Bottles & Batmobiles

Caroline started her week off well.  She had her final bottle last Sunday night and has done fine ever since.  Now we just give her milk if she asks for it and she's fine.  One hurdle down!

Her last bottle!

School went fairly well this week.  Josiah's accused me of being boring (more than once..), so I tried to make it more fun.  We walked to the library, but while we did so we pretended we were like Lewis & Clark and had to report on all the things we saw.  We also learned about the War of 1812 and with that Key's Star Spangled Banner.  We learned about the excretory system (lungs, urinary tract, intestines, skin).  Lungs were the easiest thing to work with out of this group, so we blew our pencils and had pencil races across the table.  That was deemed "fun," so it was a win.

Expedition to the library drawings

Josiah's coloring sheet

For his presentation at  CC on Friday, Josiah made the Batmobile out of Legos.  He informed his class that it changed into 6 different things (Bat plane, Bat boat, etc.).  He then attempted to show them everything it turned into, but after two transformations he was going on a little long and I "encouraged" him to stop (repeatedly).  He has a tendency to go long with his presentations.  He had also drawn coloring sheets for everyone in the class, so he passed out Batman, Superman, & The Flash coloring sheets.  He got to one girl in the class and said she got a really special sheet because he had written in "R's" where she was to color it red and "Y's" where she was to color it yellow.  The others did not get letters on their pictures informing them how to color them in.  I hoped they fared well without it.

The batmobile

For school on Friday, they were allowed to dress up as their favorite storybook character.  Josiah chose Peter Pan and made a costume to look the part.  While we were making his costume on Thursday, Henry chimed in that he wanted a costume too.  I asked him what he wanted and he said, "Black Widow."  Here's Black Widow:

Fortunately, he changed his mind to Jake from Jake & the Neverland Pirates by the time we finished the Peter Pan costume.  He does like Black Widow, though.

Wednesday evening the boys went to their Music & More class at church.  When I went to pick up Henry, his teacher told me what he had done that night.  For snack they were given a packet of oreos which had 2 inside.  He kept carrying around his wrapper and the teacher asked him why he was still holding onto it.  He said that he had saved an oreo to give to his big brother Josiah.  She told him he could eat it and gave him a new packet to give Josiah.  Super sweet of him.  (He is VERY good at sharing food with Josiah.)  Then what was funny, on the way home Henry said that Josiah could get one cookie and Daddy could get one cookie from the pack.  On Thursday, the boys opened the pack, Josiah ate 3/4 of a cookie and saved 1/4 for Todd.  And Henry ate the other cookie...

The boys have weekly chores - emptying the dishwasher silverware, dustbusting up the crumbs, and setting the table for dinner.  However, Caroline has totally taken over the dustbusting.  Once we get it out, she makes loud noises until we hand it to her.  She's sort of like a Roomba in that she doesn't always dustbust everything up quickly, but she does go all around the room and eventually will get to all spots.  Yesterday she just dustbusted until it ran out of power.  She's that into it.

We have been doing a Mommy train or a Daddy train to take the kids to bed at night.  Basically we pick them up at the "station" (the fireplace) and bring them the 20 feet to their bed making "Choo-choo" noises.  After doing this for a while, Caroline now stands at the fireplace and says, "ch-ch-ch" in a really soft voice.  It is so cute.  She is always right in there with everything.

And boy, what a busy weekend.  Saturday morning we attended a Messianic congregation which we really enjoyed as did the kids.  One of the best things was Caroline's class was given gluten-free Chex mix for snack.  The boys both liked their classes, too.  Right after that we went straight to the other church we've been attending for their Fall Festival.  The boys spent all their time on the bounce house things.  The first one they did was the bungee cord one.  You get strapped in and run as fast as you can but the bungee cord snaps you back.  Well when you're less than 40 lbs, you can't get too far with a bungee cord so both boys were just falling all over the place.  They had obstacle course bounce houses, too which they went through numerous times.  Unfortunately I have no pictures.  Todd stayed with Caroline in the shade and I forgot to take the camera with me.  They also shared a shave ice.  It came in a cup with spoons and they each picked a flavor so they had a "side."  They were supposed to take a bite and hand it to the other, take a bite, hand it back, etc.  Well, Josiah was taking a bite and not handing it back to Henry quickly enough and Henry gets angry and says, "Pepperhead" in his angry voice.  The boys have come up with this term "pepperhead" as an insult for each other.  Sometimes it's just "pepper" but mostly "pepperhead."  I suppose it beats other insults.

Sunday afternoon the boys went to a birthday party for one of Josiah's CC classmates.  It was at a fitness center and they got to play games in the gym first and then play in the pool.  They were in the pool for what seemed like forever (probably 45 minutes), but they had a lot of fun.  I need to thank the birthday boy's mom for tiring our kids out so that they will hopefully sleep in late tomorrow.  One can hope.

And in even more exciting news, our house is currently under contract.  We have the home inspection this upcoming week, so we are praying everything goes very, very well with that!

Josiah made Peter Pan out of big legos (the thing with the dog head) and then spelled out "Peter Pan" which was pretty impressive to do with the big legos. They don't always stay together very well.

Henry spent a lot of time this weekend working on his new dot-to-dot book (thank you Grandma & Grandpa). He loves dot-to-dots. Josiah got one too and did it from front cover to back in an hour.

Firsts and Lasts

We had a sick week this week.  Caroline came down with a fever Sunday afternoon which spread to Henry on Monday evening and to Josiah on Wednesday morning (around 2:30 a.m.).  Fortunately everyone was fever free all day on Thursday so we were able to make it to our CC homeschool group on Friday.  Since they were not able to do much or go anywhere, Josiah decided it was the perfect time to sharpen all 72 of his colored pencils.  He had to empty the shavings three times to his delight.

However, most of the middle of the week looked like this:

Since Caroline was sick for the shortest amount of time, she gets the most "air" time this week.  She has been saying more and more words.  She says, "baba" for bottle, "-ish" for fish, "da" for dog, and "more."  She also has been putting two words together and will now say, "Hi Daddy (or Mommy)" and "up please."  These are all welcome sounds as opposed to the screaming and pointing that makes up most of her "vocabulary."

She went into her closet one day and got out the old Bumbo seat.  It is a foam (?) seat that is made to help babies sit up before they're able to do so on their own.  So she takes it from room to room and plops down in it.  There's not much else to do but sit in it, so sit she does.  It is always good to see her sitting because this week she has figured out how to climb to the top of the bunk bed and sit on top bunk.  She knows she isn't allowed to do it so if she sees/hears me coming she rushes up there in a somewhat unsafe manner.  So we have had to put up the baby gate again.

She sat in the elephant calling for the boys on the other side of the gate.  They brought her dolls, but what she wanted was to climb the bunk beds.  

She enjoys pretending to cook in her kitchen now.  She uses it as a real kitchen and will make me items such as lego tea and boiled waffles.  She smiles when I pretend to eat/drink it, so I know she's trying to do it correctly.  From the picture you can see she wears the Lowe's apron while she cooks.  It is always on backwards in case she needs to use it as a cape and rescue one of the boys.  She is very friendly with them and when she wakes up in the morning, she'll wave and say "Hi 'Siah" over and over until he acknowledges her.

Because the boys were sick all week, I was sometimes attending to them while not paying attention to Caroline.  She loves to get in the pantry and rearrange the shelves.  One day I was looking for her after checking on the boys and found her in there.  This time she had opened up her formula container and was eating the powdered formula with the scoop.  I cannot imagine how badly that tasted, but she was quite content.  And on that note, tonight she'll have her last bottle.  We have enough formula for one more bottle and we're not buying anymore.  Since it was recommended that we stop them 7 months ago, it's high time.  I have no idea how Monday night will go without a bottle...

Caroline loves to greet Todd when he gets home from work.  Lately, however, she does so by saying "Hi Daddy" with shirt raised.  She is constantly showing off her belly.  She'll pick up her shirt and slap it a little.  This weekend she started lifting up her shirt and pressing it against the cool dishwasher.  Todd hopes it is only a phase.  Although, it does get hot at the zoo in August....

Saturday night Caroline got her first haircut.  I always do the boys hair and the last couple of times she has sat down on the step stool and I would pretend to do her hair, too.  Some of it is straight and some of it has curls, so it's sort of jagged looking.  I wanted to even it out a little.  I barely trimmed it so it isn't noticeable.  She loved it and kept coming back in the chair for more.  So different from the boys.  It is a task getting them to sit up and sit still for it.  Josiah will sit there the whole time telling me how boring it is and how he hates his new haircut.

At our CC homeschool group this week, Josiah's presentation was a hit.  On Monday he drew the pictures and came up with the idea of doing a movie.  So we made a screen out of a wipes box and he taped all his pictures together to make a story.  When he gave his presentation, he didn't just explain the pictures, he scrunched down behind the box and pretended to be Cubbie Bear and say what Cubbie was doing.  The kids and moms all really liked it.  The pictures are all Cubbie Bear from his Awana book last year.  Cubbie's friend is Timothy (wearing the crown at the end).

Picture of an apple in the bubble

Cubbie saying "no" with a bug on his head

Timothy wearing a crown

This week they started learning the tin whistle.  He learned proper finger placement and how to blow on it correctly (e.g. not as loud as you can).  They also had PVC pipes that they decorated as a case for their whistle.  He had a lot of fun decorating it with the colorful duct tape.

Josiah sporting his new CC shirt and his tin whistle case.  Henry doing his impression of Caroline...

Henry had a fruit phase this week:

"Smashed up blueberry"

Strawberry

Grape

Peach

Henry also made himself an X-men suit:

I knew Josiah was better on Thursday afternoon when he made a new costume.  This is Darken 714.

He also made a suit of armor for the armor of God.

Ephesians 6: 13-17
13 Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand. 14 Stand firm then, with the belt of truth buckled around your waist, with the breastplate of righteousness in place, 15 and with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace. 16 In addition to all this, take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one. 17 Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.

Climbing the Walls

It was a good week this week.  It started off with some early mornings.  Caroline kept waking up at 5:30 a.m. for a few days (instead of her usual 8 a.m.), Josiah was up at 4:30 a.m. on Tuesday, Henry was up by 6 a.m. every day.  Of course, Henry wakes up at 6 because he has managed to come in our bed in the middle of the night most nights.  Somehow in the midst of all our early mornings we still managed to be late to our CC homeschool group on Friday.  I wasn't even in a hurry as I didn't realize we were going to be late until we were driving there.  Of course, this week was our family presentation during the big group time at the beginning.  So, we arrived, dashed inside, and mouthed "I'm sorry" to our leader as she called us up for our presentation.  Basically we gave our names and the kids were supposed to say what they liked to do for fun.  Josiah said he liked to color, draw, and play with his trains.  Henry said he liked "to do what Josiah does."  And I said Caroline basically likes to do whatever her brothers are doing.  So it looks liked Josiah's running the show at home with two little followers.

This week we learned about George Washington becoming the first president.  We made George Washington hats (super simple) and the boys did a George Washington dot-to-dot while we read a few books about him.  Henry is a dot-to-dot fanatic.  He is always wanting us to make him dot-to-dots.  Todd made him a Thor dot-to-dot and ever since then he's been requesting quite intricate pictures.  I am on the lookout for a giant dot-to-dot book for him.

We also learned about the 5 senses.  There are SO many things to do for fun to learn about the 5 senses.  We did just a few, but I think we'll do some more this week.  We did a taste test of sweet, salty, bitter, & sour.  Josiah requested that we do this a few days in a row.  He loved the sugar and salt.  No one was a fan of the cinnamon or lime juice.  Even Caroline wanted to get in on the action until Josiah put a little cinnamon in her mouth.  She was not a fan.  We also drew pictures while blindfolded.  Josiah liked that a lot, but also got a little silly with it.

On Wednesday, after my Bible study, we had a luncheon which was really nice.  Afterwards, I went to pick up the kids and Caroline was holding a glass jar of baby food that I had in her diaper bag.  (I'm not so sure why she was holding it...)  Anyway, she saw me at the door to pick her up, got excited, and threw the jar in the air.  It came down with a crash and shattered.  Sweet potatoes (and glass) everywhere. We made a quick exit after that.

Josiah has been working on his American Ninja Warrior training.  He really enjoyed watching that on TV a few times.  He calls this the spider climb.  He practices it a lot and can now make it to the top of the door frame.  The only problem is, he says he's scared of heights so once he makes it up, he can't get down.  He'll jump if he's only halfway up, but he'll just yell for me if he's at the top.  Needless to say, he's needed a lot of assistance as the week's gone on.

Todd introduced Josiah to the old Kurt Russell movies.  They watched The Strongest Man in the World and right afterwards, Josiah got the cover and drew Kurt Russell.  :)  And he and Henry have been decorating their room all week long with their pictures, so now Kurt Russell is right up there on the wall at top bunk.

the case

Our friends in Virginia got Josiah a VeggieTales "How to Draw" video which he's watched several times.  He really enjoys it and I've noticed that he takes what he's learned and applies it to his future pictures.  He now draws eyes with a white hole in the pupil (reflecting light) and he adds shadows.  He just loves to draw.

Caroline likes to deconstruct.  I've noticed this week that if she's a little bit quiet, then she's probably sitting in front of the bookcase taking out books one by one and "reading" them and setting them on the ground.  If she's REALLY quiet, then she's probably sitting at the lego table and deconstructing whatever the boys have made.  Personally, I kind of like the deconstructing of the legos because then I can make stuff again.  Usually they make things (cars, planes, houses, etc.) and they sit for weeks so there aren't many legos left to play with (and it's a little boring for me).

Finally this past Saturday we went to a picnic.  Josiah's tutor from CC invited everyone from CC to go to her church's annual picnic.  They had a very cool playground and splash park.  The boys had a very good time.  The had a massive amount of food there, too, so we made a plate up for the boys.  Later when we asked them what they liked best about the playground, Henry said, "the food."

Net climbing - they made it to the top (and got down on their own)

Josiah on the "rock" wall

Splash park - Josiah on the left and Henry on the far right

Caroline checking it out, but she didn't even take a step towards the water (which was fine with us)

Another fun experiment from the Berenstain Bears book. Essentially a hot air balloon. I got it to work by giving it a little lift as I let go of it, but poor Josiah couldn't get it to work.

 

Cooler Temps Inside & Out

Our week started off with Todd's birthday.  The boys got him a Superman and a Batman shirt, which they were very excited to give him.  Josiah also drew him a Batman coloring book - several pages stapled together with pictures of Batman and other characters on the pages penned in ink so Todd can color them in.  I think the biggest gift of all was that our A/C got fixed that night.  Todd got about 50 mosquito bites on his legs while outside with the repair man, but at least our house went from 87 degrees that night to 78 degrees by the next morning.

Later this week, the man came back to fix our doorbell.  I would assume he has the owner's permission, but he said the old doorbell just didn't work and so he installed a new doorbell.  So now our front door has two doorbells, but only one works, and our hallway has two doorbell boxes, but only one works.  Ahhh, living in a rental.  :)

Caroline has figured out how to do her shape sorter this week.  She can actually figure out which shape goes in which space fairly quickly.  She likes to goof around with it, too, and hold the piece halfway through the hole and just look at me so I'll start getting excited for her, but then have to draw my excitement out.  She has also asked us to read the same 4-5 books over and over again.  They are the same 4-5 that the boys loved at her age, too.  She loves her ABC and her animal book.  All the books she likes have real life pictures, not artwork.  Today she was pointing at the animals in her book and making all sorts of noises.  It's really cool to watch her language develop. 

She loves when we listen to our school CD with our memory work on it for each week.  As soon as I turn on the CD player, she stops whatever she's doing to come to where it is and start dancing around the room.  She desperately tries to hop, too, but just can't get any air yet.  And she loves her goggles.

Blurry, but cute

We missed our CC group this week because Henry must have gotten Caroline's bug from last week and he got sick on Thursday.  He was super lethargic and throwing up, he took two naps on Friday, and woke up from the second one ready to eat and drink.  I was not so eager to have him eat and drink just yet, but he kept it all down from that point forward.  Now, hopefully Josiah doesn't get it.  Josiah would be heartbroken if we had to miss his CC group next week because we are doing our family presentation and he is super excited to do that.  (Me, not so much.)

Our 4 hour snuggle fest

While sickly Henry wanted to be held for 4 hours straight on Friday, Josiah and Caroline made a house.  Josiah didn't want Caroline to go in the green chair, "upper," portion of the house, so he cleverly directed her to go under the house and hang out there.  She thought it was super cool and they had a good time.  

The house - Caroline going in her "door"

Saturday the high was 78 (although our "feels like" temp is always 10 degrees higher than actual temp), so we took advantage of some cooler weather and went to a playground.  Henry said he didn't want to go because it was a park he was convinced he didn't want to play at.  Josiah, Caroline and I walked to it (the local elementary school playground), and they had a great time.  Caroline LOVES the slide.  Todd and Henry surprised us with some Hippo Ice.  What they do is puree fresh fruits (strawberries, mango, avocado, etc.), freeze it in big blocks, and then when you order it they shave it off. So, it is shaved pureed fruit and it is super good. Very smooth, creamy texture.  Of course, once Henry saw the playground we were at, he decided that indeed he did want to play.  The sun was a bit hotter than we anticipated and Todd went home with a red neck.  

She said "weeee" every time she went down the slide

Hippo Ice

Henry bounced back from his sickness and was himself this weekend.  He kept asking to watch Josiah's "eggo" video.  It took us a few tries to figure out he meant "Diego."  Now it's hilarious to hear him ask to watch Eggo all the time.  And he's never even experienced the joys of toaster waffles.  

Today, we decided to make stuffed apples as a family.  It was an Alton Brown recipe which was actually easy - not many of his are.  We all made the crumble part together, stuffed the apples, and baked them.  They were very good.  Josiah enjoyed his while Henry refused to eat his.  He told us in a defiant voice that he was NOT going to eat his.  We certainly didn't mind his refusing to eat what essentially was a sugar-filled apple.  Caroline couldn't have them (butter), so she licked a spoonful of peanut butter instead.  That wasn't exactly the plan for her, but alas that's where she ended up.  She was quite happy.

Cutting up butter (super exciting stuff)

Making the crumble with our fingers

The finished product - they looked better in person

And a peanut butter spoon...

We were able to take a walk this evening, too, which was nice.  We are so glad to have cooler weather.  The boys rode their tricycle and go-kart pedal thing.  Caroline strolled.  We were not eaten alive by mosquitoes either.  

Josiah is 5 going on 13 now.  After bath time every night he gets a comb and styles his hair.  He has requested that I don't cut it because he doesn't like it short.  So, I only trim around his ears so he can have more up top to "style."  Usually it is going all sorts of directions after he's combed it, but at least he has a huge grin on his face as he enjoys his accomplishment.

Costumes of the week -
Batman & Robin

Josiah also made a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle Raphael.  Raphael did school with us one day and ate meals with us as well.  We officially need to buy more construction paper at this point.  They need to start making princess dresses for Caroline so we can use up our abundance of pink and purple paper. 

And a cute one of Henry and Caroline. Henry is all "ho, hum" with his underwear sticking out. Caroline looks like she's about to plow into him with excitement. (She did run around him.)