A little color

Marlow likes to draw and color...especially with markers. She will sit for a long time working on a picture, longer than I would think most three year olds sit still and color. Sometimes she gets a bit carried away, the marker leaves the paper and she decorates her skin a little. I remember doing this as a child too, mostly I would draw smiley faces on my knees or toes....one time Michelle convinced me to let her color socks on my feet with a black marker.....but I'm getting away from my story.


Saturday she was coloring with some inexpensive (not washable) markers I stuck in the kids' stockings for Christmas (cheap markers = big mistake), when she decided to draw a purple goatee on her chin. When I saw her later she had forgotten about it and I asked her, "Marlow, what's on your chin?" She looked confused for a minute and then she smiled and said, "Oh, a little color."

Joseph was getting ready to go run a few errands and invited her to go with him, so we got a baby wipe and tried to clean her chin off --- and discovered that it wouldn't come off. So she went out with dad with a purple chin. By the end of the next day, her color was ready to be washed completely off in the bath.

The Evening Dishes

A couple weeks ago I told Ezra and Asa that they would start helping clean-up the kitchen after dinner. They wouldn't have to do it alone (since they don't really know how) but would switch off nights helping me clean-up. Marlow really wanted to help too so she gets to help every night if she feels like it....generally she walks in the kitchen just as we are finishing up and says, "Ok mom, what do you want me to do?" and I give her a small job and then we are done. She always seems sort of surprised that it all got cleaned up so fast....while she was off taking a bath or playing. The other night Asa and I decided to take a before and after picture of our job for the evening.
BEFORE:


AFTER:


We usually have a pretty good time together. The boys seem to enjoy the one on one time with me even though we are working. The don't like it when they think they are missing out on something fun the other kids are doing with Joseph like wrestling or reading stories. Usually he takes them upstairs for baths right after dinner, and my helper doesn't miss out, he just gets the last bath.

Mmmm, Yummy Cookies

While we were in Georiga visiting the Nichols side of our family Beth made gingerbread cookies for the kids to decorate. They had a blast, and really got to do the decorating themselves. I was not involved in the process at all.....which is good....I tend to "help" too much and try to make the cookies (or whatever project we are working on) look perfect, probably at the expense of the fun of decorating. I am really going to have to hold myself back when the kids start doing science projects for school.
The kids really enjoyed having full creative power when it came to their cookie decorations.

Asa, Ezra and Zoe working hard on their gingerbread men -- Max looking on from his highchair. They were armed with icing, gumdrops, sprinkles, raisinets and red hots.

Ezra and Zoe working hard, and below the results.....

Mmmm, delicious, eh? Looks like a cookie that was in some sort of an accident. One of the red hot "eyes" is lying next to his gingerbread head. And wow, what happened to the rest of him? I'm thinking reconstructive surgery is out and some one should just go ahead, gobble him up, and put him out of his misery. Ok, seriously, this cookie was created by Zoe, who is only 3 yrs old and did a great job for her age division. See what I mean? I get a little too intense about projects.

This one at least resembles a man, a little heavy on the gumdrops, but hey, we've all got flaws.

And here we have Asa, dressed as Joseph for the Christmas Story the kids acted out, enjoying one of his delicious creations.