Pefi doesn't want a friend.

Our Mardi Gras Queen

The adventures of having a pet fish. We are on Pefi #3. The first two met an untimely demise. We believe Pefi Uno might have had some problems before we bought him. Pefi Dos got his head stuck in a little bridge we'd gotten for inside the tank. Pefi Tres on the other hand... doing well. He was not doing so hot until I changed up the tank a bit but now he's doing swimmingly. So well in fact that now I have no need for Pefi Quatro, which I purchased in anticipation of Pefi Tres going the way of Uno and Dos.

After 5 days of Tres doing well we decided that maybe we'd give him a playmate.  I know what you're thinking. NOOOOOOO don't put two bettas together in one tank. Yeah... Well... Where were you yesterday?  Seriously.bad.scene. I thought that Pefi got excited at seeing the other fish because he wanted to play with him.  Well, play with him if that can be defined as biting Cuatro's fins and chasing him like a mad-fish. I'm telling you I've never seen anything like it. Pefi's cheeks puffed out and he went bat-fish crazy. Straight up fishy-mental. Did I mention Katherine was watching this whole scene?  Mmmmhhhmmm.  #I'lltakemyparentoftheyearawardnow.

Pefi is now solo in his tank again and I've learned that there's quite possibly nothing worse than putting two male bettas together in one tank. Note to self: there's a reason they sell the fish in little cups and not in big tanks like all other fish. *sigh*

In other news... Last weekend we went to Myrtle Beach.  We had a great time. We met with a few sitters that hopefully will make our working from MB a little easier. The first one was a keeper. Katherine thought she was great too. She's a grand mom of I believe 10 grandchildren and immediately got Katherine on her side with a little toy monkey that banged tambourines. So much so that when the 2nd sitter got there she asked her whether she brought her a cute little monkey like the last lady did. ha!! Fortunately the second woman didn't understand what she was asking. Towards the end of meeting #2 Katherine turned to me and said, "mom, are there any more people coming?" Dismissed by the 3.5 year old.

We had two Mardi Gras parties complete with beads, king cake & mardi gras music.  We even had a little dancing choreographed by Just Dance 2. (holy work out!!!) My wonderful, loving daughter chose my dancing time to point and laugh. Just not right.

Some pictures from Valentine's Day & Mardi Gras parties 1 and 2. =)

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Painting, Peffie & Play-doh

The P's continue. Unintentionally I assure you.

On Friday evening I had a "mom's night out". We went for wine and painting at a local studio. First thing I learned... I seriously need lines and numbers.  As in paint by numbers. Wo-ow. It was great fun although it taught me that my creative side is limited. I'm an in the lines kind of girl. Creative shmative. Tell me a rule and I'll follow it. Tell me to paint "whispy" or "let it flow" and I'm looking around and watching others to mimic technique. Here's hoping Katherine is far more "right-brained" than I. (I took a test tonight just to see how left/right brained I am. I'm 80% left brained. Stephen on the other hand: 75% right brained.) ~ I learned tonight that you can think in pictures. Seriously?! Pictures???? I can't comprehend such a world.

My version of Van Gogh's "Peach Tree"
His was better. 

Saturday morning Katherine and I had our 2nd cooking class.  This time "cooking" was making some fun  chocolate lollypops and (non-edible) play-doh. The lollypop making was a huge success... And they taught me something! We've made candy before at home and I couldn't figure out how to get different colors in the candy without making a total mess. I've looked for the little candy brushes that they talk about on the bags of candy chips and I've not been able to find them. What do they give 3 year olds? Paint brushes!!! DUH!!! Why didn't I think of that?! That's why they make the big bucks. (Literally... big bucks.)

Candy making with an attitude

The play-doh was creatively made with cinnamon, apple sauce and glue.  Of course it was repeated (many) time that even though it was made with cinnamon and apple sauce that it was non-edible. Talk about tempting fate with such a wonderful smelling thing to play with?! The look of "brown" play-doh however kept Katherine from putting in her pie-hole. ;)

After cooking class Katherine wanted to go "have coffee" with me at Starbucks. This means she has either hot hot chocolate or cold hot chocolate and I have a latte. Katherine selected cold hot chocolate (you may refer to this as chocolate milk...) and we sat at a little bar and watched the people outside walking by. We talked about school, life (as a three year old) and her favorite "jobs" at school. It was awesome!!

Enjoying her "cold hot chocolate"

After "coffee" we did a little shopping in Target. She wanted to "walk around". Never a good thing for me. I generally end up getting sucked into something that I didn't plan on. She's so stinkin' irresistible sometimes!! Especially after our "coffee time". So. She got a new Hurricane's sweatshirt and a new NC State t-shirt. Gotta support Red. ;)

After that we headed home to get Stephen.  He'd had an "oyster morning" (as in - the world is his oyster) while we ladies were out doing girly stuff. Katherine decided that she wanted to go out for lunch and given we were having so much fun and we were planning to go out to get her new pet fish I thought it was a grand idea. We went to Moe's for lunch. She had a "grown-up quesadilla". This consists of including chicken - not just cheese in her quesadilla.

We then went for the big event. BIG I tell you. The pet store. For Katherine's first pet. Last week we worked towards getting a pet fish. Katherine needed to get 30 chores completed on her chore chart AND get dressed every day "without giving mommy a hard time". We had a break down the previous Friday and it was determined that she lost the opportunity to get a fish as a result. Circles re-set on Sunday and we started the effort again. She achieved 30 circles on Friday morning AND got dressed every day without "giving mommy a hard time". < big big big deal for me!!!

Earlier in the day Katherine told me she'd picked out a name for her fish. It's name would be "Peffie" or Pefi. Either way... you get the idea.

Which fish?? Hmmmm. 

We decided to get a betta fish as the guy in the pet store said they were super easy.

Crazy happy with Peffie =)

Well... 30 hours later I'm going to be engaging in the 14-day return policy and hopefully getting Peffie's cousin. *sigh* Looking at the picture above it just breaks my heart that the fish had the nerve to do what he did. Stephen didn't even clean the tank with soap!!! (The task that as a child sent his pet fish to an early demise... He's still teased about the event.)

Saturday evening we started, and finished, all of Katherine's valentine's for school. She tried to write her name. I feel this is all my fault that she can't write her name. I should have insisted on a short name. Bob. Better. A letter. Or a symbol. Perhaps a circle. She'd be able to write her name already. She can write "dad" but she can't manage Katherine. <<<----- sooooo many letters!!! And E's... ridiculous. Alas, we tried. I attempted to make dots for her to trace. We tried just doing KK... At the end we were losing the "fun" part and I bailed. I finished writing the rest. She wanted to move onto stickers. I wasn't arguing.

Sunday we spent the morning hanging out at home and finishing up in our old office. We've even gotten the treadmill back together. Big news in the Aleksza house! I can't wait to jump on it! Annnnd... It's not over the family room anymore! It's over the garage so *hopefully* it won't sound like a heard of elephants running anymore as you watch TV. (This is what my darling husband would tell me as I ran... Evidently I shook the house. Whatever.)

Hope you all have a great week ahead! xo

Darlene

My art effort... Captured via pictures...

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Cooking Class

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I'll take "P" week every week, please.

Each week at school Katherine learns about a different letter of the alphabet. On Friday's the show-and-share theme is the letter of the week.

I'll admit to having anxiety over show-and-share day. I have it marked on my calendar each week with 2 days advanced reminder so I can start to think about things that Katherine can take. Choices, if you will. I've resorted numerous times to doing google searches for "things that start with [insert letter here] for show-and-share". Sometimes it helps. Sometimes it fails me miserably.

There's a lot of pressure as a Mom to get this right.  Pressure put on by the three year old.  Each Friday as she gets in the car, or when she comes home, she gives the run-down of everyone's show and share items. Sometimes it will be "so and so didn't bring a show and share today. they cried." Oh dear. Or, so and so brought a doll for show and share. Ms [teacher] told her that didn't start with L.

As the girl who used to get teased in school, I don't want my child to be the one teased. Note: I also don't want her to be the one teasing either!!! In either case... I have this pressure to make sure I get it right.

This week is P week. I thought about 30 different things she could bring for P week. We've been thinking about P week for about a month now. It started when we were talking about my brother and his job. He's a police officer. < P!!!! So we asked him to take a picture of himself in uniform. Score. THEN, at Christmas when we were in NJ, Katherine saw our cousin Gerry. He's a PILOT. Holy smokes. Another P. Now we've got a competition going. We can't take Gerry and Uncle Jason to school.  Although we did consider that momentarily but we weren't sure they'd fit in her backpack.

We decided pictures of both would be great. Holy smokes. Did you notice P!!!! PICTURES!!! Awesome. As I was getting the pictures ready to post to a certain store so I could go pick them up I noticed several other pictures that I thought might be fun. Katherine as a princess. Opening presents. With pumpkins. Striking a pose.... Okay - Idea. What if we print all of the pictures and put them in a photo album. (You see how you can get so caught up on P words... photo album... another one.)

When I told Katherine tonight that we had tons of stuff she could take for show-and-share, she reminded me of the rule that "you can only take ONE thing in for show-and-share mommy". Yes, dear. I know. I'm a rule follower too. =)

So we prepared our ONE thing but managed to get a bunch of P words/items factored in this week.

Here's Katherine showing me her show-and-share item for P week.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w2zoy9CyRKg


*Note, all photos were inserted by katherine into the album. I printed and let her pick which pictures she wanted to use. =)

You run. You eat. You run. You try not to hurl.

At the finish line with K:
GAME FACE! ;)

This was my second time running this race. Third time registered... but only the 2nd time I've run in it. (Last year it was pouring rain and I'll admit, I wimped out.)

I love this race for so many reasons. The energy. The craziness. The sweet carbs in the middle. The outfits. The fans. I could go on. The one thing that makes this race interesting... Seeing how many people hurl on the way back. This year had WAY more than my first year.

The race goes like this... Run 2.5miles from the NCSU bell tower to the downtown Krispy Kreme. Consume donuts. Run 2.5 miles back to the bell tower. There are two types of people that enter this race. (no, I'm not referring to crazy & college student.) Competitors & Casual Runners. Competitors must eat the full dozen donuts provided. They must show their empty box to the race officials as they go through the competitor chute. Casual Runners do not need to eat the full dozen. They can eat as many, or as few, as they desire. I'm of the Casual Runner group. While a dozen hot donuts might go down without an issue. A dozen cold donuts. Not so much. Although two still go down without needing to come up for air. Don't judge.

The course is hilly. There seem to be far more UP hills then down hills. I know the ups should match with downs, but I don't know... Sure doesn't seem that way.

I ran the first 2.5 miles at a decent pace. Grabbed my dozen and headed to find a place to consume the carb goodness. At that point I met up with a couple of friends. We ate. We took pictures. We admired one of the friends (MB) for consuming her full dozen. Impressive. There was glaze everywhere. And she was smiling. I convinced (KM) to run back carrying the rest of his donuts. We did. I believe about a mile back he started telling me how bad of an idea it was to run & carry them. Kudos though... He made it to the end.

Just as we were getting to the finish line (a few hundred yards away) I saw Stephen & Katherine. I grabbed her and she and I ran with KM to the finish line. She giggled the whole way! It was awesome!! Of course we had to dodge quite a few piles of donuts... not in the round sugar coated variety. More in the post consumption & revisited variety. Oh yeah. Good times. I nearly lost my own donuts as we tip-toed through the mess, but I managed to get through it. Thankfully.

Highlights of the race:

• Favorite Quote
• At .75mi of the 5mi race the girl beside me starts yelling... "Where is the water station?! I need a gel!!!" 
• Favorite Sign
• "Don't puke. HURL those donuts."
• Favorite Costume/s
• The Syracuse super-heros. (I have nothing more to say about that.)
• Scariest Moment
• A guy beside me, on the return, turning a little green. I yelled, "DO NOT HURL THOSE DONUTS!!!! And if you must: MOVE!!!" He laughed. I was very concerned I'd be caught in the wind and end up with 2nd time around donuts. 
• Favorite moment
• Crossing the finish line with my best girl hand-in-hand

PS: I can't wait to do it again next year. =) 

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Just Us Girls

"do you see your shadow
lil groundhoggie?"

For the last three weeks Stephen has been traveling and/or had meetings at work that have kept him pretty busy. My time was back in September/October/November... his is now.

So that's left Katherine and I having quite a few "ladies nights" and when Stephen is home, having some fun family time.

Each weekend for the last two weeks we've had a birthday party to go to.  Katherine's friends have all started to turn 4. She says "yippee" for the parties... I say "yippee these parents are scoping out the choices for me!" Both parties that we've been to have been lots of fun. One was at an indoor play center that had a bunch of outdoor play sets. The second was at Little Gym.  Katherine had a blast at both.  She's one of the youngest of the group so I have no doubt we'll have more options coming up. ;)

Playing at Little Gym

We started a chore chart for Katherine in January. Each week we pick a "big" prize for her to be able to get if she gets 30 circles on her chore chart. (This was revised over a couple of weeks to try to figure out what the best "earn" was to get the prize.) We've had a Dance Party, Strawberry Shortcake Movie Night party, mani/pedi night and this week... We're working towards a pet fish. I'm not sure how we quite got there... Okay, I'm totally sure, but I'm going with ignoring how it happened because it was all my fault. I will say however that I decided to make said pet fish something she needed to work for rather than just getting it. So far (it's Thursday) and she's earned 30 circles (we're about a day early on where we usually are on our 30 day circle mark). She seriously wants that fish. I'm going to have to think of something really good for next weeks reward.

Part of the reward system is reminding her what she's working for...
My attempt at drawing a fish.

My sister Nicole moved to Raleigh over the last couple of weeks. I'm so excited that she's now under 30 minutes away versus the 90 minutes she was before. We've been to her new apartment twice now and each time have laughed until we cried. And we managed to unpack these boxes... and then some!!

Last night Katherine and I had a little Groundhog Day fun. I decided to do it the night before so I could explain Groundhog Day before the actual day occurred. Plus then she'd be able to have her "groundhog" to see if she could see a shadow. :) She made a puppet pop-up groundhog and then we had dessert dirt with a groundhog in it. She thought "sprinkling dirt" onto of the "dirt" was fun.  (cookie crumbles on top of chocolate pudding) She took her Groundhog puppet pop-up to school with her this morning to show her teachers but then asked me to bring it home so it "would be safe". I'm not entirely sure what she thought would happen to it at school.

This weekend Stephen will be home and there aren't really any plans. I'm looking forward to some down time... Well down time after the one thing that IS planned... the Krispy Kreme Challenge. =) I don't plan to consume the full dozen but I will be partaking of at least one... or two... or... I'll totally stop before I eat the whole dozen. For sure. I think. Probably. :) For my friends racing... Good luck! And don't puke in my path. Thanks.

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