Pa requested a trip to the zoo during their visit and we fit it in! It was a cool day and the kids decided to wear their fleece animal onesies. Many other zoo attendees thought Sloane and Soren were super cute as little animals going to the zoo.
Some animals were out but we missed any in photos. We did get the kids and Adam on a carousel ride. And one pic of the kids with G and Pa with only slightly wonky faces by the kids.
On the first day of spring break, G and I took the kids to a farm in Oregon with baby goats. They require reservations and you get an hour of goat therapy, according to the website. We left Pa and Adam to work on the kitchen project for the afternoon and headed out to the farm. On arrival, Sloane and Soren were not so excited about that good old farm smell. They quickly got over it once we saw the sleeping pile of baby goats!
Soren was closer in size to the goats. When we would put a goat in his lap, another couple would come up too. Soren got pretty overwhelmed with hooves on his chest, chewing his jacket, and filling his lap. He was more interested in looking at their hooves and in their mouths. Soren also loved the miniature rooster and the big old ram.
We set a goat in Sloane’s lap and she also pet a few I held. After a short time, Sloane was in heaven. The goats had numbered tags and on a big white board their names were listed. This season they all were named after Harry Potter characters. Sloane would find a goat and check out their name. Our favorite was Nymphadora Tonks. By the end, Sloane was picking up goats, cradling them, and trying to bring one home.
G and Pa came for a visit at the end of March. They stayed for 2 weeks which included Sloane’s spring break. We planned fun activities, which I will do posts about soon. But the first project was our kitchen.
Pa has been feeling so much better since his surgery in early fall. He was in need of a shop project after the holidays and I made a big one for him! He built us new cabinets and drawer fronts for our kitchen. Once he had a time line, Adam and I had to get cracking prepping the kitchen. We cleaned, sanded, and painted our boxes. The kids helped with the primer and also spent a few days with Nini and Papa2.
The new cabinets and drawer fronts were shipped out and arrived in two huge boxes. Unfortunately, the painter in NH didn’t use the correct paint and Adam and I had to paint them again with the correct paint. Our garage became a painting workshop for a week or so. And then I was ready for a break from painting.
Pa was our master installer! He got all the new pieces installed and hardware back on. He and Adam fixed the lazy Susans and repainted the shelves. We only hung 2-3 doors opening the wrong way first. And the lazy susan doors were the only parts that needed to be shaved down. We also learned the lazy susan is the perfect size for two kiddos!
All the pieces Pa build in place, with the backsplash from 2021 and new counters from 2020, we’ve gone from a 1970s kitchen to a 2020s kitchen!
A big thanks to Pa!
Adam took Sloane skiing for the first time in January. The night before she was nervous about the chairlift (and I was nervous about the driving conditions!). She decided to give it a try and ended up loving the whole experience, especially the chairlift. Sloane had some falls but no injuries even though she managed to lose a ski BOOT and its ski at one point. I think they managed 3 runs total.
While they were skiing, I decided to take Soren to the zoo. He was quite sad about not going skiing so it seemed like a good distraction. I let him watch his kindle on the drive to the zoo. BIG MISTAKE! As we pulled into the parking lot, he let me know his mouth is extra wet and well there went everything he ate that day. Windy roads + kindle + fully belly = no good for Soren. We ended up turning around and driving back home. We spend the afternoon trimming dead flowers and cleaning his car seat, which was less fun than going to a ski mountain.
In March, it was Soren’s turn to go to the mountain. He was less enamored with the chairlift, but loved the skiing part. Soren took to the snow (he has great balance) but not to the instruction! Listening is hard when you are 4 and surrounded by snow while standing on slippery sticks. A big thanks to Papa2 for lift tickets he generously gave us from his hosting volunteer work.
In January, I was walking home with Soren after dropping off Sloane at school. I was planning to cut his hair because there was some drizzle that made his curls pretty tight making them easier to trim.
But as we kept walking and I looked at his hair more, I decided I couldn’t do it. The ends are still so soft and blond. His bangs are finally long enough to keep out of his eyes. And he would just look like such a big kid with shorter hair. Plus once we cut his hair, he won’t be able to wear these cool hairdos!
Sloane and I flew to NH for a long weekend. It was a long awaited trip now that Sloane is vaccinated. The last time she flew she was just over 4 1/2 years old! And that is the last time Jesse, Cam, and Lida had seen her. Flying with a seven year old was great! She did get a little overwhelmed when we got to security, telling me “I am not use to being around this many people. I am use to being around 18 other people” (that is her class size). We did end up on plane for an extra hour in Seattle while they fixed a mechanical issues. Once we finally got in the air to Boston, Sloane asked me how much longer we would be on the plane and I had to break it to her we had another 4.5 hours!
We landed pretty late in Boston but G and Pa drove down to pick us up. The arrival pick up area was a bit confusing and my parents parked a bit down from us. My dad called to us and Sloane starting running to him screaming Pa! Pa! and wrapped him in a big hug. Once we were in Wilton (at 2:15 am!), she went right to the toy cupboard to find all the toys she missed. After sleeping in, we had a nice time playing and Pa taught Sloane ‘The Hedgehog Shuffle” which is a homage to his oldest friend Charlie.
We picked Lida up after school on Friday and stole her away for three nights! Lida and Sloane were so happy to see each other. Jesse met us in Wilton after her work day and stayed for two nights as well. We had lots of art projects, card games, photo shots with the Instant camera, and cooking. We even had a tea party with tea cups from G’s grandmother. Lida also found her American Girl Doll, Chloe, with accessories for Sloane to play with during the visit. Sloane made collages with all the Polaroids she took of us and the dolls. Sloane was excited there was a bunch of ice on the back patio and she would ‘ice skate’ on it. Overall, this was fine except one huge bruise on her elbow.
Oh and it wouldn’t be a true Ouellette experience with unusual objects worn as hats. This time- cabbage leaves!
On Monday we went over Jesse, Cam, and Lida’s house. Lida has black hair with purple highlights right now. Sloane asked if she could have a strip of purple in her hair. Adam and I agreed it would be fun. Jesse has the technique down so she was the colorist. After waiting the time, we laid Sloane on the counter to rise and wash her hair pretending it was a spa. She was so excited about the color, especially since it matches Lida.
We are excited for our next visit in August- longer and hopefully visiting with more friends and family.
We had a Bramble family Christmas this year- Morgan, Darby, Zach, Ellie, Max, and Zander all came to town.
Christmas Eve we had crab and bread. While the kids and I were on a video chat to hear Pa read Twas the Night before Christmas, the adults picked crab for all the littles. The Christmas miracle was that the kids all ate the crab and bread (no substitutions, different options needed!), then we sent them to finish a movie while the 7 adults sat and ate without interruption!
Christmas morning was super fun- presents, bagels with cream cheese, and matching pjs for kids. Sloane got a karaoke microphone stand. The kids put on some great performances- including a goodbye mix when Morgan was leaving. Soren coined a new phrase when he sang to me ‘I love you so much I could put you in a bowl of soup’
Soren got a bunch of dinosaur items, including a Smithsonian book Adam picked out for him. If you know me, you know I can hardly pronounce words I already know. So this book is presenting a new brain challenge to my phonics impaired self. I made both the kids microwave hot packs with some cute fabric- unicorn forest for Sloane and dinosaurs in space for Soren. Sloane was very impressed! But then we figured out she thought I had made the fabric as well. Once she heard it was just sewing and filling that I did, she was less impressed.
We had a cold snap the week after Christmas with snow- enough to make a snow person and snow angels. Nini and Papa have a firepit that we enjoyed hot chocolate around. We had a brisk trip to the zoo which was quiet empty. We didn’t see the zoo lights, but did get to have elephant ears!
The most amazing thing when we get together is how well the cousins play together. Ellie will read to Sloane, Max and Zander will slow down their soccer for Sloane and Soren, the big cousins will consent to a movie my kids feel comfortable watching, and they will play games all together.
We are pretty lucky with this big group- and we all fit around one table still!
What a 7 year old she is! Sloane has been learning and growing so much this year. She is measuring just under 48 inches. She will ride her bike with Adam on his runs and can easily go up to 6.5 miles. It makes Adam have to run faster down the hills and occasionally work harder to give her boost up hills.
Sloane loves listening to podcasts while she is playing, eating, bathing, and even reading. Her favorites right now are Wow in the World, Melon’s House Party, and What if World. Her favorite book series include Star Friends (a birthday present this year), Dory Fantasmagory (a Christmas gift this year), My Furry Foster Family, and Dragon Masters. Sloane has read Dory Fantasmogory to herself a couple times and I haven’t read it yet. It is a strange shift to not read a book to her. She has also remarked that it is good she can read well now so she can point out the mistakes I make when I read.
Sloane loves first grade and is doing really well. Her teacher told us during the Zoom conference that Sloane could probably be the substitute teacher if the teacher was out. Sloane remembers the schedule and reminds her teacher when she forgets to do an activity. Sloane has also been asked to help a classmate who joins them for PE and music. At first, I was concerned that Sloane would be missing out on things, but it became clear during her conference that Sloane can hear the instructions once and understand them. She is there to help her classmate who struggles to understand the instructions at times. Sloane produces massive quantities of art work and drawings, including the one below with all the characters from Doc McStuffins and writing out numbers and equations. She drew the self portrait below with things she loves in each quadrant- nature, family, animals, and friends.
Sloane loves to act out books/stories and sing; ultimately she is a performer. She has even writes musical notes and lyrics down as well. I’ve mentioned it before and it continues to be true-she narrates our life in song. She will make us all tickets and have us sit to watch her movie, play, or music performance. This fall she took a theater class. It was a two hour class for 4 weeks. She missed one when she was sick, but on that day one of the instructors turned out to have COVID, so it was a lucky miss for us. Sloane went right into the class on the first day without any tears or fears. There was no performance at the end- it was just a class to do acting practice and games. The best part I heard was that they asked everyone to introduce themselves the first day including telling everyone their pronouns!
Sloane was very excited to be fully vaccinated. We talked about the two doses and the time between them. After her first dose, she set up a clinic at our house to vaccinate her dolls. She made them vaccine cards with their names, date of birth, and lot number for the vaccine. The vaccine clinic took quite some time because of all the dolls to vaccinate.
We went to the Nutcracker the day after Sloane’s birthday. And it was when she was officially fully vaccinated. We brought our vaccine cards, masked up, and enjoyed the show. Our friends Andrea, Moria, and Elyan came too. We were in the first row and the kids needed booster seats to see over the lip of the stage. Sloane still struggled to see, so I sat in the booster and Sloane sat in my lap! I highly recommend the booster for anyone under 5’5″.
Sloane and Soren fight quite well, but also play very well. They are very loving with each other. They show generosity and caring to each other mixed in with the grabbing and screaming. Sloane lets Soren share her nightgowns and Soren shares his airdough clay. Sloane can convince Soren to share bites of his dessert when she has finished hers first.
Sloane is working on her cartwheel skills. She struggles to land on her feet instead of her knees. Mia’s glare in the background is pretty typical. With almost 2 years of pandemic struggles, we are lucky to have her entertaining us, making us laugh, and keeping us on our toes (such as not skipping words in books!).
Sloane’s top front teeth have been wiggly since September. I thought they would be out by my birthday, then by Halloween. They were still hanging on at Thanksgiving though. On December 7th, she lost the top left one. Then for 4 days, the right one was hanging a little crooked! She lost the other one on December 11th while sleeping over at Nini and Papa2.
All I want for Christmas is my 2 front teeth is on loop at our house, and now it will be in yours as well…….
We have been enjoying preparing and doing Christmas-y things this year. We went to cut down our Christmas tree the first weekend in December. It was the day after Sloane’s second COVID vaccine and she was wiped out. We got her to rally to go pick out a tree. We went to a farm with animals and even a Santa to take pictures with. But the trees weren’t our style, so we dragged the kids to a second farm. We appeased them by letting them carry the electric chain saw. Their sound effects were spot on!
We decorated the tree and the house. This includes our manger that plays Away in a Manger and our humming elf puppet. Sloane and I tied wreaths with Rach, Bennett, and B’s two grandmas. Sloane was enamored by the three dogs there and both B and Sloane were super helpful making little green bundles for the wreaths.
Sloane and I watched a youtube instructional video on drawing Santa and Rudolf. Soren was in my lap with a piece of paper and marker as well. After a few minutes, we looked down and realized Soren was following along as well. I was super impressed with his Santa! Sloane’s Santa was cute too- I love how his beard is a chin strap.
We’ve been in our house for 3.5 years now. One of our favorite activities has been nightly walks to a house 2 blocks away that is over the top with decorations- as in they store the decorations in a POD because it is so much. Right before Thanksgiving, a for sale sign went up in their yard and no decorations are up this year. I got a little teary eyed because it was so exciting for the kids. We have branched out and are now enjoying other houses.
We baked a few types of cookies this year- gingerbread (which Adam had to rescue after I messed up!), peanut butter crinkles, and triple ginger crinkles. We made it through all three batches with only one person crying, and it was me. Decorating was fun and there were even sprinkles without corn and soy that we could use. Luckily Adam’s family is coming to town to help eat all these cookies.
