Finger Painting with Grandma

Mom did finger painting with the kids one morning while she was here.  Sienna is probably still a bit too young for it since she puts everything in her mouth, but thankfully the paint is non-toxic!

 Don’t think I like this stuff on my hands!

Somehow Ethan managed to only get paint on one hand for a long time. But that finally changed and we got some handprints.

Bring on the paint! 

Now I’m getting more into this and liking it!

Hairstyles by Grandma

When I was a little girl my mom braided my hair and fixed it a different way every day for school.  I know how to braid but don’t know how to French braid, so while Mom was here I asked her to do Sienna’s hair.  I wasn’t sure how Sienna would do with sitting/standing still, but she did pretty well, especially if she had a book to look at or something to distract her.

Mom started out doing a simple braid on the side just to keep her hair out of her face.  She also made several barrettes including the one in the above picture.

I thought this was pretty simple and very cute, but I still can’t do it (even though it’s just a regular braid on each side).  I’ll need to keep practicing.

  Doing one French braid down the middle didn’t work as well since Sienna’s hair is so fine and still isn’t quite long enough for that.  It also has a number of cow licks that made it difficult to braid.

But it certainly looked good when Mom first did it (before it started falling down). 

Doing a French braid on each side and then down the back worked really well.  Maybe one of these days I will be able to do that.

Playing in the Snow

We had a good bit of snow while Gary was away teaching in January.

My mom came over to visit in January and brought this hat for Sienna.  I think she liked having a hat similar to Ethan's.

She is moving around a little better in her snow pants that are too big, but still has a difficult time getting up from the ground.  She wasn’t too happy in this picture.  

Ethan was such the helper!

Our Son, the Fireman

Ethan enjoys fire trucks and playing firemen (sometimes he calls it “firefighters”).  He likes for Gary and me to lie on the couch or even stand against the wall and pretend to sleep until he “rings” the bell for us to get ready to fight a fire.  The fire pole that we are supposed to go down changes from an imaginary one to a broom to a column in the house.

Putting fires out with the different “water hoses”.Ethan slides the shopping cart around the floor as a fire truck and sprays out fires.

Ethan Studying the Church Directory

Ethan enjoys occasionally looking through the church directory from our church here in Hungary.  If he doesn’t know who someone is, he asks who they are and sometimes other questions about them such as where do they live (like in the city or one of the other surrounding towns).

So focused

Here he is pointing out that this family has moved to the States.

We just got a new directory at the end of December.  Ethan didn’t want to eat dinner so he could look at it.  We told him that he had to eat first, so he ate quickly.

Taking Down the Christmas Tree

Well, it came to that sad time of year when we needed to take down the Christmas tree and decorations.  One month is such a short time to have them up, but I don’t like doing it much before December, and definitely not before Thanksgiving.  With Gary leaving for a teaching trip so early in January and then leaving again after one day we decided to take everything down on the 1st.  The kids helped.

For William and Peggy

My uncle and aunt sent a Christmas package for Ethan and Sienna and couldn’t open the pictures I sent in e-mail.  So, here are a few so they can see them.

I personally think this picture is precious (but I’m biased :-)).  Sienna still doesn’t understand what it means to get a package or when the green postal truck comes and the postman rings our doorbell, but Ethan does and gets very excited!

We had to restrain Ethan and encourage Sienna to pull things out of the package.The kids loved their toys and books!  Thank you William and Peggy!