James Says / Amelie Says

Sam explained the no dogs sign at our neighborhood park (no dogs on the playground mulch - there are plenty of dogs making the loop around the trail each day) to James, who then saw the circle and line around a P for "no parking," and he was very confused. "Why there no P's?" And so Sam explained that too and now I hear "No parking!" shouted out every time we pass one of those signs.

James was playing pretend and he told me I could be "Jack Frost's mom -- Lady Frost." I'll take it.

But when there was frost on the window, I said that Jack Frost came, and I was immediately corrected - "Elsa did it."

James is very excited about the snow. "There's a WIZARD outside! ... It's a snow wizard!"

Pointing to a lego Darth Vader, James asks, "Who's the black guy?"

James has taken to saying, "I don't love it."

Sam asked who Amelie's PE teacher was, and she very seriously said, "Coach."

James: "Why are monsters not real?"
Amelie: "They're just a story people made up so that you will go to sleep. Go to sleep and then you won't think about them anymore."

Kids Being Weird

This is a video of the kids being weird from back in November. They totally independently set up a "band," and this is what I caught on camera - just the tail end of their pretend play.



Amelie is talking about her "bango" sticks.

Christmas Morning

We opened presents on Christmas morning. The kids had quite a pile! I actually ended up putting a few back into the closet, maybe for a birthday, because they wanted to just stop and play with everything they opened as they went.

Sam looks confused by some of the Shopkins parts.

I guess they figured it out!

I don't know what he's holding here, but boy oh boy is he excited!

Blurry My Little Ponies.

Oh, yeah, they almost forgot about stockings!

The Shopkins and the My Little Ponies were the only things they'd asked for specifically (due to friend influence at Kindergarten). We got them some kinetic sand and my friend Cabell sent some dots paint, and those are what they're still playing with regularly three weeks later, plus the new Elsa dress from Grandma Mary has sparked renewed interest in the dress-up bin, which is one of their all-time favorite pastimes (and one of Sam's least favorite)!

Look at that mess!

Amelie was worn out and had to take a nap afterward.

Haircut

It was brought to my attention that I announced that I'd chopped off Amelie's hair and then never posted a picture.

The night before we were supposed to go down to the Bootheel for Christmas, the kids had a bath and then we needed to brush Amelie's hair. She immediately started whining about it, so I asked how she'd like a haircut - and she jumped on it so we just capitalized on the opportunity and bobbed it off in the kitchen at around 8pm. I'd intended on evening it up pretty soon after that, but we still haven't gotten around to it.

I very annoyingly took these photos today while she was trying to eat lunch.

I am definitely not a professional, but I think this will do - she's already able to brush her hair on her own most mornings and that was definitely not happening before.