we had a great Easter weekend at the beach.  SO relaxing and the weather was amazing.

 Addy got straight to digging a hole when we got down to the beach.  She can nearly dig to the water herself this year.  And of course both her and Ella had to climb in and out of the hole a thousand times.

 And Ella found it hilarious to get in and out of the bucket.  When we first got to the water, she turned around and started walking back to the house.  She has some weird issue with the water and just kept saying "no ocean".  She spent a good portion of the time in my lap but finally warmed up.  At least she is finally a bit hesitant about some things - last year it was no fear of anything which was not ideal.  We need to find a happy medium right now!

On the way back from the beach with her bucket!

 We can't thank Granny enough for letting us change the railing on the porch - we went from spending most of our visit inside to spending nearly all of it outside, now that there are no hazards on the porch.  New activity this time - "painting" the porch with water.  I think that they spent hours doing this and Michael and I just sat back, relaxed and enjoyed the great weather!

 It was a bit chilly, but after letting the water warm in the sun a bit, there was more fun on the porch in the kiddie pool.  I think that it was still a wee bit chilly, hence the chairs in the pool and not sitting directly in the water.  And Granny - Ella has finally stopped standing in the plastic chairs so we actually get to enjoy them now!!   And so grateful this pool ended up at our house after the storm - I never would have thought to have one of these otherwise. 

 Easter egg dying and everything went right as planned for Addy.  And the Easter Bunny made up for mistakes he made last year, like hiding her Easter basket and not putting candy in the eggs.  And I was most excited about remembering vinegar so we could have the bold color eggs!  What a difference a little vinegar makes. 

Somehow every holiday is a mini-Christmas it seems.  Girls got oodles of cards and some fun new toys. 

Egg hunters!  The white bunny Ella is holding may have been the highlight of the weekend.  A fake bunny that hops and makes little noises.  He has been named "Hoppy" and there is some fighting between the two girls because there is only one Hoppy, but we have our pet rabbit now and Michael and Star much prefer this option over a real one.

New swimsuits showed up again in a big egg - so fun, the girls can't wait to wear them!  Before Easter Addy gave us the run-down of where she'd found the bathing suit egg the past couple of years.  Seriously crazy memory, for a million dollars I could not have told you that two years ago the egg was hidden in the flower bed at the back of the yard at our house.  Once she mentioned it, I remembered but otherwise would have had no recollection. 

1st Field Trip

Addy went on her first field trip last month.  She went to the theater!  They got to ride a school bus to get there - big news from that was that there were no seat belts, so not only was it her first bus ride but it was the first time she rode in a moving vehicle and wasn't buckled in.  I still find the no seat belt thing a bit odd, but no biggie.  Wish I could have been there, the pics they took were too cute!

 The whole pre-k crew.  

 

Addy and her buddies on the bus.

Jewish Holidays

The spring has been full of Jewish holidays that the girls have had fun celebrating at school.

It seems like most of the celebrations they have at school fall on days I work, so I haven't been that great about going.  Now that this is Addy's last year though, I've done my best to make them all.  One Friday they had a Havdalah celebration.  What is Havdalah you ask?  According to the ultimate source Wikipedia it is "Jewish religious ceremony that marks the symbolic end of Shabbat and holidays, and ushers in the new week. Shabbat ends on Saturday night after the appearance of three stars in the sky. Some communities delay the Havdalah in order to prolong Shabbat."

And after the Havdalah celebration we had a craft project - decorating a pillow case.  Not sure there is any connection between pillow cases and Havdalah, but it was fun. 

Each year the Matzah Factory comes to school and the kids make their own matzo.  I think that the dough was pre-made and the kids rolled it out, put the holes in it with this snazzy gadget and then the Matzah Factory people baked it and the kids ate their creations. 

 This is completely not in chronological order, but here are some pics from Ella's Purim celebration.  Now, what is Purim you ask?  Again from Wikipedia, "is a Jewish holiday that commemorates the deliverance of the Jewish people in the ancient Persian Empire from destruction in the wake of a plot by Haman, a story recorded in the Biblical Book of Esther (Megillat Esther)."  But at preschools they run with the celebration part of the holiday, with costumes and a parade through the JCC.  Ella wears costumes for about 1 minute, so I just took the tutu for her to wear.  How they got her to keep the crown on her head, I'll never know. 

Just leaving this one in b/c she totally wouldn't even put the skirt on at home, but based on this picture she wore it for quite a while at school! 

Right now it is Passover and before the real holiday, the school hosted a mock Passover Seder and invited the parents.  Here is the festive Passover table.  Each kid decorated their own seder plate and kiddush cup.  

Here is Addy posing with her seder plate.  

I think that she actually took a bite of the parsley, but basically the boiled egg and matzo was the only stuff she'd eat.  Guess I can't blame her for not eating the horseradish though. 

It was fun going and learning about this tradition that I'd been hearing about since I was a kid and my Jewish friends were celebrating.  As with most of the traditions, there was lots of singing.  I was sitting behind Addy so I'm not sure if she knew all the Hebrew songs, but she definitely new the fun preschool songs they sang about the plagues and baby Moses.  Each year Addy gets enamored with Baby Moses at this time and the other night she sat on the couch and watched The Ten Commandments movie on tv until she fell asleep. 

While not as formal a celebration, even Ella's class had a little seder.  This picture makes me laugh because I can't tell if Ella is scared or just totally confused as to what is going on.  Ella certainly got into the Moses and frog plague song, but she wasn't really into much else.  Turns out she is not a fan of boiled eggs and was luke warm on the matzo.  

I think that we are done with holidays until the Fall.  And Addy will be at a normal school by then, so the only reason she'll know about some of these holidays is b/c her friends won't be at school! 

Tot Spot

Ella finally got to go to the Children's Museum and visit the Tot Spot and not considering the elevator ride up to the 2nd floor, she loved it.  She is apparently not a fan of elevators all of sudden, so there was momentary screaming, but we made it!  Lots of good stuff to climb on so, Ella was happy as a clam.  She even found things to climb on that were not necessarily supposed to be played in, but it worked.  Thanks to a bunch of windows and reflective surfaces, the pics weren't great, but here are a couple.

 LOVED climbing in and out of the cars and lots of buttons to push were a big plus!

Opening and closing the door and more buttons to push = fun times