Salty Watercolors

Last week for art class we did "salty watercolors," an idea I got from this post. We've done this activity before, and the kids love it every time.

Basically, they draw pictures with glue, dredge them in salt, and then gently watercolor on the salty images. With each touch of the brush, the watercolors flow like magic through the salt.

As evinced by her first painting, Lu is very focused on the upcoming Valentine's Day.

We were reading Charlotte's Web during the week we did this project. Perhaps you can see the influence it had on Phoenix's subject matter.

Mid-process . . . I am pleased to note that Phoenix is beginning to enjoy art a little more, and he is beginning to master the gentle touch (read: he doesn't slop his paint all over any more).

This was his final piece. Ghost? Dinosaur? Ice-Age creature? You'll have to ask Phoenix.

Toothless and Fancy Free

Lutece lost her first tooth today. Exciting stuff around here, I can tell you. It's been loose for about one month now, so it's about time the thing came out. I heard her half shrieking/half crying in the other room this afternoon, and I found myself rolling my eyes, thinking, "Oh, what now?" I quickly changed my tune, however, when she rushed in saying that her tooth was finally half out. I grabbed it firmly with a tissue and pulled as hard as I could. Pop! Out it came.

There she was, crying with fear and joy and relief and excitement. Oh, it was a joyous occasion!

I caught her showing the bloody space to Phoenix, who was fascinated by it.

And now comes the very best part. The Tooth Fairy!! In anticipation of the Tooth Fairy coming tonight she actually uttered the words, "This is the most exciting day of my life!" Really? More exciting than Christmas? Or your birthday? Really?

In preparation for this night, I made this little Tooth Fairy bag last week (using this tutorial). She can put the tooth in the front pocket of the bag and the tooth fairy will leave her something special in the pouch.

Oh my goodness. Fresh out of her bath, jammies on, tooth pouch ready. She is so excited!

Gingerbread Houses

You may think this is an activity that occurred during Christmas and that I am just now posting the pictures. You would be wrong.

In fact, my original plan was to do gingerbread houses with the kids the week AFTER Christmas, when we had all sorts of *free* time, just waiting to be filled. Wrong again.

Unfortunately, Lutece has the memory of an elephant, and last week she remembered that "we were going to make gingerbread houses!" Oh yeah. We *were* going to do that, weren't we?

So we did. We started them on Friday (cutting out the pattern, making the dough, cutting out the dough, baking the dough, and then quickly trimming the pieces before they harden). On Saturday, armed with an arsenal of candy and white chocolate, we built the houses. One for Lutece; one for Phoenix.

Lutece's process was very precise. Phoenix's was a bit more random.

A piece of candy here, one there, a huge garden out front.

But, you know, it all tastes the same in the end.

Putting on the finishing touches. Lu was pleased.

I was too.

Moon Eyes and her finished product.

Phoenix could hardly wait to start eating it.

Hardly wait at all.

This is what Lu's house looked like the very next day.

And Phoenix's. Whatever. A gingerbread house is for eating, right?

Arctic Afternoons

We've been getting some crazy weather for Lexington. Snow that doesn't melt the next day? Temperatures that don't go over 15 degreees? It's crazy I tell you. After the second big snowfall (big being a relative term), we went outside to get a snowball fight going. Phoenix and I discovered one little problem.

The snow was so dry that it was impossible to form a snowball. So we ended up having a snow-throwing fight, in which we threw, you know, snow.

He was not happy about my taking pictures of him though. He's particular about that . . . and lets me know.

Another thing I found out about the snow-throwing fight is that it's a tricky business when you are trying to take pictures. Snow on a camera lens makes for fuzzy pictures. Can you see the before and after effect between the first three pictures and the last three?

And, of course, you have to eat some.

Mmmmmm. Tasty!

Making Pizza

Phoenix is our budding chef. He and Stayc made pizza last week. I'm convinced that half the reason he likes to cook is so that he can taste each of the ingredients.

Adding the olive oil.

And tasting the olive oil. Mmmmm good.

Winter Watercolors

Thank you notes are on the way!

Christmas Morning

This is going to be a fantastically boring post with very average pictures. This is one of those "since this is really the only journal I keep of my family, I need to record this event" posts. Hey . . . full disclosure.

So Christmas was fun for all, if you don't count the mini-anxiety attacks I had all day long as I looked over the gift chaos that had become our home. The kids went immediately to their stockings (my personal favorite part of Christmas).

Despite Phoenix's blank stare, and the requisite orange, he was quite happy.

Stayc got some much needed slippers. Happy.

Lu loved her new, personalized apron from Gma & Gpa DuBravac. Happy. Happy.

The kids were just as interested (if not more) in each others' presents as their own.


And Lu was highly interested in Phoenix's presents.

I'm not quite sure yet whether this was the year of the Dinosaur . . .

. . . or the year of the Pipecleaner. Lutece spent the entire week before Christmas making various presents out of pipecleaners for everyone. It was really quite sweet. Here Scott is opening his "ball-catcher." If you didn't automatically know what your present was, it was ok, because most of them came with detailed instructions written by a six-year-old.

And one of the best parts of Christmas for ME? A good excuse to sit the kids in front of a video (or two) and not feel guilty about it!