It's Spring!

In honor of the first day of spring, I made it a point to read It's Spring to Butterfly and Ladybug. It's written by Samantha Berger and illustrated by Melissa Sweet.

Although the first line is "In April, the robin began to sing.." I found it fitting for the vernal equinox and the beautiful weather we've been having. Several woodland and farm friends spread the word that spring is here - the leaves and flowers are back, the snow is gone and the sun and rains are here!

The illustrations are large and simple enough without omitting too much detail to engage the littlest of readers, and the rhythm and rhyme will make it a continual favorite for the older readers as well. There is plenty of opportunity to make animal sounds, which makes a good book so much better in this house. There are quacking ducks, singing birds, and crowing roosters. You can talk about animal motions - swimming ducks, trotting horses, running deer. It's also an opportunity to introduce the concept of hiberation as the story concludes with waking bears. Or you can just enjoy the rhythm of the sweet little poem.

Just look at that bunny. How can you not be happy it's spring?

Pink Butterfly's new identity

Purple Butterfly chose her own identity. She likes to pretend to be a purple butterfly and to flap her wings. She likes to pretend that we're a family of butterflies, so it followed that if I would refer to everyone as butterflies. But as Pink Butterfly gets older, she is becoming more and more her own person with her own very unique personality. She's still partial to pink, even more partial to hot pink, but she's also showing a penchant for ladybugs. So, for clarity and honesty and individualism, I will now call Pink Butterfly Pink Ladybug, possibly Ladybug, L, or PL for short. Yet I will stick with an insect theme. Apparently my children are more bookworms in the manner of being book larvae. I don't think that's a term that will catch on.

Owen

Our most recent trip to the library had us bringing Owen by Kevin Henkes home with us. Owen is a mouse who has a lovey, Fuzzy, a worn yellow blanket. Fuzzy does everything and goes everywhere with Owen and is not so fuzzy anymore. But Owen will be starting school soon, and won't be able to take Fuzzy with him. His parents, armed with some encouragement and advice born from a rather nosey next-door neighbor's disapproval, try to break Owen of his Fuzzy habit, but to no avail. Finally, Owen's mother devises a solution that works for everyone.

My own kids are a bit too young to have to worry about having the conversation of where the lovey can and cannot go, but this book made me think about it. And when that time comes, we will borrow this book from the library again. Henkes does great job of writing in a way that speaks to both the kids and their parents. The words are reassuring, the illustrations fun and engaging. His world of mice tackle a lot of the "issues" little kids have to deal with.

This book has inspired me to look at the relationships my own children have with their lovies. Of course, that will be an upcoming post or two.

So much for resolutions...

We're not even 3 weeks into the new year, and I've already broke my resolution in regards to this blog. I'm not going to try to defend myself by saying that I was sick, my kids were sick, and that by trying to keep my other resolutions I had much time for screen time. I am getting more sleep, though! :-D And I do feel more patient. Although, I think next year it will just be easiest for me to resolve to eat more Nutella.

A new development in the Butterfly househould is that we're reading more again. Well, more children's books, anyway. I'm still trying to fit in time to read more of what I want. But I'm excited about reading to my kids again. Purple Butterfly has always loved her books. She and I used to spend hours a day reading. Once Pink Butterfly was born, the reading time diminished significantly (although Purple Butterfly still got at least 10 books a day). Of course, a baby is more intersted in chewing the book than listening to the story or ripping the pages than looking at the pictures. But as she's getting older, she's coming around. She now brings me books to read to her. She has interest in books that have other illustrations that just pictures of babies. (See my Baby Giggles entry.) And she likes her stories before bed. Here is my newly hatched bookworm.

Purple Butterfly's current favorite is the All About Cordury story book that Santa brough her. Mr. Butterfly or I have read her that book at least twice a day for the past week. Pink Butterfly doesn't seem to have a favorite, but I did watch her spend about 15 minutes looking at Pat the Bunny tonight after dinner. As for me, I'm reading I Am the Chose King on my Kindle. I may finish it before springtime.

A trip to the library earlier this week will allow for some book highlights. I hope you enjoy them.

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year, indeed! 2012. If you believe the Mayans, the world either ends in less than 12 months, or we're headed for the age of Aquarius. Either way, we better make this year count! But that could really be said of any year, now couldn't it?

The new year always brings resolutions. Last year, I was 9 months pregnant so I didn't really make any, other than to have a baby. That one would have been difficult not to keep. This year I am game to try my hand at some, so I'll share them with you.

First, and most importantly, I am going to try to be a more patient person. This is especially true when it comes to my children. They deserve a more patient mama. My husband deserves a more patient wife. There are several steps that will go into this, probably each one could be considered a resolution of its own.
- I have to try to look at things through a child's eyes more often. It's too easy for me to be wrapped up in what I want and need and expect to my kids to conform to that 100% of the time. I need to be a bit more understanding that they don't understand, and step back to look at things from their perspective.
- I'm going to get more sleep. Sleep recharges my patience supply. With a 2 year old and a baby, I've been pretty sleep deprived for the last year. I need to make changes to my daily routine to accomplish this, as well help little Pink Butterfly learn to sleep better on her own.
- I'm going to take better care of myself. I'm purposely leaving this one vague. I'm not setting a weight loss or exercise goal, I'm just telling myself that I need to make opporunites to get more exercise, eat better, drink more water, etc.

-Organize and declutter my house. The disorder in this house despresses me and makes me anxious. It's not to the point where A&E is going to show up at my door with a camera crew, but it would be nice to have more usable counter space, room in closets, or play area for the kids.

My other resolutions pale in comparison of importance to that one, but I've made some just the same. They are more along the lines of personal development and growth. For the past two years, I've set an unoffcial goal to read a book a month, or 12 books total for the year. I've surpassed this both years, so this year I'm going to go ahead and set a goal of 25 books. I've also had a DSLR Nikon camera for two years now and 99.9% of the time, I have it on auto. I need to learn how to use my camera. Hopefully I'll be able to take some awesome pictures of the dawn of the new era, or next Christmas at the very least.

Lastly, I have goals for this blog, too. I want to improve it, make it more visually appealing, increase my readership, do more with it, post more. So I intend to post at least 3 new posts a week, 2 book posts and one general post. I hope to post more than that, but that is my starting point. Maybe I'll even work up the courage to do a give away or get this blog it's own Facebook page.

So now I have set my resolutions out for the world to see. Let's see if that improves my accountability.

The Animals' Christmas Eve

You can't go wrong with a classic Little Golden Book.

Purple Butterfly received this book as Christmas present from a friend her first Christmas, and I immediately fell in love with it. The Animals' Christmas Eve by Gale Wiersum and illustrated by Alexandra Steele-Morgan is a sweet retelling of the Nativity story told from the point of view of the animals in a barn on Christmas Eve. It's also a counting book from 1-12, which I just find clever. Each number represents an animal telling part of the Nativity story, with the number 12 being the bells of Christmas Day. The illustrations are darling with farm animals that are drawn to be warm and fuzzy looking, without being overly cute.

I do have a slight issue that number 3 mentions the Three Wise Men (obviously) before Mary, Joseph, or the Baby Jesus are mentioned, but it is a counting book, and where else would the Three Wise Men be? It can be easily overlooked by the rest of the sweetness contained in the telling.

It's Christmas Time

Not only is it after Thanksgiving, it's December 1st, which is sufficiently late enough to start thinking about Christmas, no matter who you are. If I had an Advent calendar for the girls, we'd be breaking it out. But I slipped up on that this year. Next year I will not be so forgetful.

I think about Christmas when I was a kid, and it really sparkled. It was magical. And it wasn't just the presents. It was time with family, baking, the decorations, the music, just everything about this time of year was magical. And my mom had lots to do with that. When my mom died, Christmas lost so much of that sparkle. It was still a special time of year, but I now realize how much of the magic was my mom's doing.

Now I'm a mom, and it's hitting me that making Christmas sparkle for my kids in now my job. Wow. That seems like such a tall order. I don't know why Christmas memories would take any more precidence than any other childhood memories, but there's a lot pressure to make sure that Christmas is special. How am I going to do that?

Honestly, I don't think my mom put a Herculean effort into Christmas. She did what she could, and everything else fell into place. There's enough environmental hoopla about Christmas that it probably won't take too much effort on my part, either, to make it sparkle. We need to establish a few traditions and just have fun.

It's the traditions that are tripping me up. The Christmas traditions I grew up with are still in place - Christmas Eve with my immediate and extended family, Christmas morning and day at my dad's house. That was Purple Butterfly's first Christmas. Being late in pregnancy last Christmas kept the Butterflies in their own house, and it was nice. I want my kids to wake up in their own house Christmas morning, just like I did for 33 years. But I also want them to spend Christmas Eve with their grandfather, aunts, uncles, and cousins. Not an easy task when the two are 2.5 hours away.

So we'll make our own Christmas Eve tradition and wake up in our own house with our own tree that we cut down and hung with our own ornaments. And then at some point we'll make the 2.5 hour trip to visit the extended family, and have Christmas there. Of course, when to make that trip is also a decision...

Regardless, as long as we're together as a family, I think there's enough magic in Christmas that there will be enough sparkle for my daughters.