two words!

baby jo! (yesterday)
mama boot! (today, after sledding)

and Jasper's got some new words to boot, including anything starting with 'f' (fruit, frog, ladybug(?!), plus a major monkey obsession centering around the movie Curious George and the movie soundtrack.

I also learned today that Josie doesn't remember going to the 'go dog go' play, and doesn't remember "do you like my hat? yes I DON'T!" how sad!

A Royal Occasion

This morning was the big party. Josie has been determined to have a princess birthday party, so 5 friends, 4 younger siblings, and 11 parents converged on the Chateau du Joe. It's hard having a princess party when most of your friends are boys. I tried to sell her on my idea for a service station attendant theme party, but Josie wouldn't hear of it. Maybe Jasper will redeem me. Amanda outdid herself I must say, with princess themed games, make your own crown crafts, gloves and tiaras for the (two) girls and homemade fur rimmed capes for the (four) boys (plus Jaspie), homemade wands and other favors, a giant cardboard castle with drawbridge, tower, windows, parapets, and a dungeon (OK, the engineer handled that) and although Josie wanted a princess cake like the store bought one with the Disney princesses printed on the top that she saw at the neighbor's kid's party, far be it from us to have a birthday without an over the top cake, so only a 3-D princess carrot cake with cream cheese dress and icing um, top half of dress, would do! Amanda's the one in the princess/bridesmaid's dress:

Jaspie want's to know who's in charge here, and where's his cake? Clockwise from Jasper we have Carter, Josie, Amelie, Sam's mom Celeste, Sam, and Wyatt. Don't know where Nico is:How do you put candles in a princess dress cake?

Later, Josie in the Tower:
Josie and Jasper at bedtime in the dungeon:

Everyone wanted to camp out in the dungeon, but no one would go to sleep!
Even Dada and Kippy got in on the action:

Ohio in the winter

There's Christmas pics to come, but those live in a different folder, so maybe tomorrow. With all of the cold at home, you would wonder why Ohio has been so unseasonably warm this winter. Mom wrote last week that it was "dark at 8 in the morning, and 53 degrees in January". Jasper prefers to take the long view, as the following slightly fuzzy triptych attests:


Meanwhile, Josie just snuggles up anyway:
But Jaspie isn't scared of the weather, he's setting out:
Here, Josie and Skye have a secret conference on the back patio to plot:
Apparently, they're all looking for something. Jasper thinks its in his pock:
Pretty darn cute, whether posed or not:

Blizzard of 06 part 1

I personally don't think it counts as a real blizzard, but they keep calling it that. Tuesday the 21st of December it started snowing pretty early. By noon, the old workplace had shut down and everyone was headed home. Driving home was slow but OK (I snuck in on side side streets) but my attempt to get up the driveway faltered and I slid off into the neighbor's yard downhill. I got in the house to find the kids both had developed ear infections, and while I went out to shovel, Amanda called the doctor. By the time I got to the end of the driveway, 12 inches had fallen, 2 of which were already covering the top of the driveway where I had started. I started over. Amanda came out and said that we had half an hour to get to the doctors, they were shutting down and wouldn't be in tomorrow either. Of course my car was stuck half in the neighbor's yard, and there was no backing up to clear the driveway, so I had to drive it down into their yard to get the other car out to run to the doctor. Although slow and treacherous, we made it there and back and they locked up behind us when we left (about 3). This time pulling in the drive, we got a running start and ... slid off into the neighbor's yard faster. This time I was lucky to get it off of the street! I shoveled the rest of the afternoon just trying to keep up with it. A friend with a truck helped me pull the cars out later, and get them buried in the garage.

The next day the snow stopped falling precisely at noon. We were up to 26 inches, leaving me only about 12 more inches to shovel: I can't seem to get blogger to accept the rotated version of the photo below, but note the snow on our four foot fence:
Josie and I belly flopped off of the front porch right into the powder; normally we've got 3 steps:
Here's Jasper showing us the way back up the path. Check out the snow overhang over the kitchen window shaped by the wind:
By whatever miracle (OK, route to the Hospital) our street was one of the first to get plowed. 3 weeks later, I still have this wall of ice out front:
After shoveling out, Josie and I had a big enough pile for a 12 foot long snow tunnel!What to do on a snow day morning? Bake hoska bread and serve it in bed while watching the weather channel!

West Coast Turkey

I think the best way to do this is chronologically. Since my last post will be first, I guess I should start the other way around, but I'll start at November so everyone can look at photos of Josie at the top of the page!

We had a really wonderful time in SF at Thanksgiving, although as usual, the stomach flu hit. No photos of that. I think I have three more digital rolls of photos on my computer at work, so I'll start with the ones here at home and fill in the rest later. Turns out, none involve Thanksgiving! Here's a smattering of photos from a trip to the park late in our trip:

Cousins visit down at the old boneless chicken farm:
Deep philosophies are discussed at the old watering hole:
Life's complex issues solved by a crispy creme donut:

Sisi and Uncle Brian celebrate birthdays, courtesy of another one of our extravagant and odd birthday cakes (see post from last June, Amanda's birthday, and post about Josie's birthday at the top) In this case, it took the form of a jelly-roll type yule log with almond bark icing and twig-like branches fashioned from cinnamon bark:
And Amanda and I got some time to go down into the city for a little while. Of course the one I used a flash fill to take had our eyes closed:

First of Many

OK, I'm not scared to post some photos. I'm taking advantage of my great new MacBook Pro to process and post photos that have been stacking up on my old computer for years now. (Thanks mom, dad, and of course Josie's mama!) Finally, enough horsepower to load web pages! Plus, although its Saturday night and very much 3 degrees F outside, I'm sitting in front of the fire with my feet up as I write this.

So I've got lots to cover. Thanksgiving in California, the first blizzard wave, Christmas in Ohio, more snow here, and of course, Josie-o's big birthday bash this morning. Looks like I'll be busy!

uncle brian

Uncle Brian sent a card for Christmas that plays music (Mel Torme singing White Christmas). Josie's been carrying it around all afternoon, opening it, letting it play its 60 seconds of music, then starting it over. I just asked her what she thought of it and she looked off sideways and said dreamily "it makes me think of Uncle Brian"

Uno & Dos

Josie loves to play games. Josh and Josie play games nearly every night while I'm putting Jasper to bed. We started with Cootie, which quickly grew old for Daddio, then moved on to the snail game, Monopoly Junior (a little too long and tedious, just like Monopoly Senior), Chutes and Ladders, then Beans (a card game with kidney-bean-counters), plus occasional games of go fish and war. On Friday Josie found Uno in the cabinet. We tried to explain that it's for seven year olds, and that she could play it when she's older. Well, we usually don't give in to tears, but this time we thought that we could simplify the rules a bit for her. I figured that with the direction of play reversing, the skips, having to match by color or number, saying Uno, etc, it would just be too complicated. By Sunday night Josie had beaten us fairly...twice.
As for Jasper, he's really into pretend. He loves the little animal figures that Josie got him for Christmas, and we all have fun setting them up and having them interact. He also whips things up in the play kitchen, making pouring noises, stirring, and microwaving things to eat at the little table. I've been surprised by this, but attributed it to the fact that that is what he sees going on with the Senior Chef in the little kitchen. This morning, though, I was amazed to see him giving Josie's doll Annie a drink of water after he had one himself. Then he kissed and hugged her. I know he didn't pick this one up from his sister :)
...oh, and I forgot one more sign: penguin

ice skating pictures to come....

more words

We went to the butterfly pavilion with Josie's little friend Amelie this morning and had a great time. Okay, so Josie was a little concerned about being eaten by the butterflies, but they all had fun running around in the giant greenhouse and watching the butterflies emerging from their cocoons. They also had an unnatural interest in the cockroach display, but I'm sure they'll grow out of it :) Jasper's favorite part was running around flapping his arms like butterfly wings. It was great.
In the meanwhile, I remembered a few more signs that I forgot. I'm sure that there are more, but:
turtle
no biting!
snake
banana
share (new yesterday!)
spider (new today!)
and the word balloon
were all left off the list

words and signs

Talking with my mom this morning, I realized that Jasper's been signing up a storm. This is thanks, in part at least, to Josie. She learns a sign, then drills him on it until he adds it to his repertoire...which he usually picks up after seeing it just once or twice. Thus far, he's got far more signs than words, but with the recent addition of "mine!" (something Josie didn't learn until at least 2) the words are catching up!

Words:
mama
dada
Jo!
dog
cat (also meows)
mooooo
boo (as in peek-a-)
choo-choo
roars like a lion (very deep and rumbly)
bye-bye
mi(ne)!
vroom (car)
boot
book
hat

Signs:
shakes head no/nods yes
waves, blows kisses goodbye
points
thank you
love
night-night/sleep
diaper
hat
dog
squirrel
duck/bird
horse
mouse
lion
bear
tiger
giraffe
elephant
rhino
monkey
fish
flower
hot
cold
ball
snowman
ornament
Santa
snow/rain
up
star
moon
light
airplane
egg
milk
more

Okay, I'm sure that there are more, and I'll add them once I think of them. At this point, I'm fairly certain that he already knows more signs that Josie did, and he's acquiring words at about the same pace as she did. I'm also surprised that he actually distinguishes between rhinocerouses and elephants, bears and dogs, etc. Like I said before, though, I think Josie's been a real help. Once he learns the 'shower' sign I think we're really done for. We'll all be prunes, since he could spend all day in there :)

We all enjoyed Christmas, snowstorms, travel, Santa, Christmas cookies (by the dozen), homemade ice cream, ornament making, present opening, family, and Charlie Brown. Yes, Charlie Brown. He may be fictional, he may be overwrought with the commercial nature of the holiday, but starting before Thanksgiving, and even in the new year we've been watching and grooving along with the Charlie Brown Christmas movie. We even went out in the blizzard to buy the last copy. Our first kid-movie purchase (followed closely by Curious George, which has Jasper doing the monkey sign nonstop, and dancing to the soundtrack in the kitchen).

More later, once we have pictures!

favorite books: Beatrix Potter, and Richard Scarry's "What Do People Do All Day?" for Josie; any book with animals that he can do the signs for would be Jasper's pick.
favorite music: Jingle Bells!
etc: dutch pancakes with lemon, oatmeal with blueberries (a perennial favorite!), and frozen fruit obtained surreptitiously from the bag in the freezer. Preferably one strawberry would be left on the floor to melt--and perhaps revisit later.

It came upon a midnight clear

Josie: "Come on, Baby Jesus, let's go in the kitchen!"
Mommy: "Josie-o, why do you keep calling Jasper 'Baby Jesus'?"
J: Because we're playing Baby Jesus. You guys are Mary and Joseph.
M: I see. That's cool.
J: But Joseph went to work, so it's just Mary here with Baby Jesus, and I'm the donkey.
M: The donkey, huh? That's interesting.
J: No...actually I'm the angel. (J exits stage right, singing "polly wolly doodle" at top volume)