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.