Lemony Webbles

performance art

I went to a storytelling festival at the library today (with the girls, of course) and one of the storytellers was really good and the other two were... not so good. I'm trying to figure out what made the difference between riveting and very distractable to a room full of kindergarteners. I think it was mostly talent. Also, I think, experience, timing, and knowing the audience. Mostly, though, I think it was that the good storyteller had a really great voice that was loud and resonant and that you just wanted to get more of. Like a butter-rum lollipop. Yum.

He also managed to make all the kids laugh SO HARD over and over at the same physical humor. It was really impressive. The good storyteller's name is Dan Keding- I highly recommend seeing him if you ever get the chance.

how do I do this?

A dear friend of our family recently lost her baby early in the pregnancy and I just realized that I haven't told the girls yet. It made me sad and weepy all over again to hear Georgia talking about the baby and knowing that I would have to tell her... what do I tell her? How do I tell her? How do little kids deal with loss like this and how much can she understand? I don't know how to talk about it with them without crying, but maybe that's ok.

And the silly thing is that right now there is this kid's show on called Jakers! about these animated animals set in Ireland and it's making me cry to hear it on because the last time we watched this show it was about about dealing with the loss of one of the character's (Ferdi the cow) pet goldfish (Thor) right after I heard about our friend's loss and they went into a lot of detail on that show about helping the grieving Ferdi come to terms with death... hmm..maybe that can help me explain to the kids about this, if they remember that episode. Anyone else have experience with this?

Update: I told them and they took it pretty well. They were mostly shocked and then had questions about the next world and were concerned about our friend.

Wow!

Georgia actually played soccer today in her last game of the season. The two star players were down with bronchitis so the rest of the team got a chance to shine and they were good! They really pulled together and helped each other, passing the ball and playing their positions instead of bunching around the ball. It was beautiful to see. And Georgia got a few good moves in, on defense especially. She kicked the ball way down the field out of her teams goal area (I don't know know enough about soccer to even know what that area's called! Endzone is football, right?) and when she was goalie she caught the ball when it would have gone in otherwise (there's probably a cool term for that too but it escapes me right now, like a save?). I was so happy that she understood what she was supposed to do and did it! Yeah! She really had fun too. Double yeah! And then we had a team picture and pizza party and there was much rejoicing.

this is actually about the eleventh, but it was late at night...

what I was trying to say in the earlier post was that it was Georgia's birthday and it was really fun and we took lots of pictures. Let's see what turned out well enough to put up...

Here's a good moment.. Bahia was making the girls laugh by telling them she was going to do a scary face and then making a silly one every time instead. And Amy is hugging Maya in the background.

The flash 'was not kind to us' this night, says Billy. All the pictures we took look really harsh, lighting-wise. We need a new camera that will let us not use the flash and yet not be blurry. There are also many moments that were captured in little movies- hard to post up here...like Maya insisting on singing Happy Birthday to Georgia by herself and the kids whacking away at the pinata...others that we have stills of but just didn't turn out that well... Billy dressed up as a baby (it was a costume party) and lots of birthday mayhem. Here's a cute one of Teresa as a fairy- well we put wings on her anyways- and I'm 'mother nature' or 'fairy girl' or 'nature angel' or some variant of what I always am when I dress up in this old costume of my mom's.

And here's Khalil right after he did his scary face for the girls (that dern camera. it takes too long to click). Billy says it's an interesting picture anyways because Khalil's chin is kind of square.

a sweet birthday

Can you believe that Georgia turned six today? Me neither. Each day caring for small children seems like at least three days, which would make her really eighteen years old.

Done!

Promised quilt pictures and some cutie Teresa ones:

I love pictures of hands, especially working ones. (They are my favorite part of me, by the way.)

Here it is, finished, with the pillows I made to go with it. The whole set will be auctioned off this weekend to raise money to build the House of Worship in Chile.

Teresa brushing her hair..er..teeth

A smile for the camera! Progress!