I'm in training!

My dear friend, Shannon, facebooked me several weeks ago. "Wanna do something crazy?" she asked. Shannon is celebrating 10 years of cancer survival, and wanted to do the Susan Komen 3-Day Walk for the Cure. Knowing this was dear to me, as well, she invited me to join her.

In September, Shannon and I will walk 60 miles in three days, celebrating life. If you would like to donate to Susan Komen Walk for the Cure, please use the link at the right of my blog.

A True Story About Peas

Katie doesn't like peas. Hasn't since the first day I lovingly strained all the skins out of the homemade puree. Ungrateful twit.



I keep serving them to her, every once in awhile. If I'm lucky, she'll chew one up, and then spit it onto my plate, saying, "Shyucky!" That's "yucky" in Katiese.

Tonight, I realized how far the depths of her hatred goes. At dinner, I was being an excellent role model, with a large serving of peas on my own plate. I happen to really like peas. I took a big spoonful, and brought it to my mouth, saying "Mmmm! Yummy!" Katie followed the spoon with huge, round eyes. As I put it in my mouth, she gasped, and yelled, "Mama! No! No, Mama!"

True story.

Grandpa Bear

Katie is all-of-a-sudden in love with her Grandpa Bear. Grandpa Whitney passed away while I was pregnant with Katie. My dear friend Kelly managed to get ahold of one of his famous Hawaiian shirts, and asked her mother-in-law, Kathy, to make a teddy bear for Katie.



Of her own accord, Katie has been pulling down Grandpa Bear from his shelf at bedtime, and has lately started carrying him around the house with her. Right now, Grandpa Bear is coloring with her

My daughter, the reader

We are a read-y family. Katie is showing signs of being a bookworm, too.





Snuggling in with a blanket and a pile of books... Laying on the front room floor, on the tummy, feet in the air, book on the floor...





Often times, her daddy will lay on the floor reading, and a few weeks ago Katie slammed his book shut for him, kicked it out of the way, and threw her book down in front of him, before she plopped down on his back, ready to read.

A couple of days ago, I got two catalogs in the mail, and sat on the couch to read the knitting one. Katie climbed up next to me, grabbed the scrapbook one off my lap, and started to browse. But she kept looking over at my shoulder, as if to see what I was reading, before going back to her own catalog.



I just wonder when she'll get enough patience to actually listen to the story....

Wishes...

I wish...

**I didn't have to work tomorrow, but could stay and play with Katie.

**that my crockpot had an extra ceramic insert.

**that my hair hadn't gotten quite so red.

**that I had gone to bed an hour ago, but I wasn't sleepy.

**that it would snow again.

**the clean floor fairy would come visit my house.

**I had more time to visit with friends.

**I had returned that library book on time!

Happy New Year!

I am very ready to be done with the 'aughts'. They have not been kind to me and my family. I have had many blessings, but much of the time, those blessings have been overshadowed by some darkness.

So, 2010. I'm ready. I'm ready for a year (or decade) to be boring, monotonous, and uneventful. My family is beautiful, and loving, and wonderful.

May the laughter that you find in your tomorrow wipe away the pain found in your yesterdays.

Snow!

We took Katie to play in the snow today!

At first she was hesitant. She didn't want to get her feet messy.


In fact, she would rather sit and pout than go out into the yard.


What can I say? She's her mother's daughter.

But then she decided that Tiny looked like he was having fun, so maybe she could, too.


And in fact, she really liked stomping in the snow, kicking it, and throwing snowballs.


And we ended up with very snowy boots, after all.