Erik doesn't look too happy that I've snapped a picture of him and Jenna eating potato chips. In New York we had a picnic and the only thing Jenna ate was potato chips. She loves them! She even likes salt and vinegar potato chips. Yuck!

Besides knowing and saying many words, Jenna also says animal sounds. She says bock bock for Chicken, baa baa for Sheep, NeeNee for horse, and woof woof for Dog. So very cute.

My mom is here now watching Jenna since I will be gone Tuesday and Wednesday and Erik is going to Indianapolis on Wed. She said we could go on a date tonight. I'm trying to decide whether to go to a movie or to go out for coffee. If we go to a movie then we'd get to see a movie :). However that would be several hours and it is finals week for me so I"m busy. We will see what we decide.

My mom also brought the scrapbook she is working on for Jenna. It is incredible. I'm so glad she is making this beautiful scrapbook - I would never be able to do something so nice.

On Friday Erik's paternal grandmother died. She lived in Maine and had lived there her whole life in a small town with railroad tracks running through her property (explains why Erik's dad loves trains!). Erik didn't go to the funeral as it was Saturday and was difficult to get a flight on such short notice.

Well I must be off as I need to put Jenna down for her nap. I got 78 today on Quiddler - no bonuses!

Jenna....not a jock

I was asked to compile a list of words that Jenna says. I thought about it for half an hour and came up with 50 words! After which she said 2 or 3 that I didn't have in the list. This was a good exercise as when I took her to the doctor for her 18 month checkup yesterday and he asked if she said at least 6 words, I could say 6 *10 words at least (not including signs!!). He said he knew she would be off the charts. Of course when we were talking about her physical development and he asked if she ran, jumped or skipped I said no. So she's smart but not good at sports? That's odd...her parents are nothing like that *smile*.
Some words Jenna says:
dress, poop, blanket, box (bok), ball, black, stroller (lolo), broccoli (bokee), trash (tratsch), cup, bib, bubbles (baba), Jenna, bread, cheese, light, bath, chip, elmo, dark, pink, pig, sweep (speep), pop, this, steps, door (doda), dirt, wheel, sock, mama, dada, nana, up, truck, cook, baby, black, bow, eyebrow (ibow), no, cake, beep, juice, duck, boink, fish, book, booboo, yogurt (ogurt)

Today I got 57 on Quiddler with no bonuses :(

New York and Lobsters

Erik, Jenna and I took a trip to New York to see Erik's parents and grandparents. We had a really good time there and Jenna was able to meet her great grandparents. She is still going through separation anxiety so she never wants to leave mommy and daddy's arms to be held by a grandparent, which is too bad as I'm sure they would have liked to hold her. She did very well on the plane and during the entire trip. She had a great time (as did we all!). Here is a picture of all the guys on the trip including Jenna (not a guy). I"ll post another one later of the ladies and maybe I'll include Erik in that one (not a lady).

In other news, I was reading about interesting animals and came across this picture on the web. It is a blue lobster. How neat is that? I love lobster and I love blue - really you can't go wrong with blue sea creatures right?

Erik said he wanted me to explain my reasoning for my favorite letters. So here goes:
1. G - the first letter of my name!
2. A - my blood type and my favorite grade!
3. C - for Cooper and chocolate and church - love them all!
4. K - the letter that makes my husband unique!
5. M - Monter - my maiden name!
6. J - Everyone who's name begins with a J is someone I like a lot!
7. Y - It's only sometimes a vowel. It's the most misunderstood letter of the alphabet. So I feel kind of sorry for it.

Today my pitiful quiddler score was 6!!! I lost 42 points since I ran out of vowels and lost the last 5 letters - ouch!

Eragon

Tonight the girls and I watched Pride and Prejudice and ate scones, devonshire cream, tea, and popcorn balls. It was so fun! The defonshire cream wasn't sweet and I thought it wouldn't be good, but on the scones it was fabulous! I'm definitely going to make it again. The scones were not sweet either but together everything was delicious!
Christine made popcorn balls and they were yummy as well. I've never made popcorn balls but I should sometime - they are yummy.

A series I'm reading (more for young adult) is coming out as a movie in December. I'm so excited :). The book is titled Eragon and the author is Christopher Paolini (a 16 year old!!). I've included a picture so you can see. It's about a boy who finds a magic egg. The egg turns out to be the last dragon who hatches for him. It's a pretty neat book and there is a second one called Eldest. Fun reading :).

I've also grown to love a new website called Refdesk. Here is the link: http://www.refdesk.com/
I like the content and layout. I've included it as one of my 15 home pages - I love firefox!!
I got a miserable 52 on Quiddler today. Erik beat me by 20 points!

Crayons

When I came home from teaching Wednesday night, I saw this blue crayon on our kitchen wall. Erik said he didn't put it there and I've never seen Scruffles draw with crayons so it must have been bug. I have uploaded this picture as evidence. While looking around, we also saw blue crayon drawn on the refrigerator and pantry doors. Her first art :).

Sunday night I'm having my girlfriends over to drink tea, eat scones with devonshire cream, and watch Pride and Prejudice. It should be a jolly good time! Here is my recipe for devonshire cream:
3 oz cream cheese
1 tablespoon sugar
pinch salt
1 cup heavy cream.
Mix all together until stiff peaks form. This is relatively fattening, however I'm making cooking light's version of scones which is low fat. So it all cancels out :).

I created a myspace page just to be extra cool. It is located at www.myspace.com/trillianstales
(stealing the same name!). I have 4 friends on it - Yea! This means I am cool.

Time for bed! Jenna and I are making chocolate cookies tomorrow!
I got 80 on Quiddler today and Erik got 88 - much better than me - but I still got the 8 letter word last time :)

Rejection :(

I submitted a paper to IEEE Transactions on Education and was rejected. I suppose that is not surprising since getting into a journal of that prestige is so difficult (1 in 1000), but I was hoping nonetheless. I'm hoping it will be a conference worthy publication. We will have to see.

I created a myspace page. It seems fitting that I attempt to become cool with a myspace page. Here is my address: http://www.myspace.com/trillianstales
I used the same name just to be extra cool.

This morning was a whirlwind. The terror plot that was uncovered in Britain was scary. It amazes me that such crazies live to kill innocent people. In fact that is their goal. Why would anyone have such a goal? I would die for my faith but as a suicide bomber? That is crazy.

On a happier note, last week we discussed our life purposes in Bible study. From prayer and contemplation, I came up with 4 adjectives that describe the person I want to become and put them to my name:
Godcentered
Innocent
Nice
Appreciative

I want to be a thankful, godly, pure, blameless, and kind woman so I made this little acrostic to help me remember.

Today I got 97 on Quiddler with a max of 77. I made the word cornered which is a 20 point bonus for 8 letter word. Rock on!!

Home improvement with Daddy

Jenna bakes with mommy and helps daddy with home improvement projects. Erik changed the locks on our front door and Jenna helped. She carried around a screwdriver all day and pointed it everywhere. She had fun helping Daddy put new locks on our front door. Here is a picture of her helping Daddy with the lock.

I also got her a shopping cart from WalMart (sorry mom it was only $9). She LOVES the shopping cart. She tears all through the house with it and pretty much leaves skid marks in her wake.

Yesterday at church we sat in the cry room the entire time. Jenna didn't really want to go to the nursery and kept screaming at the top of her lungs. So we stayed in the cry room together as a family. After church we played games with Tim and Jen. yea! We played a new game called Tigris and Euphrates. It was created by one of our favorite game authors Reiner Knizia. He creates such fun games!
Erik and I are talking about buying some new games. Here is a list that we will buy, however we want to wait until next month since Tim and Jen got 4 new games recently:

1. Princes of Florence
2. Caylus
3. Through the Desert
4. Kill Dr. Lucky

Games are great! Speaking of games. I got 87 on Quiddler and made the word shying. That was a good word!

Daddy's Girl

Jenna is such a daddy's girl. She loves to crawl and jump on daddy. He also does Jenna push ups and it's quite a work out. Jenna went to a public pool for the first time on Thursday. She liked it at first but lost her footing and her face went underwater. After that, mommy had to hold her the whole time. It's been so hot - I was hoping she would like the water.

We also went to Der Dutchman in Plain City on Monday. That was fun! It was a buffet and although there was plenty of food to eat, Jenna had more fun watching the people than eating. We got there just in time to have both the breakfast and lunch buffets :).

On a more somber note, the war in the mideast has been on my mind quite a bit lately. I'm hoping America will strongly support Israel and that we can unite in Judeo-Christian values. An end to terrorism (while unlikely) would usher in a time of peace and that is what I am hoping for. Although I can imagine a superhero type person who would unify the middle east and bring a one world order as someone who might also be a Nicolae Carpathia type!
I'll keep praying for Israel.

In a lighter note, I got 69 on Quiddler today which was pitiful.