I've been working on applications to grad school and i've finally finished the two first choice schools. It wasn't easy, I had to put together 2, 20+ page portfolios of my work, get 6 letters of recommendation, write two 1,000 word essays, take the GRE, get copies of transcripts from BYUI and Purdue and get it all done by the 16th for Harvard, and the 30th for UPenn. Man, the last month has been a marathon and Amanda has been a great sport about me not having a job, but I think the grace period is over. Anyone seen the yellowpages? M....McDonalds, yup, they look like they're hiring. Gotta Go!So just when I though all who were going to get it had it, Casey had to go and join the ranks of the children (as usual) and get a raging case of pink eye. So far I am the only one in the family who hasn't personally dealt with the nuisance (knock on wood).
And just to prove we are not bias towards brunettes we thought we toss a blondie into the show. Bennett is so great at haircuts, and always ends up looking incredibly studly!
After picking the kids up from primary on sunday, I was talking to Maya's teacher and she said, "Maya was eating paper in class today."
"Yeah, she also likes to eat chalk too," was my reply.
"Yeah, she sits next to a chalk board in the primary room and i've seen her run her hand along the chalk tray and then lick her hands." she said.
"I know, she's a weirdo."
"Yeah, she is a weirdo."
I stumbled on this video from the summer which only reinforces my daughter's weird eating habits.
So this is not a new year's resolution, because I really don't like those guys, but it is a much needed update. As our camera has been on hiatus because of lack of AA batteries in the Elmer house, there have been very few pictures taken to catalogue our happenings, and thus, we forget what we have been doing week to week, but I did happen to find these photos of Elmer Family Poncho day, and two pics of Bennett's first birthday. so there you have it. 
When I was at Olin Partnership on my internship, I was exposed to this really neat british artist, Andy Goldsworthy (http://www.morning-earth.org/ARTISTNATURALISTS/AN_Goldsworthy.html) and I was totally amazed and felt a deep connection with his work as he is an artist/naturalist. I know it sounds hippie, but his projects are so cool that I had to try out some works of my own, i know it's sort of copycatting, but who cares, it was a ton of fun and took me a good 6 hours to make gathering up all the leaves from different maple trees and arranging them arround the trunk of one of our trees. As I was working on this I started by collecting leaves from one of my own trees, but as I ran out and needed more colors, I kept having to go around my neighborhood to get more leaves. I think it turned out pretty cool and the next day, it had pretty much blown away, but it was still a fun little project. I even had a little go at the front porch which didn't get completed.
I know that we haven't had much to post of excitement these past couple of weeks and that usually our blogs are heavily photo based and for that reason you haven't heard from us. Well, we are at the Porter's this weekend for conference and I had to take a few pictures of our newest member of the family strutting his stuff and getting his first haircut.
Today I was talking on the phone with Sarah when Maya decided to go out back and play. She opened the door, stepped outside and started screaming her brains out. I was afraid she had sliced her foot off (or at the very least her toe) so I ran over and started scanning the area for blood. I didn't find any blood, however I did find a rather large praying mantis standing near the doorway. My child who loves everything nature was pointing and crying hysterically. Being the mature adult that I am, I made fun of her and suggested we catch it so we could show Porter and Dad when they get home. Maya now loves her 'Pry Mantis' and after a short while came in saying "Mom guess what my 'Pry Mantis" did?" "What did he do Maya?" "He POOPED and it looks just like our poop." After that exciting event she decided her "Pry Mantis" was hungry so we got out the Bug library book she just checked out last week and did some research. It turns out Mantis are voracious eaters and will eat just about any bugs so we went bug hunting and watched that "Pry Mantis" devour a cricket. It was awesome!
I'm going absolutely nuts without my camera! My mom always told me "You should never love anything that can't love you back", and I usually try to heed that advice, but I'm dangerously close to loving that stupid camera. I hate not having it, especially now when my baby is starting to make his first big boy messes.
Due to the previously mentioned delima of having no camera you will have to dust off your imaginations and picture this... I was siting in the living room talking to my sister when Addie (my niece) came in saying 'Bennett eat food' I just assumed she meant he was playing in the pantry and continued my discussion. Well I know what happens when you assume but I don't let that keep me from proving it. A few seconds later I happen to see Bennett's little leg from around the corner and it's covered in a brown powder. And instantly it clicks "OH CRAP HIS GOTTEN INTO THE COCO POWDER." I had just bought a brand new container of coco and somehow he had gotten into it and spilled it all over himself and the pantry. It was a terrible mess to clean up but his little coco face was priceless and he smelled delicious all day.
At leas until the next big mess of the day. A little later I saw Bennett going into the bathroom while I was busy so mentally I say to myself "Oops he's not supposed to play in there I'll get him in just a sec." A second was just long enough for him to get into the toilet and not only grab the contents (he has a sister who is afraid of the sound a flushing toilet makes) but put them into his mouth (don't worry I wouldn't have photographed this mess). What has my baby turned into?
Last week the we finished reading Charlie and the Chocolate Factory by Roald Dahl to the kids. They both loved it! And in celebration of our accomplishment (reading our first big book) we bought a ton of Wonka brand candy and settled in for a movie night. We had prepared everything and had even borrowed the video from Sarah (way to save a buck). I had made these cute meatloaf and mashed potato cupcakes from family fun, and candied carrots (Willy Wonka wouldn't have it any other way). After dinner we started the video, broke into the candy, and the kids had eaten more than I care to admit before the opening credits even finished (we watched the old version). Well you would think with all the careful planning that went into this little shindig we would have been all set, but less than 10 minutes into the movie the disc started skipping infuriatingly (that's what I get for being a cheapskate). Casey then tried to improvise by renting the movie online, but it was going to take an hour to download so in a fit of desperation we let the kids watch an animated Star Wars movie and gorged ourselves on chocolate and 'fizzy lifting drink' to lessen the disappointment.
