July 19, 2008

It has been a loooooong day! It started with me answering my ringing cell phone. Then I wanted to reach through the airwaves and choke the idiot who woke me up at 11am and told me he DIDN'T have the wrong number! When did I become Beverly Slomsky? How'd I miss that?!

Anna awoke before I did but went into the play room with Sarah and Caleb until I got up. I was going to take her to Uncle Jay's pool and over to Grandma's to see all the "cluck-clucks" (her word for my Aunt's chickens/ducks/Guinea hens), but Grandma reminded me it was supposed to be in the upper 90's today. Anna was disappointed but cheered right up when I told her I'd fill her baby pool so she could play in it.

We played downstairs for a couple hours and I filled the baby pool for the kids. I wanted to give the water some time to warm up, so Sarah took Caleb downstairs and I took Anna upstairs for their naps. Sarah told me that Anna would fall asleep watching the first Shreck movie. NOT! She watched the entire thing. I was trying to get to sleep but it was impossible with her tapping my arm or back every two minutes and pointing towards the television. She finally dozed off around 2:30 but we didn't wake until 6:00pm! I was shocked we slept that long and Mom thought we'd been awake for a while, but quietly doing something here in the craft room!

Anna and Caleb played in the pool on the deck for a little while, but that came to an abrupt halt when Caleb saw me eating crackers. I put two of the deck chairs side by side and sat each of the kids in one. I was having chicken salad with the saltines and snacking on potato salad as well. Caleb just wanted plain saltines and a few bites of the potato salad. Anna was just the opposite. She wanted Saltines with the chicken salad. Then she just wanted chicken salad and I had to make her eat the cracker by telling her she couldn't have more chicken until she did. My "snack" turned out to be their dinner as it was about 7:00 by that time.

Anna and I folded laundry when we came back inside. It turned out that she was my shadow all day. She had to "help" me every time I did something. Here's Anna's idea of helping Aunt Beth fold laundry: she stole my kercheif that I wear when I'm driving with the windows down and the sunroof open, then took my sunglasses off my head (I refuse to show the pic of her wearing my underwear as a necklace; Sarah missed it when they were on Anna's head). The fact that we're wearing the same color shirt is a total coincidence; it was the only shirt I had with me that wasn't down in the laundry room when I got dressed.

I was sitting on the couch because my back was tightening up on me after a full day of toting Anna around. The only reason I wasn't in need of a painkiller and muscle relaxer is because Anna is so small! At two years, eleven months of age, Anna only weighs 30 pounds. Much heavier and I'm not going to be able to carry her like that. While I was sitting there, Anna came over and grabbed my hand. She started pulling me and saying "nite nite." We were all suprised because it was only 8:00, but Sarah asked her if she wanted to go up to bed and she said "yes."

Anna closed her eyes a few times, but it never lasted. I took the nightlight from the bathroom and plugged it in here. I turned on the light to show her the smoke detector when I figured out the blinking light on it was what she'd been staring at and pointing to. I explained to her that it was a good thing, not bad, and the light flashing just told us it was ready to do its job. None of that mattered and I gave up after an hour of telling her Aunt Beth wanted to go to sleep.

Sarah had gotten Caleb to sleep, so when we got downstairs it was just her and Mom. Dad was playing music at a carnival in Westminster and Ian and Sara went swimming at her dad's. Anna was just wired for sound. Sarah tried taking her down in the rec room to watch another movie and hopefully zonk out, but she gave up after two hours. She did the same thing down there that she'd done up here in our room to me.

When they came back up, I was on the couch working on Mount Coot-tha. I was totally dissatisfied with my progress thus far today (three whole stitches) and was determined to get more done. Anna is fascinated with my stitching and climbed up on the couch with me. I was going to bring my laptop downstairs with me but gave up the idea when I remembered I had to climb under Mom's work tables to run the cord to the plug. Anyway, Anna is very focused when she's helping me stitch. I have to hold the thread when she pulls the needle through for me so she doesn't keep going and unthread it every time, but we make progress.

We have a game we play when she's helping me. Mr. Needle plays "Peek-a-Boo" with Anna! When the needle goes to the back of the fabric (my turn) he's saying "Bye bye!" and when it pokes through to the front he's saying "Peek a Boo!!" Anna is so cute, saying "bye bye" and "pishboo!" Then she gets to laughing like crazy and you can't help but laugh along with her.

She also had a scrap of fabric we took from Mom's stash and my tweezers that I use for pulling lint and hairs off my projects that she found in my stitching accessory bag. She made a "flag" out of them buy pinching the fabric in the tweezers and waving it around. Yes, I showed it to her first, but she just thought it was the neatest thing. Her other favorite thing to do with them is to pick at my QSnap cover and pluck it. The couch and my clothes were off limits.

While we were in the middle of our stitching, she started blowing on my face and laughing. I laughed with her and tipped my head back. When I did that, my glasses tumbled backwards, making her think she'd blown them off my head. This caused her to laugh even louder and she took the glasses, put them back on the top of my head, and blew again. It just tickled her something fierce, thinking she was blowing the glasses off my head. We did that several times and finally got back to our stitching.

So here's another picture of the next generation of stitchers. By the time these pictures were taken it was actually after midnight, but they won't make as much sense if I wait until tomorrow's post to show them to you.

Also have to apologize, for I mis-spoke yesterday when I said I'd completed another side of motifs; I only finished the varigated bows. I finished the green ribbons between them this evening.

Now I'm off to get some well-earned rest before this little munchkin that's forcing me off the mattress awakes. First, I have to scoot her over, though. Wish me luck in getting through Sunday!