Saturday, January 24, 2009

Jolly Green Giant

My mom visited us this weekend for her birthday. We took her to the Hidden Lake Gardens conservatory to take in some lovely green, growing things. Liam had so much fun with Grandma and even more fun running around in the gardens. To my surprise, Liam wanted to use the potty while we were at the gardens. He used the potty successfully, and then continued to use the potty the rest of the weekend! :)

(written from memory on 3/18/09)

Monday, January 19, 2009

Phrase of the day...

"I DO IT". Yes, he's only 2 and he's already mastered the phrase "I DO IT!" So today, Liam washed his own face and lathered his hair in the tub. He clipped his own finger nails (with mommy tensely watching). He got out his own plate for breakfast. What a big little boy he has become!

Sunday, January 18, 2009

This Little Piggy

Overall, this weekend was very trying. It was a combination of me being tired and a little sick and Liam being, well, a toddler...tantrums and all. But with all it's ups and downs, Liam made up for it this evening when he took my hand and started doing the "Little Piggies" poem on my fingers. I didn't really get what he was doing until he got to "wee-wee-wee all the way home". I started to laugh and told him he did a good job. Then we each did "piggies" on each others hands for a while. He is such a clever boy!

Friday, January 16, 2009

A kindred spirit...

Today I found this blog about making crafts from recycled items. This is also one of my pastimes, so I had to share!

Sunday, January 11, 2009

Dinosaur Say Roar!

This weekend we visited two museums. Yesterday, we went to Impression 5 Science museum with Alissa and Ashtyn. Today, we decided to go someplace new. We took Liam to the Nautral History museum on the MSU campus. It is a small museum, with modest collections...but the displays are pretty nice. I told Liam that we were going to see Dinosaurs. He got very excited and said "dinosaur say ROAR!" He had fun going through the galleries on the first floor. Then we headed up to see the dino bones on the third floor. But the huge skeletons were a bit frightening to Liam and he wanted daddy to carry him. He told us that the dinosaurs were "scary". I told him that the Triceratops was a plant eater, like cows...thinking that this might make them seem a little more friendly. But he told us "that scary cow". Well, so much for that. :/

We did spend a little more time there and looked at the animal dioramas. At the gift shop, Liam picked out several tiny plastic animals: 3 dinos, horse, and lion. Then we walked over to look at the clock tower. The sun was peaking through clouds and the campus was quite lovely. Liam and I raced each other on the snowy sidewalks. It was a nice outing and we all had a lot of fun!

Friday, January 9, 2009

Think of the Children

In an effort to improve safety for children's products, our legislators have introduced the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act. Unfortunately, this act goes too far. If enacted, it will hurt our economy, create more waste, and more importantly it will significantly affect my pocketbook!

Please see my sister's wonderful post on the matter. She says everything more eloquently that I can and has many great links on the subject: http://fireinthewind.squarespace.com/ranting/2009/1/9/think-of-the-children.html

Sunday, January 4, 2009

The Cat Returns

Tonight we watched Hayao Miyazaki's film, The Cat Returns. This is one of Liam's favorite films, mostly because of all the kitties! This interest in cats is because, Liam and our family pet, Dozer, have become inseparable. Even though they didn't get alone too well initially, Liam and Dozer are the best of friends now. Liam is obsessed with watching Dozer, feeding Dozer, playing with Dozer, chasing Dozer, and even naps with Dozer. Liam also has fun sometimes pretending to be a cat with Dozer. :)

Thursday, January 1, 2009

Horsey New Year!

Yes, you read that right....Horsey New Year! Since we didn't get out of the house yesterday, we were all pretty stir-crazy today. But everything was pretty much closed today. So we decided to treat Liam to a trip to the MSU horse farm. It was opened today and more importantly, it was free! The frigged weather prevented us from staying outside too long. Luckily the stables were open, so we visited horses and barn cats inside. Liam loved to visit each of the horses. We learned from one of the students working there that some of the horses were kept inside because their had been shaved for ultrasounds and it was too cold for them outdoors now that they were missing so much fur. There were also two very friendly barn cats in the stable. One of them liked Liam so much that he followed Liam around. Liam had so much fun that he didn't want to leave.

Unfortunately for mommy and daddy, Liam fell asleep briefly in the car on the drive home. This meant that he wouldn't lay back down and nap once we returned home. Liam was pretty crabby this evening and fell asleep in my arms at around 6:30pm. Even with Liam not taking a nap, I managed to be quite creative today. I resurrected my long-dormant silk-painting skills to paint two orchid paintings. Why orchids, you ask? Well, every February Sean and I enter orchid-themed artwork in a local orchid show. Today's paintings will hopefully be good enough to use for this year's show.