J is for Jelly

Sometimes I wonder if the child can "read my mind." If so it is not a fully realized skill, at least based on this week's Alphabe-Thursday post. I thought for sure she would pick Jelly Beans for her J word...especially since her first field trip by school bus this past year was to a local Jelly Bean factory.

After some false starts she settled on the word Jelly. (Close, but not quite, Mom.)

Jelly is another staple around here. This week we just have grape, and it's just the generic store brand, so not that exciting of a photo...I know. All kind of plain isn't it...but in my book there is little better than hot buttered toast with a bit of grape jelly. Yum!

It is a bit of a bone of contention, though, too. Sometime in the middle of the school year the child started asking for peanut butter and jelly sandwiches in her lunch. Not a problem. She generally gets on a streak where she wants the same thing for weeks on end. That's not a problem either, except that evidently she burned out on PB&J. Now it is Summer and we do a fair amount of packing lunches to take them on road trips, or to the park, or whatever. The easiest thing to pack is sandwiches and now she no longer wants peanut butter and Jelly. For a while she would eat meat and cheese, but no more. I personally like peanut butter and Jelly, but not together, so I've tried one half of each, but that was not satisfactory. To make matters worse, the boy has a mild peanut allergy, so I usually just give him Jelly and then...that's what she wants, but she needs the protein and he drinks milk (which she won't). It all sounds very minor until you know that when she isn't happy about something it displays with aggression, sometimes even hours later when I think the whole problem has blown over. When it's over something that I don't feel I can compromise on (like ingesting some protein) it's like being caught in a trap. Well today maybe I got a break. We had sandwiches for lunch and without batting an eye she requested peanut butter and Jelly again. You're sure? Yep.

So what was that all about? I'll never know...

Maybe Alphabe-Thursday just did me a huge favor!

Jump on over to all the other Jubilant Jiffies here.

I is for Ice Cream

We are home again - first day back - so this will be short and sweet (literally!)

It didn't take the child long to think of something that starts with I, and then ask to have it for dessert. Luckily we had some in the freezer.

Ice cream is kind of a staple around here. It is rare to find us with no Ice cream in the house. My husband is a dessert hound, and has passed this on to his children quite nicely. When she asks for Ice cream I really don't mind. She refuses to drink milk, so this is one way to get some calcium in her, and since she is so active she is skinny as a rail. Yes, she gets that from her daddy, too.

I scream

You scream

We all scream

for Ice Cream!

Go get some...you know you want it...

Then hurry back to Investigate other Imaginative Inventions here...

H is for Harness

Here we are at Grandma's House, and just squeaking in for the Alphabe-Thursday letter H through the eyes of the child.

In unfamiliar territory it took a while to think of a word that starts with H, but the one she arrived at is very fitting in a sweet and sad kind of way. It used to be, you see, that a big part of the thrill of going to Grandma's House was getting to see Grandma's dog. Grandma's rambunctious, rascally, over-excitable, but beautiful, brindled boxer. Our children viewed McKenzie as sort of a long-distance pet. We have no pets of our own, and the fun of walking, feeding, and playing with Grandma's dog never got old (we went Home before that ever happened.) Sadly, McKenzie died about six months ago, somewhat suddenly though not unexpectedly. It has been very sad for Grandma, who misses her constant companion, and a great loss for the children as well.

Grandma is not quite up to the task of taking on another pet (though she would if we didn't put our foot down) and so there is a great void now at Grandma's House.

Today when asked for a word starting with H, the child thought for a long time, and then said, "Harness - McKenzie's Harness that we used to walk her," then promptly went to the closet and found it in its usual handy hanging spot. Luckily, the child had also brought (400 miles, in the van) our large stuffed dog which was more than Happy to model the Harness. Then I realized that she probably brought this dog to try to fill the void. Even after I snapped this photo she "walked" the dog around the house, much to our amusement.

In loving memory of sweet McKenzie, and all pets everywhere who have brought us so much joy.

Head over to Ms. Jenny's Headquarters to read more Heavenly Headlines

G is for Green

We are now departing noun-land. So far everything the child has decided I should photograph was a noun: apron, blanket, cup, dresser, elephant, fireflies...GREEN. Maybe there just wasn't a noun in sight that started with G, or maybe she realized photography is visual and you can take a picture of a adjective, too. Maybe she remembered that Green is one of my favorite colors.

Can you take a picture of something Green, Mom?
Sure. What Green thing should I take a picture of?
The palm leaf.

Silly me at first I thought she meant one of Daddy's beautiful house plants. Nope.

No she wants me to reveal to the world (well some small portion of it anyway) that we still have Easter decorations up in plain sight at our house. Yep.

This is a palm leaf made in Sunday School by Little Brother on Palm Sunday (so technically Pre-Easter Decorations.)

He even embellished it a little with some green paint. So it is Green on Green...very Green. And yes, it is (past) the 4th of July, but we all know people who keep their Christmas trees up until Valentine's Day or so, so what's the big deal, right? Go ahead, enjoy a laugh at my expense.

Then Go Gander at other Great Goodies here.