Like Mother, Like Daughter

My wonderful mom saved about 7 or 8 dresses that I wore from when I was a newborn until I was about three. Maggie has had the privilege to wear many of them to church, and people will comment about how her dress looks vintage. This past Sunday she wore another one. My mom said that Maggie looked like a little Jenny walking around. What do you think?

Maggie is nearly 18 months in these pictures, and I had just turned two (sorry about the quality--it is a picture of a picture.) My mother was so upset at the time that I wouldn't smile. :)

Autumn Fun

Jared's preschool had a fieldtrip to a local farm. We saw newborn (2-day-old!) pigs, went on a hayride, picked a pumpkin, and played on slides and in cornboxes. Jared loved playing with some of his preschool friends.

newborn pigs

older pigs that were available for petting--Jared didn't want to

on the (very slow) hayride

Jared on the slide with his friend Bronte

A bragging moment (hey, you don't have to read my blog if you don't want to): While we were on this field trip, Jared's preschool teacher came up to me to make sure that I was aware of the fact that Jared could read. She said that earlier that week Jared had just spontaneously read a paragraph of something aloud and he and the teacher's assistant just been in shock! He seriously is such a smart kid (I'm not taking much credit--most of it was his own determination.) About 5 or 6 months ago reading just really clicked with Jared. Now I have to check out chapter books on a 1st or 2nd grade reading level (like the Frog and Toad books by Arnold Lobel). He just devours them and can read them without help. It is amazing. Anyway, his preschool teacher said that later in the schoolyear she sends home beginning reader books for the kids to read, and she'll have to make sure that she finds books on his level for him. :) He is such a funny kid.

The first video is Jared on the slide. The second is Jared in the corn box. My friend Summer would kill me if she knew I posted this, but you can hear her telling her son to get his hands out of his pants in the second video and then telling him he was "all clear" after she had removed the corn from his pants. :)

Backyard Fun

Sometimes Jared and Maggie play well together. Sometimes. :) This is a cute picture of them cuddling on the couch one day.


Maggie has loved to swing. She is saying "cheese" to the camera.
I love this boy!!!


This was a craft Jared made at preschool: C is for Clifford.

Done for this year...

Today I canned pears, which wraps up all the canning I'm going to do this year (actually, I might make pear jam if my sister-in-law says it's not too hard to make...) Since the peaches on my peach tree were ripe in mid-August, I feel like I have been doing some sort of canning for two months now. Does anyone actually like canning fruit? I surely don't. I mean, yeah, it's nice to have the lovely jars all lined up when I'm done, but it sure is not fun while I'm doing it. Either my kids are nagging me the whole time, or I resent the fact that I'm using precious nap time or time while Jared's at preschool to can fruit. I'd much rather be doing something else.

Results for this year:
21 quarts peaches
52 pints applesauce
6 pints peach jam
14 quarts pears

Yay for me! Sorry, no pictures for this year. But I think I've posted pictures of my canning efforts in years past. They look the same this year. :)

Shoutout

A couple of months ago some good, good friends of ours (who also happen to be relatives) spent the night with us while vacationing here in our neck of the woods. We LOVE these guys and used to hang out all the time together when we lived in the same state and B.C. (before children). Jared talks about them at least once a week and can't wait to see them again when they come back out at Christmas time.

A few weeks ago Jared attempted to spell out their names. Hello, out there! We miss you...

Preschool

Jared right before his first day of preschool

Better late than never, right??

Here is a post dedicated to Jared's first day of preschool. He's been going now for a few weeks, and he loves it! (I must admit that I am loving it, too, and am wishing it was three days a week instead of two... I didn't even cry on his first day.) He loves the endless crafts and keeps talking about a friend named MaKenna and how much he loves that name. Today he told me we need to name our next baby MaKenna. No, this is not an announcement.

Cute random picture of Maggie. I love her pigtail.

Jared sporting one of the endless handouts he brings home from Sunbeams on Sunday.

Zoo

I'm never very good at these "self-portraits." I love that you can see Maggie's eye in the corner. Yeah, she came, too. This was our first time riding the little train at the zoo.

A couple of weeks ago we went to the zoo with our neighbors the Pratts. They have awesome mechanical dinosaurs right now that Jared loved! (Although at times he seemed a little scared and kept asking me, "Those are pretend dinosaurs, right?") In fact, as I am going through my pictures I realized that I didn't get any pictures of zoo animals--just the dinosaurs. Ha ha! That's ironic.





Jared likes the zoo even more and more each time we go, but he still thinks the most exciting part is the automatic toilets. I think he went to the bathroom four times in the three hours that we were there. I cannot for the life of me convince this kid that bathrooms are yucky and that we should spend as little time as possible in them.


We went to one of the bird shows this time, which I totally recommend! It was pretty cool. It was my favorite part of the visit.