Category Archive
The following is a list of all entries from the India category. Noteworthy entries are filed topmost.
Halloween: Take One
Every year it seems there are all sorts of Halloween festivities. I like to add an extra one for the kids. India invited kids from school and from the neighborhood. We wanted to keep it small. If anyone out there went to India’s 4th birthday, you will know why I wanted it small.
We had a blast. There was dry-ice making the witche’s brew even more witchy. We decorated the punch and snack bowels with glittered bugs. India and I put together a puppet show while Ezra napped. There was even trick-or-treating at the school afterwards.
I am sorry to not have photographed all the decorating we did. It is difficult to get a party together and photograph the details.
The cast of characters:
the pirate
The witch and Hannah Montana
The construction site, the Wookie
The uncostumed (she soon got dressed up)
and the undressed… Ez ran around the house yelling and laughing for at least 45 minutes.
The spin dizzying the kids for pin the face on the pumpkin. I kept hearing “this is too easy!”
But no one pinned a perfect jack-o-lantern!
The puppet show
On the way to trick-or-treat street
Pumpkin Patch
This year we didn’t make it to a quaint, picturesque pumpkin patch. We went to a patch beside a busy road in Denver. But it was for a good cause. The proceeds went to Habitat for Humanity. One of India’s school friends was heading to the patch so we followed. It was a lot of fun and we got a couple of cute pumpkins.
India didn’t get enough of her own popcorn since Ezra dumped it in the car. This is her buddy’s bag… she’s sneakn’ some
I feel like I’ve taken this back-lit shot before.
Not quite the same, but this is India at almost a year and a half. This was at a quaint apple orchard just outside of Boston. Oh the yummy apples!
Popcorn… we love it!
When we come inside, after school, it is often popcorn time. I have sworn off microwave popcorn in favor of the air-puffed variety. This change of thought happend a couple of weeks before the popcorn scare. I don’t know what is in microwave popcorn and wanted something a bit healthier. So I bought an air popper. But I never got around to buying the kernals. When the story broke about the man with the lung disease, Zach went out and bought a couple bags of kernals. When he made the trip he had to go to 2 stores, the shelves were bare after the story came out.
Sometimes we pop it on the floor, even.
Creating a Bird Stamp
India and I were watching the Martha Stewart Show together. Yes, we sometimes watch that show. I typically fast-forward past Martha’s sometimes awkward banter to get to the good stuff. I love Tivo. India saw them coloring in bird stamps with makeup. Coloring and makeup?? She had to do it. I told her we could make a stamp and create our own bird picture.
Later that night she kept telling me that she could cut four pieces of paper at the same time. I thought that was great, but had no idea what she was up to. The next day I came to our project room (yes, we now have a project room/office) and I saw this:
I asked her what it was. She promptly told me it was her bird stamp that she made. How great is that?
I let her know that I had just bought some blocks and ink so we could make our own stamp. Not from paper. Basically I purchased more block printing supplies.
Last year I had made a passport for a church activity. I carved my own ’stamp’, if you will, out of that very soft woodblock printing block that is available at any art supply store (even Michael’s has it, but that is all you’ll find). It was so easy to do that I wanted to give the harder, linoleum blocks a try. That way the block would last longer and I could make finer lines more easily. My desire to get back to woodblock printing began a couple weeks ago. I was inspired by a friend’s collection of greeting cards displayed in her home. I thought, I can do that.
Well, India beat me to it. We printed out a few images of birds for her to copy and this is what she came up with. I carved the block and she did the rest!
This is the block:
and this is a print:
At the Fair
You know how a church fair can be really lame? Well move over lame church fair and welcome in the Denver Stake Fair.
I cannot believe the amount of cool stuff there was at this fair. Free concessions… which is always very cool… cotton candy, snow cones, home-baked bread, chili and pie cook-offs (with plenty of tastes), corn on the cob (which India will actually eat), cupcake walk, cookie decorating, fishing game, ice cream sandwich eating contest, dunk your friend in a pool of water thing, plus two giant bounce houses.
I kept joking that I only saw people we knew every 20 minutes or so because there were so many people. Our ward (congregation) is pretty small and the stake (regional congregation) is pretty big and apparently has good ideas and money to make things happen. In any case, loads of fun and if the cotton candy line were smaller we would have had some pretty hopped up kids.
hula-hoop contest. Zach beat India and I, if you can believe it.
India in the bounce obstical course
India ready to dunk a kid
Our friend William gettin the job done!
India and her friend at the end of the night with their cotton candy
Exploring Colorado
“Are we there yet?”
“How much longer?”
Luckily Ezra was asleep most of the ride so we were only getting it from one kid. But as we entered the mountain pass we saw all the traffic heading back to the city. I knew it would be a long day.
We began with pizza. Thankfully in fru-fru Vail they have a family friendly, hip pizza joint with skeletons everywhere (which India loved) and ’80’s music piped through the speakers. We ate, then headed to the trail that would eventually take us to a waterfall. India and Ezra really enjoyed hiking up the trail… even with the chilly rainfall. Most days in Colorado have a rain in the afternoon. We are still getting used to that. We hiked as far as we dared (who wants to be stuck in a flash flood… or just in rain?) and I think that was key to having a good experience with the kids… no pressure (even without the waterfall). After the hike I suggested we head back to Vail and really take a look around the place. I also had my eye on some shoes for Ezra around the corner from the pizza joint. I’m glad we returned because I ended up getting a really cute pair for him and we saw what Vail is all about… it is basically an outdoor mall.
These were under $20… great sale.
Most the shops were closing so we headed for home. Being Labor Day weekend we figured we would have a very long drive ahead of us. Once we hit traffic we pulled off the highway and had some dinner. We found this really cute little diner with the best peach pie around. I was very happy to eat dessert. Too bad India would only eat the ice cream. Some day she’ll appreciate the finer things in life. Hopefully.
A few photos from the hike:
First day of school
India is officially in Elementary School. Can you believe it? She began on Monday. Other than the early mornings, she is loving it. Ezra doesn’t seem to notice the loss of his playmate. He gets to sleep when he wants and even some quality time with mommy… grocery shopping, poor boy.
As for me, I’m fine. I can’t wait to finally update my out-dated website. Although now is the time when I most miss my friends. We have yet to build a close relationship with anyone. Today we thought a family was moving into our ward right up the street from us. Too bad they got the street name wrong and their house is actually across town. We got so excited there for a minute. Oh well.
No, this isn’t her schooliform. Although she told daddy she wanted to wear it every day it was warm and get another outfit for the cooler days. That sounds all right. Hopefully she stays easily satisfied for a long, long time.
Clown Camp
India spent a week learning how to be a clown. She learned acts, how to paint her face, and even made balloon animals.
The other day she told Zach that she no longer wanted to be a scientist, she wants to be a clown. I told her that while being a clown she could be a mommie too. Great career choice.
Estes Park with some old friends
We haven’t seen Nancy and Jared since Thanksgiving 2002. India and Issac were just little babies cruisin’ NYC (where they lived while Jared was at Pratt) and braving the cold to see The Wiggles at the Macy’s Thanksgiving Parade. It was sooo cold and Zach yelled very obnoxiously at the Blues Clues guy (I think it was Joe) to get him to come over to our freezing babies who didn’t have a clue who Blue or Joe were. But that’s another story.
Anyway, Issac now has a yonger sister about the same age as Ezra. We seem to have kids at the same time. It’s quite uncanny. Too bad we live so far away from each other. But just before we moved to Colorado they moved from Ohio to Utah. Jared is now director at this cool little gallery in Heber, near Manti. In any case, they were at Estes Park in June for a family reunion so we made the trek up there to spend the day with them.
While there India had her first experience fishing! It was a blast. India was the only kid who tried to hold her own fish. Once she got it she kept picking it up when it would wrigle out of her hands. Fearless, with a good grip. She’ll make a fine fisherwoman. After catching the fish the kids got a kick out of watching them being gutted. This was a full service place. Nothing authentic about it; the bait was a little plastice-like flourescent orange ball, the pond stocked with trout, and we couldn’t even gut our own fish. It was actually perfect for a bunch of young kids egar to give fishing a try. We didn’t have to wake at the crack of dawn or even wait longer than a few minutes for a bite. I think we were in and out of the in an hour and caught at least 6 fish.
Once home, I cooked up the catch and India even took a baby bite to see how it tasted. She said it was pretty good but that bite was enough.
Ezra;s crazy laugh shocks adults and kids alike.
How cute is Isaac
The assisted hold. That’s Jared and Ez in the background.
Isaac caught an upside-down fish.
It may not seem like it but this is a laugh. Ezzie was really excited and pulling out all the stops with his crazy laughter.
Blood on the wrist.
Some of the gang.
The oh so popular gutting sink.
India’s Haircut
This was written in reply to the question: “When did India’s hair get cut, and how did that get decided? I’m very curious! She looks fabulous….”
So you want to know the story of India’s hair cut… Well, it all started when after her bath it took me 10 minutes to untangle her hair. This is while the conditioner was in her hair! After all of that we only had about 10 minutes to dress and get out the door for the bus to pick her up. I was so frustrated (since I didn’t even get all the tangles out) that I pulled out the scissors and chopped off about 5 or 6 inches then and there. So some of the earlier photos of her short hair she is sporting a 2 minute hair cut. Just before her dance recital I decided that the one long piece in back needed to be trimmed. So we sat on the deck and I did a more detailed cut. I don’t really know how to cut hair, I just did what was done to my hair the last time I got it cut… 6 months ago. HA!
Anyway, I told India that she can grow her hair out again once she learns to brush her own hair. I know it sounds terrible, but we would forget to brush her hair and that is when it would get really badly tangled. Now her hair is typically brushed, by her, and if we forget it doesn’t mean we have to struggle for 10 minutes or more to get it nice and smooth. What a relief. Thankfully she has a pretty tough head.