Speaking in Sentences??

Well, Lillie is really getting going with her sentences lately. She is trying so hard to just talk like everyone else. She practices her words over and over. She loves putting words together, but has a limited vocabulary. It is so funny to listen to her, because she will be practicing in her bedroom and having little conversations with herself. It sounds like this:

Mom Dad Nanny Papa juice potty. Baby eyes nose teeth? (laughs)
Nanny papa pepperboy. Lips lips lips. Baby Juice? Milk? Poop?

Then she will run in to Miner's office and tell him:

Dad. Boy. Down. Treat!! (Translation: Dad, Pepper needs to go downstairs to be let outside. Then you need to give him a treat.)

She is very interested in what Pepper is doing all the time. She walks around the house saying, "Boy, Are you?" Then when she finds him she gives him a hug and laughs and goes about her day.

She is so cute and just loves to have me read her books in the rocking chair. She askes me, "Mom, rock?" It is so cute because she rocks back and forth when she says it.

She is my little sweetie and I just love hearing her giggling all the time and talking to herself. She just thinks she is so big.

Good-bye Christmas Beard...

Miner decided it was time to shave the Christmas beard. The first thing Sierra said was, "OH DAD!!! Now you look just like a girl!!" That about says it all I think!

Yet another Sierra Story...

Last night Sierra was sitting on my lap and I was reading a book. She told me she wanted to stay awake late, but I knew she was really tired, so I told her that she could snuggle on my lap until she fell asleep. She was so cute and she just snuggled in and then she looked up at me and said in a really sleepy voice, " Mom, when my eyes close, that means I love you." And then she closed her eyes and fell asleep. How can you not just eat that up?

Cinderelly, Cinderelly...

I just had to post one more thing. Sierra watched Cinderella the other day and she has been singing the follows:

Cinderelly, cinderelly, we can help our Cinderelly...
Tie a bow around it. Put a ribon though it.

Then dancing at the MALL
She'll be more bee-utiful than all..

In the lovely dress we'll make for Cinderelly.

Then just the other day she came to me and said, all dreamily, "I can't wait until someday I can go to the MALL, and dance and sing..."

I'm Back!

Just a couple of pictures from Sierra's first dance recital. She is the cutest kid ever! I just can't get enough of her. I just love Christmas time. I don't know how you can't just love it. Especially, when you get to share it with your kids. It is so exciting and new again. Everything is such a surprise. I love reading Sierra all my favorite Christmas stories. We have been reading the Grinch Who Stole Christmas. We have read it about a thousand times, but I think it just gets better every time I read it. Sierra is starting to get some of the lines memorized, and so when it gets to a part that she knows she "reads" that part. It is so cute! She watched the movie the other day and she has been going around singing, "Your a mean one...your a nasty wasty skunk!" Over and over. She thinks that is so funny.

I have been getting all my Christmas cards finished up and mailed. I love writing Christmas cards. It is one of my favorite things. It reminds me how many people I love in the world, and how many people love me back. I get to think about each person and family. It just brings back such good memories. I usually get all misty eyed when I write my Christmas cards. That is probably why it always takes me so long to get them done...

I don't know what it is, but for some reason I just feel so grateful this year. I just feel like my family has been blessed. I think there are so many families that are struggling this year, some I know personally, and I just think how grateful I am that my family is together and happy.

I know it has been a while since I have blogged. Most of you know that I have been really busy taking some classes. I ended up with the highest score in my Nutrition Class, and the second highest score in my Chemistry class...can I just say I am awesome. Truly, I worked hard for it though. I am pretty proud of myself, since I wasn't feeling all that smart before I went back to school. I was having a conversation with my sister Erica and she was telling me about how she was afraid her kids were going to die of Carbon Monoxide poisoning from this space heater at my Mom's house...and I told her, "Well, actually you shouldn't have to worry about that, because it is an electric heater and Carbon Monoxide is a byproduct of the combustion of carbon based fuels." (yes, I actually said that!) And she said, "That's exactly what Landon said! You guys are nerds." And then I said, "SECOND HIGHEST SCORE IN MY CLASS, SUCKAS!!!"

So just don't have any conversations with me until I can work this out of my system, ok...

Peace.

A little ranting...

For those of you who don't follow my cousin Becca's blog, I just thought I would re-post a portion of her post....

The one that has been getting my goat lately has been SOCIALISM. Let me help sort this out for us. First: Socialism is an economic system, not a political system. Therefore, our country would not be transitioning from a democracy to socialism. If such a transition to socialism was occurring, we would be transitioning from capitalism to socialism. Second, Marxist theory classifies socialism as characterized by unequal distribution of goods and compensation according to work done. Let's take health care reform, then, as an example. A chief complaint about this reform is that people who do nothing get something, but socialist theory clearly states that people who do stuff get stuff, and people who do nothing get nothing. So while health care reform might be a big steaming pile of you-know-what, it just isn't socialist.Count Henri de Saint-Simon is regarded as the first individual to coin the term socialism. He advocated the creation of a society in which each person was ranked according to his or her capacities and rewarded according to his or her work. Economically, socialism denotes an economic system of state ownership and/or worker ownership of the means of production and distribution. There are elements of both of these principles in our society now, and they were in place long before our current president. Think about Medicare, Medicaid, our PUBLIC lands system, and our system of PUBLIC education, just to name a few. I don't necessarily think that all of these programs are run well, but they have been around for decades, yet it is only recently that talking heads have started screaming "SOCIALISM!"My final note comes from Che Guevara, and I'll quote:
"Socialism cannot exist without a change in consciousness resulting in a new fraternal attitude toward humanity, both at an individual level, within the societies where socialism is being built or has been built, and on a world scale, with regard to all peoples suffering..."See? We Americans could never be socialist because we don't give a **** about anybody else.The moral of the story: Go ahead, call the state of affairs in this nation a joke, call our President delusional, say that Congress has their heads in dark places, and say that the proposed health care plan will never work. Just don't call it Socialism. It isn't.

Thanks Becca...I totally get it, you rule.

I just want to say, that maybe some of you are sitting out there and thinking, "Boy, I sure wish I had healthcare, that would sure be nice..." or maybe you are thinking, "Boy, that grand I've been dropping every month on my health insurance would sure go a long way in the grocery store/towards my kid's dance lessons/get some new shoes/car or mortgage payment..." Or maybe you (like my friend Annie) have great health insurance until you get real sick and have to have surgery...and your health insurance won't cover you anymore...

Whether you are republican, or democrat you can agree that health insurance reform is needed. Every other well developed nation has better health care than we do, and it costs less...that alone should tell you there is a better way to do this. And maybe Obama's plan isn't perfect, but what plan ever proposed by the government for any reason is ever perfect? I can't understand all this fear mongering about socialism and our country going down the toilet, and all our children are going to have to pay for it for thousands of years....because who wouldn't pay for it? You already pay for it! If you knew your child or even somebody else's child or your sister or cousin or grandparent or even your next door neighbor was going to have health insurance, was not going to be denied coverage, was going to be able to afford life saving surgery/chemo/prescription drugs and not go bankrupt and lose their house...who wouldn't pitch in? Who wouldn't try to pull together to help them? This is healthcare, not gun law, not abortion rights... This shouldn't be a grand debate, for me this one is easy.

The Miner Family Comedy Tour...

I just had to post this quickly. I am supposed to be doing homework for my class, but this was just too much fun.

Two nights ago, I am putting Lillie to bed and, normally, I give her a bottle of milk and she drinks it and she has her snuggy and she just snuggles in and goes right to sleep. Well, I am rocking her in the chair and she drinks her milk and closes her eyes. I am rocking and it is quiet and dark in her room, and I think she has just fallen asleep...and she starts fake snoring!!! I am not even kidding, and she opens her eyes and looks right at me and just smiles the biggest smile! I know she was just thinking that she really got me, and she totally did!!! I couldn't even help it, I got the giggles, I mean, how does a baby know how to tease like that? How does a one-year-old understand that concept? But she totally caught me off guard, it was completely well played! I got the giggles, and then it was on...she was just giggling and laughing. It was so funny! I knew it was going to take another half hour just to get her calmed down enough to go to sleep, but it was totally worth it! I got faked out by a one-year-old...

Then, this happened this morning at breakfast...I am trying to teach Lillie that we don't throw food on the floor, or feed the dog while we are eating. I have been very firm with her, but this morning she threw all her pancake on the floor for the dog. Well, I was so mad and I yelled at her...LOUD!! Sierra looked right at me and said, "Mom, you don't need to yell at Lillie like that! You need to use your quiet inside yelling voice." Well, what do you say to that? I totally got the giggles...I couldn't help myself.

Have I ever mentioned how much I love my kids??? They are the most awesome little people ever!!