Trunk or Treat

Our church had "Trunk or Treat" this evening, so we debuted the Star Wars family costumes.

Aren't we an interesting bunch? P is Darth Vadar, of course. Allen is Obi Wan. I'm Padme(! - NOT Leia. No cinnamon bun hair!) And J is, well, Yoda.


Watch out, Yoda's trying to use the force on you.


Happy Darth


Mean Darth (but still awfully cute)


A Yoda close up. The teens at the church started calling her Joda. She actually kept the hat on the entire time and didn't seem to mind wearing it. Must go shopping for cute hats.

Behold

Isn't she too cute?
Here's Jo practicing her walking.

Sometimes she makes sudden right turns.

The "walk behind" also works if you stand in front of it.

Here are a few shots from P's soccer game this weekend. It was the first loss of the season (Phoebe's first experience with losing a game), BUT P did get more into the game...

AND actually got her feet on the ball a few times....

And had a shot on goal...

Alas, this girl isn't on our team. Otherwise, P's shot would have been directed into the goal.

One Small Step

It has happened. And there are no pictures. Sorry.

Friday night, Little Miss J took her first unassisted steps. This story really has two tidbits of information. Apparently Josie is going to be quiet the girly girl. And girly things are very motivating for her.

Friday night we were all sitting on the couch. My friend Sue, and her daughter Audrey, and Sue's friend Cheryl, were here. The couch is a sectional, so it's shaped like an L. We had the ottoman pushed up into the corner of the L and Josie was crawling around on the large cushy space this made. She found one of her sister's headbands and HAD to have it on her head. I put it onto her head and she smiled and hit herself on the head and crawled over toward Sue and stood up beside her on the couch. I reached over and took the headband off of Jo's head an put it onto mine. She laughed and then took a step toward me reaching for the headband.

Hmmmm. "Could be on to something," Sue said. So, we repeated this process several times. Each time Jo took from 1 to 3 steps toward me while standing on the couch without holding on to anything.

In my mind, it seems like if she can walk on a less than stable surface like a squishy couch, the wood floor shouldn't be a problem. She has yet to be so brave on the floor.

I will try to get pictures next time this happens. We were all so in awe that we didn't grab a camera. We didn't want to mess up the scene lest she decide she didn't want to do it anymore.

Hmm. I may need to shop for shoes....

The Gap Between Posts

You may be wondering why there have been so few posts lately. Why no cute pics of the girls? Well the answer is over there on the left, just under the "About Me" section.

Around about the time we got our referral of Jo in March, I kinda lost any time I previously had to make jewelry. Well, a couple of weeks ago, my friend Sue told me about this site called Etsy. Now I'm in trouble. It's pretty addictive, but it has gotten me back into making jewelry. I have a little store there that you can access by clicking the link over there on the left under the pictures.

I have to warn you. It isn't just addictive as a seller. It's addictive as a buyer. It's an entire virtual marketplace of handmade items. Pretty much anything you can think of is there. And buying from there supports individual artists. I've heard there are mass producers masquerading as independent artists on the site, so you may run into that. For the most part though, it's individuals. It's a cool place. I may do most of my Christmas shopping there.

So, now for the reason you're actually here.



Here's all the girls in the family - including the dog. Senna was diagnosed with Addison's Disease last week. It's totally treatable and she's feeling much better now that she's on a daily dose of Prednisone.

Look how much Jo is filling out. She's definitely had a growth spurt!

Jo loves her sister. And I think the feeling is mutual.

Jo also loves to play in the toilet. Dad didn't want that in the pic, but yes she's holding the toilet paper roll holder and putting a foot up on the toilet lid. We have a lovely lock that holds the lid down now.

And, this picture is just P in a nutshell. My sweet girl.

Soccer is Life - Life is Soccer

Phoebe had an 8am soccer game on Saturday. We needed to be at the field at 7:30.

This is what the sky looked like when we left the house. My camera just refused to capture the redness of the sun.

Here's the team warming up. The dew on the ground almost makes it seem like Fall.



These pics are from the game. Once again the other team had uniforms very like ours. In fact, I think the only difference was the color of the socks. This time, the OTHER team wore the scrimmage jerseys.

I'm pretty sure that's a legal move. Ahem.

I love this pic simply because P is actually going after the ball.

And she's staying focused.

Another win for the Rock Angelz. Woo hoo

Today's Sparkles

My miniature roses off the front porch.

I had fun trying to catch a drip with the camera.

It really seems like there should be a frog under there.

More roses.

These are the bracelets I'm wearing today.

Leave me a comment and let me know how you are making your day a sparkly one.

Be Sparkly!

Friday is Sparkly Hannah Day. Hannah would have turned 6 on Friday if not for a horrible tragedy that happened two months ago today.

Hannah was a very sparkly and fancy girl who loved "all things bright and beautiful" and often found beauty where most adults wouldn't think to look.

Hannah's mom has been keeping up with her blog and "talking things through" in a way I can't imagine doing myself. They have a wonderful day planned for Friday. She invites us all to go out of our way to wear or do something sparkly on Friday, or just slow down to notice beauty around you that you may have not noticed before. Notice the dew on the grass. Paint your toenails. Wear that jewelry that you never wear because it's "special".

Start thinking about Friday and how you can honor this precious spirit.

Always Fun at the Lineberrys'

Phoebe had her second soccer game this weekend. She again had a total blast. She stayed focused more this time (didn't come to the sideline for a drink during play). She ignored some trash talk (! from a 6 year old !). She generally ran around, kept up and had fun.

When we got home from the game, she was beat - and acknowledged that. That should have been my first clue. She took a bath, ate and basically chilled. Except she didn't REALLY chill. In reality, her head was quite warm. The girl had a fever. Her temp hovered around 101.5 Saturday night and all day Sunday. She didn't act like she felt bad, unless you count that she generally played in the floor and didn't run around like a crazy person all day. Last night her temp went up to 102.6. I gave her some Tylenol to help her sleep. She fell asleep, the fever broke, and all was well...

Until she woke up around 4:30 this morning, again burning up. I didn't take her temp, but did give her some more Tylenol. This time it didn't knock her out quite as quickly, but did handle the fever. This morning, I took her to the doctor where she, of course, had no fever. She apparently does have signs of a virus, though. Whee!

Just for grins, I asked the doctor to look in J's ears. Guess what! Again with no symptoms, J has an ear infection as well as a red throat meaning she could have P's virus. So. There's too much fun going on here at the Lineberry house. The doctor told me, "She's got a pretty good virus. You and Dad may end up with a cold."

My daughter. She's such a giver.

Negotiations

S: "I want my bone. You can't take my bone!"

J: "How about if I give you this lovely plastic chain?"

S: "THAT smells like I shouldn't play with it."

J: "How about a wicked game of peek-a-boo?"

S: "Uh, no thanks. I'm just going to go back to my bone."

J: "Hmmm. What if I get THIS bone?"
S: "That's mine, too. Where are you going with that?"
J: "Right about here. I dare you to try to take it from me."

The Latest

When we first came back from China and we were introducing J to all of the new people in her life, one person she instantly took to was Elastigirl's Manchild. He is 12 years old, and is just awesome with J. She just stares at him whenever he's nearby. Often J reaches out for him to hold her, which is a rare thing indeed.

One of the first things the Manchild did with J, and still does every time he sees her, was play peek-a-boo. He'll put his hands over his face and she just waits in anticipation for him to move them and say peek-a-boo, or sometimes "mao mao", which is what our guide told us is the Chinese version.

Well, yesterday at church after the service, I was holding J talking to friends when the Manchild walked up. J did not wait. SHE put her hands over her own face and then moved them and smiled at him! It was the cutest thing. She did it a few times and he did it back. Then she reached for him and, being a 12 year old boy, he wasn't overly enthusiastic to hold her, which was fine. So, she covered her eyes again.

Now today at home, if I say peek-a-boo, this happens:

What a sweetie.

Opening Day

Today was the first day of the rest of our lives. Phoebe's first soccer game.

OK, OK. I get it. Thanks Brandi for giving me that little push to sign her up (whether you knew you were doing it or not). Phoebe had a blast!

The games are made up of 10 minute quarters. Phoebe played the 2nd and 4th quarters. She finally seemed to get the hang of things about half way through the 4th quarter. Up to then, we had to remind her to pay attention to where the ball was, etc. Apparently she got into it on a corner kick when the coach told her to not let a girl on the other team get in front of her. That was all it took. We truly could not have asked for a better group of girls and parents. I'm so glad that the coach emphasizes that we're there to have fun.

Because pink is a popular color among girls this age, the opposing team had shirts similar in color to ours. Our team wore yellow scrimmage jersey thingies. You COULD tell them apart by their socks. Ours are black.

Here's Phoebe's first ever play in a soccer game. Doesn't she look like she knows what to do?

She did manage to keep up with the other girls most of the time. That's her on the right.

She didn't actually score here, but she was staying focused. Always a plus.

Here I'm really hoping she didn't push that girl down. I'm sure she didn't, but she's not trying to help her up either. She's going for the ball.

I liked this pic because she's actually in full on motion, trying to get to the ball and not part of the cluster. The blond in the middle of the pic? That's D. She's really good. I think she scored all 7 of our goals. (Not that they keep track of the score at this age, but we won.)

Soccer Practice - Take 2

Here we are on Thursday again. It's Phoebe's soccer practice day again. And the sky looked like this at 6:15pm.

Here's Phoebe all dressed up and ready to go. Boy, is she ready!

"This is how you take a soccer picture, mom."

I'm happy to report that the skies were only threatening and did not actually produce any thunder, lightning or rain.

Here's P practicing going after a corner kick. She also practiced corner kicks. She can't quite bend it like Beckham yet, but hey, neither can he a lot of the time.

Here's Josie watching big sister's practice. Notice the dark spot on her bottom lip? Well, maybe you can't see it, but she's been getting more and more brave letting go of things when standing. The down side is she tends to fall face first into whatever is closest.
Here's P after we got home. I'm not sure what's up with the pose. I just thought she looked so old, I had to post the pic.

And here it is...the jersey. Apparently my computer can't handle the color of the jersey. In the picture it looks kind of coral or salmon. NO. It's bright, Barbie pink. And I do mean pink. She's a bit excited.

There was a gorgeous sunset on the way home. I didn't manage to get a picture of it. Even with all the cool features the minivan has, it doesn't take pictures or drive for me while I take a picture.