January Accomplishments

1.  She went to primary.  She was so excited to be able to go into the big kids class but wasn't to happy to not have toys to play with anymore.  Here teacher said while they were talking about what names your mom and dad are called by she said, "I call my dad Sir and I call my mom Ma'me".  I started to laugh when I heard this because the only time she says that to us is when she's being funny.

2.  She has started to talk on the phone with people longer than just saying "Hi and talk to you later, Bye."  She actually sit and listens and talks.

3.  She's starting to be more helpful around the house.  She wants to help clean.  Her job is taking the silverware out of the dishwasher and putting it away.

4.  She always remembers that it's time to change the clothes on the Welcome bear that we have.  She loves getting to change it clothes.

5.  She has learned the song Days of the Week.

6.  She lost the privilege of going to volleyball with me on Wednesday because she bit Bria this month.  So now she gets to be babysat by Angela Borzea every week.  Scott got to have the talk with her about not biting people and using your words to figure out disagreements.

7.  She sticks her tongue out and to the side when trying to do things.  She told us that's what Grandpa Hobbs does.  We laughed so hard because yes it is what he does.

George Strait Concert

I heard that George Strait was coming to Boise and it was his final tour.  My boss from ISU Shipping and Receiving(Dorothy Barrett) had talked to me about if he ever came close enough we would totally love to go to his concert.  I wasn't about to miss this opportunity.  I was so excited I called Scott up and said I know what I wanted for my birthday present.  When I told him he was fine with it.  So I put out a call to everyone on Facebook to see if anyone wanted to go to the George Strait concert with us.  Scott's sister Jamie said her and her husband wanted to come.  We were so excited about it.  Jamie got here and had a present for Rachel. 

Yep she now has Rapunzel hair.  She's so excited.  We had to figure out how to get it to stay in though with the hair clips that it had.  My friend Kristin came over to babysit since now that we have Cameron we can't just leave him with anyone.  He has to stay with someone over 18 and someone who's approved through Health & Welfare.  I was so grateful she was willing to do this for us.  We headed out to the Nampa Center and that was a complete mess out there.  I don't know why they can't figure out the traffice flow out there.  We went around actually to get back to it.  We showed up and found our seats just as the show was getting started.  I didn't take my camera in because I didn't think they would let me in with it so the pictures aren't very good since we had to use Scott's phone.

Martina McBride was so awesome and amazing.

 The stage was diamond so they were going to each corner of the stage to sing.  We had awesome seats that weren't that far away from the stage. 

 Big Screen.  She has a voice.  Man she can sing.

This is a better view of just how close we were to the stage.

 Jamie & Keith

 Me & Scott

Our group picture.  It was so nice to have adult conversations.

 George Strait.  He was good but I would have preferred that he sang more of his new songs but he sang a ton of old songs so I didn't even know them.  I would say I knew 50% of the songs he sang.

There he is on our side of the stage.  He sang two songs at each corner.  The concert last until 11:15.  We had gotten up to head to the exit just before he came back for his encore.  The last five songs we listened to were standing in the corridor.  We were still bummed that he didn't sing Jamie & Keith's wedding song and he didn't sing Carrying my Love with you.  We hurried out to the car and got out of the center parking lot before the crowd.  It still took us about 1/2 an hour to get home because the roads had started to be icy. 
I had a video of him singing, Check Yes or No but it was sideways on Scott's phone.  I was so mad.
So grateful for Kristin being a great friend and helping me out with the kids.

Many Outfits of Rachel

Rachel has started to get her own style.  I'm always amazed at what she has come up with lately.  She used to be really good about matching but lately she has a really wild side.  Here are the many different outfits

lately.

Super Hero

 

 Fully clothes super hero.

 Her new thing is using my hand towels as her cape and then I use a binder clip to keep it together.

Being Rapunzel after Aunt Jamie brought her the hair.

 This was her preschool outfit.  Isn't it just loverly.

I love the flower pants with the striped socks.

I let her leave the house this way because I had seen a friend on Facebook who said that she allows her daughters to pick out their clothes during the week but she picks them out on Sunday.  I thought that was good advice so that's what I have been doing with Rachel and all of her cloths.  No more fights about what to wear.

Cameron

Some how we ended up getting a phone call today to ask us to take 3 foster kids.  We said no because we didn't have the room to transport them all in our vehicles.  They then called us back again and asked if we could take at least one.  Scott and I had talked about it and said we could take the littlest that was 16 months.  They said they would call back if they needed us to take one.  Well needless to say they called us back and said yes we need you to take him.  We were completely shocked. We didn't think they would actually split them up.  They ended up bringing him to us at Buffalo Wild Wings.  We couldn't believe it that they would actually track us down and not let us go home first.  The lady who brought him to us gave us a sack with a few diapers in it and a shirt.  That was it.  So he came to us in a pair of sleeper PJ's and a hat.  That was it.  We were completely shocked.  She gave us a voucher to go get a car seat and $50 dollars for clothing.  I totally freaked out at this point and called Linda who was Rachel's foster mom to ask advice.  We ended up at Burlington Coat Factory to get the car seat and some clothes.  We got a coat, some socks, and two outfits and that was it with the money we were given.  After that we headed home to give him a bath and then I rocked him to sleep.  He didn't look like he felt well at all.  Needless to say for the next four days we fought a fever with him.  When he spiked 104 again that's when I called his Dr. and we got him in.  He had an ear infection.  I couldn't believe it.  So we started him on antibiotics.  He is a very sweet little boy.  Rachel's not sure what to do about him.  People ask how she is doing with it and I just tell them it's minute by minute with her on it.  Here is our sweet little foster boy.

 Isn't he just a cutie.  So happy for the most part.

This was him so sick.  He just didn't feel well and slept a lot.  We had to give him multiple baths a day to get his fever to go down.  This time he just decided to cuddle into me and fall asleep.  I felt so bad for the little guy.

Scott Sleeping

So I was sick for a few days.  Scott helped out with taking care of Rachel during the nights.  He's not used to getting up several times during the night and so this is what I found the other day. 

He ended up taking a nap but I should actually say he slept in the chair.  He was asleep for 2 hours.  I give him kudos for helping out with her though.

Another Snow Day

I can't believe it we actually ended up with another day of snow in Boise.  This time it put down six inches of snow.  It was so awesome.  Scott got the plow on the 4 wheeler and went out to plow.  Rachel of course wanted to be on the 4 wheeler so she made it through all of our driveway but then this happened:

Yep she fell ASLEEP.

It makes me laugh so hard that she falls asleep any time she's on the 4 wheeler for longer than 30 minutes.  It must be the noise and vibration that's relaxing for her.

1st Ever Breadsticks

So I decided to take the plunge and make these easiest  in the world to make.  I am always afraid of making bread because I'm afraid of yeast.  I wanted to use my Bosch and this is what I tried out.  I do have to admit they turned out pretty good.  I was excited about it.

Can't believe I actually made homemade bread sticks and they turned out.  YE-HAW!

Playing in the Snow

Yeah we finally got some snow in Boise.  It was so exciting that it was actually a good dumping of snow.  I shoveled thinking it would not stay for very long but come to find out the snow ended up staying around for 2 weeks.  I sent Rachel outside to play in the snow though.  She had fun.

Making foot prints

Throwing Snow

Yes she's going to jump on the tramp.

Jumping.  The snow was totally coming up to her face.  She was laughing so hard.

Laying in the snow.

Scooping snow off her little tramp.

Rachel being Rachel

Rachel was in a pretty good mood today and was just making us laugh so hard.  I totally laugh at the clothing choices she is making lately.  Today she decided it wasn't worth keeping her shirt tucked in.  We weren't doing up the buttons just tucking it in but she wouldn't tuck it back in after using the restroom.

 Back view

Front view

She was using the hearth as her stage today. She was doing Elf practice.  She is so funny as she was doing this.  Her new thing is to say, "A 3 ah, 2 ah"  so funny I was laughing as she did this over and over tonight.  Here is her video of her singing Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer.  http://youtu.be/G5o5sISzRhw