Witches' Brew & other misc

Brewing in Action (sorry, not beer)


So on Friday, we finally got around to making the "homemade" laundry detergent that several of the Mom's in my Mom's Club swear by. I'm looking forward to seeing if I like it. It is very inexpensive (a penny a load!) and it's supposed to be great on stains (and heavens knows I have enough of those). The recipe requires you to make 10 gallons at a time, so I really did feel like we were making Witches' Brew. John Michael thought it looked particularly appealing - I tried to give him a stick to stir with, but he just wanted to touch it.

Earlier in the week, the big event of the day (yes, my planner is still organizing a big activity for us every day, although Mike was really responsible for this one) was Elvis going to get a bath and nails trimmed & then ... home for her birthday party. Mike let the girls buy her a present (dog toy) at the grooming place and then they came home, wrapped them, unwrapped them and gave them to Elvis. I'm sure there must have been party hats involved as well - I was out for the evening so only got to hear about the great event. But here is our super shiny, sweet smellin', cute in her pink bandana, girl:




And finally, the big accomplishments for the week.


Yes, he really did color on his own. He thought it was important to put the crayons back in the box and close after every scribble, but he had lots of fun!

Clara was quietly playing with blocks while the rest of us were off doing something else and when I looked over, this is what I saw:

She has been quite taken with the idea of building stairs with blocks and this is the most complex structure I've seen yet. BTW - in Clara's block world, those purple blocks are people. Waiting to go up the stairs, I'm sure.