Pretty Successful Week

 Last week I mentioned that my phone and computer were not recognizing each other.  I'm not sure what happened, but yesterday, the computer decided to acknowledge the presence of my phone and I was able to upload my pictures.  Lucky you! 

A couple of weeks ago, Molly requested to paint. So naturally, John wanted to also paint.  Luckily, he was pretty happy with the water doodle pads.  And, Molly impressed me with actually painting a picture and not just mixing all of the paint together which had always been the finish product of previous forays in painting.  I also realized she will soon surpass my artistic capabilities.

 Dom and Will have continued to exceed my expectations in their work ethics.  Sure there is plenty of wasted time and refusal to do any sort of writing (ahem...yesterday Will's sentence using a vocabulary word was: "I grow weary of Mom's yelling." We discussed how one might avoid my yelling and agreed to each work harder) but in the end, they complete more assignments on a daily basis than they did last year.  Will continues to excel in his math, while Dom has developed an interest in creative writing and actually enjoys writing briefly in his journal each day.  Something I gave up on last year due to absolute mutiny at the school table.

 Both boys are reading up a storm.  I keep them well stocked in books from the library.  Dominic picked up The Hobbit one day a few weeks ago...naturally, William also decided to read The Hobbit.  Fortunately, we have several copies of this novel and were able to convince Will that all copies were identical.  Dom finished it last week and Will is a few chapters shy.  Today, I walked in to check on their progress on school work and Will immediately looks up and cries:"I just couldn't help it!" He had his copy of The Hobbit out and was reading instead of writing his paragraph about favorite holidays.  Not unlike Anne reading Ben Hur instead of doing her geometry. My empathy was great.

 Speaking of reading, John has a fascination with letters.  I credit his hours of 'Super Why' consumption for a lot of this.  We go on walks around the neighborhood and look for "Super Letters".  He recognizes several, and if he doesn't, he says it is a "Yo Yo" to which I reply, "You're a Yo Yo".  We are quite the comedic duo.  And it is something the whole family gets into.  Will wanted to make sure it was ok to give John a pass if he mistook an upside down W for an M.  We discussed it for longer than necessary, but both agree that would be an acceptable answer for our 2-year-old.  And Will's opinion that John is the smartest 2-year-old ever remains unvarnished.

 Dom and Will in their usual Sunday attire.  They sang in the choir on Sunday which meant we traded in their khaki shorts from the summer for the long pants.  Will has finally grown out of the size 5 pants he wore for 2 years and is into Dom's old size 8 pants.  We had to roll up the pant legs, but pretty good fit. Probably get another 2 years out of them.  Having multiple children is really quite economical and environmentally friendly.  And now I need to find a second pair of pants for Dom...but, what is the point?  He chooses to wear the exact same thing to Mass every week no matter how large a selection I provide.  Though, I probably should get him shirts with sleeves that go all the way to his wrists.  The rolled up sleeve look will not pass muster come December.

 The first day of school, I was afraid that I would have to sit John in front of the television in order to get any meaningful lessons taught.  Turns out, he is actually a very easily entertained little boy.  He will spend a couple of hours if not more playing with trains, marble works, or little figurines in the office. When all else fails, I hand John our ancient iPod touch from 2008 and he does puzzles or practices writing letters.  Because those are the only two apps I could find that were compatible with our dinosaur of an iPod.  He really enjoys them, though, so...#winning.  Now, this does not mean I actually use those hours meaningfully, and he will definitely interrupt our lessons with monkey like hijinks when he is through with his quiet time in the office.  But, still, we are on to something.  I just need to get in line.

Finally, this last picture is really bad, but Dom was so proud of his new shoes.  His feet grew two sizes from last spring to this fall.  Or from whenever we last measured his feet.  One pair of shoes were worn through, others he couldn't even get his feet in.  Using my keen Sherlock Holmes skills, I deduced it was time for new shoes.  These looked so big on his skinny legs, but he was thrilled.  And I suppose I would be also, if I had been wearing shoes a couple sizes too small.  Who knows what his toes will do with all that space to stretch out?  Probably grow...

September afternoon

Despite the title of my post, it is actually a Friday morning.  That seems the best time to collect my thoughts.  The kids don't bother me as they know I will have them start school.  John is busy with his marble works and I've had my cup of coffee. 

Let me first air a frustration.  Last week, for the first time, I was able to download pictures from my phone quite easily.  I even found them immediately on the computer and uploaded them to this, at the time, future post.  Hurrah!  I had mastered the technology.  Then this morning, I got to upload some additional pictures and the computer won't even recognize my phone exists.  Which leads me to believe those people a hundred years ago that maybe got one picture of their kids were really living the dream.  They didn't spend hours trying to get two unliving devices to talk to each other.  They probably spent that time actually talking to living devices...stupid technology. 

But, when I'm not trying to earn a degree in computer science, I spend quite a bit of time with this guy.  This past week it occurred to me to stagger the start times of the kids with their schoolwork.  This has worked very well.  I can spend a little time with each child, and the ones who are not working play with John.  It only took me three weeks to come up with this system.  So far, John has played football with Dom, veterinarian with Molly, and wizard's duel with Will.  Dom also spends a little time each morning tutoring John on various college logos.  As he pointed it out, it is also a nice way for John to practice his letters.  Which he loves.  He has a couple of letter puzzles that he plays with regularly.  He refers to them as "My Letters".  He will randomly point out letters in parking lots and in books.  "Is that a P?".  You know it is, John...

The lady who lived in our house before us had the prettiest yard on the block.  This is not necessarily the case, but we do try (we do have lovely children, though).  One thing I knew I could not take care of was roses.  I watched my mom baby hers over the years.  She had special clippers for them that we were not to use on any other plant.  I have too may kids to also be concerned about my flowers (granted, she had the same amount of kids...but, whatever...you get my point).  So, last spring I cut back the rose in the front garden.  It ended up coming back anyway and bloomed on the anniversary of my Grandpa's death.  He had loved roses and had several in his garden.  Mom always asked his advice on growing them and would talk about his rose garden.  It was a lovely coincidence or maybe he had a hand in bringing this one back.  Because it was definitely not me.

In other outdoor activities, we have spent many hours at parks over the last few weeks.  I had some guilt that John wasn't getting to the park nearly as often as the boys and Molly had when they were his age.  But, between weekly visits to the library with a visit to the park and three hours of soccer practice that takes place right next to a park, he is getting ample time.  So is everyone else.  He loves the slides.  So much that despite having hurt his ankle last night, he continued to hobble up the stairs to take many rides down the slides.  His ankle seems much better this morning, so it seems the extra activity didn't hurt it too much.  By the way, watching a two year old limp is a pretty sad sight.  He would limp to the slide, cry a little, go down the slide and laugh and smile and get back up and do the whole thing over again.  Sometimes Molly or Will or I would carry him around to minimize his walking, but he did not want to stop. 

A few weeks ago, the curse of technology on my life continued as a tablet we purchased for a road trip refused to let me download any apps.  The nice gentleman at the store tried to help, but eventually even he conceded it was no use.  John was with me at the time and he gave me a couple of display phones for him to play with.  John was not fooled, but the older kids had a really good time pretending they had actual phones.  I'm trying to teach them that they aren't all that they are cracked up to be...but, that is a lesson they will have to learn in their own time.

School is going really well.  All of my children continue to be above average just like in Lake Wobegon.  Molly prefers I treat all of her lessons like a task in The Great British Baking Show.  There are days I have the energy to do this and her giggle is totally worth the extra effort.  And there are days I do not have the energy to do this and the guilt is enormous.  Luckily, the boys are more than happy to step in...but, then their work does not get done.  So the dilemma is great.

When they are not working on school they are playing with Legos, reading (Dom recently finished The Hobbit and Will isn't far behind.  Will through Molly for a loop the other day when they were doing a wizard's duel and he said his name was 'Gandalf'), playing soccer, listening to the Hamilton soundtrack and reenacting duels or The Battle of Yorktown with water guns, or running races with anyone they can convince to do them.  Or watching Lego themed cartoons. Now that we have finished the recent season of The Great British Baking Show we are ending our evenings with some superhero cartoon they have discovered.  And they are pretty entertaining.  Much more so because of the laughter from the kids.

Now it is time to get someone started on their lessons and continue to try and get my phone and computer to talk to each other. 

August in Review

 Apparently, a potential hurricane has us in her sights (Tropical Storm Hermine at the moment.  As this is the case, tidying up the house seems a little futile.  I mean, how many opportunities do you get to say "It looks like a hurricane went through here" and a hurricane actually went through the vicinity of your house?)

And what do I do when I'm not tidying the house and the children are otherwise occupied with each other and food?  I write about the family.  We had quite the busy month of August.  It started with visits from family.  First up: Tropical Storm Reddig

Molly took the majority of pictures on the visit...

 Katie and Robert and Mary Ann and Rose and Peter and Margaret arrived on the 4th (I purchased an 8 man tent and two air mattresses for the kids.  More than a couple of people were not impressed (namely, Eric who had to set it up and pump up the mattresses in 90ish heat (Robert helped, but had a much kinder attitude than my husband) and Mary Ann and Rose.  One of which slept in the tent the other remained firmly in the air conditioned house),  but Dom loved it and sort of wanted to sleep in it forever) and we all moved into a condo in Fort Walton on the 5th for a week.  It was a great vacation, despite it being the rainiest week of the summer.  We spent mornings in the water and afternoons watching the Olympics, playing cards, and vegging out in general. 

We played The Great Dalmuti with 8 players!  It was amazing!

 Towards the end of the visit with the Reddigs, Nana and L'Opa arrived.  We had a really nice time catching up with them.  Though, the majority of the conversations centered around William trying to tell L'Opa everything he knew about Harry Potter.  Which is a lot, by the way.  Especially as he had just finished The Cursed Child.  That would be 8 books worth of knowledge he tried to educate his grandfather about...eventually, L'Opa suggested watching a movie. 

When Harry Potter was not being discussed, we swam in the hotel pool and visited The Armament Museum, or hung out on our back deck enjoying the August heat and mosquito population.  We never made it to the beach.  The weather just was not cooperative during this span of time.  Hopefully, they will make it down again before we move so that can see what all the fuss is about!

 Due to all the swimming in the pool, we could no longer ignore John's long hair.  His bangs went down to his chin when wet.  Granted most of the time, they were in curls and one couldn't notice.  But, if the humidity dipped, it was just one big mess.  So, a couple of weeks ago he got his first real haircut. 

Most people cannot tell, but it makes a huge difference during swimming lessons and the day or two after a bath.

 John continues to be quite capable at getting to places he wants to.  He climbed the rock wall at the park.  Will was there with the assist at the end.  And, I did relent and help him down.

 Molly's "I enjoy being a girl" moment. 

 John's "I love nutella so much I prefer to wear it" moment

 The kids did spend time outside during August.  Dom is currently in training to race a 1 miler over Memorial Day Weekend 2017, granted, he has baseball, basketball, and soccer between now and then to distract him from this particular goal, but he has most of the neighborhood kids running relays in the evening.  Uphill...it has actually been great for his endurance at soccer.  And, it is an excellent way to tire out a certain 2-year-old with a propensity for late afternoon naps.

But, when they weren't running hills, and the weather was so hot that I didn't want to be out, much Wii was played.  We have weaned off it pretty well.  In fact, they haven't played this week come to think of it.  Funny how when you start schoolwork, they naturally start playing other games when they get breaks and do not ask for video games. 

The above is an older picture taken the first week of July.  When I was out of town, Eric, a.k.a. Super Dad, took the kids to Henderson Beach by himself.  You can see the top of John's head at the bottom of the picture.  Impressive. (Say that in a Darth Vader voice)

Last week, we went for our final visit to Universal.  I cannot tell you how excited I was at the thought of taking this picture and then presenting it as our First Day of School pic for social media.  Molly did not exactly play along:

But, she sort of did earlier, just without a clear shot of the towers:

We had a nice time that seems nicer the more time goes on.  Turns out, I'm not a huge fan of amusement parks.  But, I am a huge fan of my kids' excitement.  Will loves them.  Molly really does, too.  Dom really enjoys the spectacle and loves some of the rides, but refuses to ride others.  However, he is perfectly happy to stand in line and wait with John in child swap.  Something I'm not sure many 9 year olds would not complain about.  At any rate, we are ready to move on to other parks and see what they hold. 

Finally, we had our first real day of school this past Monday.  Dom has shown wonderful diligence in his work.  Will, has not slipped a bit over the summer.  And Molly is happy to do work for about 15 minutes.  Luckily, that is really all one needs to get through the academic portion.  Then she plays and creates (messes or art...it could go either way) the rest of the day.  John is a work in progress.  But, I think we will get through the year without too much time in front of the tv for John.  Though, those PBS shows are highly educational!

And that wraps it up! Phew!  Time to call in a couple of kids from their break.  And probably should tidy up a little.  Until next time!