Another Look at 2008

To start the new year off, I thought I would post a few pictures and stories from 2008 that I never got around to blogging about during the year.

In February, hubby was invited to speak at a Father and Daughter Banquet at a local church. I thought I was going to have a nice quiet evening at home, but about 15 minutes after they left, hubby called home. He had forgotten his shoes and asked if I would bring them to him. Not such a hard task except...it was snowing quite hard out and I was driving a vehicle I wasn't accustomed to (my in-law's truck which was on loan to us while they were on vacation). I had to drive though the country...following the car tracks in front of me because the road was covered in snow. I slid a few times and was quite frazzled by the time I arrived at the church with hubby's shoes. I told him he owed me.

I found a really neat book at Winners about how to make different types of puppets as well as a puppet theatre. I taped a couple of cardboard boxes together and covered them with tissue paper. C and her friend had a blast painting the theatre and sticking stickers to it. The book showed curtains made out of tissue paper but I figured I could string a cord across the top of the box and hang some real material curtains. I found some scrap material and set about sewing the curtains on C's toy sewing machine. I became a little too zealous on the sewing machine and ran over a pin which broke the machine. The curtain project was put on hold...and the theatre boxes ended up being used for everything besides a puppet theatre...eventually ending up in the garbage.

A highlight for C during our regular hospital visits where the nights that the Therapy Dogs visited my mom's floor. The owners would ask for C when they arrived and she would follow them around...wanting to pet the dog, hold them, or feed them treats. I think the requests for a pet became much more persistent after getting exposed to these dogs.



For C's birthday, we made a pinata. I know I could have purchased a pinata, but I figured that C would enjoy making one since she loves getting her hands messy. What I didn't factor in was that she also likes getting her legs, feet, arms and face messy too. After the first layer of mache was applied, I was starting to regret the idea. There was glue everywhere...including all over C, who for reasons unknown to me, rubbed it all over her arms and legs.

Our church has started a kids club program that runs on Wednesday nights and I've been coordinating activities, as well as running some of the craft nights. In addition to making garden stones, painting T-shirts, puppet making, and cooking, the kids also practiced for a number of weeks and performed their first drama. I was very impressed. I've enjoyed running the craft nights with the kids and I learn things every night. I've learned which kids are the tactile kids and must be monitored during painting activities. I've learned that it's not obvious to everyone that glass should not be put into a garden stone sticking straight up. But most of all, I've learned that kids love the freedom to be able to express themselves artistically the way they want to...even if it means drawing a knight inside a Christmas card, or painting around dots.

C lost her first tooth in July, and has lost 2 others since then. She was so excited to lose her first tooth...an event she had been talking about for months leading up to the day it finally came out. She asked me straight out if the tooth fairy was real and I told her "No"...but she didn't believe me and wouldn't put her teeth under the pillow in case the tooth fairy took them.

I loved Little House on the Prairie when I was young. I've seen every episode of the TV show multiple times and have read and own all the books. This fall, C has fallen in love with Little House on the Prairie too and after watching a couple of shows, brought the book home from the library (she didn't know I had them already) for us to read to her. It's a nice change of pace from reading her picture books all the time.

In November, we went to baby Faith's 1st Birthday Party. A party to celebrate a miracle as a year ago, Faith was on life support, her body organs shutting down and the doctors giving her no chance of survival. Read these links (here, here and here) for an amazing miracle story. C insisted that she had to make Faith a blanket for her birthday...which ended up turning into a pillow after she stitched the sides together and filled it with fiberfil. She was so proud of it and couldn't wait to give to Faith. This is the second home-made present she's made recently...the first being a 2x3 foot "picture frame" she made out of twigs taped together for a 16th birthday party.

I finished C's stocking about a month before Christmas. She loved it and was so excited to have a fancy stocking with her name on it. I found the kit last year after Christmas and started working on it during my hospital visits but it got shelved half done when C and I started making cards.





For Christmas this year, C gave hubby a race track (so they can race cars together) and a "#1 DAD" key chain with a basketball and net engraved on the back (Basketball is hubby's favourite sport). Chloe was so excited that she said she didn't think she could keep it a surprise until Christmas. She loved the key chain and I thought I might be getting a key chain too after she asked me...Can you take Daddy and I back to that store and then leave for an hour?