A few notes from this week

This is Elena and ALL THE STUFF she has to take into the bathroom every single time she goes potty. She is a bag lady extraordinaire. She gets a sticker and a chocolate every time she goes, but lately she cares more about the stickers than the chocolate. However, she raided the drawer we kept the stickers in and now they are dispersed throughout her bag collection. Still, every time she goes potty she locates one and gives it to herself. Crazy chica.

Chilling on the couch. Oh, by the way, Elena has become so spoiled of late. Practically every Sunday at church the Hermanas in Guardaria (Nursery) give her some toy. She has a Dora doll they gave her that she carries everywhere. Then we went to a family's house for dinner two Saturday's ago, (they're in the Spanish ward, the wife's from Colombia so of course we were instant buddies!) and their daughter Nathalia gave Elena a Dora backpack--the one she's wearing. Now she takes that everywhere too. She also wants to go to school everyday with Ana and is so sad that she can't go.Elena is lecturing Ana on the intricacies of the book, but Ana obviously isn't interested.Isabel is most interested in eating books of late, rather than reading them. So far she's digested almost an entire alphabet board book and several Friend magazines. Yum. This is one of those killer squirrels out on our back step, plotting on how to enter and steal all the good food I've been baking. Evil thing. Really, I've been on a cooking kick. I'll post my favorite recipe after this. Sorry no pictures, everything was eaten too quickly. But I made brownies, apple pie, Bavarian Apple Torte (that's this recipe--sooo good!), Tortilla Soup, Pandequeso (my best batch yet), BBQ's Cheddar Quesidillas, and well, that's it, but in the space of four days, it seems like a lot. We had our friends, the Herrs, over for dinner Friday night. It was so nice, they just feel like family, friends like that are just few, very very few. :)
Elena decided to exercise with me. She is in the way a lot of the time, but at least it isn't her whining for me to come someplace else, or get something for her, or crying about who knows what.
She does pretty well, for as long as her attention lasts. Her push-ups are the funniest things ever.
Ana took some sewing classes for her early birthday present (we also gave her a Barbie sewing machine, but it was second hand and doesn't really work), anyway she loved it at first but by the last project the teacher had to finish quite a bit for her. Anyway, this is a baby blanket she made for a good friend of ours.
This is the blanket she made for herself.
And the pajama pants she has on, was the last project. She also made a pillowcase. Sweet, eh?