Today we spent some more time across the street.

We have been so "lucky" to have a lot of construction across the street for what feels like years now. The friends all think it is the greatest thing ever as we spend time either on the front porch watching the progress or packing up in the stroller and getting a closer look. Yesterday it was the big crane, today the HUGE dump truck, and everyday there is some sort of digger, mini loader, or bulldozer. The friends have adopted quite the vocabulary for all these contraptions...the boom, tracks (no wheels), stick, front loader, excavator, and more. I never knew that I would know so much about all these machines. I think that I may actually be sad when they are all done.

However, we do have a lot of kids sized moving machines in the backyard that we get to use...

Speaking of the backyard, we have been continuing to work on our fairy houses. We helped feed the birds, and will be watching our first plantings of cilantro, nasturtiums, and sweet peas as they grow.

Out for lunch.

Leave it to the crazy Oregonians to be ecstatic about the sunshine and picnic in the park. That's what we did today. It is so beautiful outside! Still a little bit chilly, but ah as the sun hits your face you can't help but smile. We went to a little bitty park down the street from us and enjoyed visiting with the neighbor cat, Bernie. We also met some friends from another program Head Start and some pre-k kids from a Waldorf program, Wishing Star. Everybody was making friends and gathering sticks and pine cones and dandelions for a huge tree fortress.

Yesterday we turned the whole downstairs pink and red in preparation for Valentines Day. One of the moms came by to pick up a friend in the midst of the chaos and helped out, thank you! Always fun to create a project and a mess.

I have included some pictures from the photo booth option of the computer that Carman has discovered. It's pretty hilarious to see all the pictures that Carman has taken, mostly of herself making all sorts of funny faces...

first lesson in shaving.......

Well not really.....but shaving cream is so fun! Searching for hidden toys and creating a mess. It doesn't get much better than that.

Conversations between friends

MINE...... "friend, is there another vacuum cleaner (push toy, popper, etc) that you could use? ummm, yeah. do you want to go find one? do you want me to help you find one? yes, please. "where is it?" oh vacuum, where are you?" there it is! The other friend now wants the one that the new friend has picked out. "MINE" says the other friend and we begin again the ritual of what is more exciting. friend, I say, "you were playing with the vacuum cleaner that you just left in the other room." "Maybe you could trade with your friend." The friend retrieves the vacuum cleaner and gives it to the friend who is more than happy to trade and they are both happy. Until..... friend number 3 wants to vacuum too. Alas, there is a third vacuum and friend number 3 is also Happy!

Of course, there aren't 3 of everything and sometimes we have to compromise and sometimes we have to work with our frustration. I like to take deep breaths when I'm frustrated. What about you? Sometimes it's hard to channel our energy when we get excited about something.... we are trying to talk about reacting to this and expressing when we are "all done" with wrestling or to stop and say ouch that hurts when someone is using there aggressive body with our body. If we do hurt our friends we ask if they are OK. We give gentle nice touches.

It is unbelievable how much there is to learn for these friends and even my five year old, and by golly, even me. This is the coolest job ever!

Painting and playing in the new year...

Hi everyone!

Look at what we can do. We have been making art and playing outside.

so much to do and so little time....

Time to blog that is. Sometimes, it's hard to get the time to write about my favorite people.

We played in some more water. We gathered pinecones and distributed them with our dump trucks. Carman got some new earphones that she shared with the friends while listening to some Michael Jackson. We were about to get ready to paint and the friends decided it would be more fun to create snow with the paper torn up. We went to the playground and played on the swings and took a ball in the tennis courts and jumped through puddles.

Oh and the toilet. So much interest in the toilet. We spend a lot of time going in the bathroom and choosing a toilet and sitting on the toilet and being "all done" and then wanting to sit on the toilet again and then wanting to streak down the hallway without a diaper (a favorite of some, but not all, some friends are actually modest:)

It's a good sign that they are interested.

Happy New Year!

It's 2010 and we are back at it. The friends were so excited to see each other today and play and play and play! We went outside and splashed in the rain (which is our focus this week) and we made mud pie soup.

We had a delicious soup that one of the moms gave us a recipe for (Jefna soup) that was so delectable and so messy.

After nap all the friends proceeded to get down to their diapers and we played in a big tub of water. Exploring the colanders, measuring cups, seive, funnels and plenty of water was a blast.