Tidbits

Reina has an imaginary friend named Lucy.  Lucy is married to a guy named Lightning Glenn and they have two kids, Sheba and Sloppy.  I can only assume that Lucy is fabulously glamorous, showers her children with presents and has a house full of cats.

Reina's birthday is a few weeks away and we are in the midst of party planning.  This year's theme is not Frozen or Elsa's Castle or any of those predictable topics.  Nope, Reina wants to have a Cleopatra party.  I'm not really sure where that idea came from, she's definitely not been watching old Elizabeth Taylor movies.  She has checked out a few books from the library about Egypt and mummies and she knows Cleopatra was bitten by a snake (I blame Glenn).  So Cleopatra party it will be.  Stay tuned.  Or at least send me your party game ideas that feature ancient Egypt and ruthless rulers.

The kids brought their report cards home last week and it was good news all around.  They are both working hard and while they don't really get grades at this point, we were happy with their scores.  They are learning so much this year - it's fun to see the progress.  Will is adding and subtracting columns of numbers and starting to learn some multiplication.  He's reading like a champ.  This week he brought home "I Survived the San Francisco Earthquake" and "I Survived the Battle of Gettysburg."  I think my dreams of reading Little House on the Prairie might have to wait until Reina's ready.  Reina is reading!  It feels like it happened overnight - she went from being too nervous to sound stuff out to reading "Hop on Pop" and "The Foot Book" with confidence.  Watch out world, she can read.

A quote from Reina's teacher, "Reina is mature for her age and has excellent communication skills. I can always depend on Reina to be an active participant in whole group discussion." 

From Will's, "Will, you are such a good friend to everyone in our class.  No matter what, you always seem to give everyone the benefit of the doubt.  This is such a nice attribute for a young man to have." 

I think so too, kiddo.

When you try to take a 7-yr old's picture

Will was all dressed up for the UW game yesterday and I thought he looked so grown up that I wanted to take a quick picture before we walked out the door. Okay, I was also surprised that he chose jeans all by himself. 

Smile buddy! 

I said "smile" not whatever it is you are doing.

Oh, okay so it's going to be the one of those battle pictures. Naturally. 

Nevermind.  There's my cute kid. 

Basketball - Will edition

Will had his first basketball on Saturday morning.  Between Reina's Friday night games, Will's Saturday morning games, UW games on Saturday afternoon or evening, we are one basketball crazy family.  Yes, football season is over.  Mercifully so, perhaps.  So on to basketball!  Will, just like his sister is #7.  Funny how that worked out.  I've had a chance to bring out my zoom lens that I got for my birthday and it's fun to try to capture basketball moves. 

At practice, they are all enthralled by something.  Wish I knew what it was! 

Will's first game was Saturday morning.  His league looks much more basketball-like, although there are still no fast breaks.  Kids try each time they get a rebound but the referee holds them in one spot (sometimes literally) until the rest of the team gets down the court.   Will's team won their first game and it was a lot of fun to watch. 

Okay, so there's no double-teaming either but I appreciate their defensive tenacity. 

Exasperation? Maybe?  Will's pretty cool-headed out there so he might've just been fixing his bangs. 

And chewing on his shirt.  This blog post should be called the many expressions of Will Pauley.

Action shot!  I love how the teammates on the bench are looking in the complete opposite direction of the basketball action.

Sending the telepathic message.... stop taking my picture Mom.

My big handsome kid.

Basketball - Reina Edition

How Reina feels about basketball can be summed up in one facial expression:   

For the record, I gave her the option to play this year and when it was time to sign up, she said "yes please!"  So I signed her up.  The kid is fast and she has good hand/eye coordination.  However, she doesn't like touching the ball, having the ball touch her, be jostled by other players and most of all, getting hit in the face by either the ball or the players.  With that said, she willingly goes to practice and listens to the coach and runs up and down the court.  

Standing in line during warm-ups.  Soooo boring. 

Hey look, she's touching the ball!  Of her own free will! 

Hey look, she's holding the ball! 

Her first game was Friday night.  She's one of two girls on her team and while the players are dressed like basketball players, there's a basketball involved and even a referee, there are baskets at each end of the court, and there's a whistle every now and then, any resemblance to actual basketball ends there.  It is chaos.  Adorable chaos, but chaos nonetheless.  At any moment, there's at least one kid crying, someone else is dribbling towards the wrong basket, several kids are piled on each other trying to get the basketball and parents and coaches are shouting out suggestions.  I'd planned on taking a bunch of in-game photos but frankly I was giggling too much and I also volunteered to sit on the bench with the players who were taking a break in the hopes of keeping them actually involved in the game.   We usually ended up talking about movies and speculating about the snacks after the game but at least I kept them on the bench.  The next game is Friday night and I can't wait! 

Toothless

Over the Christmas break, Reina announced that she had a loose tooth.  When we responded with enthusiasm and excitement, she announced that she didn't want to lose her tooth because she didn't want it to hurt.  Keep in mind, this is the kid who's had blood drawn a few times and didn't even flinch.  The tooth became looser (more loose?) and looser and we tried not to make too big of a deal about it.  Last Thursday, Reina cried for about an hour because the tooth was so loose that it was making a weird noise (her perspective) and she went back and forth between wanting to leave it in there indefinitely or letting Daddy pull it out.  She was also bothered because she could feel the new tooth coming in behind it.  She finally decided to leave it in there and I figured the tooth would eventually just walk out of her mouth on it's own.

 

Fast forward to today and when I arrive to pick up Will and Reina from the after school program, I'm greeted by a beaming Reina who announces that SHE PULLED HER OWN TOOTH OUT AT SCHOOL.  Hooray! 

Look at that big girl! 

Cookie crumbs and all. My new camera is pretty cool. 

She's written a note to the Tooth Fairy and her tooth sits in a little bag under her pillow.  As I was tucking her in tonight, she told me that she doesn't want anymore loose teeth ever again because she doesn't like how it feels.  Oh kiddo.  Welcome to Big Kid-ville. 

Basketball

The football season might have come to a screeching halt tonight but hey, we still have basketball!  Yesterday we piled into the car for a quick trip to Laramie and a Cowboy's basketball game.  A great time was had by all, mostly because the Cowboys won but also because the kiddos are finally old enough to enjoy the game.  Will watched the whole thing, sitting next to me, clutching his giant foam finger.  Reina cheered and clapped at the appropriate times and also entertained herself by dancing, writing in her diary ("Mom, how do you spell 'snowflake'?") and walking up and down the empty rows of seats behind us.  So really, more of us were interested in basketball than last year, but not quite ALL of us, at least all of the time. 

Wyo Girl shaking her pom-pom and the rest of the gang saying cheese.  That's not a stuffed chicken in Glenn's lap, as someone asked on Facebook.  It's Reina's puppy, Belle, who also enjoyed the basketball game.

There's the giant foam finger! 

 Before the game, the kids and I spent way too long at the UW store picking out new Cowboys shirts.  Will outgrew his from last year and Reina was not interested in wearing a brown, boy's shirt out in public.  After looking at every shirt made for kids sizes 6 to 10 (on the big side, but it works), we finally found a few that fit the bill.  Will has just as strong opinions about clothing as his sister. In fact, he's as concerned about color, logo color, logo size and the material used in the construction of the shirt as he is with whether or not it looks like a "girl's" shirt. 

And... it's time for a haircut already. 

The Cowboys are off to a pretty good start and at the risk of jinxing everything I'll just stop raving about them now.  We can't wait for our next game! 

My birthday

My something-something birthday was Saturday and it was just a really nice day.  Reina had asked me a few days before if I was having a party with my friends, but no such plans like that this year.  She probably hoped we were going to rent some bouncy houses or get our nails painted.  Don't forget the goody bags. 

On the morning of my birthday, I slept in for a few extra minutes and when I came downstairs, I had smiling faces and presents waiting for me.  The night before, Reina had been telling me about seeing a scary doll at the mall. I wasn't sure what she was talking about but then she told me, "I saw the vampire doll when I was on the super secret shopping trip with daddy."  Oh... unbeknownst to me, Glenn came home from work early on Friday and took the kids to the mall. All. By. Him. Self. 

So back to my birthday.  I unwrapped a new Broncs hat from Will - it's orange!  Reina gave me the first season of Downton Abbey and pointed out that lady who looks like the teacher from Harry Potter. I wonder if Maggie Smith likes that she's known to a whole generation as that lady from Harry Potter?  Glenn gave me a bigger lens for my camera which I'm super excited about.  Close up pictures of school programs and sporting events, watch out!  Grandma gave me a cool little gadget that attaches to the lens cap of the camera and keeps it from getting lost.  There was also a card from Pop-pop and a happy birthday check.  Yah! 

Later in the morning, I jogged and then the girls in the family met Baby Cousin and Aunt Vicky for lunch where I got even more presents and a delicious meal.  And some smiles from Baby C. 

Saturday night, Vicky and Matt and Ainsley came over for bbq and we all watched football for a while.  It was a nice start to what I hope will be a very happy year.   

Pauley Christmas cookies

I've had this post sitting in the queue for a few weeks and I'd better finish it before it's time for a Valentine's Day post or something.  For the last several years, maybe since we got married (?), I've baked a few different Christmas cookies from recipes that belonged to Glenn's grandma.  I've probably posted about this before and (frankly I'm a little too lazy to go look it up right now) so if that's the case, consider this my annual post about German Christmas cookies.  

 

First up, we have the spritz.  Up until this year, I haven't been able to get my cookie press to work so I've rolled out this cookies and  cut them into shapes.  But this year, I pulled out the cookie press, brought in some muscle (Glenn) and voila!  Spritz the way they are supposed to look, although Glenn tells me that his grandma used to decorate the spritz with a candied cherry in the middle.  Things to remember for next year. 

Spritz artfully arranged on a cookie sheet.  Or spritz pulled out of the oven and the cook thinks, "Oh hey, I should take a picture of this."

Next up, we have the hazelnut macaroons.  In previous years, I had to search high and low to find hazelnut flour. I even had to order it on the internet once or twice.  Now I can find it at health food stores and sometimes even here in town.  These cookies are simple, egg whites, hazelnut flour and powdered sugar.  They are supposed to be decorated with a hazelnut on the top but I don't even know what a whole hazelnut looks like, much less where to find one.  These are delicious and they don't often last the entire holiday season because we gobble them up so fast.   

Food blog, this ain't.  Hi, crinkled parchment paper and randomly arranged cookies. 

I also make lepkugen and I finally know of someone else around my age who also makes lepkugen.  We need to get our recipes together some year to prepare.  A cross between gingerbread and fruitcake, it's full of spice and candied fruit with a light glaze. 

I wasn't paying enough attention to the oven and this year's batch is a little darker than it should be.  Not burned, just a little browned. 

I also made a batch of buttery S's, which are exactly what they sound like.  A butter cookie shaped into a little "s."  It's time consuming to shape each one and decorate the top with chopped nuts but they are also delicious.  Pictures of those next year, maybe? 

I also like to make cornflake wreaths that are a little globs of marshmallows, green food coloring, cornflakes and red hots. Guaranteed to turn your mouth green and crack a filling on a red hot but delicious nonetheless.  They also barely last 24 hours, not because they get stale but because they get grabbed by hands of all ages they minute they are cool enough to eat. 

So there we have it, another year of holiday baking in the books. The diet starts tomorrow.