Shara's first movie in a theater

Today we went to see Horton Hears a Who. This is the first movie Shara's seen in a real movie theater! She really liked it. We read the story so she'd know what it was about and the reviews said that it was good and appropriate for 4+, so we gave it a shot. She wasn't scared, but did sit on my lap. We saw previews that didn't scare her either, but the movies wouldn't be good for her to see at this age. Of course Mommy & Daddy will go see Speed Racer. But at this age, she's good in not wanting to see things that are for older kids.

After the movie we swung by work to change the backup tape and then to Stone Forge in Easton for lunch. It was ok. Shara liked her mac & cheese. We then took a quick trip to Hilliard's to check out the Easter candy. Our bi-annual pilgrimage - Easter and Christmas. Shara picked a dark chocolate dipped flower Peep lollipop and I got a dark chocolate marshmallow egg. She was more than happy to pick just the one and to wait until next week to eat it. She really doesn't care too much about candy, at least not in practice. Yesterday we stopped at Target on the way home from dance and looked in the candy aisle and got an egg coloring kit, M&M stickers, and the promise to go to Hilliard's to get "good" candy. Meaning good quality and not this junk. Which turned out to be false since the yellow sugar coating on her marshmallow, not to mention the marshmallow itself is full of artificial junk! What I'm hoping is that getting one piece of "good stuff" is deemed higher than a large package of peeps - since that's the only size they came in. The original idea was to get a peep for Shara to experience, but the packages came with 12 or more, which is ridicules for one small kid. So we are all happy and hope that friends, relatives and classmates don't go nuts with the quantities.

Was going to post a movie that I uploaded to google movies - great service, but it was so dark there wasn't much point.

Jidor's Birthday - Part 1

Last night we had a really fun time at Tanya & Andrew's house. We were there to celebrate Mr. Rao & Jidor's birthdays. It was a full house and very shortly after we arrived, Shara became comfortable and was just as social as if she'd been there many times before. She loved the 2 medium sized doggies and visiting with all the people. She also says she liked the short kids - Alex and Andrea. She also liked watching Poker on tv. Shara wants me to write that the last time we were at Jill's she pet Bell lots of times. Tanya was certainly a hit with Shara. She loved playing and talking with her quite a bit, and really had fun doing London Bridges.
Take a look at some pictures and soon you can view a movie.

JidorBday1

Words to live by

The other night at dinner we were talking about nice words to live by. I mentioned Denise Austin's (as well as others) motto, "live well, love much, laugh often. Shara said, "live happily ever after and don't let the moose bite your tongue". We thought those were great words to live by!

Edamame

I was trying to think of what Shara said earlier that made me laugh and tonight she said, "you were going to make me edamame" and then I remembered, but she didn't. She made a joke saying, "eata mommy. I don't want to eat mommy!"

Going to New Hampster

Shara's been saying may funny things lately - new hampster is certainly one of them! I'll try to write them down or get them to stick in my mind when they happen or they seem to be gone forever )-;

Last week we started super bargaining. Shara wanted me to write a note to remind her to listen because she really wanted to go with me to the SEMLS Legislative Breakfast with all my library friends. She knew if she didn't behave, she couldn't go. So I wrote her a note that said, "Shara, remember to listen" and we posted it on her mirror (mirra, thank you Anne Marie - dance teacher). For the next day or 2 it came in really handy and we even brought it with us to the breakfast. She had a good time, was great, and everyone was very sweet and enjoyed seeing her.

The other day (Sunday) she said to me, "I want clips in my hair." I told her we could do that tomorrow, when I did her hair. She said it's a big treat and I asked her if she wanted that to be a big treat/reward for being good and she said, "yes". Apparently she just can't be good for the sake of being good and knows it. She actually ended up not getting clips because she couldn't keep it together that night. I even had to threaten to take Skippy John Jones back to the library. It's awful because on the one hand, I want to laugh because she sounds so cute saying, "don't bring back skippy john jones", but then she's so upset it's tough for all of us.

She was so tired and had very little sleep because Saturday night she stayed at Oma & Jidor's while we went to dinner. Picked her up after 8 PM and she didn't end up getting to sleep until about 10 because of the trip home and needing to read books, which didn't quite happen because it was so late and we ended up giving in to a really short one because at that point, lessons will not be learned. The next day we went to breakfast - Good Day's and then to the market & Lowe's and then home for a short nap. We wanted to get up in time to go to the Mansfield Library to see Sparkey's Puppets. It was really cute and we had a good time. Shara had fun playing with the puzzles at the library after, and we picked out some nice books. Later though things got ugly. Dinner was ok - but she didn't want to eat much, and was holding out for popcorn which we finally understood and brought it to her to have with supper. Eventually things worked out and she went to sleep.

Yesterday was the best day we've had in a while, but really it's been quite good. We finally figured out most of her fits are really pretend and real tears happen and we have to learn to joke her out of it because she's really trying to pull one over on us. Yesterday on the way to school she's trying to tell me that she'd rather be sad and she doesn't know why. She's saying this with such a straight face that I started thinking I have a manic depressive child, but she was just joking with me. I can see we have a lot to look forward to as she gets older and smarter. Another thing that got her laughing this morning was Tenley's yogurt. She couldn't decide between vanilla or banana so brought both. I called it banilla, not very original, but new to Shara and she thought about it and then started smiling, then got shy about it and hid a little.

Oh, and everything is now her favorite, "popcorn is my favorite" "pink is my favorite", and Good Days has the best syrup, much better than what we have at home, and she calls Alan and me "your highness" and rather than just saying, "yes" she often says, "yes sirs". I think we're reading to her too much. Is that possible?