My Kids Still Love Me!

For Mom's Day along with beautiful white daisy mums and a handmade card, I was also blessed with a handcrafted wooden sketch book personalized with my name carved on the front! Jake knows how much I love books and notebooks, but this one I will always be terribly fond of!

Duncan

This li'l doggie was born out of my first attempt to create a critter from Sock and Glove: Creating Charming Softy Friends from Cast-Off Socks and Gloves by Miyako Kanamori.

Button Wreath

I love doing a craft that, whether you're 5 or 55, the process and product are delightfully simple!
(Thanks, Julie!)

"What's Fer Supper?"

Saturday night's debut of Basil Shrimp Fettuccine was a hit with my hubby! However, for my less-seasoned tasters, next time I'll hold the cayenne to be added individually. Definitely a permanent menu option!

Scrabble Scramble

To help sharpen word skills, we've been playing Rummy Roots and a variation of Scrabble as part of our afternoon routine. Rummy Roots is played as "Go Fish", or in this game, "Go Diggin'" as we try to make the most matches of English prefixes and suffixes with their original Greek or Latin roots.

In our own version of a recently learned Scrabble variation, the board is not used and all tiles are face-down in the middle. Each player pulls 7 tiles. On "go" we try to arrange the tiles into words, either in crossword style or not. When a player has used all of his own letters, he says "take one" and all do so. This continues until no tiles are left in the draw pile. As soon as someone uses all of their letters, he says "stop". The point value of unused letters tells each player how many points to remove from used letters. The score value of the remaining used tiles equal each person's score for that hand. It's proved to be an effective way to strengthen word skills!

A Snow Day!

After a tolerable dose of math and history, Jake and Kylie ventured into Monday's nasty but welcomed conditions until hunger brought them back. Meanwhile, the semi-blizzard threw me into a bit of a baking jag...

M&M cookies!

An oatmeal pie for my man...

and banana bread for breakfasts.

While snow clothes tumbled in the dryer and they refueled, we took in our current read-aloud, The Dog Who Wouldn't Be, Farley Mowat's comical account of a dog that seemingly refuses to believe he's a dog. Then it was back to snow tunneling until they reappeared with wind-chapped cheeks just as supper appeared on the table. A pleasant day's memory made with what was probably Winter's last hurrah.

Wordplay with Mother Goose and a Thesaurus

We found ourselves getting pretty silly as we tried a suggestion of rephrasing Mother Goose rhymes. Here are 2 of them. Sound familiar?

Triple Unseeing Rodents, Triple Unseeing Rodents!

Observe their fast pace!

They all speedily chased the agriculturalist's spouse,

Who hacked off their long posterior appendages with a butcher's scalpel.

Did you ever witness such an event in all your born days as triple unseeing rodents?

Four-and-One Mini Metatarsals

This wee porcine critter traveled to the open-air grocer

This mini porcine critter remained in his abode.
This tiny porcine consumed butchered bovine,
This miniature porcine consumed zilch.
This runty porcine bawled Wah! Wah! the entire journey home.

Winter Highlights

Before we pick up speed into the busyness of Spring (only 30 days away!), I wanted to glance over a few winter doings, starting with...

The Science Factory in Lancaster which initially looked like a waste of money...until we REALLY looked!






With a plethora of very hands-on exhibits, this large, deceptively bland-looking building proved a treasure trove of enjoyment! FOUR hours later, Jake's and my hunger pangs forced Kylie that we "must needs go" already! Finally, she resigned to pull herself away until..."GASP! But Mom, I just saw an exhibit I didn't even notice until NOW!" Jake and I assisted her out the door.

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Moving along...we discover our scarf model showcasing her silliness as she sports a handmade fleece scarf, one of the few "fine" crafts we busied our hands with this season.
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Our Frey Christmas Crew transformed into a motley crew after a risky game of Musical Masquerades. In musical chairs style, a handweight (which discourages the tossing temptation) is passed around. Whoever is caught holding it when the music stops is given, by a small Frey, a brown grocery bag which is stapled shut to hide whatever gay apparel they will don! This year the Gayest Apparelled Award goes tooo........Amos Frey, sporting a pink cowgirl hat and beautiful butterfly wings! ( As you can see, Wayne got off too lucky and is content to sit behind his peacock blue masquerade mask.)
But, we can't leave this memory without recalling LAST year's winner....

Dear, dear Jerry, (here at his Pretty Pedro debut), who had to be wrestled to get those lips ruby red! (The trauma must have been long-lasting because he didn't celebrate with us this Christmas due to "work".)

How very convenient.

Hopefully, he remembers that he's among friendly Frey's......like Elfie here....

....and Kylie the Clown,

...and this charming odd couple....~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Jake attended his first pro football game! He had a memorable time with Wayne, Tony, and his son Brandon and was very surprised at how much smaller the field looked compared to TV. Reportedly, nearby Steelers fans were quite entertaining, and he only got shouldered on his way out by a Raven ruffian. I'd say he made out pretty well, all possibilities considered!



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Gotta go where there's SNOW! We've been hoping to fall under the white magic spell of at least one B-I-I-I-G snow. Fortunately, we found our White Tail Mountain cabin amidst a beautiful 10 inches of it, complete with a thick ice layer in between! Woo-hoo!



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Back home again, we used the last of our Whitaker Science Center membership pass, which included a Manufacturing Exhibit and ended with an awesome 3-D IMAX presentation of a Grand Canyon adventure.
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Also got in some iceskating (and rollerskating at the Castle in Lancaster, but was having too much fun to shoot.)~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Kylie finally got another long-awaited surprise visit from Sandy who introduced her happy self to us last summer. She knows where to go for love when she feels lost. Unfortunately.
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Despite the solemn browns and grays of a relatively snowless winter, many mornings we're greeted with spectacular sunrises!
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March Plans
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Review history of St. Patrick

People to appreciate:

• Missy (1st)
• P. Gorog (8th)~Celebrating 38 years of faithful service to the Lord at the Mission
• P. Joe (13th)
  

Field Trips and Outings:

• Maple Sugaring
• Visit Heirloom Weavers
• Visit The Science Factory
• Fly a kite at Sam Lewis Park

On the lOOk-out for:

• Crocuses a-poppin'
• Yellowing forsythia
• Pussywillows to buy

Goodies to make:

• Maple syrup
• Irish soda bread

Crafts/Activities:

• Make an edible bird's nest
• Play Gaelic game of Caber Toss

Around Home:

• Clean birdfeeder
• Dream up a garden (to actually make real this time!)
• Start indoor seeds
• Window boxes - pansies, and....
  
• Gather Easter basket goodies (includes a trip to Weaver's)
  

Winter Day

We've been waking up to some beautiful winter sunrises and snapping away before the moments are gone. (I often hear Jake calling, "Mom! Quick! Get the camera!")

There was just a dusting this frosty morning....

....but we certainly didn't expect to be able to do this in the evening. After our pesky neighbors honked by our kitchen deck door windows as we sat eating our supper, the kids were off to hitch a ride right along with Mammaw.