picture this

My Dad stands up the other day, puts on M's necklace, grabs his shirt tails and prances, yes prances, around the room singing, "dream come true, dream come true" over and over in a high pitched voice.  

have you met my Dad?????

Madam Librarian

Tobler Sunday Dinner-Thai Style!

Dad has a very cool resident who we'll call Joy. She's part Thai, she's friendly and sweet and we wish she'd somehow just become a Tobler herself!

She came and cooked with Teriney and it was sooo fabulous.

Below is Pad Thai with prawns

some of the gang, we missed getting a pic of the chef, in the little bowls is a coconut, chicken and mushroom soup that was to die for! 

green curry with chicken, eggplant and zucchini

red curry with beef, baby corns, bamboo shoots, and pineapple

noodle balls, so pretty and yummy

For dessert we had sticky rice with mangoes! so yummy!!!! sorry, no recipes to share but enjoy the eye candy

Christian's baptism

My oldest nephew had his eighth birthday today!  That means that he can be baptized and confirmed a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.

My parents gave him the scriptures for his birthday and I made him a bag to carry them around. It's a work in progress. I want to make some kind of flap so that if it gets dropped, everything won't go flying, but we'll get there.

I asked him one time if I made him a bag, what would it look like. He said, blue and yellow with a Harry Potter lightning bolt on it.  How'd I do??? It was fun to make!

And something else I finally made. I've had these cut out and ready to sew for weeks but finally did it last weekend while W was on his way home from Dallas. I couldn't sleep waiting for him, so I stayed up until one am sewing.  I'm in love with them!

mom's checklist

I had a sweet conversation with my Mom on the way to a church Enrichment activity. We were talking about my sister's new boyfriend.  He wants to come and visit at the end of the semester! augh! (a boyfriend coming all the way here to meet all of us crazy people!) and it's not the boyfriend that was her Valentine! augh! (she's only nineteen! she can't have boyfriends!) We were talking about a Mom's right to pray for her children and receive revelation for her children.  

In my head, I was thinking, Did she pray about W and me?  Did she get a good feeling and was thrilled with my choice or a bad feeling but supported me anyway? augh again!!

Timidly, I asked her! She said, Oh, I feel totally responsible for W! When we met him, it was like checking things off a list in my head of qualities that I wanted for my daughter.  It was the year that I walked on the treadmill everyday and would walk and ponder and pray a lot.  I prayed for Joe that he would find someone that..... and I prayed that you would find someone that would take care of you and adore you and other qualities that I would list in my prayers. I knew you needed to get married because you'd be such a good mom.  So, I didn't even really need to pray to find out if it's right because he had everything I'd requested for you. 

It made me feel so good about my sweet husband that even if he drives us nuts sometimes, he's exactly not only just what I wanted but what my Mom wanted too.

And that's another reason why my Mom is so wonderful!

**parentheses added for explanation that augh! is not a bad thing. It's more, I can't believe my sister has a boyfriend that might come to visit and she's nineteen!

It's all mine fault!

I took M to the doctor last week. I was worried that potty training had given her a UTI.  M would NOT give the doctor a urine sample. shocking, I know! Then the doctor sat down and asked if we'd had any big changes lately like going back to work.

ummm... yeah.

She then told me to back off toilet training completely until M tells me she'd ready and gave me some handouts.  A week later, I'm reading the handouts.

I'm such a good mom.

One has a list of do's and don'ts to prevent toilet training problems.  Here are the don'ts:

DON'T:

Don't try to start teaching your child to use the toilet when he is in a stubborn or negative phase.
Don't use any kind of punishment or pressure. guilty
Don't force your child to sit on a potty chair or keep him on it against his will. guilty
Don't flush the toilet while your child is sitting on it.
Don't lecture or remind your child. guilty
Avoid friction about using the toilet. guilty
Avoid battles or showdowns about using the toilet. guilty
Don't try to control what you can't control. guilty
Never escalate your response, you will always lose. guilty
Don't appear overconcerned about this normal body function. Be casual and relaxed during your child's learning process. guilty
When your child begins to use the toilet, don't expect perfection. Some accidents will probably occur for months.

C. R. A. P.

The good news is that I WAS doing okay on the do's list as well. I apparently don't know what the heck I'm doing!  And so she's spent the last week having some accidents and varying between panties and pullups and diapers.  And thus the princess potty diaries will continue... on and on and on and on!

cute cute giveaway!

Go to Make it and Love it for a cute giveaway!

mmm... baby!

pic courtesy pioneer woman

You have got to try this!

I was the cook for Tobler Sunday dinner... being that it was just our little fam and Sam. It was a nice quiet Sunday complete with a long nap for all of us!

I heart DVR!

Is it bad that one of the things I love about living here is my parents' DVR?  I love watching what I want when I want... that is, can! Especially when SEC basketball interrupts "Lost"!  or when M asks about the guy that's dying on "Law & Order" and I don't get to watch it live.  

I love "Lost"!!! I love the characters, the story, the twists, the irony and intertwining plots!  I am a Sawyer fan. I'm going to be really mad if Kate returning makes him do something really awful to Juliet.  I love the new guy who can "see dead people"- he gets all the best lines after Sawyer!  I love the island!

My Dad has gotten me hooked on the "Ghost Whisperer" since we moved here.  Once you get past the fact that Jennifer Love Hewitt wears super-dressy, often-revealing outfits to run around dealing with ghosts and that her eyelashes can NOT be real, you can really get sucked in. And I have. I like that not every episode is scary but some are and the cool ideas that they come up with.  

Now here's where my cheeks get red and I duck my head a bit to admit that my Mom has gotten me totally hooked on "Charmed"! It's not on TV anymore but it's on TNT every morning and afternoon and well, I watch it almost every morning and/or afternoon.  Oh, I soooo need to be spending my time better!  And you want to talk revealing clothing! The three witches on this show fight demons in skin-tight, skimpy clothing!  It is cheesy and hokey and I'm hooked!  

So between all those shows (among the many others that I watch now and then), it's no wonder my room is a mess! 

proof!

Poor LG! She truly has no pictures of her compared to the hundreds we have of M! As soon as I posted about her sitting up, I was on a mission to take a good picture of her doing it.  So here she is in all her glory! Sitting up, playing with toys and giggling at Mom!

She also recently discovered that her toes are permanent toys that never go away and are fun to suck on!

And here is my little bird.  I took some video of her at dinner yesterday eating.  It cracks me up.  She sits there with her mouth wide open and if we don't shovel it in fast enough, she growls at us!  And rocks back and forth in her chair, she's so excited to eat.  I love it! I'll upload another video of the bird pose later.... or send it directly to Grace and Grandma Jan because they're probably the only ones who want to see it! :)

She sits up!

I don't have any pictures yet, but she's sitting up and it's soooo cute!  She sat on the pew at church almost the whole time, just playing with her toys! She is such a big girl!

Unfriended

I'm having a pity party for myself.

I think I'm a friendly person.  

I'm easily intimidated by others and I am intimidating (so they say) to some others.  So I still have to work on being better at this.

I am trying to be a better listener.

I'm trying to keep in touch, especially since we moved twice in the last year!

but I still don't think I deserved to be "unfriended". cause yes, some people do notice and yes, they will be insulted.  

so, if you're on the list that thinks I've been a crappy friend, please be patient with me.  because I really am working on it.

I am Job!

I started working two weeks ago! 

People have asked how it's going and I haven't had much time to report so here's the low-down.  

I'm not working at the Children's hospital for now. I may in the future but they don't have anything for me to do right now.  Since I got here though, a lady at church as encouraged me to check out her daughter's school.  I'm not a school speech therapist. I have never wanted to work in a school so I always thanked her and told her I "might" in the future.  Then one day, my Mom mentioned the school in passing and asked if I'd ever followed that tip.  My Mom and her impressions!

So I called the school and less than a week later I had a job!  I work two days a week. It's a really cool place. It's a small private school for special needs kids.  Some parents started a homeschool because they weren't happy with the services their kids were getting at school. It grew and now it's its own school.  There are less than 30 kids there and most have Down Syndrome or Autism.  They go to class during the day and the therapists pull them out for speech, PT and OT.  What I love is that it's the best of both worlds. It's a school but I'm not tied to an IEP or a school curriculum.  

My first day of work was rough so the next week at church everyone was so excited to hear how it went and I felt bad. I didn't have much to report.  But I loved the kids from the first day!  Now that I know my way around and am more comfortable, I'm really enjoying it!  

My Dad

I've always known my Dad was pretty amazing.  So forgive me for bragging. Click here.

What to make, what to sew!

I got some new, yummy fabrics this morning. Mom and I went with Teriney and descended on two stores with all our girls and found some lovely fabric. I've been drooling over this line for the past few weeks. In a few weeks, it will be some very cute Easter dresses for two cuter girls I know!

I'm going to mix and match the stripes and small flowers so the dresses "match" but are individual.  

Now, what to make???

This one?

or maybe this one?

this one's cute too!

Tobler Sunday Dinner

Last Sunday was a classic... Mom's Chicken Rolls! yum! I've made these for the Holman's and even their picky palates liked them.

3 cups chicken, cooked, shredded, keep the juices it cooked in for gravy

1 pkg. cream cheese

scallions, chopped

1/4 cup butter, softened

1 can mushrooms

salt and pepper to taste

2 cans crescent rolls

walnuts and pepperidge farm stuffing mix, chopped and ground

Mix cream cheese and butter til smooth. Stir in chicken, onions, and mushrooms and salt and pepper to taste.  Love my precise directions, don't you! 

Get some more butter, melt and put butter in one bowl and bread crumbs/stuffing mixed with nuts in another.  Stretch out one crescent roll, put a spoonful of chicken mix in and wrap it up! Dip in butter, roll it in the nuts/bread crumbs and bake them at 325 for 20 minutes.  Make gravy with your drippings and enjoy some warm, gooey yumminess!! We love it with Uncle Ben's Wild Rice.