What I love about thrift stores...

Two trips to find other things, stumbled on 25 books, including several additions to our Bearenstein Bears, Curious George, Madeline, and some of these luscious titles:




This book received an audible gasp from me when I found it: I had this book when I was a kid and a flood of memories came back when I saw the title- the chocolate ice cream, the tooth necklace, the tooth fairy, everything. Very exciting.

I love Jan Brett- I also got the Gingerbread Baby by her as well while on one of these trips, The Lost Mitten was probably one of my favorite books when I was a kid, but when I came home and opened up the Owl and the Pussycat, I was thrilled to find this:


I just looked on ebay and comparable titles by Jan Brett that were signed were going for $50 a piece. I paid a buck for it.
So, just for fun, I looked up all the titles I bought at the ARC online and got their shelf-price for all of them and came up with a total of about $100 ($150 if you count the signed copy). I then added up what I paid for everything (most of the titles I got were 50% off because I went on a Saturday and today, which was Martin Luther King Day)- $23 all together.
I originally went to get some new clothes for Linus because I've run out of stock from donations I received from moms of older boys at church (I would love to add up what I would have paid for all the clothes I got, but I'll save that for another day...), but every time I go to a thrift store I always have to stop in the childrens book section (Savers in Ft. Collins, which is now sadly closed, used to have a huge wall full of them and they were each 69 cents a piece, ARC isn't quite as good, but better than full price for sure). Our little kids library is full of thrift books, I love it. Craig scoffed at me when he saw me pull the books out of the bag and said "Don't we have enough books?" to which I promptly replied "NO! Not even close." When I was a kid we had a huge shelf full of kids books and each night I could go and pick one out to read before bed, I loved it! I wish I knew what happened to those books, but between all the moves we went through growing up they all disappeared, but I'm well on my way to creating our own collection.
Thank you ARC. You've made my life an affordable place to live.

In need of assistance!

I need help! In an effort to promote both my photography as well as my crocheting, I am in need of some children models for my hats of varying gender, age, and size! So here is the deal: if you are interested in loaning me your child to model, please submit in an email your child’s name, age, gender, and head size (in cm please) including a recent picture to chelseas_attic@yahoo.com. Of the applicants I receive, I will chose 5-10 children to photograph on a specific day in Spring/Summer. What you get in return: you can either have a CD including all the professional shots of your child for that day or you can keep the hat. Either way, you’ll be helping me out and it’d be a great chance to get something free from yours truly. J You do not have to live in the area to apply, but you would need to be available for photos in Colorado this Spring or Summer. I need children of all ages, even newborns, so if ya got one or you will have one soon, send me a note! Applications are due by the end of February. Thanks for your help and hope to hear from you soon!!

Christmas and so on...

So this hopefully won't be too long of a post, but I feel like I have a lot to cover! First and foremost: Christmas! It was fun. Short week and a half, but fun. I don't think I did diddly squat the whole time. The only thing Craig and I really had on our agenda was to have fun on Christmas, take the kids to the pool at the Fun Plex sometime, and see Tron, and we conquered all three. I would have loved to take my camera to the Fun Plex, they have a pretty awesome splashy-watery-playground there, but there was no way I was going to risk damaging my camera for that, so I left it at home. Note to self: next Christmas I want a cheapo waterproof camera. The kids had a blast on Christmas, had a blast at the pool, and were sleeping when we went to see Tron. :-) Although I did go and see Tangled with Chloe and my two sisters-in-law: loved it. It was totally not what I was expecting and I laughed outloud through a lot of it. :-)
Anyway, here are a few shots. I had a lot more, but I don't want to waste my entire night waiting for pictures to load on blogger, so I'll just get the important ones.

I love Odell's eyes in this shot. She gives this look a lot nowadays when a toy is presented in front of her because she's finally figuring out how to get it in her hands and then in turn, in her mouth.
Remember when I said we splurged and got the kids something big this Christmas? Well here they are unwrapping it. I only had my 50 mm lens on, so I couldn't get a lot of it in the shot, but it took up like the whole living room when Santa left it by the tree...

What is it??Pow-pow-POWER WHEELS! When I was a kid, only the rich kids had power wheels. Well, we're not rich, but we just couldn't resist. :-) They love it! Unfortunately it's snowed a bunch the last couple of weeks and so we haven't been able to take it out much, but here you can see Chloe enjoying it. Linus just crashes it into everything, but he sure has fun doing it.

Yes, that is my husband barbequeing in the snow. Why wait until summer to enjoy all the good food? That was the Ellingson philosophy on this particular snowy night. Not rain nor snow nor storm will keep us from our ribs...Well, it's getting late, so I'll just post one more update: Odell's four month checkup (at five months). She weighs 13 lbs. 2 oz....oh poop, and I forgot how long she is and how big her head is. The sheet is in the car and I'm too lazy and cold to go out in the garage and get it. I do remember, however, that her percentages have gone way down since her last visit (except for her head size, that's still at a whopping 99%). I definitely noticed that she's not as big as my other two were at the same age, but she doesn't look gaunt or anything. She was at 66% for weight and 80% for height and dropped down to 18% for weight and 23% for height. Her doctor things she's just gearing up for a growth spurt, but we'll check again in another 6 weeks just to make sure. In the meantime, her large noggin is preventing her from having a very enjoyable tummy time because she's got a lot of head to hold up, which means we just need to do it more so she can build her neck muscles. I'm not too worried about anything, she eats well, has lots of rolls on her legs and arms, and is a happy baby.
As you can see here.