Tidbits

Matthew slept 11 hours straight the other night. That is, I turned off the monitor and didn't go to get him until 11 hours had passed. This crying it out thing is painful. I didn't mind getting 6 straight hours of sleep, though. Hooray! Thought I'd post some videos.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eA2WNaC-T0s
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h_ofIvJOA-M

We changed ballet schools, following Ellie's original teacher to one of her own studios (she had quit in August). The new teacher the first school had hired was hardcore ballerina/non-nurturing preschool teacher. She actually yelled at Hailey because Hailey wanted to be held, then she yelled at Hailey and Ellie for lying on the ground. Then she made them do EVERY ballet move known to man during the 45 minutes. Ballerina Nazi teacher. Here's a video of her doing some moves.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nITp5dCrpRE
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=15KaXjKkCjI
This is another I came across from when she was about 15-16 months, I think.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dPvBK7u-zVc

I watched Akeelah and the Bee last night. Reminded me of Bring It On. And Take the Lead. And Mad Hot Ballroom (OK, that was a documentary, but still). And the TNT movie about the teacher with Chandler as the teacher. In other words, predictable and feel good to the point of cheese. It made me reminiscent of my spelling bee days. I actually went to County in 7th grade. My mom had made me study daily, and I hated it. So when I found myself in the top 4 at County, knowing the top 3 went to State, I blew it on purpose so I wouldn't have to study more. I said "f" instead of "ph". When I returned to my seat, my mom looks at me glaringly and says, "That was so obviously ph." Then she didn't speak to me for days.

There was a cold front in Houston. 2 glorious days of highs in the 80s. We're back in the 90s now. And that was fall and winter.

I'm trying to experiment more with cooking. I have to say, Food Network really inspires me. We hosted house church this week, and nearly everything I made was from some Food Network show. I forgot to salt and pepper the flank steak. Oops. Very important. Too bad there isn't a Korean food show. I think if I watched it, I'd be inspired to make more Korean.

I can't stop buying clothes for my kids. My specific weaknesses are shoes for both of them, cute tops for Ellie, and button down shirts for Matthew. You should see their shoe basket. Granted, Matthew only has 3 pairs of shoes, but the child can't even sit up yet. And Ellie has, like, 3 pairs of boots. Sigh. Gotta get a grip on this.

Ellie's stubbornness is getting stronger. Christen was over the other day, and I told Ellie not to do something in front of her. She got all haughty and wouldn't apologize or obey me. It's like she didn't want to lose her ground or something. It was pretty fascinating, actually, evidence of inherent sinfulness. It was more interesting when you take into account that she doesn't behave that way when we're alone. Another thing is that she behaves differently with Christen than her other friends. They're almost competetive with each other. I totally see them as being the catty kind of friends growing up, especially as teenagers. Love-hate, gossipy about each other, etc. Sad, isn't it?! It upsets me. Hopefully it's a phase they'll grow out of.

That's it for now. I posted some new pics on my flickr thing if anyone's interested!