The McMillans: July 2009

Friday, July 31, 2009

The Apple Book

This is Myla, my three year old, sleeping tonight. Notice anything out of the ordinary for a three year old?

She's got her stuffed animals, her pillow, her beloved blankey...and (here, let me zoom in for you)

the Twilight book. I don't get it. She can't read. There aren't any pictures. I haven't read it to her! I don't know what the fascination is with this book. Tonight she cried for 15 minutes straight (not just cried--screamed) because she wanted the apple book and I had no idea what she was talking about. I was picturing board books about fruit or a story with Dora and an apple. Kevin finally went in to talk to her, then he came out and told me she wanted the apple book. I said that I knew that, but had no idea what the apple book was. He said, "Think about it. The book with the apple on it." Oh. Twilight. Weird. We found the book, which she had already stashed somewhere in her room, and she started giggling. I don't know. More often then not, I am one baffled Mama.

I do wonder though, is she Team Edward or Team Jacob? :)

Saturday, July 25, 2009

Playing house

The other day I bought this really cool cardboard playhouse at Hobby Lobby. The idea is to spend hours and hours coloring it and making it pretty. Then spending hours and hours playing in it. (During those hours and hours Mom would get to clean, or sew, or...something.) The coloring lasted about 20 minutes then Kevin put it up and then Myla abandoned it all together. Cade, however, has staked his claim.

For the past three nights he has slept in it. I keep thinking he'll wake up all kinked and not want to sleep in it anymore. Not yet...he loves it!

It's a work-in-progress, and I'm hoping they'll continue coloring it. They would if I let them use markers. The dreaded markers. Does anybody else feel the same way I do about markers? They are banished, exiled, hidden from little fingers. Maybe it's time to have a marker party! I love a good theme party. :)

Monday, July 13, 2009

Harry Potter Party-time!

In case anyone hasn't heard, the Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince movie is coming out tomorrow at midnight (I guess technically that's Wednesday at midnight). And in case you didn't know, the McMillans are pretty crazy about Harry Potter. Kevin and I are going to the midnight showing tomorrow, thanks to my sweet brother, Richard, who will stay the night with the kids. But we wanted to include the kids in on all the excitement, even though it will be many years before they get to watch Half-Blood Prince (we've decided that the Harry Potter movies after the second one are too scary for our kids - all the dementors and everything). So, we had another Harry Potter party.

During the day the kids and I made our Harry Potter wizard hats.

We took a paper plate and colored it black, then I cut a hold in the middle to create ample room for the head.

Then we decorated a half-circle cut out of black construction paper.

We formed it into a cone...

and taped it to the plate to create our hat. Looking at this picture I realize we should've colored the bottom of the plate too! Oh well, they didn't last long before Gavin got ahold of them and ripped them to shreds.

Gavin Potter

Everyone getting ready to eat!

This time I made dinner. I went off of a line in Harry Potter and the Sorcerers Stone, "He had never seen so many things he liked to eat on one table:roast beef, roast chicken, pork chops and lamb chops, sausages, baconand steak, boiled potatoes, roast potatoes, fries, Yorkshire pudding,peas, carrots, gravy, ketchup, and, for some strange reason, peppermint humbugs." Well, I wasn't going to make all that, but I did make roast chicken (aka. rotisserie chicken from Fry's), mashed potatoes, carrots and Yorkshire pudding (which, interestingly enough, is nothing like our American pudding, it's more of a bread that you smother with gravy--quite good actually). Then we had Butterbeer (aka cream soda in those cool bottles).

After dinner we made our wands. We dipped pretzel rods into white chocolate and sprinkled them with colored sugar.

Myla making her wand.

Our finished wands.

While our wands dried, we made potions. This was my favorite part. For our potion ingredients we had Lionfish (Swedish fish), Hippogriff gizzards (lime Jello squares), Flaxweed powder (dry jello), Doxy eggs (Skittles), Dragon tears (red Kool-aid) and Bundimum secretions (blue Kool-aid). We mixed whatever ingredients we wanted together.

I called Cade's potion "Happy All Day" potion. You wanna taste, dontcha?

Myla liked eating the ingredients as well.

Even Kevin got in on the action. He wanted to create the Felix Felicis potion which gives you good luck all day.

For dessert we got a nice surprise from our good friend Jill (whom Cade has a small crush on). She brought us Harry Potter cupcakes -- red velvet decorated with yellow and red sprinkles (Gryffindor colors). They were super yummy! Thanks for the surprise treats Jill!

So, Harry Potter is tomorrow night. I need to get my sleep in tonight since I won't be getting much tomorrow night. But I'll let you all know how it goes. No spoilers, I promise.

Friday, July 10, 2009

Summer Becomes Her

Tuesday, July 7, 2009

Summer stuff

Warning: pic overload. I haven't been able to find my camera cable to my small camera, so all my fun summer pics were trapped inside. :) Kevin found it for me last night and we're good to go. Here are just some pics of what we've been up to so far this summer.

Gavin is walking! I put this in because he went from crawling to walking in about a week's time. As soon as he turned one he was walking full-throttle. I'm trying to get him on video. He's such a cute little walker.

Swimming with the cousins. We have really enjoyed playing in the water this summer. Last summer I had just had Gavin so our water time was really limited.

Rachel and Aunt Nicki. The big news here is that Nicki is pregnant! She's due around Thanksgiving. We are so excited for her and anxious to meet little Haws. She's not finding out what she's having...so exciting!

Cade

No suprise here that I've been sewing. My favorite right now are child aprons. I love this 'Lil Rockstar apron that someone ordered. Cute little model, eh?

We went to the zoo last month with some good friends. Yes, it was hot. No, we will not be going again this summer. :) But we had a great time!

Myla got a little kitchen for her birthday. She and Cade love cooking for us. :)

We've gone to the splash park several times this summer. These are pics from Myla's birthday party at the splash park.

Patiently waiting for food.

Kevin and Gav

Blowing out the candle on her cupcake.

Myla's birthday is really close to my mom's. Since we were leaving town we had a combined birthday dinner at Islands.

We met Kevin's family in St. George/Tuacahn last month. We had so much fun!! Kevin's dad brings his boat and wave runner and we make camp on the beach and hang out all day. The kids loved it. We had a very enjoyable time making sand castles with our uncles...