Free Range Family

It is pretty late. Anna is up again cluster feeding before she falls asleep. I feel like she may sleep for longer than seven hours because she has eaten so much this past hour. So I figured I might as well do my Darling Dozen post for today. This is the twelfth and last week of the Darling Dozen. I simply cannot believe that Anna is already twelve weeks old and that in a little over a week she will be a three month old. Wow! She is just so big and so ready to be bigger, I joke that she is twelve weeks going on twelve months! She is so determined to sit up and crawl and move around like her big brother! Its amazing! So I have total mommy brain. Went to sub that art class yesterday and I expressed my excitement about finally having a birthday party tomorrow. My boss was instantly confused and after looking through our records, I realized that I was just crazy and had made up a fictional party in my head lol. No, my first birthday party is October sixth! Okay, so today we just have the ...

Grandma Melanie, Alan, Anna, and I went to Jenelle's senior art show Monday night after I was finished with dance class. I cannot believe that Jenelle is already at her senior year of college, I remember when we were just starting college together and sharing a table at our art class. We used to make fun of our crazy old teacher Jussila and talked about my family alot  (she was dating my cousin Garrett at the time). Now we are all grown up, she about to graduate and start teaching art class and me married with two children. I miss those days, looking back. It was nice to go back to the art building and see the classrooms I used to frequent. Jenelle is serioulsy one of my favorite artists. Her artwork is so different and unique, I love all the colors she uses. The theme of her show was manifest destiny, so there were various native american styled pieces as well as some western artwork too. Oh, I loved it all! I really enjoyed the native american side the best, I loved a...

Happy Thursday everyone! Today wasn't as warm out as yesterday was, but since its my only day off in a while I figured Alan and I would still take our little walk over to my parent's house. We did and though it looked like it wanted to storm on us the whole time, we had a really good time! This time on our walk, we saw a rollie pollie on the sidewalk. I told Alan to scare it so that it would roll up, and he bent down close to it and yelled as loud as he could lol! :D Needless to say, the rollie pollie wasn't scared at all and continued on its way to the grass. It had me laughing for blocks though lol! He is too funny sometimes! Tomorrow night is my friend Jessica's Bachelorette Party. I was invited before I was pregnant lol, so I think I will still be going, for a little bit. They even bought me a matching shirt and nicknamed me Sexy Hippie Mama or something silly like that lol. Pretty close to the right name! :P We will be doing dinner and then going out the bars af...

Today was another hot one. 84 degrees almost right away when we woke up at 7:30. I had to work this morning in Child Watch and teach my Kindergarten art class plus Lon was finishing up his sixth folf basket, so Alan came with me to daycare. The first hour Alan was the only kid in there, so he got to decide which side he wanted to play on. He changed his mind about every... ten seconds lol. But then more kids started showing up, including on of Alan's older friends he hadn't seen in a while. They ran and played ball together, and had a wonderful time. I had to leave him at daycare for my art class and he didn't even care! :) Lol art class was good. We made Summer Collages and Hand print Birds (I feel like I've already typed this before lol, maybe earlier in the week!) and my chatty girls finished their kites from last week. We will be moving this classes' art show to the Saturday after next, due to one student's absence for the holiday weekend. But we still dis...

Today at my art class, one of my little girls brought me flowers that she and her father had picked together from their garden for me. :) This is seriously the sweetest thing! The flowers are so pretty and they smell delicious! I will keep them in my kitchen window until they start to wilt and then I will hang them upside down like I do with most of my flowers (the other I press in books). But this made me smile and completely brightened my day! This is why I teach! I love and care and think about each and every one of my students, and its nice to be reminded that they love me just as much. Simple gifts from the heart are such a blessing that I will never take for granted. Thank you again sweetheart! :) I forgot to mention this the other day, but Alan used sidewalk chalk for the first time! We bought some Crayola Giant Chalk from Walmart and Alan responded really well to it! I was a little anxious about him not liking the chalk dust that would cling to his hands, clothes, etc. But he...

I felt like a chicken with my head cut off all day today, but I enjoyed the majority of it. I started the morning with one of my Kindergarten art class. We made Father's Day cards and Kites. This Kindergarten class is an all girl class, were as my Monday Kindergarten class has one boy and two girls. So the girls got a little chatty about their beloved dad's so I decided to start writing down what they were saying. I heard adorably funny things like, "My dad is the best ever. My mom is also the best too though." and "I like when dad makes me eggs and lets me use chopsticks." or even "He taught me how to ride my bike and now we ride bikes everywhere!" Then Alan, Lon and I went to our second cousin Sophie's first birthday party at Pioneer Park. They were having a barbecue, and while we waited for burgers Alan and I enjoyed strawberries and cantelope. Yum! Alan was really shy and wouldn't go wish Sophie a happy birthday, even though we had be...

I hope everyone has a great day today! I have one of my Kindergarten art classes this morning and then I work at the daycare from 3 to 8 tonight. Nothing too exciting, but its a nice day out again so hopefully we can go outside in our free time! For now, here's Meet me on Monday!! What is your favorite yogurt flavor?  Like regular yogurt or frozen yogurt? Cos both of them are pretty plain lol. :) For regular yogurt, I like just about any yogurt with fruit chunks in it, but strawberry yogurt is my favorite. I'm not really into the whole flavoured yogurt thing, I like my yogurt vanilla with fruit chunks in it lol. Via For frozen yogurt, I like chocolate frozen yogurt. I know lol, pretty lame!! Via Ankle or knee socks? and on the same theme, white socks or coloured?? No socks if I can! I prefer to be barefoot all the time! But if I have to wear socks, its whatever I can find to wear lol. I'll wear long and ankle socks, but only knee socks if I ...

Happy Monday everyone! As of today, it has been a year since I stopped nursing Alan. Unfortunately, someone has forgotten to inform my body and wardrobe of this, as I still seem to wear nursing bras! :D Lol one of these days I'll be able to throw them out, but right now I would have almost no bras. So they will have to work for the time being. I started my Summer Art Classes today with my first Kindergarten class at 10. I had two sisters and a little boy in the class, and boy were they a talkative bunch! :) We were only able to get through two projects lol, The Summer Self Portrait and The Graphic Design Summer Project. But both turned out great! All the kids did so well! I was one proud teacher. Please enjoy today's Meet me on Monday! Its short, but sweet today. :) What is was the last piece of candy that you ate? A Green Apple Jolly Rancher that Korbin (Alan's BFF) didn't want to eat at daycare. Don't worry, he hadn't opened it lol!  Do you "r...

Good morning everyone! Today is Alan's LAST art class for the school year! :( He and his father get the summer break off from art class so that I can take Alan to swimming lessons and we can go camping several times in the summer, guilt-free. :) I'm still really said that its his last class with me for a while, he's only been going for 3 months now, but I'm already used to having him. Plus I love all the art work he makes each class. Our house walls have never been more decorated. :) Oh well, he will start up again in September. I just have to remember to grab my camera for pictures- today we have our family art show! The Undomestic Mama has not posted a Top Two Tuesday blog hop yet, so I will go ahead with Oh Amanda's Top Ten Tuesday! Enjoy! Top Ten Baby Names!! ***This baby names are copyrighted- In the sense that no one else in my family can steal these names for their own children!!! Lol not that anyone will want some of these names, they are German an...

So this post just kinda snuck up on me lol, but its my 100TH POST TODAY!!! Wow, it doesn't feel like I have been blogging for that long (though in reality if I had blogged November through February I would have already hit this point) but here I am! Happy 100! I hope for 1000+ more posts lol! Today is the wonderful Martha Graham's 117th birthday. Martha Graham is a brilliant dancer and choreographer who influenced a lot of modern dancers, such as myself. For those that don't know, I studied dance for 12 years at Tracy's School of Dance. Dance and movement in general is very important to me, and Martha Graham felt the same way. She developed a wonderful technique and many different moves that are now used all over the world today. She was so important that Google dedicated their name doodle to her today. I urge you to go online to view it, I can only get the photo of it on here, and the movement is what is the best. :) I love how she spells the word backwards too. Ch...

For any of you who don't know (if there is anyone lol), Lon and I were married last Saturday, April 23. :) It was a beautiful event, and though I have yet to post pictures of it yet, you can read about it here and here. We cannot wait to go on our honeymoon, but unfortunately we will have to wait until June when my mother is out of school (she's a first grade teacher) and can babysit Alan for a weekend. We still are super excited to go and are grateful for the extra time to save more money! :) Via Lol, sorry I just love Precious Moments! I had to put one on here, especially for the wedding! :) But I digress... We have finally decided on a place to have our honeymoon, and I'd love to share the exciting details with you! We plan on leaving Saturday morning (Toddler free! Wahoo!!) and going to Chico Hot Springs Resort, by Livingston Montana. There we will participate in such activities as outdoor pilates, horseback riding, massage therapy, hiking, hot spri...

This post is not to offend anyone, to the contrary I want to explain my family's situation beforehand to make sure no one is confused or offended by it. I wish to never go through the discrimination my son and I experienced last year at an Easter egg hunt... But that story is for another day, another post. I figured I might as well post about this topic today though, as Easter is on Sunday. My family and I will be participating in Easter activities, as we traditionally do, even though we are not of the Christian religion. As most of my readers know, I am Buddhist but my husband and son do not belong to any religion. My husband has his own scientific theories about our creation and our fate. We have not decided if we will raise Alan as a Buddhist or just raise him without a religion. The latter seems more appropriate to me, as even though I am a Buddhist I do not practice with a church. I do not believe in organized religion (I actually believe your relationship with your spiritua...

We have art class again today, can't wait to see what my amazing toddler artist creates! I'm sure it will abstract and breathtaking. :) Plus the three of us with the whole class always have such a blast together, learning and creating. I love it, and I love my boys in my class! Oh my goodness, my wedding is literally eleven days away!!! I'm freaking out a little bit right now, I'm just so excited!! I hope its as awesome as I imagine it, and I have a feeling it will be. Everything is planned, and (almost) everything is perfect. The only missing thing as of current is the remainder of Lon's tux, we still need to buy his shirt and his vest. But honestly, I love Lon and will marry him in jeans and a t-shirt. If he doesn't get his stuff by the wedding, I will not care one bit. :) That's how much I love him. <3 <3 <3 Okay, okay, enough of this wedding bliss lol... Onto Top Two Tuesday!!! Top Two Favorite Drinks (Alcoholic or Non) I'll do on...

So its midweek and while everyone else is busy (Lon is doing the therapy thing :D and Alan is having lunch next to me in his highchair) I'd like to take a moment to reflect on how this week is going for me and the family.  Art class yesterday was good. There was supposed to be five students total, but only one other kid showed up besides Alan. That made for a more private class though, which was nice. The theme for this month is Famous Artists and Springtime. Yesterday's projects were Pablo Picasso Cubism Faces, Pipe Cleaner Flowers, and Easter Bunny Drawing. Lon helped Alan with the harder parts of each project but Alan pretty much colored, drew, cut and glued all on his own. :) His projects turned out great too! We had a very good time together overall (and we always do). I didn't get any photos, but I haven't figured out how to upload them from my cell phone anyways. I always seem to have people searching for information about my art and birthday party programs o...

Can't wait for Alan's art class today at eleven! Its his last class of the month, and we are making paper bag puppets and doing a simple spring collage. Then at the end of class, we will have our art show for all Y members. Alan's been working on his colors and he'll impress all the girls at class lol, I just know it. :P And today is Lon's day off of work and my self proclaimed day off of blogging (even though I took a day off Sunday too lol). So please enjoy my Top 2 Tuesday and check out some archived blog posts today. I'm always adding new ones! Top Two Celebrity Hairstyles #1 Pixie Lott... Now I have honestly no idea who this celebrity is lol, but I always love the classic hippie braid headband look. :) I love how thick her braid is too! Love this hairstyle so much, and I haven't worn my hair like this for a while. Might wear it this way tomorrow. :) (This photo thanks to http://www.sugarscape.com) #2 Ashley Olson... Once again, its a brai...

Today was an busy but good day for my family and I. :) Unfortunately, I had to get up early this morning for work lol. But it looked like a nice day outside so I decided to walk to work, rather than wake up my husband and son to take me three blocks lol (Yes, my car is still in the shop and probably will be until Tuesday or Wednesday. Great! Thankfully for me, its springtime!) because that would have just been mean! My husband has been dealing with a lot of tooth and eye pain lately and has thus been losing a ton of sleep. And like I said previously, its only like three blocks. The walk was pleasant too. It was a little chilly, surprisingly, but the birds were singing and that sun was just a shining. I love Big Sky mornings. :) Today was Healthy Kids Day at the YMCA. This was a day that invites all children to come and participate in fun, healthy activities. They could take part in arts and crafts, hula hooping, carnival games, face painting, Despicable Me showing IN THE POOL, planti...

Yesterday was uneventful for us except for Alan's art class. Lon doesn't work Tuesdays so he and Alan met me after my first class and we prepared for this next class together. I love that my husband is an artist because I can just give him directions and not have to worry about him. Which is good because I had about 25 shamrocks of various sizes to cut out in fifteen minutes lol. Oops! :P Class went great! Everyone was there, and all the toddlers participated in all of the projects with their parents/grandparents. Alan loved being the only boy in class, besides his daddy. He got to sit in between two of the girls and he thoroughly enjoyed helping them get their crayons, glue sticks, pompoms, glitters, and colored noodles for their crafts. I think everyone enjoyed making the 3D shamrocks the best because of all the gluing. Or maybe the Saint Patrick's Day drawings because they were allowed to draw with pencils. Or even the shamrock rainbows because of the coloring and text...

So we've been kinda preparing Alan for potty training since Christmas. As gifts, he got an Elmo trainer potty, Elmo Goes Potty DVD, Elmo Potty books and a few other big boy toys. And everyday since then, Alan sits down to watch his DVD and then I will read the book and we talk about going potty. But now that its March and Alan's eighteen months, we have actually started potty training him. Today was first day and I was anticipating it not going over very well, but everything surprisingly went great! Thank goodness! I've been researching the best way to potty train a toddler since December, and I think I've developed a fool proof way which combines a lot of what people have told me with what I've read in books. My biggest concern was not making it too scary or too forcing it on him, because my son is such a free spirit he tends to revolt a little if I force to do things. So everything I'm doing is not immediate and not too demanding of him (honestly if he doesn...

I am going to make this post a short one because my last two were so stinking long lol. Tomorrow is my son's first ever art class with me!! :D That's right, Alan will be attending my Y Arts- Be Creative class this month, as he is eighteen months! I am so elated and excited for this, I have been imagining this day forever. That's an artist for ya though lol. He will be taking my Parent/Toddler class with his father. What a great bonding experience this will be for my boys! I promised to do my best to just play the part of "teacher" lol, but I will admit this will be hard for me. :) I am just so excited! Our lesson for tomorrow is African art- we are making African finger paint masks and drawing safari animals. I am anxious about Alan finger painting lol, but I know Daddy will help him draw those animals real good. :) I read somewhere that with lots of practice eighteen month old children can draw circles and shapes. I hope if we show him enough, he'll pick tha...