Out of the Mouth of Quinn

Quinn has been doing really great at learning signs and new words recently. His favorite words include:

Trash

Door

More

Chair

Dog

Hi

Mama

Daddy

Bar (for drinks)

Juice

Ken Dee (for his friend Kennedy)

and Fish

He amazes me at how fast he is starting to pick up language skills. I was able to teach him a couple of signs during dinner tonight where as before it would take a few days and before that he wouldn't sign back at all. He doesn't know a ton of signs but will do the signs for hungry, more, hat, light, thirsty, milk and fish.

If you ask Quinn how old he is he will now hold up 1 finger and then clap really excitedly.

He has been walking around saying fish and doing the fish sign a lot the past couple of days. We saw a fish at the library today and he was pretty excited about it. When we got home I decided to make some cardboard fish and attach paper clips to them so he could 'fish' them with a little magnetic fishing rod he has. I printed out the fish onto card and showed him the pictures. He looked at it and said "Fish!" Then ran into the room and sat down on the floor where we eat snacks and folded his arms to pray. Apparently he thought the fish in the picture were for dinner!

England Goodies

Today was a busy busy day. Lots of baking and playing with the little munchkin. The best part of the day was opening the door to see two packages from my amazing grandparents on the doorstep filled with goodies for our little family. Lots of treats that remind me of home.

We also inherited a little yellow duck. This duck has been in my grandparents 'extension' ever since I can remember and it was always such a treat to be able to eat a little chocolate out of the duck. (it is hollow and it twists apart). The ones I remember the most were wrapped as basketballs and soccer balls. Now the duck gets to be in our living room for Quinn and James to have their treats out of. Such a fun tradition!

Excuse me while I go relax on the couch and savor every bit of my Wispa candy bar. Divine!

Sad story and project help

My last diaper bag ripped, so I started using the free one the hospital gave us. It works great and though I don't think it would be good for new born items because the inside is flimsey, its great to lug around toddler stuff. Apart from sippy cups. They just don't want to fit anywhere. Last week I was in a hurry so I threw the sippy cup into the middle compartment instead of trying to force it into the side pocket. And water went everywhere! Only I didn't realize how bad it was. I thought its just dribbled a little as sippy cups tend to do but the contents had indeed found their way over books, diapers and....my hubbys camera :-(

Its working again but the lens is blurry so we will have to see if we can take it apart and fix it. In the mean time I feel awful for breaking a camera and can't share any fun pictures of the projects I have been working on.

Ahh projects...I have about a hundred and three projects lurking around my house, all unfinished. A lot of them I wanted done about a month or two after we moved in...and we have been here a year. I figure one of the best ways to get things done is to make yourself responsible to other people. You guys are my people :-)

Here is a list of a few of the things I am working on:

Curtain ties: Right now I am using scraps of fabric to hold back our curtains. UGLY. I have the fabric and just need to whip up some nice looking ties. I also want to add a simple valance.

Pilows: I have the fabric, the design, and a bunch finished without snaps. The thing holding me back is that I have some pillows I want to cover in a box, which is under another box, and about 10 more boxes in Quinns room and I need to know the size of them. Why is moving boxes so hard? Not sure but I just need to get in there and do it.

Comforter: I am making a comforter for the twin bed in Quinn's room so there is some color and everything is matchy matchy. I was on a role with this until I realized that I messed up and cut a couple of pieces too short. I finally cut out some more..and I cut it too short again! Aparently I can not measure. Mistakes like this make it so hard to get a project finished.

Window boxes: We started building these fabulous window boxes before Christmas. We have one almost finished. It turned out being a lot higher than we planned but it gives us tons of extra storage. With this one we need to add a few supports in the inside and attach the lid. Then put molding around the front. The second one has the upholstery and lining done but some of the wood is unstained. As I am pregnant I can't whip out a brush and finish this up and the best way to get it done is to help set it up and let Peter take care of it.

So those are the projects at the top of my list. I'll keep you guys updated!