Trading Up

We recently sold our 2001 Ford Focus Wagon to get an upgrade for Dave's commuting car.

He is VERY happy with his "new" 2002 Audi A4.

Featuring an automatic, digital thermostat, which Dave loves!  Optional manual transmission (with steering wheel shifting), which we will probably never use.  And heated leather seats, which we will also probably never use :(

Dave says it is way more fun to drive than the Focus.  Unlike the Focus, which felt like it was going to explode above 65 mph, the Audi feels like it was made for highway driving.  Which is perfect because it's going 50 miles every day on the highway.  Between the new car and the audio books from the library, Dave actually looks forward to his commute every day.

Random Pictures from Dave's Phone

Audrey on her daily ride to school.

Claire fell asleep at church.  Overwhelmed by the spirit.

Audrey helping Claire come home after she ran away.

She ran away from Audrey.

Cute girl.

Cute girl.

Sam's Eagle Project in Rexburg, ID

Dave's identical twin, the nefarious Professor Hunnycutt.  A genius twisted for evil.

7th Anniversary

Engagement photo.

Cool!

Our friends, Roger and Oliva Hester, took Dave out on their boat last week.  He was so excited.  Dave LOVES waterskiing, but he had not done it here in Texas.  This was the first time since he was a teenager that he dared to get in the water without a wetsuit.  He said it was amazing.  The water was cool and refreshing, but not cold.  I guess not wearing a wetsuit made him feel a lot like a teenager again because he apparently thought he could still pull some of the old teenage stunts like in this movie.  

Silly almost-30-year-old-lawyer-dad.  Flips are for kids.  

Pictures

1 Little Alligator

I just overheard Jane singing a song she made up (I'm assuming she made it up) to the tune of 10 Little Indians:

1 little alligator pink with polish

1 little alligator pink with polish

1 little alligator pink with polish

Then he fell right down

2 little monkeys purple with polish

2 little monkeys purple with polish

2 little monkeys purple with polish

Thoooose ones fell down

3 little monkeys yellow with polish

3 little monkeys yellow with polish

3 little monkeys yellow with polish

Thooooose ones fell down . . . too

More Stuff About the Girls

Every day for homework, Audrey goes over some of her reading words: and, the, like, we, to, go . . .  Today she said she wanted to say them in "English."  I thought, "Well . . . ok . . ."  Then she said all of the words with a British accent.  Which was perfect.  She likes to use it a lot when she plays.  Seriously, it's spot on.  After she finished all the words, she was so delighted with herself, she said, "I speak two languages!!" (And no, I didn't teach her how to talk like that.  I think she learned it from her older cousin who likes to talk with one when she's playing pretend.)

So, while Audrey is perfecting her accents, Jane is perfecting her manners and domestic arts.  She has helped me with all the chores around the house lately.  She has an amazing enthusiasm and skill when it comes to sweeping, mopping, putting away laundry, unloading the dishwasher, and picking up around the house.  It's truly awesome. Add to that the fact that she says please and thank you any chance she can, at the most adorable moments, and she's the perfect little housekeeping companion.  Everyone should have a Jane.

As for Claire?  She's practicing being naughty.  :)  She just loves to take things and run off with them, pull tablecloths and curtains, pour out cups and bowls and bottles, take off her diaper and run around naked, and hit people in the face and pull hair.  She has the biggest grin on her face as she's doing all of these things, if it's not a full-on giggle fit.  Oh, I forgot about her fondness for cupboards and containers. She tries to sit in both, no matter the size, after emptying their contents, of course.  Despite all of this, she's irresistible.  You just want to pick her up and squeeze her and kiss her face every time runs away laughing as you chase her.  I'm sure one day soon the naughtiness will get really un-cute, but for now it's impossible not to think it's adorable.    

Audrey, Pirate Captain of the Sea

Overheard Audrey talking to Jane in the back seat . . .

"ARRRG!  Be curful with me hook!  I'm captain of the sea!

. . . .
"ARRRGG!  Be curful with me bandaid!"

Apparently pirates get pretty testy when people touch their bandaids.

Klas

This is Audrey's latest drawing.  It is nice to see that she is thinking about school, even if she would rather have a talking horse teaching her "klas."  

David was watching over her shoulder when she drew this and he said it was amazing to watch as she very quickly thought through the drawing.  One of the crazy things about Audrey's drawings is that she almost never stops mid-picture to look at the picture or think about what to draw next or how to draw it.  She just draws, as if she is taking dictation (1:05 :) or something.  Dave said that with this picture, she would think just for a moment about whether whatever she was about to draw would make sense or not.  Like when she was drawing the table in 3-D, she drew the back leg on the left, then the front leg on the left.  Then she went over to the right side and was about to draw the back leg the same way as she drew the other back leg, David cocked an eyebrow as he saw her about to make this little mistake, but she stopped before she drew and David could see that she had realized that if we are looking from the left side of the table, we wouldn't be able to see the back leg on the right side.  So she quickly went down below the square tabletop and drew the back leg poking out the bottom.  This all happened in about a half a second and without a word.  

Things to notice:

1) Details: eyelashes, fingers, the clippy part and the clickly part of the teacher's pen, pages in the book behind the open page, numbers on the clock (although some of them are backwards).

2) 3-D (perspective): every time something is in front of something else, that takes planning.  The desk is in front of the teacher, who is in front of the chair.  The teacher's head is turned so that one ear is in front of the other, and the hair is in the middle.  The teacher's hand is closed with the thumb over the other fingers.  And of course, the legs of the table are drawn at various lengths to show which ones are closer to the "camera."

3) Drama: where is the focus of the picture?  Most kids have a single focal point in their pictures (think of the family of stick figures).  This one has at least 2 on-stage focal points and an off-stage focal point: the teacher is in the center, but she is pointing at a chalkboard, and she is looking at a class that we don't see.  These three focal points show that this picture was "taken" in the middle of a "situation," a dramatic interaction between people in the picture and people out of the picture.  Another indication that things are happening instead of holding still is the speech bubble -- the teacher's mouth is open and she is addressing the class -- presumably to teach them all the correct spelling of Audrey's name: A-U-D-R-E-Y-O-J-R-E" ("ojre" is the phonetic spelling of Audrey.  Audrey insists on spelling her name this way.  Apparently, her compromise with the authority figures in her life, us and her teacher, is that she will spell her name our way and then she will spell it the correct way.)

Love this picture.