Am I 4 now?

Those were Arianna's first words as she walked out of her bedroom this morning. She had her little feetsie pjs and her hair was all in her face and she looked at me with those big brown eyes with a smile. Today is her birthday and she has been waiting for this day for a long time. Seems like she's been 3 forever, but on the other hand she seems like she's so much older! I just can't believe my baby is 4 years old now:). We spent the day making a castle cake, decorating for the cinderella party on Sunday, dressing up, and dancing. My dad and s-mom in Baton Rouge sent her a bag full of the princess dresses with jewelry and head pieces! Lately they spend a lot of time (most of their play time at home) changing clothes in and out of leotards and dresses and doing dances.
This was the first round of gifts which started around 6:30 this morning. We wanted to open them before daniel went to work! We got her a carriage to go with her castle. Ellen gets "sister gifts" and ends up with a lot of presents for arianna's birthday too! I got her a little locking diary from the dollar store. she wrote about 5 pages of words. She wrote several months and other words off of different lists I have posted in the playroom where we do our "school work." She was doing it all on her own and didn't want any help! They both got a pink robe with the princesses on the back. I had to make Ellen take it off before going to the store this afternoon. She couldn't understand why it wasn't appropriate for Kroger!




This last picture was my desparate attempt to make a castle cake (vegan). It looked so easy online :) One of my problems was that I was letting the girls help me all day. It's a lot of fun to have them help and they love it but . . . things don't turn out quite the same as if I was doing it alone! Our friend Lily had a castle cake for her birthday and when I brought the cake out for us to sing to Arianna tonight Ellen said that Lily's was a "real castle cake". I guess that means that ours didn't quite make the castle status. It was tasty though!!

Tile floor all done

After scraping up the old nasty tile floor and patching the concrete subfloor I laid tile and Daniel put in the toilet. Wow, doesn't it look so much better!

inspiring words

From Daniel:

I am reading the seventh book of the Republic by Plato. I found a nice comment from Socrates that I thought all of you educators would find at least interesting if not, I hope, inspiring:
Socrates: "Now, all this study of reckoning and geometry and all the preliminary studies that are indispensable preparation for dialectic must be presented to them while still young, not in the form of compulsory instruction."
Glaucon: "Why so?"
Socrates: "Because, said I, a free soul ought not to pursue any study slavishly, for while bodily labors performed under constraint do not harm the body, nothing that is learned under compulsion stays with the mind."
Glaucon: "True," he said.
Socrates: "Do not, then, my friend, keep children to their studies by compulsion but by play. That will also better enable you to discern the natural capacities of each."
Glaucon: "There is reason in that," he said.

YOU THINK? Often I am tempted to mold or guide my children while forgetting that there is an essence, a budding life, that I must first nurture and acquaint myself with, before attempting to lead. Socrates words caught my attention for that ingenious combination of simplicity and profundity. How can you guide what you do not know? Where will you lead what you are ignorant of? As educators we must first create an environment of life where the child feels free to begin to become. Then we must attune our senses to the recognition of the many and varied ways a child can become in order to rightly nurture and care for the way they begin to grow. Once we have "discerned the natural capacities" we can begin to provide a curriculum or environment further suited to those capacities.

This is obviously a very idealistic picture which would be almost impossible to implement on a "mass" scale in our current educational system. But I think Socrates' words speak well of the type of "education" are children need. At this stage it is the educator who is being educated about the child in order to later provide the education the child will need.

D

old friends

I went to a baby shower for a dear friend of mine this weekend. Kelly was my roomate and best friend in college. We went to Appalachian State and shared a little 1 bedroom apt. for a year before moving out to Banner Elk with 2 more friends for our senior year. I had not seen Kelly, Kara, or Courtney in almost 4 years. Kelly lives in seattle now and is expecting twins! Courtney and Kara are both maried and living in NC. We had a great time remembering the good ole days:)

This is a picure that a photography friend took of us back in 2000 when we lived together.




This is at the Shower on Saturday.


I told Daniel that it didn't look like we have changed. He said that's because we are all getting older and don't notice it in each other!:)

Daniel spent the day with the girls playing on the trampoline, building a fort and a fire then going to the ice cream shop and toy store. A fun day with dad!

teaching dance and tiling and sweet moments

That's what I've been doing this week. Actually, I haven't been teaching dance, just trying to get a job doing it! I contacted the local park to see if they wanted to start up some dance classes. I was very hesitant to make the call because I get nervous when I have to promote myself or try something new. I didn't really know for sure if they had a space or any interest in having dance. But, last Thursday I made contact with the park manager who was very interested in my ideas. He said they used to have dance classes but the teacher left and they just didn't try very hard to find a new one. I brought him my resume and some ideas for classes and he didn't even hardly look at it before telling me to come back so I could fill out an employee packet! I was so shocked since I was so sure that this was going to be a lot more difficult. :) It's been difficult to communicate with this man. He seems to be a great basketball coach and I know the park has a big football and baseball program but I just couldn't get much information from him. I guess that's a good thing. I can just do whatever classes I want anytime I want and they provide everything--the advertising, facility, paperwork. I just get a nice paycheck. Speaking of pay, I'll be making more here than I've made in the past since my profit depends on the amount of students I have instead of being paid by the hour like in Indy. I've designed some new classes this time that will combine dance and gymnastics which should start in March. I'll be offering 2 beginning dance and gymnastics classes, 2 intermediate dance and gym classes and 1 toddler dance class for 30 mins with parent participation. The classes will be on Thursday afternoons and Saturday mornings. The parks advertising program has already gone out for this season but they will advertise on the web and I'll be putting up fliers. I think my biggest challenge will be getting the word out.

In addition to the dance thing, I've been putting down tile in our little master bathroom. When we first moved into the house one of the first thing I started doing was ripping up the old tiles. Not only was it horribly ugly, it was so stained and the grout was cracking. I've tiled a bathroom before so I knew I could do it! But like all do-it-yourself projects it was a lot more complicated than I planned. After ripping up the first section of tiles last semester I realized I needed to put the project on hold since we were so busy with other things like getting used to a new town. Plus I didn't want to spend any more money on it. We got a few Lowe's gift cards for christmas and I used those to buy most of the products I needed. I started working on the floors again a few weeks ago.

The first problem I had was the subfloor. It was a concrete bed and as I was pulling tiles up pieces of grout were hard to get up and the top layer of concrete was also coming up! So I had to use conrete patching. (very hard to use because it dries in 10-15 minutes so you have to do all your work that fast!) Then the cutting and laying out was a challenge. I borrowed a little tile saw from a friend and that part went pretty smoothe. It was just time consuming. That's what I did for most of Saturday. Then once I had all the tiles ready I had to figure out how to put the mortar down without mixing up the tiles. I hadn't thought of it ahead of time but as i'm spreading the mortar under the tiles i had to put sections of tiles and pieces of tiles on top of each other. That may not make sense but I was a little confused while doing it myself! My thighs and knees have been soooo sore after squatting in tight spaces for 2 days. I didn't even realize I was using those muscles so much until the next day and I could hardly walk. All I have left to do now is the grout which is actually kind of fun. It's messy and goes by pretty fast and the results are awesome.

I was going to do that tonight but I laid with the girls while they fell asleep tonight and got out of their room too late. I don't usually lie with them after we read our stories but sometimes it's just nice to be with them. They usually say the sweetest things. I can just imagine their imaginations as the rest with their eyes closed. Ellen said, "mommy, I'm so comfortable right now I feel like I'm a baby in a soft crib. . . I'm so comfortable I feel like I'm flying." Her head was on my shoulder and her arms were wrapped around mine. how sweet.

Sorry for the long post. Guess I had a lot on my mind. Hope you could make it through!

Early learners

Posing with the pengiun craft we made outside the zoo.


Ellen and Arianna with 2 friends from the coop and Hudini the hawk


petting the baby flamingo



look at the crowd

look at Ellen's face



We meet every other Friday with a homeschool group called Early learners coop. There are probably 7 or 8 families with k-2nd graders plus younger siblings. Sometimes we meet at someones house and sometimes we do fieldtrips. One parent chooses to "lead" a meeting and they usually decide where to go and plan an activity or craft. Today we met at the zoo for a picnic lunch then we read stories and talked about penguins and together we all made our way through the zoo before finishing the day at the penguin feeding at 3:30. I think I've mentioned in the past that the zoo does a great job with spacing out feedings throughout the day so you can get a close up view and listen to a little talk about the animals. We stopped at the bird show where they bring out a scarlet macaw, a hawk named Hudini, a baby flamingo, and a black vulture. We've watched this show probably 4 times and I knew a lot of what they were going to show us and talk about. Every time they get volunteers out of the crowd to hold up hoola hoops for the hawk to fly through. This hawk swoops through the crowd and does a few tricks--pretty amazing. Anyway,since I knew this was coming I asked Ellen if she wanted to volunteer and she did. Ellen has been known to be pretty shy in public especially around people she doesn't know. But, recently, she has come out of her shell a bit. So she was excited about the opportunity and ran up there when the lady asked for volunteers. Arianna was soon to follow with the little boy in the red hood (Sam from our group). They were so cute and held those hoops up and listened to the instructions while the bird keeper told them exactly where to hold them. Once the bird flew low, then high, then through the tiny space between the hoops then up through one and down the other. (shown in those last 2 pictures)I wish I had taken video of it.

Arianna update

She is doing fine. The swellig has gone down and the scab is about to fall off. The doctor told us that the glue should start pealing off by the end of the week and that's what it looks like it's going to do. The only problem is that it is itchy and she can't scratch it. She just wiggles her nose and that usually helps. It really hasn't changed the way our days have been. I am paranoid about every step she takes and I still get kind of sick to my stomach when I look at her lip. Some kids act funny around her. They don't really know what to do and then stare at her. The bold kids ask her what's wrong and the shy ones turn away. After playing for a little while it seems like they just get used to it. At the museum yesterday for playgroup I had to hold her hand and tell lots of kids and parents what was wrong with her lip. We have taken a little break from the trampoline. I jump on there with them holdig Arianna's hand so that she doesn't fall and bump her face. A few people have asked me if I'm going to make a rule that only one person can jump at a time. That doesn't seem like much fun to me:) Part of the fun of the trampoline is bouncing and playing games with friends. We'll definitely be more careful when little ones are on there with big ones.

Arianna's trip to the ER. . . she's ok. (written by Daniel)

We had one of "those" days today. It started out normal. "They" usually do. That's the thing about horrible bloody accidents. You never plan for them. Of course there are certain factors, when put together, that certainly make them more likely. Add a bright sunny warm day to a new trampoline, two excited, laughing, light girls, and one overly enthusiastic, heavy dad and stir well. The world is at peace, all is well, and I descend with a perfect double bounce. The girls ascend all smiles. But wait there's something about that angle. It's not right. As if in mid-fall slow-motion Arianna rolled back and Ellen floated on top of her while they headed toward the mat. Once there faces collided I knew we were in trouble. Ellen got off of Arianna howling, but not bleeding much. But when I took Arianna's in my arms my hands and her face were stained red. I took a quick look and from what I could tell Ellen's tooth went straight into the front of Arianna's upper lip. It was deep and nasty. So, just like that we entered crisis mode. The whole family rushed to the emergency room, with our newly acquired Medicaid in hand, and sat through all the stages of waiting. Finally after a couple of hours Arianna was glued back together (when I was growing up this was a stitches affair) and we were sent on our way. "That feeling" in my gut is now starting to subside. What a way to spend a Saturday. And it wouldn't be a Kruidenier tale without mentioning the stoic strength and endurance that Arianna maintained through the whole ordeal. Think about her over the coming days as she heals. And of course a card or phone call would be extra special for her


Here is Arianna resting with a full tummy of Soy-Delicious (Vegan ice cream) and Bugs Bunny on the tube. Most of what you see is drainage. The cut was very clean and should heal up nice and tight. And if anyone is thinking, "Dammit Daniel, be careful!" I know, I know I have been thinking it all day...

A playdate in January

warm days in january.

I know it has been unusually warm everywhere, but we were so warm yesterday that the girls put on their bathing suits and wanted to run in the sprinker. We had some of our new friends over. We met them at our first tea party club meeting back in August. Melissa and I hit it off immediately when I told her I had lived in Boone and I realized she knew all about it and wanted to move there. Her 3 girls Micaiah(6), Anna(4) and Alexis(3) play wonderfully with Ellen and Arianna so we have been getting together about once a week for the past few months. So, when we got home and got the trampoline set up the girls were very excited about having their friends over to jump with them. The weather was supposed to be stormy and I'm so thankful that it never actually rained until later in the evening. So we had a wonderful, breezy, warm day filled with outdoor play!


I have been scrapbooking with Melissa on Friday nights. We had planned to get together last night but as I mentioned the storm came through right when I was about to leave and I HATE driving in the rain and didn't want to transport all my pictures and stuff in the rain. So, we canceled it and I went down the street to rent a movie instead. It was my turn to pick the movie and I got a true "chick flick" called Stepin Up. I highly recommend it for any of you who like to watch good dancing. It was like watching that show "so you think you can dance" without the commercials. The plot was predictable and unoriginal but we (even Daniel) thought it was entertaining. I think I might watch it again tonight. :) So if you like movies that have good acting and a good plot, this one might not be for you. But, if you just want to be entertained this one is a good pick.
Did I just write a movie review?!

Christmas Vacation part two Mountain City

After visiting with Daniel's side of the family, we traveled to Boone and Mountain City to see a few friends and some of my side of the family. Neal and Paige (my brother in sis-in-law) and his family go to Mtn City to stay with mom every New Year so we met them there. On our way, we stopped at Anna and Scott's house in Boone for lunch and a long afternoon of playing. We got to mom's on Thursday evening where we opened the last of the Christmas presents and settled in for a few more days of vacation.

We went skiing at Beech Mountian, NC. Daniel spent all day towing the girls up the bunny slope and they soon learned how to ski down and stop. Even though I'm a decent sckier I was not comfortable taking the girls down a regular slope. I went down a few slopes by myself but soon found I'm not the skier I used to be. In fact, I'm a big baby and was scared of being hit or falling the whole time. I did get hit from behind one time years ago and I'm still not over it! :) or at least that was my excuse. We were very proud of the girls!



As if that wasn't enough adventure. . . we all went ice skating the next day at Appalachian Ski Mountian right outside of Boone. If you've never tried it, ice skating is a lot harder than it looks!! The kids skated behind those little things that you push along the ice and hold on to. We had lots of fun and laughs.

Neal and Will







Way to go mom and thanks for treating us to a wonderful weekend! (That's mom in the yellow sweatshirt.)

BEST COUSINS!!!

Christmas Vacation part one Charlotte

We are driving back from our 10 day Chistmas vacation. Daniel is driving, the girls are asleep and I’m thinking about all the things I need to do when I get home! I want to share about all our adventures starting in Charlotte before Christmas and ending in Mountain City on New Year’s Eve. Since so many things were going on I’m just going to post a bunch of pictures and notes.


We stayed at Grandaddy William's house while in Charlotte. The girls were cozy on their palette on the floor in their new Christmas feety pajamas. That was one of their favorite presents because they had been asking for them for so long. They didn't want to take them off.


These are Daniel's brothers and sisters--Liz, Stephen, David and Anna.





We spent Christmas day at Gail's house. We ate tofurky and opened tons of presents! This is us playing monopoly--one of 3 games that was played over the 2 days. We had so much fun!!


Is that Dave wearing Khaki's?! Although that looks just like Daniel, it actually is his twin brother David. This is the first time I've seen him with a beard and they really do look like twins now! The girls had a great time hanging out with their aunts and uncles. We wish we could see them more often.



The girls got their beloved trampoline for christmas (thanks to all the grandparents who went in together). Since we were in Charlotte we didn't set it up but just surprised them christmas morning with the big boxes unopened in the garage. They really wanted to see inside so we took the top off of one and they ended up playing inside that box for most of the afternoon.

bird feeders and santa

Daniel helped the girls hang the bird feeders we made this afternoon. He initiated this whole craft idea where we rolled pinecones in peanut butter and bird seed. He loves to watch for birds out our back window and the girls have picked up a love of it too. We hung these feeders right outside their windows hoping they would be able to see some from their bed during the day.



Later on in the evening we were all on our bed talking about santa. Daniel had gone into a big explanation about santa's bad list. They didn't know much about it. He asked the girls a few questions about what they thought santa knew and how he knew it. Ellen told us that santa doesn't see he just knows. Right after daniel finished his last words Arianna leaned down and kissed his face a few times. We couldn't stop ourselves from laughing. After Ellen stopped hysterically laughing with us she asked us what was so funny! :)

all together again!

I pretended to be a photographer the other day and spent a little while trying to get a photo of all of us to send out in our christmas card. I couldn't get one that I really liked but this one turned out pretty good.


I let the girls take pictures with the camera when we came back inside. This one was taken by Ellen. What a model! I'm getting him back for joking that no one reads this blog!



We went to see the christmas lights at the zoo tonight. It was a beautiful night. I haven't seen that many lights in a long time. I made the mistake of telling the girls that it was the 3rd Santa we have seen this year. Ellen didn't even want to talk with him. Arianna told him she wanted a cinderella dollhouse. i don't know where she got that from. Ellen told me today when she was writing a letter to santa that she wants a purple fairy book. I can't figure where she got that from either. I told her I didn't know where to get that and she was sure that santa would be able to get one for her. Anyone know where I can get a purple fairy book?

being vegan

I got this cartoon from a friend's myspace page and I'm not exactly sure where he got it but I love it. I haven't talked much on the blog about being vegan but I will eventually. I'm hoping this cartoon will just get you thinking:) I was trying to figure out a way to get it to stay at the top of my blog but when I put it in my profile picture it was so small you couldn't read it. oh well, i'm still figuring all this stuff out. Now that I have access to the computer in the evenings again you'll be reading a lot more from me! Daniel is out late finishing his last night of grading before our holiday. I've been working hard rearanging my blog:)

Arianna and Drew

How sweet!! Claire and I are already making wedding plans! If you listen closely you can hear Arianna talking about riding the Black Stalion.

good friends, good places

The original plan for when Daniel had to go back to Indy to defend his thesis was that he was going to go by himself. But, I just couldn't imagine staying here in Columbia while he was going to be so close to our friends. We made the 10 hour drive in my grandmother's hand-me-down car. The car ride there was harder because the girls didn't sleep as much as we were hoping and daniel and i were very tired. I had run into a curb and had a flat tire on Friday right before taking the girls to a ballet at a theater downtown. That added a little stress to our day and put us on the road a lot later. Anyway, we made it to Indy and the drive was well worth it. I enjoyed every single minute of being there. Even though the kids hadn't seen each other in about 5 months they acted like we had never moved away. It was very cold there the first couple of days so we didn't play at the parks like we were hoping. We did get to spend a day at the Children's museum and walked around the mall that was so close to our old house.



Arianna and Drew were so cute together. I was trying to get a video clip of them up on the blog but I'm having trouble with it. They were riding the horses on the carousel and reached out and held hands. They were always together, holding hands and playing together. I even caught this shot of Arianna with her arm around Drew waiting for our turn on the carousel.


I'm sorry that I didn't get a picture of the grown ups on the trip. Claire and Val were so sweet and put us up in their basement. We got to hang out over at Shael and Tom's house a lot too. Daniel was working most of the time. It was bad timing for him because he would have loved to sit around with us but he was so busy finishing his semester. Don't worry, I had a lot of fun anyway. Claire and I went out for a glass of wine one night and we all just had a great time hanging out. It is so nice to spend time with other families. We shared meals, helped clean up after each other and played with the kids together. The time went by so fast. I am so thankful for those families. Good friends are hard to find and I hit jackpot when I moved to Indy. I have to keep reminding myself that I was there for over 6 months before even meeting them. It takes even longer than that to really get to know someone.

We really miss Indianapolis. It is such a cool town and Columbia doesn't seem to be quite so great, yet. At least it is warmer here and we are only 2 hours from the beach and 3 hours from the mountains and an hour from our family. Oh I almost forgot to mention our lunch at Shalimar (Indian food). It is my favorite restaurant of all time. They have a great buffet and we would ride our bikes there almost every Saturday. They treated us to a free meal the day we moved. Anyway, they remembered us and it was the best meal I've eaten since I left! We ate there twice and the second time the waitor was waiting for us with our drinks ready! He saw us getting out of the car and got the girls mango juices ready!

another chapter

Daniel defended his thesis in Indianapolis on Monday and he has now officially completed his masters degree in Philosophy! He has worked very hard for the past 2 1/2 years. When we made the decision to sell our houses and quit a good paying job in one of the most beautiful places (Booone) you might have thought we were crazy! We moved away from everything we were familiar with and made a life for ourselves in Indy. We began the life of grad students. Daniel took on the job and lifestyle like a pro. Once I got adjusted to the new town I fell in love with the big city and of course the people. I am so proud of Daniel for taking the chance--leaving what he knew and was good at to go for what he really loved, studying and teaching philosophy. It is not a rare thing around our house to brew a pot of coffee or tea after dinner so daniel can get through several more hours of work after the girls go to bed. I tell him he is crazy. This weekend, my friend Claire called him a machine. He just looks at me and tells me he loves it. What a man! We are proud of you daniel. Congratulations!!!! Now we get a whole month to be together and take a break. :)

zoo

This was an amazing experience. Once again we were at a place when hardly no one else was there. We had the whole zoo to ourselves. We got to see a lot of animals close up but Arianna and I loved to visit the gorillas. There are 3 males that live there behind a huge sheet of glass. They will sometimes sit right next to the window. They have been interactive in the past but since we were the only ones in there we really got to spend some time with them. This one was actually giving kisses to us and looking us right in the eye. One time he stood up and hit his fists against the window before running up the hill. He came back and sat right back down by us. When I was sitting there next to him I had set my purse down to put my camera back in and he was very interested in what was inside. He was watching me look through the bag and we pulled a few things out like a coloring page and snacks and he was looking at them. The girls had a lot of fun showing him the stuff.




Ellen said that her favorite part of the day was watching the meerkats. Those little squirrel like animals that dig in the ground are pretty fun to watch. But she also loves to feed the lorikeets. These birds are beautiful. Arianna and I are a little skiddish. I have yelled out a few times as they fly right by skimming my head with their wings. We have been in there when they sit on us. I have to hold Arianna because she said it hurts when they get on her.

angels

Well the girls have been sick for a few days. Pretty much as soon as we got home from our trip, Arianna started coughing. That turned into runny nose and fever and then Ellen got it. Thankfully it only lasted a couple of days and the girls are feeling much better today. I got to get out of the house yesterday and meet Gail and Anna in Charlotte for some Christmas shopping. We had so much fun. Daniel got to spend a lot of quality time with them this weekend and today they spent the morning outside building a fire. We have one of those outdoor fireplaces and they spent several hours out there in the cool weather gathering sticks and playing in the yard. Then we all sat around the fire before coming in to enjoy some hot chocolate and cookies. I got this picture of them enjoying their drinks and watching the angels. My mom sent that to us in Indy last year and it is so cool. The girls love how the angels spin around and make the sweetest little jingle as the bells are tapped.