Icebike

I come home from work and see my husband was looking at the Icebike home page. I know he is addicted to riding his bike and rides in the snow if the roads are dry, but I think he is starting to cross the threshold of delerium. You may think cycling to work saves money on fuel, but I assure you every dollar saved is spent on cycling gear so he can look and feel great. It's all about staying in shape and loving it. Please feel free to leave your comments.

Time to read!

I read Naomi two bedtime stories and she read the 3rd one to me with very little help. I am so proud of her. Ever since Naomi started kindergarten, I've realized what a difficult language English really is. Why do we even have the letter C when K or S would work just fine? Why do the letters bdpq all look the same only turned just right? Why do we have so many different ways to write the same letter or number? And why does giraffe start with the letter G instead of J? Despite all these crazy things we all have to learn, our children learn to read anyhow. First grade is very fast paced, but the rewards are worth it. Three cheers for Naomi! Hip! Hip! Hooray!

Yard Work

Today I pulled weeds from everywhere, gathered them up and stuffed them in garbage bags. I watered my plants. I picked up the yard. I pulled the nasty disintegrating carpet off our front stairs. I sweeped off the patio and sidewalks. We made a run to the dump to get rid of extra garbage. After spending all day working in the yard, I feel I have finally accomplished something outside. However, I still have inside the house to worry about too, and I didn't even get to play this weekend. I can now see the advantage of owning an apartment. Less work to do, more time to play. Until now, I had never thought of any positive aspects of apartment life, but it is suddenly appealing. I even thought of moving into the camping trailer and parking it at my parent's house or something. Has anyone else had similar thoughts?

Potty train in one day! Why is this new to me?

Check out http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22425001/vp/25057426#25057426 for a quick video of Booty Camp, one woman's idea following ideas from this book. This inspired me to try something similar, and it seems to work. I've read the book and believe this is the best method. Check out "Toilet Training in Less Than A Day" by Nathan H. Azrin, PH.D. and Richard M. Foxx, PH.D. Sabian goes potty by himself now, thanks to Grandma's help while we were on vacation. I plan to try out this "new" method with Adora in a few months, and am optimistic. Adora can already use the potty with assistance when prompted, but I would not consider her to be "trained" by any means. This book has been around since 1974, so why am I only hearing about it just now? I've heard some of the techniques discussed on Dr. Phil, but was never told about this book. The author's study involved a range of children from 20 months to 4 years old and all cases were successful, most in less than 5 hours. This book wasn't in my library, but I bought it off ebay for less than $7.

Naomi is a First Grader!

Naomi loves her new school and is very excited. Yes, she already started. School started August 14th, which may be early to some, but it is so worth it cause we get spud harvest off. That's right, 2 weeks at the end of September and first of October, a time when no one else gets a vacation. I went to Disneyland at the end of September once; there were no lines. Imagine a theme park vacation with school age children and not having to wait in lines for more than 5 minutes and not having to make up school work upon getting back home. I know you're all jealous. :) The house next door to me is for sale if anyone is interested. I like first grade because now she can ride the bus both ways to my grandparents house too. Going to school all day makes it easier to find babysitters. I used to think kids learned to read in 1st grade, but now they start in kindergarten and fine tune their skills in first grade. Naomi only wants to learn to read so she can understand and play more video games. Go figure.

Check this out! Pooh bear rap! (I had to give a link cause I can't see how to post from youtube anymore)

Euromotion - Get Serious

For some reason this just makes me laugh. I especially like the kid in the supermarket with a dumbfounded look on his face. Obviously it is his first time being confronted by strange people singing in his face at the supermarket.