Grandad & Nana Arrive

The weather here has been gorgeous.  It has finally cooled off and the humidity has gone down.  The kids have spent a lot more time playing outside.  At the beginning of the week they were spending hours playing in the backyard together.  It was wonderful.  You never know how long the low humidity is going to last, so we're enjoying it while we can.

One afternoon, once school was finished for the day, the kids decided to try my workout video with me.  The videos have five "rounds" of five minutes each with a minute's rest in between each round.  Josiah said that his arms were getting a workout even though I wouldn't let him hold any weights.  Henry said his favorite part was "active rest," which basically meant he liked to walk around during our minute rests.  Caroline talked through the entire video.  It was quite the experience.

Henry has been having a tough time listening and obeying.  It's been going on for about six years, but has increased in frequency in the past several months.  While he might fight us on 10-12 things a day in general, lately he fights us on absolutely everything.  Caroline and he just bicker constantly as well.  It's been a time.  Yet this week, he had wonderful pockets of sweetness.  At Boys of Iron at church, they made trail mix.  The boys had eaten all of their mix by the time they got home, except Henry had saved all his mini-marshmallows for Caroline.  That was an incredible gesture on his part.  Then he and I got to spend some time alone together on Saturday.  He was on house arrest, so he and I were home while the others went out.  We did puzzles, ate lunch, and read books together.  It was a wonderful time, very positive and happy.  He is such a good kid, incredibly sweet and funny.  He's just going through a rebellious phase.  Maybe he'll get it out of his system now and be an abnormally pleasant teenager.  We can dream.

Mid-week, Grandad and Nana flew our way.  The kids knew what time their flight landed and stood watch at the window for a good 90 minutes.  They were so focused that it was useless to try to get them to do anything else.

It was a very happy reunion.  These children love, love, love their grandparents.  The kids also love, love, love to kick me out of the house so they can spend more time alone with them.  I happily left one afternoon and was able to get a haircut all by myself.  I even stopped by the Goodwill store and browsed without having to tell anyone I wasn't going to buy them anything.  Alone time is a coveted thing around here.

Grandad took the training wheels off of Caroline's bike so we could start teaching her how to ride like the boys.  She was happy to get her first lessons in and she did a good job of putting her foot down to stop her falls every time she got off balance.  We also took the little clown bike out again to try to get her to sit on it and push off with her feet and let it glide.  She always resisted doing that in the past, but she was starting to get it this time.  She's gliding better than the boys did, so she may be a quick learner.  We need to get to a smoother area as well, because the side walks here have many bumps.

Grandad and Nana were able to come to the boys' Robotics class as well.  While they were watching them make their robot, Caroline put on a puppet show for me.

We have two days of school this coming week before the kids get a whole week off.  They are not too happy with me making them do those two days.  I'm praying it'll go smoothly and they'll be motivated to finish their work well so they can soak in all their Grandad & Nana time.  That should spur them on to finish well.

Dewberry Fun

We packed shoe boxes for Samaritan's purse this week.  (The shoe boxes go all around the world to give gifts to children who, for the most part, don't have anything.)  In Caroline's shoe box, she packed a baby doll that she had a hard time releasing into the hands of another child.  When I bought it, I didn't realize it cried and so every time the baby cried, Caroline would give it the little plastic bottle to make her feel better.  Then, as we were packing the shoe box, the baby would cry every time I laid her in it.  Caroline kept insisting that she needed to feed the baby to get it to stop crying.  I took a picture of her with the final shoe box (closed) and she looks so sweet.  Then I took a picture of her with it open to show the baby and she had a more reluctant face.  Guess what she's getting for Christmas this year?  A baby that is eerily similar to this one.  She's also getting the jelly bracelets that made it into the shoe box.  Apparently, anything that goes in a shoe box is immediately coveted.

The boys packed their shoe boxes as well.

Our CC Group made a trip to Dewberry Farm.  While it is called a farm, I'm not so sure they grow anything there except Christmas trees.  And the only animals they have are in the petting zoo area.  What they do have are lots of fun activities for the kids to do.  They have giant air-filled pillows to jump on, pedal cars, a super tall slide, and a tractor pull.

It's Texas.  You have to have a horse to sit upon and rope a calf.

Josiah decided to try the pipe slide.  It is made up of pipes so you sort of roll down the slide on the pipes.  I tried it a few years ago and even with all of my padding, it hurt the tushy area.  Josiah went down it, and to see his face as he made his way down was hilarious.  It hurts even more when you have less than 5% body fat.

We tried the corn maze this year.  I was slightly reluctant to go in with one particular child of ours.  He had a friend there and he was more interested in stealing away from the group than staying with us.  The last thing I needed was a child lost in a corn maze.  I was happy when we all finally made it out.

Henry seemed to know of only one way to hang onto a rope and that would be just barely.

This year, the kids noted the zip line area was totally gone.  Last year we watched as all the adults hit their knees on the ground trying to zip line, so maybe that had something to do with it, but it was our kids' favorite thing to do.  In the end, we had a great time, left totally exhausted, and quite thirsty.  No matter how many drinks I bring each year, I cannot keep up with their thirst.  Next year I'm just going to have to bring two gallon jugs of water.

Henry went into beast mode during his camo belt test this Friday.  At first Henry kept saying he was getting his camel belt.  When I caught on that he was saying the animal, it was pretty funny.  Not the animal, buddy, camouflage.  Todd was at the test while the rest of us were at Awana, but he said Henry did very well.  He even broke three boards at the end.  He was happy to move up in rank.

Next week, I get to sit in on Josiah's CC class for the first time.  It came to my attention that while he is doing great in class, his presentations are going a little too long and it's cutting into the other subjects time.  I spoke with Josiah later that day about his presentation (which was teaching them how to draw the swan, Louis, from Trumpet of the Swan).  He mentioned that he didn't have time to do the trumpet or the notes.  I asked him what happened (since he had practiced this presentation four times at home).  He mentioned that he spoke too long about the book.  And therein lies the problem.  The book was not part of the presentation and if Josiah starts explaining a book (especially one he's very excited about), that would be a good 15 minutes before he got to the picture.  His presentations need to be 3 minutes max.  He definitely does not have a problem speaking in front of a group.

We have some very special visitors coming this week.  The kids have been counting down for at least a month or two for their Grandad & Nana's arrival.  I have a feeling we'll hear, "Best Day Ever!" the moment they see them again.

Go Astros!

Last Sunday, Josiah woke up and said he had pink eye.  He tends to say this whenever he has even the smallest amount of crust on his eyes in the morning.  So, I didn't think much of it.  We did make him stay home from church just as a preventative (because I didn't actually open my eyes to look at his eyes when he woke me up early Sunday morning, and he had cleaned them up by the time I was awake).  But then Monday morning, his eyes really were crusty.  Argh!  Fortunately, our pediatrician gave us eye drops for just this thing several months ago.  We looked at the label and he gave us 10 refills.  Thank you, doctor.  It only took two days and his eyes looked as good as new.  We quarantined him for most of Monday to prevent an epidemic in our house.

We had some late nights watching the World Series.  Before Game 6, Henry was cheering, "Ass, Ass, Astros!"  Keep the word together, son. It was pretty exciting to win the whole thing.  The next day it was a race to get all the gear.  Todd learned that there was a very long line outside of the Houston Chronicle because all the newspapers had been sold out everywhere.  Sporting good shops had several hour long lines just for t-shirts.  We were excited, but not crazy enough to stand in those sorts of lines.  We're also glad the games are finally over because we were staying up way too late watching them.
We did partake of a Houston Astros doughnut.  No lines for those.

We didn't do Halloween this year, but neither did most of this area.  It ended up raining Halloween evening and with the World Series (Game 6) starting at 7:00, the joke around here was that it was going to be the shortest Halloween ever.  We did have the kids go from door to door within our house and Todd and I would dress up and give them treats.  At one door we gave Henry a can of corn to make up for the corn he missed out on at Sweet Tomatoes.  They always have a fun time doing it. Caroline, who normally does not like chocolate, has a new found love for Reese's Peanut Butter Cups.

Caroline was excited to earn her white-brown belt at karate this week.  She was being a bit silly in class, so I wasn't sure they'd give it to her, but she boldly asked for it.  "I'm supposed to get my brown belt today."  I think she said it with the understanding that she wasn't leaving the dojo without it.

The boys were glad to go back to robotics this week.  At the beginning I was talking to the instructor and asking how class was going (and if the boys were behaving).  He was telling me what they were going to do that day.  It was a robot that had 47 steps to make it and he thought it would be a two-day project.  When Caroline and I came back towards the end the boys had finished their robot.  They were very proud.  It moved very slowly, but the instructor said he'd help them make it move faster next time.  I'm glad they're enjoying the class so much.

We had a rousing weekend of cleaning up the house.  The kids have probably never been more excited for school to start.  We're headed back to Dewberry Farm this week, so it should be a fun one.