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Sunday, January 28, 2007

feliz cumpleaños a mí

My birthday was Friday so Jeremiah took me to Vegas Thursday night. We were going to see a show, but because of my indecisiveness I waited until Thursday afternoon to try to buy tickets & the show I wanted was sold out so instead we did dinner & a movie. Jeremiah wondered why I hadn't chosen Rocky instead of the chick flick we ended up seeing. Hmmm. Actually, for our first date my friends & I drove to 2 or 3 Blockbusters to rent all the Rocky movies & we had a 2-night Rocky Marathon. Not that we were into it, but we figured it'd be a great way to win over the guys. Victory, obviously! And that was the beginning of our beautiful story! So yes, Jeremiah & I will definitely watch the newest Rocky together - when it comes out on DVD!

We spent a long day Friday looking at model homes. We recently bought some lots that we're going to build on, so we wanted to find a layout that would suit our family for the rest of our time in Kingman - it could be a very long time! Here's Jeremiah & I at the end of the day on some couch in one of the homes. In typical Jeremiah fashion, he wouldn't smile - just stare or make gay faces.

So the only other update is that Jeremiah is officially a college student! Woohoo! He's taking a Spanish class at the community college and impressing all of his Mexican employees with phrases like, "De donde eres?" & "Que hora es?" His guys humor him & answer his questions about what they like & do they like football, etc., & then they ask Jeremiah questions back. Jeremiah's the head of his class, although he needs some work on his accent! :)

Friday, January 19, 2007

Snow Day

It snowed in Kingman last week! Even though it was definitely naptime I wanted Callie & Jack to be able to play in the snow since snowfall in Kingman is a nearly annual occurrance! Jack got over his tired grumpiness long enough to spend some time outside. He was fascinated! I showed Callie how to catch snowflakes on her tongue, which she thoroughly enjoyed trying!



Jeremiah was pretty excited about the snow since that meant that hunting the next morning would probably be better. Unfortunately for him the snow didn't improve hunting conditions. A funny aside - he's been bow hunting in the same spot for several weeks now and about a month ago he finally saw a buck in his spot so even though it was nearly out of range he let an arrow fly. He missed the buck but came home with raised spirits because at least he'd seen something (he's spent many hours sitting in the cold & never seeing anything)! A few days after missing the buck he was talking to a friend about it & saying how odd it was that he hadn't seen anybody else in that area. His friend informed him it was because that area was closed! Turns out it was the ONLY area not yet opened in the state! Slight oversight on his part! So now I feel that it was divine intervention that stopped him from getting the buck that day! I probably would have been visiting my husband in jail not to mention that he'd lose his hunting license for life for poaching! So now that the area's open, we're crossing our fingers that he'll see another buck in the next couple of weekends before the season closes.

One more thing. We've been doing our reading program for just about a week now & already we know that it's working! At least for Callie - Jack doesn't seem that interested. But then again, children his age learn much faster than children Callie's age so maybe he is picking the stuff up. Anyway, Jeremiah wrote down "mama," "daddy" and "Callie" the other day & she read what he'd written. I was a little annoyed with him when he'd told me because you're absolutely not supposed to test in the beginning, and when you do finally test you never just show a word & ask them to tell you what it says. Then last night after I'd told him how excited I was that Callie had grabbed one of the words from the set that I hadn't yet put away and said that it was "dolly," he said he wasn't surprised because he'd tested her again! Agh! He promised he won't do it again. Anyway, despite my annoyance with his sneaky testing, I'm pretty stoked to know that our efforts are thus far fruitful! Woohoo!

Friday, January 12, 2007

Stupid Blogger

So it's been almost a month since my last post, but there's been a lot of the every day stuff going on. So I've added the latest in a few different posts so that I don't write a novel in just 1 post (although you may think this qualifies as one). First of all, I'm super annoyed with Blogger right now. Notice my template & page are totally different? That's because I switched over to the new Blogger & it won't let me customize any of my stuff like I used to be able to. I'm sure there's a way, but since I'm not really familiar with html I can't do it. I was able to figure stuff out before, but after trying for quite a while yesterday to change my background (as you can see I only succeeded in changing my title bg), I threw in the towel. So welcome to my new look. Thanks a lot Blogger.

Anyway. The little Divis clan is doing well. I'm trying to lose weight (isn't everybody this time of year) so I've signed up for an account on MyFoodDiary.com. It's pretty much a luxury calorie tracker but I think it's pretty cool. I've never in my life worried about counting calories, but I'm giving this a try since it's cheaper than Weight Watchers and basically the same thing when you really break it down. It's definitely helping me eat smarter. Like last night even though I had more than 450 calories to go I opted not to bake chocolate chip cookies (we keep frozen balls in the freezer that are warm & delicious in 12 minutes!). I decided at the beginning that I'd only have dessert twice a week (I'm a dessert freak!) & I wanted to save myself for the weekend! So my change of diet is one big thing for me right now.

Also I started a reading program yesterday with Callie & Jackson. My bro/sis-in-law Justin & Jamie told us about a reading program (among others) developed by The Institutes for the Achievement of Human Potential. I was a little skeptical at first, but reading the information, then checking out the book at the library has convinced me that it's totally possible to teach your baby to read as well as many other things (if you're curious there's a video clip on the Institute's website [early learning programs\view us on fox tv]). So we're now going to be working on their reading program daily & eventually adding other areas. And if you're wondering why I want to teach my children to read, the point of the program is that your children are learning how to learn and to enjoy learning. What really got me interested in the program was hearing about the Institutes math program. It teaches to think in quantities instead of numerals, and since I struggled so much with math in HS, I thought if I could help my children in any way it would be a small thing on my part & such a huge advantage for them! Anyway, maybe in a few months I'll be able to report that I've lost the weight I want to & that my children can read some words.

We did it!

We started trying to potty train Callie when she was about 18 mos. because I was so excited about the Princess Pull-ups, but she wasn't ready for it. And since Pull-ups are a lot more expensive than diapers we went back to diapers for a few months. So about 3-4 months ago we started working with her again & she did much better. Now just a few short months later she's an official Big Girl as the Pull-up potty-training site would call her! We had a big girl party for her New Year's Eve with cake & Dora ice cream (she of course picked it out) & we gave her a new package of panties & some princess Megablocks that she'd seen sitting in the garage for a couple months that were to be her reward for being potty trained. I had taken her with me to pick out her new package of panties and there was no question that they were to be Dora, but unfortunately for her WalMart was out of her size. Doesn't it seem like WalMart is always out of half of what you need? I felt bad for Callie but I wasn't too upset since the Dora panties are super ugly! She choose Tinkerbell panties instead. It will be nice when she can wear a size 4 - there are way cuter options once you hit 4. Her 2/3's are big on her though so it will probably be a while before she's a 4! I did get these cute little panties for her from Osh Kosh. They say they're a 2 - yeah right! Anyway, we're so excited that Callie's potty trained! In the words of Dora, "Lo hicimos!" We did it!

Christmas Stuff

Christmas was pretty fun this year with Callie! Even though she doesn't know enough about Santa to not be able to sleep the night before, she knows that he lives in the North Pole, likes milk & treats, has reindeer & that he's back home resting now & getting ready for next year. We left "pumpkin gooey butter cake" (thanks Shannon - the recipe was a hit!) & milk out for Santa on Christmas Eve so when Callie got up Christmas morning she went over to the mantle to inspect things & then came into our room to tell us "The milk is all gone - Santa drank all the milk!" How cute is that?! She had a great time opening presents - she was a pro! Jack on the other hand - I wanted to get some pictures of him opening some up but since he wasn't really interested in opening presents I had to pick him up & set him back by his present! Callie, the dutiful older sister, helped Jack open most of his presents. Callie also found a new favorite word that morning - mine! A couple days after Christmas I had to sit with her & have a talk about it. Amazingly it helped & we're hearing "mine" only occassionally, which is totally expected for a 2-year old! So below is a clip of Callie going through her stocking - one piece of candy at a time! It's a little long so unless you're a grandma or aunt (and even then) it's probably a little boring.

Stocking Inspection