Stories from September 13, 2016
Gretchen's Story:
It's the one with when we get back I'm going to pretend that we buyed ice cream and we go outside and it's melting. And I get all sticky and I go in the bathtub and wash it all off.
Olivia's Story: {sung}
Once there was the sun shining everybody. This is a singing story. This is the singing story. There is trees growing outside. And there is a car. And driving, driving today. There is all kinds of cars driving away. And there is a house with four peoples in it. Gretchen and Mommy and Kaitlyn, Gretchen and Mommy and Kaitlyn and Olivia. Those are the people. First there was the bink.* There came the moon then they went to sleep and then they woke up and there was snow outside. And then they ate their breakfast and then their lunch and then -- !** ...That's the end.
*Me: The what?
Olivia: The bink!
Me: The bink?
Olivia: Yes.
**I read the story back to her and she said, "What about dinner?" "You didn't say dinner," I replied. "Oh. And the dinner."
Gretchen's Second Story: {sung}
Once. Once there was. A. Car with peoples in it. They were driving at church. And then! Jesus came and said, "I'll make sure the monsters don't come. But if they do come, I'll stay here and be with you. If the monsters came then you would be with Me. Everybody is so perfect." Once there was a green car. Somebody broke* into it with us in it. Then it was green and yellow. And old. It was our old car. And then there was Olivia and Gretchen and Mommy and Daddy and Kaitlyn. And then they got a new car. They got in it. And then somebody thought the old car was theirs. They got in it and drived away.** And then there was the wind. It was blowing my coloring paper. I catched it. I drived away. My mother drived away. Everybody was so happy la la la la la la la. They went to sleep. And then a bracelet was glowing. And then the strong wind blowed it. I catched it and put it on me. I watched my mother drive away. We went to sleep. We waked up. There was snow outside. We runned back inside and got our things. And then! Everybody was happy!
*Olivia said this word was "bumped," and Gretchen agreed after the fact, but I heard "broke."
**Olivia: The end!
Me: Yes, the end!
Gretchen: No, not the end!
28 September 2016
18 September 2016
September 11-18
A bonus post happened this past week, so hop on over and look at that if you haven't seen it already.
Keshia and Rudy came to visit one afternoon, so we made sure we got a cousins picture. Other than that it was same old same old at the Barhorst house this week. Olivia (and Gretchen) are enjoying school so far. Kaitlyn is enjoying getting into things while the older girls are working on them. Really, there's not much to report. Maybe this next week will be more interesting. :)
I do have videos, though!
Pictures and Videos:
Keshia and Rudy came to visit one afternoon, so we made sure we got a cousins picture. Other than that it was same old same old at the Barhorst house this week. Olivia (and Gretchen) are enjoying school so far. Kaitlyn is enjoying getting into things while the older girls are working on them. Really, there's not much to report. Maybe this next week will be more interesting. :)
I do have videos, though!
Pictures and Videos:
14 September 2016
Bonus Post: Sound Bites 13
Bryan: Will you always be my little Gretchen?
Gretchen: Yeah. When I say I'm not your little Gretchen then I'm silly.
Olivia: Three and three spells six.
Gretchen: Daddy, I thought you were a monster because I saw a big head.
*After a trip to the grocery store*
Olivia: Why did we not get any food from those people?
Me: We did get food.
Olivia: No, why did we not ask for food that we could eat?
Me: Oh, a sample?
Olivia: A human.
(She did want a sample, she just didn't realize that's what it was called.)
Gretchen: Daddy, if you were my daddy I would take you a bath. And I would let you watch a lot of movies if you were my daughter.
Olivia: Last night when we waked up on the next day.
(I'm not really bringing points back, but sometimes a reward is necessary... 15 points to the first person who can tell me what time Olivia was referencing in this comment.)
Olivia: I could not remember what you telled me to say to grandma, so I telled her something else.
Gretchen: Let's play with the meerkats!
Me: Meerkats? Can you show me the meerkats?
Gretchen: The meerkats are in your room!
Gretchen goes into my bedroom and comes back with the board game Blokus.
Me: There's New Hampshire and New Jersey and way down New Mexico, then New York, North Carolina, North Dakota, OHIO! Can you sing Ohio with me?
Gretchen: Yeah.
Me: There's New Hampshire and New Jersey and way down New Mexico, then New York, North Carolina, North Dakota... *points at Gretchen*
Gretchen: I-HO-OH!
Gretchen: Yeah. When I say I'm not your little Gretchen then I'm silly.
Olivia: Three and three spells six.
Gretchen: Daddy, I thought you were a monster because I saw a big head.
*After a trip to the grocery store*
Olivia: Why did we not get any food from those people?
Me: We did get food.
Olivia: No, why did we not ask for food that we could eat?
Me: Oh, a sample?
Olivia: A human.
(She did want a sample, she just didn't realize that's what it was called.)
Gretchen: Daddy, if you were my daddy I would take you a bath. And I would let you watch a lot of movies if you were my daughter.
Olivia: Last night when we waked up on the next day.
(I'm not really bringing points back, but sometimes a reward is necessary... 15 points to the first person who can tell me what time Olivia was referencing in this comment.)
Olivia: I could not remember what you telled me to say to grandma, so I telled her something else.
Gretchen: Let's play with the meerkats!
Me: Meerkats? Can you show me the meerkats?
Gretchen: The meerkats are in your room!
Gretchen goes into my bedroom and comes back with the board game Blokus.
Me: There's New Hampshire and New Jersey and way down New Mexico, then New York, North Carolina, North Dakota, OHIO! Can you sing Ohio with me?
Gretchen: Yeah.
Me: There's New Hampshire and New Jersey and way down New Mexico, then New York, North Carolina, North Dakota... *points at Gretchen*
Gretchen: I-HO-OH!
11 September 2016
August 28-September 11
A few posts ago I wrote about the Indianapolis Symphony and their viola openings. Since then I've found their repertoire list and discovered that I don't know about a third of it, including the concerto. So I shall not be auditioning for Indianapolis this time around. :-P Around the same time, I decided not to audition for Springfield either. One of my 30 Before 30 goals was to play with two professional symphonies, but at this point playing with Springfield would be more trouble than it's worth. I play with Lima, and I get paid to supplement college groups, and that's good enough for me. Auditioning for a very similar symphony an hour and a half away is not a priority right now. I have started investigating the possibility of taking the occasional lesson, though, in an effort to learn more repertoire (including that concerto). We'll see if that goes anywhere.
Olivia doesn't use the words "people" or "person." Instead, she uses "humans." It's a weird quirk that makes her sound like she's constantly on the lookout for aliens. In actuality, we think she uses humans because all the movies and books she likes have to differentiate between monsters and humans or mermaids and fairies and humans. They don't use the word "people," so neither does Olivia.
Gretchen is going to be a better mother than I can ever hope to be. Her nurturing instincts are strong, a fact I've noticed even more now that we have an extra one-year-old running around the house several days a week.
Kaitlyn can carry a tune pretty well. One day she sang a perfect arpeggio in the car ("I don't care" from "Let it Go"). Her words for that part are pretty clear, too. Other words she's learned: outside, dessert, brrm, chugga, honk (these last three from her favorite car book).
Kaitlyn loves to go! She'll stand on one side of the room, yell "go!" and run as fast as she can to the other side of the room. She also does this on the enclosed trampoline, which is hilarious to watch because the unsteady surface makes her rather ungainly. She is easily persuaded to do things if enough excitement is added to a "ready, set, go!" command. By far the best incarnation of this delight, however, is found in the car, where she yells "go!" and then kicks her feet as fast as she can while breathing heavily. I'd take a video, but it always happens when I'm driving.
Olivia started dance class this week. It's a ballet/tap combo class and I wasn't sure how she would do with being dropped off. We've been talking it up for a few weeks now and last week she and I went shopping for her shoes and leotard, which I think helped a lot. I introduced her to her dance teacher, pushed her into the room, and left. She seems to have done fine and Gretchen, Kaitlyn, and I got to see her dance a little at the end when we picked her up. Gretchen was very excited and stood in front of Olivia mimicking her moves as she danced.
We started school on September 1. I'm doing preschool at home with the girls and it's going well so far. Gretchen is participating more than I'd planned because the older of the two little girls I babysit is participating at the request of her parents and Gretchen is the same age. All three of the schoolers seem to be enjoying the activities.
The electrician finally came. We now have baseboard heat and independent lights in the two rooms Bryan built in the basement. There are a few ceiling tiles to put in yet, and then trim, carpeting, and furnishings. Bryan is excited to have an office (with heat!) for this winter.
Because of Olivia's dance class, we knew we would probably need a second vehicle soon. It seems ridiculous since Bryan works from home and I stay at home, but if he ever needs to be in the office on a day when Olivia has class then we're in trouble. Bryan's been wanting a truck for a while now anyway, so he took his opportunity and ran with it. He is now the proud owner of a Dodge pickup truck that is approximately twice as big as the one he set out to buy.
We went to the zoo at the end of last month, meeting Kara there on one of her days off. Let me tell you what, August 31st is the day to go to the zoo. School has started so the zoo is wonderfully empty. We wandered around at our own pace and stayed at each exhibit as long as we wanted to. We even got to go on the giraffe observation deck to see the giraffes up close and personal -- and one was very close, pushing his 250 lb head right through the opening to see if any of us had lettuce leaves for him. We also compared tongues, and Olivia and Gretchen decided that the giraffe's tongue was the longest of anyone's. We're headed back to the zoo at the end of this month to visit one more time before they close for the season. :)
The Fourth Annual Barhorst Fun Run happened on Labor Day. People came and had a good time. Only one of our 5k runners ran an actual 5k, despite vastly superior signage compared to last year's sticks with yarn on them. Everyone else missed a loop and only ran 2.5 miles. To be fair, Alison and Hector went out after finishing and ran an extra 0.6 miles. Bryan ran his annual mile, running the whole thing this year and finishing in a respectable 8:34. I was not able to run since someone had to do times and watch kids (we missed you, mom and dad!), but after a couple of the milers finished I relinquished my clipboard in order to prove to Bryan that I could run a mile faster than he could. He claims that had we been running together he could have beaten my 8:07. I guess we'll have to find out next year.
Pictures:
Olivia doesn't use the words "people" or "person." Instead, she uses "humans." It's a weird quirk that makes her sound like she's constantly on the lookout for aliens. In actuality, we think she uses humans because all the movies and books she likes have to differentiate between monsters and humans or mermaids and fairies and humans. They don't use the word "people," so neither does Olivia.
Gretchen is going to be a better mother than I can ever hope to be. Her nurturing instincts are strong, a fact I've noticed even more now that we have an extra one-year-old running around the house several days a week.
Kaitlyn can carry a tune pretty well. One day she sang a perfect arpeggio in the car ("I don't care" from "Let it Go"). Her words for that part are pretty clear, too. Other words she's learned: outside, dessert, brrm, chugga, honk (these last three from her favorite car book).
Kaitlyn loves to go! She'll stand on one side of the room, yell "go!" and run as fast as she can to the other side of the room. She also does this on the enclosed trampoline, which is hilarious to watch because the unsteady surface makes her rather ungainly. She is easily persuaded to do things if enough excitement is added to a "ready, set, go!" command. By far the best incarnation of this delight, however, is found in the car, where she yells "go!" and then kicks her feet as fast as she can while breathing heavily. I'd take a video, but it always happens when I'm driving.
Olivia started dance class this week. It's a ballet/tap combo class and I wasn't sure how she would do with being dropped off. We've been talking it up for a few weeks now and last week she and I went shopping for her shoes and leotard, which I think helped a lot. I introduced her to her dance teacher, pushed her into the room, and left. She seems to have done fine and Gretchen, Kaitlyn, and I got to see her dance a little at the end when we picked her up. Gretchen was very excited and stood in front of Olivia mimicking her moves as she danced.
We started school on September 1. I'm doing preschool at home with the girls and it's going well so far. Gretchen is participating more than I'd planned because the older of the two little girls I babysit is participating at the request of her parents and Gretchen is the same age. All three of the schoolers seem to be enjoying the activities.
The electrician finally came. We now have baseboard heat and independent lights in the two rooms Bryan built in the basement. There are a few ceiling tiles to put in yet, and then trim, carpeting, and furnishings. Bryan is excited to have an office (with heat!) for this winter.
Because of Olivia's dance class, we knew we would probably need a second vehicle soon. It seems ridiculous since Bryan works from home and I stay at home, but if he ever needs to be in the office on a day when Olivia has class then we're in trouble. Bryan's been wanting a truck for a while now anyway, so he took his opportunity and ran with it. He is now the proud owner of a Dodge pickup truck that is approximately twice as big as the one he set out to buy.
We went to the zoo at the end of last month, meeting Kara there on one of her days off. Let me tell you what, August 31st is the day to go to the zoo. School has started so the zoo is wonderfully empty. We wandered around at our own pace and stayed at each exhibit as long as we wanted to. We even got to go on the giraffe observation deck to see the giraffes up close and personal -- and one was very close, pushing his 250 lb head right through the opening to see if any of us had lettuce leaves for him. We also compared tongues, and Olivia and Gretchen decided that the giraffe's tongue was the longest of anyone's. We're headed back to the zoo at the end of this month to visit one more time before they close for the season. :)
The Fourth Annual Barhorst Fun Run happened on Labor Day. People came and had a good time. Only one of our 5k runners ran an actual 5k, despite vastly superior signage compared to last year's sticks with yarn on them. Everyone else missed a loop and only ran 2.5 miles. To be fair, Alison and Hector went out after finishing and ran an extra 0.6 miles. Bryan ran his annual mile, running the whole thing this year and finishing in a respectable 8:34. I was not able to run since someone had to do times and watch kids (we missed you, mom and dad!), but after a couple of the milers finished I relinquished my clipboard in order to prove to Bryan that I could run a mile faster than he could. He claims that had we been running together he could have beaten my 8:07. I guess we'll have to find out next year.
Pictures:
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)