Sniff Family Reunion

Last weekend we took the kids back to the small south-eastern Colorado town where I spent much of my childhood. It is also close to where my pioneer ancestors settled 100 years ago. I did more kid-wrangling than photo-taking, but here's what I got.
Great Grandma checking folks in and showing the DAR membership she, my mom and Kimi worked so hard to obtain
Our family tree
Doggy Day Care (fun activities for kids- Kathryn LOVED it and wants to play DDC every day)
chasing their tails, barking and howling with Big Dogcrawling contest
puppy parade, who let the dogs out?
digging
puppy chow
the balloon, a Zen experienceThe old metal and splintery equipment I remember at my old school playground is gone. At least the element of danger is still present in the chain rope ladder of doom.worn outwell, at least one of them waseh, maybe two.

I ain't gonna paint no more!

Niamh's latest

She's crafty!

Like father, like daughter

Hey, hey we're the munchkies

Master of Flight

Germs and all

Learning to share...

Sew, a needle pulling thread

I was going through old cassette tapes a couple of weeks ago when I came across my Sound of Music sound track. I play a lot of music in the car for the kids, and this was a welcome change from "There's a Hole in the Bucket" which had been climbing Kathryn's charts. She fell in love the TSOM the first time she heard the songs and still asks for them over and over again. I rented the movie this week and watched the musical numbers and other scenes I thought she would like with her. She is obsessed. She even told me she wanted to learn how to sew like Maria. While I was trying to cut the tip off of a needle to give to her, she got my sharp needle and thread for mending and began "sewing" a paper towel. She was careful, so I let her continue. She sewed a few more paper towels, then asked for fabric. She just wanted to play at first, but then she let me show her how to stitch. She made this "swaddled baby Maria" with a little guidance.
Today, after checking my email for a few minutes, I came back to see she had done this completely on her own.
Mom fail or Kathryn win? Maybe both. I mean, it's a good stitch, but I really might have thought to mention that it's best not to wear your project while you sew it.

I ought to show her the tape of when I played Maria in a high school summer production, but that would mean having to watch it myself, and I'm not sure I'm ready for that yet (even now)...

oh, help.

Littles

Cupcake jamboree

Happy birthday, Lucy Goose!