Friday, September 26, 2008

Melina likes to carry bags


Making Coffee With Daddy




On the weekends, Jeff has a morning ritual with the girls (or whomever happens to be hanging out in the kitchen when he makes coffee is more like it). He started doing this when Isabelle was Melina's age. Melina sits very still on the counter, smells the coffee with Jeff (she says mmmm, mmmm), grinds the coffee, and turns on the coffee pot.

Yes, Jeff is wearing a neck brace in the pictures. He had pinched a nerve in his neck a few days prior and was still recovering.

Morgan Girls

Melina idolizes her big sister...

No, Melina, No---Not Yet!

Tea Party

A local business in Ridgecrest, The Enchanted Tea Cottage, (or something like that) hosted a tea party for girls of all ages this past Saturday. I thought it would probably make a good Momma/daughter outing and invited Grandma Bettye and Mackenzie along as well. Isabelle loved it and can't wait to go again, but it really wasn't Mackenzie's "cup of tea!"


Finger Knitting

I first read about finger knitting from this book, now one of my favorites, and introduced it to Isabelle about 2-3 months ago. She didn't seem that interested at the time and never asked about it again until about a week ago. I showed her how to do it once more, and even still she seemed a little bored. However, at the beginning of this week, she picked up the yarn on her own accord and started knitting away. She started by finger knitting with one finger and has finger-knitted an entire basket worth of yarn in a few days. I reintroduced her to finger knitting with the entire hand, shown here:

She is very excited at the prospect that her next step will be working with actual knitting needles. Obviously, I'll be looking for a kind friend who knows how to knit!

Just throwing in this cute picture of Melina from this afternoon:

Monday, September 22, 2008

Happy First Day of Fall! Craft and Dessert!!

To celebrate the first day of fall, we painted a fall picture that I found on this blog. It looked like fun, so I did my own too! It was quite easy and very minimal!




Here are our finished paintings:


I also found this recipe from one of my favorite blogs yesterday and then happened to receive a forwarded email today with the same recipe. Guess it's making its rounds! We just had to try this 5-minute chocolate mug cake!

It was very quick and delicious too!I'm in trouble now. The author of this blog states how "dangerous" this cake can be, and it's so true! You know those moments when it's a couple hours after dinner and you're rifling through the cupboards looking for some brownie mix or some type of rich chocolate? Well, here's the answer: 5-minute chocolate mug cake! Usually always ingredients you have on hand, so you're set!

Friday, September 12, 2008

I love our backyard! Thank you, Jeff!!

I'm sure I moaned and groaned about the remodeling that went on at our house last summer (of course in my defense we did have a newborn baby), but this morning, I realized how grateful and blessed we are to have this large cement pad for the girls to play on with their toys, sandbox, playhouse (thanks, Uncle Mike), and swing set. Both girls love to be outside, and now that beautiful fall weather is upon us, they will be outside more and more.

I thank you God for these simple things in life!

Isabelle has a cold, so we took off the morning from homeschooling. Now I had to take a moment and calm my anal OCD self down (no, we didn't have to complete today's lesson--that's what homeschooling is all about after all), and we played outside, fertilized the roses in the front yard, and created a play house out of an extremely big box we had sitting in the garage (forgot to get pictures of that though). It was a great morning!



Crafts--Week of Sept. 8

A homeschooling project. We took a sponge and put radish seeds on it in the shape of Isabelle's choice, an I of course. With any luck, it will grow sprouts in the shape of an I! (of course, as I'm writing this, Isabelle watered the sponge after being told NOT to pour the water directly on the seeds, which of course she did, and then proceeded to squeeze the sponge of its water, so needless to say, we won't be seeing radish seeds in the shape of an I!).



One of my favorite craft blogs, had simple directions to make these blankets out of fleece. Isabelle chose the fleece at WalMart, she made this one for herself, and even made a smaller one for Melina. You can make a pillow too; maybe that'll be next week's craft!


Isabelle chose this craft out of one of our craft books. Very simple--construction paper hearts stapled to pipe cleaners pushed into a pot with playdoh (see Melina in the background--she's up to no good!!)

Painting

We didn't do many any crafts after our vacation, but we did settle down one day at the end of August to do some painting.

Last camping trip of the season...

We went to Mammoth the Wednesday after Labor Day and stayed through Sunday. On the way, we stopped in Big Pine and visited with Aunt Mary T. who was visiting Aunt Connie and Uncle Mike. We had a great visit and also got to see Aunt Connie and Uncle Mike's new kitchen--it was beautiful!

We camped above the Owens River and went to sleep each night listening to the tranquil sound of the river. The fishing, in general, was pretty terrible, but the weather was gorgeous and the relaxation was great! We did some more exploring for the lost cement mine, did some hiking with the Pacheco's who camped with us, and overall, had a wonderful time.

We had our trailer in Mammoth for the summer at the Mammoth Mountain RV Park but brought it home this trip. While we'd like to make another camping trip to Tuttle Creek in Lone Pine next month, with the cost of gas and the time and effort needed to get the trailer ready (packing for 2 kids is exhausting!), we will probably just make it a day trip instead.

I am supposed to sleep somewhere in this bed!

On our hike around Convict Lake. Ginger's husband, Donald, took us off the main trail a little, but we saw this beautiful creek above the lake.

Out of the front carrier for a quick rest and snack.

Enjoying some time at the park. While Isabelle pushed Melina, Melina would just laugh and laugh--they both enjoyed it so much!

We explored the Inyo Craters. See the mountain ridge behind us? We were on top of that ridge last month with Uncle Mike looking for the lost cement mine. At that time, I looked down onto the craters we are now in, wondered what it was, so it was fun to be in the area we had so recently viewed from above.

Mammoth...until next summer...

Our vacation from a 5-year-old's perspective

We bought Isabelle 2 disposable cameras for our trip last month. Take a look at the amazing pictures Isabelle, our genius photographer, took:










Notice a theme here? Most of them taken from her seat in the car!