01.11

Welcome to the new Quiggle blog, inspired by another blog that I discovered not long ago.  The idea is to take a family picture once a month for the whole year (hence the twelve times in the blog title).  I might be crazy to take on yet another project but a picture a month seems doable and I'll try to do a little month synopsis to go along with it.



January 2011


I was so inspired by this idea and how hard could it be, really, to take a family picture once a month and do a monthly write up.  I had visions of a notebook I could keep notes in and then the end of the month it would just be a breeze to put it all together.  Well, this months picture is of us one morning this weekend, all in our pj's and unshowered (well except for Hailey) as I scrambled to get a picture really quick before the month was over :).  Just keeping it real!  And that monthly notebook?  Blank.  I guess I'm leaving plenty of room for improvement.

The first part of January we spent getting back into the routine of things.  The magic of Christmas had past and it was time to bring the house back to it's "regular" state.  It was back to school and back to the morning routines of getting up and dressed and fed and out the door to school.  Back to "Daddy Mondays"  where Dave takes the kids to school and picks them up and they eat lunch by the fireplace while I try to get somewhat caught up on work.  Back to Mommy and Hailey Tuesdays and Thursdays where we drop Tyler off at school and then come home and the TV babysitter occupies Hailey for approximately 45 minutes while I try to get a quick bit of work time.  Then Hailey comes in and reminds me it is play time not work time.  Back to swimming on Tuesdays and Thursdays for both kids (they are such good swimmers now).  Hailey is swimming the length of the pool now and has mastered her side breathing (though it is very slow, not fast like Ty's).  Back to Dave and I getting up at 5-5:30 to workout and hopefully shower before the kids wake up and Dave heads off to work.  Back to (well this never really ended) working at night after the kids go to bed and trying our best to get to sleep at a reasonable hour.

Since this is the very first blog I should probably do a quick recap of where the kids interests are at.  Tyler LOVES legos.  He's building everyday.  When we pick him up from school, one of the first things he mentions is what he is going to go home and build....as if he's spend the last 2 1/2 hours contemplating it, instead of focusing on school :).  Tyler and Hailey are playing well together right now.  Outside of legos they don't so much play with toys as they do imaginative play.  The call it "being the guys" whether it is Harry Potter, Lego guys (like Ninjas), Star Wars, etc.  They also love to build forts and snugly places filled with blankets and stuffed animals.  Hailey is always asking us to play with her (even when we are sitting there playing with her).  When you ask her what she wants to play she ALWAYS says "tag".  So thankful for our playroom.  Tag comes in various forms....traditional tag, tag by soft poofy ball, tag by soft stuffed animal, character tag, you name it.  Hailey is an endless bag of energy.

Tyler has school every other Friday (since he is in half day kindergarten).  I worked in his class twice this month.  Once for math mania and once as the art docent.  For the art project I talked about portraits and the kids made a portrait of George Washington.  School Fridays are called Fantastic Fridays because they get two recesses, they get to eat lunch at school, and they teacher gives them a little something known as Friday Surprise.  Tyler calls the Friday's that I come and work in his class Super Fantastic Fridays.  I hope he loves me this much forever.
Our month ended in sickness unfortunately.  It started off with me getting a cold.  Then Tyler came down what we thought was a cold but then turned into a cough and three day fever (hence his face of joy in our picture).  This is our sick Tyler.

And now we are moving on to February......