according.to.kim

Heavenly 100 Day Hash

In February, Madeline brought home a book from the school library called Miss Bindergarten Celebrates the 100th Day of Kindergarten. We really enjoyed this book and read it many times during the week we had it. Inside was a recipe for "Heavenly 100 Day Hash" which sounded tasty and fun to make, so I jotted it down with the intention to make it with the girls on the 100th day of the calendar year. Did you know April 10 is the 100th day? What luck that it happens to be Good Friday as well this year, so there's no school or work tomorrow and we have time to make it. Looking forward to it!

Heavenly 100 Day Hash
(from Miss Bindergarten Celebrates the 100th Day of Kindergarten by Joseph Slate and Ashley Wolfe)

Pick 10 pieces from each bowl:

1. cereal-os
2. pretzels
3. nuts
4. marshmallows
5. sunflower seeds
6. raisins
7. chocolate chips
8. banana chips
9. cereal pillows
10. popcorn

On creativity and genius

I really enjoyed this 20-minute video of Elizabeth Gilbert, author of Eat Pray Love, speaking on creativity:

Over the past week

• Sophia's class went to see Anne of Green Gables - The Musical at The Globe Theatre on Tuesday. Her cousin B went too. Lucky girls!
• Madeline and her Sparks group sang songs and read children's books to residents at Pioneer Village. Madeline took a great poetry book, The Wishing Bone, because she doesn't know how to read yet, but has memorized her favourite poem from that book (Perpetual Number Song). Neil's cousin Rhonda met us there and stayed with Madeline while I went to my dance class. Thanks Rhonda!
• Sophia and her Brownies group took a city bus to the Central Library. After my dance class, I went to the library and helped Sophia get a library card. She was very excited about getting her own card and then choosing some books and DVDs to borrow.
• I managed to do a little Christmas shopping at the Cornwall Centre during lunch breaks. It's very handy because my office building is attached to the mall, but unfortunately, it doesn't have all the stores I need.
• Neil and I went to parent-teacher interviews with Sophia and Madeline's teachers on Wednesday. They're both good students and well-behaved at school. We're pleased! I meant to copy the teacher's comments from Sophia's report card, but I forgot and have already returned it to her teacher.
• Rhonda came over to stay with the girls while we went to the school. The girls enjoy having her over, and it's great to have someone we can call to help us out once in awhile. Thanks again!
• There was no school on Thursday and Friday.
• Neil took the four girls to the Science Centre after they practiced their Irish dancing on Thursday.
• We both took the four girls to Agribition on Friday afternoon, then to their former babysitter's house to wish her a happy birthday. They were all excited to see Sharon and she was happy to see them.
• I went to a fun Pampered Chef party last evening. I had to get more Prep Bowls which are great for food prep, temporary storage (b/c they have lids), and heating or melting things (b/c they're glass), and are the perfect size for kids' snacks and desserts.
• I had an extra private dance lesson to work on my Slip Jig this morning. I still don't have it down, but definitely made progress today.

Learning to count

This morning I read Eric Carle's Mister Seahorse to Georgia. (This is one of my favourite children's books, by the way.) At the end, she exclaimed, "There's lots of babies!" and I replied, "Yes, do you want to count them?" She quickly pointed to the seahorse babies and counted, "Uno, dos, tres."

I love it! (This comes from her love of Dora, of course.)

September pics (14)

The suggestion for September 14 was to capture a treasure; something I keep and love because of its history. All day I wondered what I should photograph. At suppertime, I asked the girls for their ideas. Sophia suggested "365" and I had to agree. I do treasure The Golden Book of 365 Stories, a book my brother and I received from our Grandma and Grandpa Mantay in 1977, and a book I've enjoyed reading to Sophia and Madeline since the start of 2008. (We are also reading a Childcraft book called Art Around Us right now.)

Encyclopedia of Saskatchewan

Did you know...?
The complete Encyclopedia of Saskatchewan, "the single largest educational publishing project in Saskatchewan’s history," is available online at http://www.esask.ca/ (it was launched 18 months ago but I didn't know about it until recently). Also, the 1100-page print version is on sale right now for $64.95 (regular $125). Tempting! I like the search- ability of online, but sometimes it's nice to open a book.

Bedtime. But first...

What an excellent evening! I attended A Reading By Leeann Minogue at the Shu-Box Theatre (U of R campus), hosted by the Saskatchewan Writers Guild. Theatre students and a local actor read a couple scenes from Leeann's hit play, Dry Streak, as well as some partial scenes from a play she's working on. The new play sounds fantastic! Leeann also answered some questions, discussed her writing process a bit, and explained how and why she started writing Dry Streak. I enjoyed it very much. (By the way, Access filmed this event, so those of you in Regina with Access can see it on the community channel.)

It was great to see Leeann again and it was also cool to meet a fellow blogger, Sally, whom I hadn't met in person before (you may have seen her comments here lately). When the Regina Little Theatre produced Dry Streak last fall, Sally played the role of Denise. (I didn't see that production, but I saw Dry Streak performed in Milestone earlier in 2007.) We all went to the Hotel Sask for a drink afterwards, along with a few other friends and family of Leeann's.

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I was hoping to start a new project on this blog Feb 1, but due to technical difficulties and mostly a serious lack of time this week (especially tomorrow), I probably won't be able to post the first of this project until Saturday. Stay tuned...

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P.S. (6:55 a.m. Feb 1) I should mention, Neil didn't have such an excellent evening while I was out. He had a terrible time putting all three girls to bed. In the past, Neil has been able to put them all to bed quite successfully on his own; much more quickly than I ever could. It seems this has changed. He had the same problem last Thursday when I played volleyball. The problem is none of them will stay in their bed or their room, so it's much more difficult for one parent to put them all to bed. Thankfully, we're both here almost every night. Georgia does not need a long nap in the afternoon anymore, but she usually has one at the babysitter, and Madeline doesn't need one at all, but since she goes to preschool in the morning now, she often falls asleep in the afternoon. Sophia has never needed much sleep. The result is three kids who are determined to stay up much later than we'd like. One can only hope this is temporary, although it may be years, not months, before we can eliminate the nap problem altogether! At least we know Madeline will be in afternoon kindergarten in the fall.

Daily pic: 28 Dec 07

I'm very impressed with Sophia's reading! I'm excited for her too. She's enjoying her new skill very much. Today she read some instructions on the computer to Madeline and didn't have to ask for help. She was proud of herself, as she should be! (Oh yes, this is great for me too!)

A couple months ago, when Sophia really wanted to try reading English words, she would pronounce each letter with the French pronunciation and would get a bit frustrated because she knew it didn't sound right (and I had to correct her, of course). I must give her credit though for not quitting like she does sometimes when she's frustrated. She persevered and gave it a try almost every day. Then it just clicked one day (three weeks ago) and the words started to come out of her mouth much more easily. She still gets stuck on a lot of things, of course, but I think she's doing very well. When you work with someone to read English, you realize just how many things don't make sense in this language. It seemed like every time I provided a rule to Sophia, the very next word that came along that looked like it should follow that rule was an exception to the rule (I think K:) said something similar once). The book Sophia is holding in this photo is one of our favourites for her to practice reading. It's the Usborne Farmyard Tales First Word Book. I bought it several years ago and it's great to see it paying off now. Each word and sentence is related to a picture, so it gives her clues and confidence every step of the way.

P.S. Tonight, we tried playing Perfection in pairs and now Sophia loves it! Thanks for the tip K:)

Daily pic: 18 Dec 07

Seven Sleeps Until Christmas by Stuart Adams. (A shamelessly easy thing to photograph today.) Neil's sister, Shauna, gave us this book a few years ago and we haven't read it yet. We didn't have it with us in Texas last year, and before that, I think the girls were a bit too young for this type of book. But not now. I look forward to reading it to Sophia and Madeline this year -- starting tonight, of course! The forward begins: "Greetings from the Santa Archives. Welcome to a special collection of letters written by Santa Claus, himself... Together, I believe they capture the caring, sharing, giving values which can be so easily overlooked at Christmas."

P.S. I'm tired! I can't wait until I'm finished work on Friday and then I have a whole week off! I have so much to do before Christmas though... I'd better get to bed; I feel like I need a little extra sleep tonight.

Daily pic: 17 Sep 07

Our latest literary adventures: Alice in Wonderland (1865) and Afternoon on the Amazon (our 7th of the Magic Tree House series because we read #18 first). I started reading both books to the girls two nights ago and I'm reading one chapter of each per night. (Mixing it up like that seems to hold Madeline's interest a little better.) That should keep us busy for awhile! I've never read Alice in Wonderland, nor have I seen it on film, so when Neil spotted it in Chapters for $3.99, I thought, why not? I'd like to read that. This book also contains the sequel, Through the Looking Glass (1871). I hope the girls enjoy these classics. I did not realize until tonight just how old they are.

Daily pic: 18 Jul 07

For the past few weeks, I've been reading The World of Pooh (The Complete Winnie-the-Pooh and The House at Pooh Corner) by A. A. Milne to the girls. The compilation copyright is 1957 and the individual copyrights are 1926 and 1928, respectively. These stories are 80 years old and they truly stand the test of time.

The inscription in this copy reads, "Merry Christmas to Kim and Robbie! Love, Uncle Roger and Aunt Janet, 1975." (Thank you Uncle Roger and Aunt Janet!) I fondly remember Mom reading this book to us. It's a wonderful book and I'm so glad I can share it with my children 32 years later!

I love reading from this book too. The writing is remarkable. Quite distinctive. It often makes me smile and even laugh out loud -- in many cases due to subtleties young children wouldn't notice or understand. My favourite sentence of the book is the second one in this paragraph:

You can imagine Piglet's joy when at last the ship came in sight of him. In after-years he liked to think that he had been in Very Great Danger during the Terrible Flood, but the only danger he had really been in was in the last half-hour of his imprisonment, when Owl, who had just flown up, sat on a branch of his tree to comfort him, and told him a very long story about an aunt who had once laid a seagull's egg by mistake, and the story went on and on, rather like this sentence, until Piglet who was listening out of his window without much hope, went to sleep quietly and naturally, slipping slowly out of the window towards the water until he was only hanging on by his toes, at which moment luckily, a sudden loud squawk from Owl, which was really part of the story, being what his aunt said, woke the Piglet up and just gave him time to jerk himself back into safety and say, "How interesting, and did she?" when -- well, you can imagine his joy when at last he saw the good ship, The Brain of Pooh (Captain, C. Robin; 1st Mate, P. Bear) coming over the sea to rescue him.

Isn't that the most inspired use of the comma? And Milne's acknowledgment of the reader, "...rather like this sentence..." Brilliant!

Daily pic: 22 May 07

Our latest "chapter book", The Borrowers (1952). Did you read it when you were a kid? I'm pretty sure I did. I read the first chapter to the girls last night and I look forward to the rest.

Ever since we read Buffalo Before Breakfast and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (1964) in March, Sophia and I have been hooked on chapter books. Over the past six weeks, we've read Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator (1973), The Fantastic Mr. Fox (1970), and Danny the Champion of the World (1975), all by Roald Dahl, and Jacob Two-Two Meets the Hooded Fang (1975) by Mordecai Richler. All were good books, but I think we enjoyed Danny the most -- in spite of its glorification of poaching (and I'm not referring to the method of cooking.) The writing is wonderful!

I enjoy reading these books so much more than the younger children's books night after night. Unfortunately, Madeline is not quite as enthused as Sophia and I. She starts out listening but quits paying attention after a short while. She stays there beside me, but squirms around, makes beds for her stuffed animals, and even chatters away to herself until I'm finished reading. I know she'd be more interested if I read books with lots of pictures and I wonder if I should be reading more age-appropriate books to her (and I do occasionally), but there are only so many hours in a day!

A fabulous evening

As I mentioned earlier, I attended a dinner theatre on Saturday with my mom and sister-in-law, Robyn. Dry Streak, a play written by my friend Leeann Minogue, was performed by the Milestone Prairie Players in Milestone. I was very eager to go to this production as I had missed earlier performances.

Everything about the evening was wonderful! We loved the play. The whole audience did. It was very funny! I think the actors did a great job, the props were just right, and the scene changes were done very smoothly. The dinner was excellent too -- especially the salad course and dessert. I've never seen such a spectacular display of salads and desserts in small-town Saskatchewan! I was so glad I went with an empty stomach and a healthy appetite. I also enjoyed visiting with Mom and Robyn very much. And, to top things off, the weather was beautiful. It was a pleasure to drive to Milestone and back (a 30-minute drive) on such a lovely evening.

At work yesterday, I ran into a lady from Milestone who had attended the dinner theatre the same night as I. I asked her if she liked the play and she replied, "Yes! It was one of the best ever!" This is the 23rd year of the Milestone Elks' Dinner Theatre featuring the Milestone Prairie Players.

Daily pic: 20 Mar 07

We've taken bedtime stories up a notch (or two) this week! I read this Magic Tree House book, Buffalo Before Breakfast, to Sophia and Madeline over the weekend and we really enjoyed it. I purchased it years ago simply because the buffalo caught my eye (because my parents raise bison, in case you didn't know). This book was fun and educational. We learned about the Lakota people and bison. I'm eager to pick up the entire series and read it to the girls, as the two main characters go on all kinds of adventures.

Last night, we started reading the one and only, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Sophia is loving it and so am I! We're up to chapter six (of 30) in just two nights because it's so compelling. (Hmmm, maybe that's why I bought a bunch of dark chocolate today!) My introduction to this wonderful book was when my grade three teacher, Mrs. Miller, read it to us in class. I remember that so well. This particular book is from Neil's childhood and is part of a Roald Dahl boxed set.

Progress

I'm feeling a bit better today (mentally, that is; the cold I've been fighting doesn't seem better at all). Supportive messages from family, friends -- and even strangers -- do make a difference. Thank you.

Yesterday was a nice "free" day and I managed to make some progress in this house. I cleaned up the living room and Sophia and Madeline's room and it feels great to accomplish something around here!

Another thing lifted my spirits too. I finished reading Real Estate Investing in Canada last night and I believe what I learned (I have just started learning in this area) will help improve our lives. There is nothing more empowering than knowledge, is there?

Speaking of knowledge... I tried to take a break from thinking about my audit yesterday, but when it did creep into my mind, I focused on one thing. On Friday, I spoke to our lawyer who did the farm partnership documents and he told me that in a partnership, there is no automatic entitlement; that is, no partner is entitled to draw on the profits from that partnership (not without agreement from all partners) and all revenue must first go toward operating expenses. So, two key points emerge: Even though I was a partner, I had no entitlement to the farm earnings as they were received, and since there was no profit in 2003, I could not have received any income from the partnership anyway.

Well, at some point today, like it or not, I'm going to have to think more about this audit and revise my letter again. But it's not going to get in the way of having some fun today. I'm looking forward to attending a Stampin' Up! workshop with friends this afternoon!

Great drawing books

I had these books when I was a kid: Ed Emberley's Drawing Book - Make A World and Ed Emberley's Drawing Book of Animals, and I absolutely LOVED them. (Wish I knew what happened to them.) I believe my brother and I got them for Christmas one year when we were in Seattle. I'm planning to get them for my kids someday (soon perhaps). There are many more Ed Emberley drawing books to choose from as well.

(This is what our books looked like. The newly published paperbacks have updated covers.)

Bits & pieces

My friend's book, Dry Streak, has been shortlisted for the Saskatchewan Book Awards. Congratulations, Leeann!

I had a wonderful time scrapbooking and cardmaking with friends Friday evening and all day Saturday. I'm very happy with my accomplishments this weekend. Photos are important to me and I need dedicated time like this to work on organizing and preserving them. I made this "Georgia" page at a Stampin' Up! event last weekend (i.e., it was designed by someone else) and then simply added the photo yesterday.

'Tis the season to receive stuff in the mail (such as greeting cards, calendars, labels...) that make me feel guilty and/or annoyed. I won't use things I didn't pay for, and yet I feel bad about tossing them into the recycling bin.

I've added a link to The Breast Cancer Site in the right column. If you have a few seconds to spare, you can help provide free mammograms for underprivileged women by clicking the "Fund Free Mammograms" button at The Breast Cancer Site. It's legit. According to Snopes.com, it takes 45,000 clicks to fund one mammogram. Click once a day if you can.

I regret buying a case of juice boxes last week at Madeline's request. I realize now that I absolutely hate juice boxes. For one thing, it would be so much easier if I could just throw them in the garbage, but no, I feel compelled to rinse them out and recycle them. No more juice boxes after this.

We managed not to buy Halloween treats until today, and I'm determined to keep the box unopened until Halloween. Last year, we bought some early and ate them. Then, Neil and I were both out shopping separately on the same day and we both bought a bunch more candy to hand out. We had WAY too much. And we didn't take any of it back to the store.

We sold a case of chocolate mint Girl Guide cookies last week, and we only bought three of the twelve boxes ourselves! (No wonder we don't need any Halloween treats right now.) Sophia really wanted to sell them door-to-door, but we ran out before we could do that. Perhaps we should get another case.

I enjoyed listening to Eddie and the Cruisers with Sophia this evening. She fell asleep right away, but I stayed and listened for awhile. Definitely one of my favourite soundtracks. It had been a long time since I last heard it.

Georgia has developed a cold. Major runny nose. Bleh.

It's all good

1. Georgia news. Georgia had her nine-month checkup this morning with Dr. Miller. All is well. She weighs 8.16 kg or 18 lbs even (just under the 50th percentile) and is about 28 inches long. (Sophia reached that size around seven months of age, and Madeline didn't reach 18 lbs until well after her first birthday.) In other news, Georgia is crawling very well now and likes to explore everything. She also started standing up in her crib on October 1st.


2. Dry Streak. Last evening, Georgia and I attended a book launch at the Book & Brier Patch. The book is called Dry Streak, a play written by my friend, Leeann Minogue. Dry Streak premiered at the Persephone Theatre in Saskatoon in January 2006. Unfortunately, I haven't seen the play performed, but I look forward to reading it! I've heard great things. For more details, click on the image to enlarge. And look, Dry Streak is available on Amazon.ca and Chapters.indigo.ca! Very cool.


3. Excitement is in the air. I must admit I am looking forward to the Rolling Stones concert tonight (even though I really didn't care about it when the tickets went on sale). We've been listening to CJME (news talk radio) all day and it's almost all they're talking about. For me, going to this concert is not about the music at all; it's all about the show, the excitement, the spectacle it'll undoubtedly be. Some say "there is nothing like it".


4. The weather. Gorgeous! Today, October 6, Madeline was outside jumping on the trampoline wearing only a swimming suit. And yes, I really should be out there doing the yard work.


5. Thanksgiving weekend. Have a great one!


6. Good grade. (Added 3:35 p.m.) The Saskatchewan Real Estate Association just called to tell Neil he got 94% on his Phase 2 exam!


7. Dollarama. (Added 4:00 p.m.) Office supplies, hardware, cleaning supplies, kitchen stuff, party supplies, decorations, scrapbooking stuff, pet supplies, clothing... I challenge anyone to go to that store and not be completely and utterly astonished at what you can buy for $1.00!

Thank you

Thank you to everyone who sent supportive words regarding the situation with Sophia. I really appreciate them. I'm not sure why, but it actually does help to know we're not alone.

I'm definitely going to get a copy of the book Laurel suggested: Raising Your Spirited Child: A Guide for Parents Whose Child Is More Intense, Sensitive, Perceptive, Persistent, and Energetic by Mary Sheedy Kurcinka. The book sounds perfect. I can't wait to read it. This is from the publisher:

The spirited child—often called "difficult" or "strong-willed"—possesses traits we value in adults yet find challenging in children. Research shows that spirited kids are wired to be "more"—by temperament, they are more intense, sensitive, perceptive, persistent, and uncomfortable with change than the average child. In this revised edition of the award-winning classic, voted one of the top twenty books for parents, Kurcinka provides vivid examples and a refreshingly positive viewpoint.

The title of the book describes Sophia to a T. Also note the "uncomfortable with change" characteristic mentioned above. We've encountered this many times with Sophia. In fact, Sophia was in "fine form" at her dance class on Monday evening; her reason: it wasn't the same place as before!

In the meantime... the last two days have been a bit better. We are making a concerted effort to praise Sophia for all the good stuff and have reined in our negative reactions to the less desirable stuff -- except when safety is an issue (usually Georgia's safety).

Five posts in one

I won an auction on eBay for the first time this evening. (I feel so 21st century now!) I bought a set of 29 used books called Help Me Be Good by Joy Berry. The last time we were at Public Health, Sophia picked up a book called "Being Selfish" and asked me to read to her. I thought it was a great way to teach her about that subject, so decided to track down a set. The series covers a myriad of behaviours (such as disobeying, being a bad sport, whining, tattling...) that all children need to learn about sooner or later. Looking forward to getting these books. We have a few issues to tackle.
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I watched some of the Academy Awards this evening. It's the only award show I ever watch (or half watch). I don't see many movies, so I like to see what's nominated and then try to watch some of those movies over the following year. Not surprisingly, I haven't yet seen any of the movies nominated this year. And looking back at last year's nominees, the only ones I've seen are Million Dollar Baby, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, The Incredibles, Shark Tale, Shrek 2, The Polar Express, and Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. There are several I still want to see, so I'm a little behind.
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I really miss having the Olympics on TV. Other than a few shows on the Food Network, there's very little I like to watch (probably because I'm just really out-of-touch with what's on, plus we don't have all of the channels upstairs). On the upside though, I've read an entire book while nursing Georgia since Monday: I'm Just Here for the Food by Alton Brown. Neil gave it to me for Christmas. Gotta love Alton. Neil and I are both fans of his show, Good Eats. He's also on Iron Chef America, another show we both like to watch.
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Neil and Sophia completed their solar system project yesterday. It's from the Childcraft book, The Universe, which we've been reading to Sophia at bedtime for the past week. Neil crafted the mobile structure, I cut the circles from bristol board, and Sophia coloured the planets and the sun. It's now hanging in a corner of her room. Sophia loves stuff like this and we think it's great! I've been enjoying reading about the universe too. It's so completely mindboggling and fascinating! Listen to Read this: "They believe there are about 100 billion galaxies in the universe. Each galaxy may hold billions of stars...The Milky Way is made up of billions of stars that are trillions of kilometres apart." How about that to put things into perspective?
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Back to our little speck of the universe... We took the girls to a new indoor playground called It's a Blast today. It cost a small fortune, but the kids definitely had a blast. We won't be doing that very often, but it was a good reward for the girls getting 20+ magnets on their 'responsibility charts'. We've been using these wooden Melissa & Doug charts since about mid-January and the girls have earned more magnets each week since we started. It really seems to work as an incentive. Their goals right now are to share, brush/floss teeth (an automatic seven per week because it's not optional), get ready for bed (quickly and cooperatively), bath (without crying and complaining), say please and thank you (without being prompted), help mom, and put toys away. They have to do some of them pretty well all day to earn a magnet. A couple of weeks ago, we took them to Dairy Queen for supper when they achieved 15 magnets in one week. They'll have to earn 30 in a week to earn the next big reward. (Yes, we have one for Georgia too.)