Alligators

These silly alligators kept the kids happy and busy the entire weekend! Who would have thought?

Apocalypse

On our last day in Holden, ash from the Flick Creek Wildfire started falling on us - a very light dusting of snow. (The fire was miles away on the other side of the lake and no threat to Holden.) Loud picked up his guitar and made up songs about the Apocalypse as he played cards in the ashfall.

Holden Pictures

To say we had fun would be an understatement. Grace and her buddies played with rubber toy alligators for two straight days in the gardens. The alligators had lively conversations. Each evening, a Mama deer and her twins (Feline and Bambi) and sometimes a Daddy deer walked through the village.

Holden Village

We just came back from our annual trip to Holden Village. This year we took 5 days. Here's a picture of Grace, hiding, before we got on the boat to Holden.

Friends

Grace's friend Little Foot, her troublesome dinosaur companion, will not stop eating from our garden. Grace is constantly asking us to tell Little Foot to stop eating the garden.

She doesn't have a brother or sister to fight with yet, but today she asked us to tell her imaginary friend, Mr. Q, to stop following her. So instead of actual fights we're refereeing imaginary fights between Grace and six inch tall girl named Mr. Q.

Cucumber Egg Hunt

We pulled up the cucumber plant today with all the remain xxxx-large
cucumbers attached to the vines. After Nelson tossed them in the yard
they looked like Easter Eggs, so we hid them and then Grace pretended
the Easter Bunny came and we had a cucumber-egg hunt.

Last Day of Class

Reading a book called "The Dragon Machine", they built a Dragon Machine to lead the baby dragon back where all the other dragons lived. This is just another typical imaginary adventure for Grace.

Grace Picture

Grace composed and took this photograph.

Grace's New Bed

A picture from Grace's first night in her new bed in her new room. (She loves her new room. So do we.)

Sleepy Airplanes

Grace, upon waking up this morning, said to Aimee: "Where do airplanes sleep?"

Also last night, Grace reports the following dream: Mommy was there, and Grandad was pretending to be a ghost, and he poked his head out of the sheets, and then we all went to Isabel's house, and Isabel's house was right next to our house.

Thumper Told Me

Grace offers many explanations for her behavior, or how the Universe
works, by prefacing her comments with "Thumper Told Me."

New Room

Our big project this past weekend was removing everything from Grace's room, painting it "Blue, like the morning sky", and putting in a new light and a new big-girl bed. She is now sleeping in her new room!

Self-portrait

Grace has figured out how to take pictures.

Life Lesson

We went to the zoo/  On the way home Grace had a bag of chips.  Aimee asked for the bag and Grace gave it to her, and then when Grace wanted it back, Aimee said, "Just a minute, I'm eating a few more chips."  Now, I started to joke about the lesson Grace should be learning from this: namely, never give away your bag of chips to somebody sitting in the front seat of the car.  Aimee said she was learning patience.  The debate was soon settled.  A few minutes later Aimee wanted some more chips and asked Grace for the bag back.  Grace, having learned her lesson, gave her the chips one at a time and kept the bag safely in her lap.

Grace's Homemade knock knock jokes

Knock knock.
Who's there?
Crab.
Crab who?
Crab door?

Knock knock.
Who's there?
Turtle.
Turtle who?
Turtle Curtain.

Knock knock.
Who's there?
Duck.
Duck who?
Duck light.

Knock knock.
Who's there?
Fish.
Fish who?
Fish Store.

4th of July awe

Grace, watching fireworks explode overhead in a variety of colors, from our front porch on the 4th of July: "Red and green at the same time? That's impossible."

Kitty Torture

You would think that Mango the cat, knowing that he will be treated rather roughly when Grace is near, would run. You would be wrong.

Mask

Grace and her new "sky" mask. (Note the shiny stars and yarnlike galaxies on the black background.)

July Flower Blogging from our Garden

Happy Fourth of July

Fight the Empire!