New Dollhouse

That was the highlight of Tori’s Easter—a new purple dollhouse to go with her pink one. She had more than enough furniture to stock the two and made some steps out of Legos. The house is small enough for her to carry, and she did—to her room, downstairs, upstairs, etc. She says she is going to put the black family in the new house and the white family in the old house, but last night, she had all kinds of dolls in the houses, along with Eli.

She also got the first-ever boy Lala Loopsy and the Frankie Stein Monster High doll, plus some play jewelry, tiara, etc. Right away the clothes came off Patch the Lala Loopsy doll and went onto another Lala Loopsy. Patch now has on some Builder Bear clothes. Frankie escaped the clothes switcharoo, but not for long I’m sure. Tori was absolutely thrilled with her Easter basket—thank you Easter bunny.

Back Home

The kids are back home now and back in school. This week is Spirit Week, and Tori is having a ball. Today was Fashion Disaster Day and she dressed for it—yellow shirt, green and purple dress, Hawaiian shorts, mismatched socks and crazy hair. Christian is sitting this one out, and tomorrow’s Career Day too. Tori wants to dress up like a fashion designer, so we’ll see what that entails. Maybe her new pink outfit with a tape measure or a feather boa around her neck.

Excited and Weepy

Tori was so excited to go to her grandparents for the weekend, she was up and dressed at 6:45 am on Sunday morning. Considering she doesn't usually get up until 8 am on weekends and we weren't leaving until 8:30, this was a miracle. She was ready to go! On our trip down we stopped for drinks and snacks and I told the kids if they had to go to let me know so we could stop. About 10 minutes after we stopped in Springfield, Tori told me she had to go. Luckily there was a rest stop up the road. We stopped and got out and I told her to meet us by the flag pole when she was done. Christian and I came out and she was dancing by the flag pole. She exclaimed "ha ha I didn't have to go". So we stopped for nothing! We hit the road for the rest of the haul and the kids were excited to try the head phones that came with our car so they could hear the movie, while I could listen to anything else but the movie! We got to Wentzville and the kids had lunch at McDonalds. Tori showed her Grandparents her color book and they were off.

We called Tuesday to check on the kids and they were having a blast with their cousins. Tori talked to us and got a little weepy when I was talking to her. She missed us a little bit, but I'm sure she perked right up after I got off the phone with her. They had a big week planned and it sounded like it was in full swing!

Almost Time

Christian and Tori are headed to Marie and Steve’s this Sunday for a whole week. Lucky for them, the weather is going to be good, if not great. Eli is not going though he keeps saying “I go.” He would miss Mommy and Daddy way too much.

Tori is the most excited. She can’t wait to spend some time with her grandparents and cousins. She thought she was leaving tomorrow and got really excited. I don’t know if we will be able to contain her excitement tomorrow. We have clothes to wash and bags to pack. She will probably be over the moon!

Everyone Loves Tori

We met with Tori’s teacher, and she had nothing but good things to say about Tori. She is a real delight, and all of the first grade teachers want her in their class next year. She has mastered most of the skills and is working on her numbers to 100—moving from one group to another, 69 to 70, and saying them backwards. We were thrilled to find out how well she is doing and got Chinese for dinner to celebrate.

Dancing Queen

DWTS started last night, and Tori couldn’t wait. She was all excited when the first pair came on and danced her way around the living room. Huts and I looked at each other at one point and said she needs to be in a dance class. Today I am going to look into some dance classes. I might find her one soon. She also wants to go to camp this summer, so we’ll see.

That's Just The Way They Are

Christian and Tori go to latchkey run by the Y every morning and afternoon. With Mom living with us, they could ride the bus, but they don’t want to. They like going to latchkey; the people there take good care of them.

The kids receive an afternoon snack at latchkey, and yesterday, Huts and I brought in drinks and cupcakes in lieu of their usual snack. The kids loved that, and the staff was all over us. Guess we’re the first parents to bring in snacks. They were so grateful that Tori and I are going to do it again for Easter.

Apparently when the staff was passing out the items, one of Tori’s teachers was there. She told the Y people that “that’s just the way they are.” Tori’s teachers always call us generous. Huts and I never thought much about it, but I guess we drop by a lot of stuff from wipes to play-doh to cupcakes to goody bags for the party. Just goes to show you that the smallest efforts mean a lot.

Miss Wants-A-Lot

Tori has now decided that she wants another dollhouse, the Manor, so that she can separate her dollhouse families (one white, one black). The Easter bunny was going to bring her a handheld game, but now it looks like he will be bringing her another dollhouse. This one is two stories with a purple exterior—how lovely next to the pink and green, three-story Victorian dollhouse she already has. This smaller one is less expensive—a good thing for the Easter bunny’s wallet. Two dollhouses seem a little excessive, but at least now, Tori will be able to put all of that dollhouse furniture to use.

Of course, Tori has a jillion other things on her list, including all of the Monster High dolls she does not have. Those can wait until her birthday, and lucky for us, she will never remember everything she asked for this Easter. If she did, we would never hear the end of it!

On another note, we brought in drinks and cupcakes this morning for the latchkey kids. Nothing green about them—more springy that anything, but they will have to do. I couldn’t even find green plates—
just blue and yellow. And the cupcakes have confetti on them. Oh well, no one seems to care they have nothing to do with St. Patrick’s Day. They are just glad to have a cupcake and a drink. Usually all they get is a bag of crackers as a snack.

A Bed Full

Tori has so many stuffed animals we strung up clothesline around half of her room for her to hang them from. Last night, she decided to take all of them down and throw them into the floor. I was going to put them back up this morning, but then I decided to just pile them on her bed and leave it to her to do tonight. That should keep her busy for a while! She’s always looking for something to do, and tonight she will have plenty to do!

Last night did not go smoothly with Tori either. She has several goals she has to complete for kindergarten. We have been practicing and made it through much of them. Then she lost focus, and that was that. She just started guessing on her sight words, and words she had read just moments before became something else entirely. At this rate, she is never going to get those sight words down pat!

The More Girl

Christian has just a couple of collections, Legos and Bionicals, whereas his sister has many. Tori likes all kinds of things, and every time we go out, she tries to get a toy out of us. Like this weekend when we went to K-mart for a new microwave. They all looked at toys, and Tori decided she wanted another monster doll. She already has two, which she rarely plays with, so that wasn’t going to happen.

When she figured out that she wasn’t getting anything, she changed to the Easter tune. Can you put this on the list for the Easter bunny? (The kids usually get a couple of toys for Easter.) She has quite the list going, but lucky for us, she will forget most of it and be happy with whatever the Easter bunny brings her—the last two mini LaLaLoopsy dolls and a handheld game.

New Beds? Perhaps!

After a few trips to the local furniture stores, Christian and Tori have settled on the same loft bed, just in different colors. Tori would like white, but the bed comes only in natural and black, so she is opting for natural. We’re going to girlie it up with stick-ups, etc. She is getting drawers underneath and at the end of the steps, plus a bookshelf. If we move the bookshelf under the head of the bed, she will have some cubbyholes to crawl into and hide her stuff.

Furniture shopping with Tori is very interesting. At first, she was all wound up and excited about it, begging us for a bed that she would outgrow in a couple of years. Then she settled down a bit and zeroed in on the bed with steps yesterday—with some help from us. She is in the middle of this “I don’t know” stage, so we have to work hard to get her to focus and make a decision.

We’ve got some things to do on the house and then we may order a bed for her and one for Christian. It just depends upon how things go with the work on the back of our house (new door and some deck repairs). Wish us luck if we get them new beds. They will want Huts to have everything together in an hour!

Valentine's Day Girl

Tori had a ball yesterday. Not only was it her helper day, but it was Valentine's Day. She made some crafts, played some games and came home smiling with all of her loot. She glued lots of things together last night and made her own little box for her valentines. It was a cute box to begin with, but Tori has added her picture, stickers and lots more to it. She has also stuffed it with her valentines. She took it to school this morning to show off to the people at latchkey. Tomorrow is spring pictures, and she can't wait to dress out of uniform! Goodness knows what outfit she will come up with!

My Birthday Book

Tori is all about making books these days. She steals the computer paper and either staples the pages together or has her dad do it. Sometimes she tapes up the pages. Then she bugs us for hours on end how to spell certain words. She decided to make me a birthday book, nothing about birthdays persay, just a bunch of scribbles about whatever happened to be on her mind. A nice gift, but very much a Tori gift.

Ready To Go

While Christian was bellyaching about all of the writing he had to do, Tori was watching everything, looking forward to the report she will have to one day do. She loves doing homework. She’s my little eager beaver, and as her teacher says, we don’t worry about Tori because she tries so hard we just know she will get it. Yep, my little Tori is always ready to go to school and do whatever her beloved teachers tell her. She loved making her poster for the 100th day and can’t wait to do her homework each Monday. If she could have, she would have written Christian’s report for him! At least I know she won’t be bellyaching when she has to write about the man or woman she chooses for Black History Month.