Julia Explores 1784

Julia has been reading a bunch of the "Kirsten: An American Girl" books over the past few weeks, and apparently her interest in these books has inspired her to write her OWN historical novel.

Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you:

"Meet Satfier."
1784


JULIA: You know, her name is Satfier, like the shade of red?
ME: Well, a sapphire is blue, actually.
JULIA: Oh.  Wait.  Then is it "Astrid" that's a shade of red?


I honestly have no idea what she is thinking of.


Aaaaanyway, are you ready to find out about Satfier's amazing journey, way back in 1784??
Read on!:

"Satfier's long braid smakt her face in the wind as the horeses pelld the wagon from the long gernie to Texsis from Atlantas.  But Satfier wanted to exsplor the world."

I guess Julia doesn't realize that Texsis was not called Texsis back in 1784, and was not actually a recognized area of land within what is now the USA.  But, hey, the characters are coming from Atlantas, which, as far as I know, is a city that doesn't actually exist, so maybe we can all be free to suspend our disbelief in this story.  I'm ready to find out more about Satfier exsploring the world!

"Finily they reacht Texsis.  'Were are we staying?' ask't Satfier.  'In a cabin made of logs and youv met your casans.  And they live here."

I wonder if their casans are Naduv Amerikans?  Or perhaps Naduv Mexsicans?  Satfier and her family are looking a little too Nordic to be related to those inhabitants of what we now call Texsis back in 1784.  Hmm.

"Satfier's sister Astrid said 'I miss Atlantis.'  'So do I,' said Satfier's other sister Lisbeth."

I think *I* might miss Atlantis too if I had to move from there into the Wild, Wild West before it even was the Wild, Wild West.

And as if Satfier and her family needed any MORE reason to miss Atlantis:

"They reicht the cabin.  All of asuddin, clouds moved in and it got windy.  'It a tornado,' said Mama and Papa."

Oh, NO!  All of asuddin??  It a tornado!  Help!  Run for your lives!!

(I suppose this is terribly perverse of me, but I can't help but think that this picture looks like a belt with a...um...sheath hanging off of it.)


Speaking of, Madeleine is holding her own in the category of "my kids and their unintentionally phallic drawings."  She came home from school having made this free art:

ME: Madeleine, what did you make here?
MADELEINE: Oh!  I didn't FINISH it.  It's supposed to be the OUTSIDE.  Outside of town.

Or outside of pants.  Or severed finger.  You decide!

Julia's MLK Day Pledge

Julia brought this classwork home the other day:

"I can make the world a better plase by not litoring."

I love the sentiment, Jules!  I also love the suspense of the drawing she did: a girl is standing by a trash can, looking somewhat solemn, holding a piece of garbage.  Will she or won't she throw it in the trash?  Or will she litor?  I can see the weight of the moral decision upon the girl's face.  (I also really like the fact that Julia is starting to experiment with more advanced facial features in her drawings.  Although I'll miss her cute little dot eyes and semi-circle smiling mouths.)

One thing I find amusingly ironic, however, is the choice of not litoring as Julia's good deed.  One of the items on Auntie Shannon's task list that Julia has yet to master is remembering to throw her wrappers away.  So we have not even conquered "not litoring" within our own house.  But, hey, good intentions, right?  I'm sure we'll eventually move from having the mere intention of not litoring to actually picking up the piece of trash and throwing it in the garbage, don't you think??

Another way in which Julia is making MY world better is by providing me with plenty of new music in our household.  This morning, before school, Julia was an on-the-spot composer, as well as singer, as she played with the Barbie dollhouse.

While I wish I could have captured all of her songs on video, I can at least provide you with a few masterpieces from this morning:







Boxes, boxes, glorious biloxes! 
A floor, a floor, I'd rather be a floor!  (Well, maybe it would be not that comfortable...)

WHAT. THE. ----

So, Madeleine is pooping on the potty right now, with the bathroom door closed (as it always must be when either kid is pooping in there.)

I just popped into the bathroom for a second to get some hand soap.

Madeleine is sitting there on the potty playing a pretend-play game with a toothbrush. 

Just.  Yuck.  That toothbrush is definitely not getting used on anybody's teeth anymore.

Seriously, I understand that kids don't get the concept of bacteria and germs and what not without being explicitly told what is clean and what is not.  But sometimes I've gotta wonder HOW ON EARTH kids can think certain things are okay.  Like, for instance, last week, when Madeleine had just finished wiping her bum BY HERSELF after pooping, then, before washing her hands, exclaimed, "Oh, yum!" and picked up an old pretzel from the bathroom floor and ATE IT.

I repeat.  YUCK.

Aaaaanyway, as much fun as Madeleine is having playing with Mandy (the name she gave the toothbrush in her pretend play game) and no matter how many times she has saved Mandy from some real cliff-hangers ("Maaaaandy!  Hold on!  I've gooooot you!  Hold my hand and I'll saaaaaave you!"), I decided to take the toothbrushes (that's right, it became multiple toothbrushes after awhile) away, after which she suddenly realized she was done.   (Read: she no longer had any fun reason to stay aboard the pot, so she decided it was time to get off, despite the fact that she had physically finished pooping well before she hopped off.)

So.  That all happened.

On another note (literally), Madeleine informed me today that she thinks Angela Lansbury has a nasally voice as Mrs. Potts in "Beauty and the Beast."  Here, on video, Madeleine demonstrated the difference between the nasally singing on the movie and a much more beautiful version:




Sigh.  If only she had decided to sing on the potty, like Julia did for a LONG time last night, instead of playing with toothbrushes...*


*To the other adults living in this house right now, don't worry.  Madeleine's didn't take the toothbrushes we are all CURRENTLY using, which are still in the toothbrush holder.  She took some of our spares out of the bathroom drawer.  So nobody needs to freak out about butt germs whilst brushing his or her teeth tonight.

The Replacement Outfit

One of the items I bought for Madeleine this past Christmas is an all-white dress outfit, complete with gold-sequined tutu and white leggings.  The reason behind this purchase was Madeleine's near-daily insistence on wearing her white tennis skirt and white short-sleeved lace tee, in order to look like Emily Binx from "Hocus Pocus."  Since Emily Binx is wearing a white cotton Victorian nightgown in the movie, Madeleine was gung-ho about wearing all white, but as the weather grew colder, her Emily Binx outfit was becoming more and more inappropriate.  So what better present for her than a long-sleeved white dress with long leggings to replace her summery outfit?

Needless to say, Madeleine LOVES her new Christmas gift, and has worn it repeatedly over the past month.  However, she seems to have let go of her determination to actually BE  Emily Binx.

Here she is, all dressed up for church today in her white outfit, compete with purse and microphone:

MADELEINE: Okay, you wanna play "HOCUS POCUS?"  I'll be Ginny the Rock Star!

Yes, let's play "Hocus Pocus."  Great idea, especially seeing as you want to be a character who does not actually exist in "Hocus Pocus."  Just a thought, but maybe we should just play "Ginny the Rock Star" instead.

Madeleine used her microphone the whole way to and from church, singing along to the CD player at amplified volume.  She also made sure to repeatedly hold the microphone too close to her mouth so that it would continually emit an ear-splitting high-pitched squeak. 

Julia had NO tolerance for the microphone.  While I scolded her for not addressing her sister nicely, I can verify that she was speaking for both of us when she snapped, "Madeleine!  STOP DOING THAT.  Right NOW."

Madeleine didn't seem to hold it against Julia, however.  At Sunday school, the kids had to draw a picture of things they're thankful of.

Julia's drawing: me, a hamburger (representing all the food in her life, according to the artist), and our house.

Madeleine's drawing: a balloon, a table, and Julia.


In other art news, Julia has been busy creating Valentines for all the people in her life.  While she has filled out a number of store-bought Valentines for kids in her class, she also got to work on hand-crafting some Valentines for members of our family. 

I think this Valentine might be my favorite:

"You know it, so show it!"

Honestly, was there ever a more apropos Valentine message than that one??  Forget the trite "I love you" messages.  Who needs a Valentine that says something like "For my sweetheart" or "Be mine."  What speaks love more than "you know it, so show it!"??  Julia hit the nail on the head with this one.

I don't know about you, but she has gotten me TOTALLY into the Valentine's Day spirit!  And since I know it, I think I'm gonna show it!

Coloring With Bears

Madeleine spent much of the morning coloring in her Berenstain Bears' Christmas activity book, since the near-Arctic weather is keeping us house-bound.  She has enjoyed designing wrapping paper for the blank presents in the book, matching cookie shapes to cookie cutters, and decorating the table for a holiday feast.

Speaking of, here's a glimpse of the feast she created:

If you're wondering why there's a human head on the table, it's because, according to Madeleine, "Look!  It's a cookie shaped like Jesus!  When he was a GROWN-UP!"

The feast grew even more scrumptious over the course of the day:

From left to right, top to bottom, the samplings are, according to Madeleine: a hair cookie, a dinosaur foot cookie, the Jesus cookie, a swirl cookie, another swirl cookie, and apples in a bowl.

Now, you may notice that Jesus looks a little rosier than He did in the first picture.  Madeleine explains that, as well: "Oh, He got a SUNBURN."

Seriously, this all looks pretty delish.  I don't know about you, but I'd *definitely* be going for the sunburned Jesus first.  Mm-mm-mm!

Creative Play With Mundane Objects

Madeleine is literally playing with a twist tie and a serial number sticker right now.  And she's deeply invested in a pretend play game involving the aforementioned objects.  She's even singing a made up song as she plays with them.  I know, I know, you may be wondering, how much fun stuff is there to actually *do* with a twist tie and a sticker? 

Apparently a lot. 

Here's an excerpt from the conversation Madeleine was making them have:

MADELEINE: You want this?  My grandfather says it's VERY expensive.
ME: Madeleine, what's very expensive?
MADELEINE: Uh, the BLACK thing.  The grandfather says the black thing is VERY expensive.
ME: Whose grandfather says that?
MADELEINE: The AIR'S grandfather.

Oh, boy, even the air is lucky enough to play a character in this riveting game.  Seriously, doesn't it just LOOK like a barrel of fun??:

Next thing I knew, the straw from Madeleine's juice box was getting involved in the game.

MADELEINE: (making the twist tie talk to the sticker) You want a straw?  Yes?  Okay.  Here you go.  Here's a straw:

If you're as confused as I was about what exactly is going on in this pretend game, never fear: I got a concise explanation from the originator of the game herself.

ME: Madeleine.  Can you tell me what's going on with the black thing and the sticker?
MADELEINE: So.  The sticker was a TAG, and it was ATTACHED, because it was at the STORE, and the sticker wanted to buy it, but then the sticker buyed up a DIFFERENT home that was my STRAW.

See?  It all makes perfect sense now!

The Task List, and Surprise Gifts

Auntie Shannon recently made a task chart for the girls in order to help them follow through on some of the household chore promises they have made.  Each task that they successfully complete within a given day gets a sticker next to it.  The tasks include everything from cooperating with Mommy in the morning to throwing their wrappers away after eating snacks:

And speaking of throwing wrappers away, Madeleine apparently had that on her mind as I drove her to school this morning.  She sat in silent contemplation in the back car seat for about half the drive, staring pensively out her window.  The quiet was suddenly broken with this announcement:

MADELEINE: Mom?
ME: Yes?
MADELEINE: I think that we should PAUSE the movie when...when...when...when...when I need to get up to go THROW my wrapper away.  Because...if we DON'T pause the movie, I feel like...like...like I'm left out of the MOVIE when I go to throw my wrapper away.

I assured her that we would, indeed, pause the movie - whatever movie it may be - next time she needs to throw her wrapper away. 


In other news, the girls were recipients of some exciting new gifts today, sent from Blake in New Mexico.  Not only did both girls get a pair of silver and turquoise earrings, but they also received authentic Navajo rattles.  Julia, who loves playing "Native Americans" at school with her friends, was especially excited about the Navajo instrument,  which prompted Madeleine to exclaim, "Boy, Julia, you and Auntie Shannon SURE are into MERICANS!"

Madeleine herself seemed pretty into Mericans, as she delightedly showed off her new shaker to me.

MADELEINE: Mommy!  We got REAL Merican noise-makers!  They were made by REAL Mericans!

Madeleine shaking her Merican noise-maker like a real 'Merican

Shake it, baby, shake it!