Random shots....

Smile

Drawing in a notebook

Paper chain decorated

Swing fun

My arm warmer

Eating and drawing in her cabinet house

Fairy preparations for Halloween party

Cat pumpkin

Face painting baby doll... eerie

The gift of an old communion dress...

We went to a celebration a few weeks ago to welcome home a friend, Amelia and her fiancee, Hendra, from Indonesia. It was a quick visit and celebration. Our friend and Amelia's mom, MaryEllen, had found her old communion dress when she was cleaning out her closet. She thought someone might enjoy using it to dress up. That someone was certainly Johari! When we got home from their house, she put it on right away without the slip, of course. And she pretended to be Amelia and I was Hendra. We danced to get married. She introduced him to her dog, Riley (Barney Boy played that part). We kissed. We hugged. She put on a veil.

She had a couple of pumpkins from Cortney that she was busy painting in between the wedding ceremonies.

triking at Greenlake in October.

Some time in October, Johari wanted to take her tricycle to Greenlake to bike around there. It was a beautiful day and she had fun doing it.

I think she is going to be ready for a bigger bike soon. She rode a little bicycle with training wheels all around the store the other day. She is used to being able to bike backwards on her tricycle so it took her a little bit of frustration and figuring out to work with the brakes when she pedaled backwards on the bike at the store.

More creative outlets....

Lua and Johari reading books on the couch...wearing newly made cat hat.

I have been knitting a whole lot. Really into it right now. My latest project was a pink cat hat for Johari. Johari has been knitting often as well. I give her a set of double pointed needles, some ends and yarn and she wraps it all up in some special way. It kind of looks like casting on. I am not sure what it is but she has a plan because sometimes she gets really frustrated and upset with it, saying, "The yarn is not doing what I want it to do!" And then she throws it down. But she picks it back up and works on it some more.

A necklace Johari made for Stacy

Johari has also been enjoying doing beading. She is making necklaces and bracelets for people.

Grandpa Marvin just got her a small but real guitar from Goodwill. She played it on the way to the grocery store through the grocery store and home again the other day. She has also started doing dance performances. Then she got people to take turns getting up to do a dance performance. I think it is so beautiful to watch her skip and twirl around the room, so free! I love it. Today, she incorporated the guitar and the dance performances. We took turns one would play the guitar while the other danced.

I might need to learn some guitar so that we can actually produce some organized music out of this nice little instrument. I have been interested in learning how to play a guitar for a little while now but I usually brush myself off as not having musical talent. But maybe it is just undiscovered.

Drawing

Johari has been doing a whole lot of drawing recently. She draws on paper and then she also can spend quite a while drawing on the DoodlePro. So I snap a picture of her drawings before she erases them away. It is nice to get a a record of her pictures but not have to have all of the waste of the piles of paper pictures. Some times she has a little notebook that she draws in. I wish that I could remember what her descriptions of these drawing were. She seems to be getting more and more elaborate and things are looking more and more like what she says that they are. It is amazing to watch.