Snippets From The Week: The February 25, 2012 Edition

The Suz was looking at a picture of herself where her belly was sticking out. She said, "Good thing my NICKELS weren't showing!" [referring to her chest, of course]

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I've been working with the Suz for weeks now on understanding what a "vowel" is. One of her workbook lessons from this week had several short words where she had to circle the vowel. She did all right until I said, "Okay. In the word 'I,' what is the vowel?" And you know what she shouted with a great deal of confidence? "U!"

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When it's misty outside, the Suz says it's "soggy." And when she's eating cereal, she doesn't want it to get "foggy."

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Campers was at the entrance to the room I was in, opening and closing the door multiple times. He said, "Mom? I can't believe you've not told me to stop." So I said, "Well, it's still early in the day when I have a nerve or two left. My real beauty shows up later on." He replied, "I think you mean The Beast."

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Right before lunch one day I hollered out, "Campers! Say prayer." And once we all got settled and quiet, he said just one word, "Prayer." To which I replied, "Okay! Let's eat."

[I laughed. Boy did I laugh. Yet Campers knows this is a one-time joke. I figure lightening up and letting go are things I should do more often.]

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Japanese Gardens

There are some Japanese Gardens in town. A whole five acres of them, Pa told me. We have not visited them before, primarily because of the cost. There are usually a couple of "free days" a year, but they always, always fall when it's cold and sopping wet outside. Well, this year it fell on a day when Pa had off of work, and it was cold and sopping wet outside. But nothing will stop me from saving thirty bucks and finally getting to see the gardens. Nothing. I am a Pacific Northwesterner; the rain makes me grow.

We covered the grounds in about an hour. We were pretty much traveling at Kid Speed, with some acceleration added in due to the rain. I figured--I wasn't paying a thing and felt I got my money's worth for sure.

Well, seriously, we did enjoy the gardens, the peaceful zen-like gardens. We had to silence our cell phones as we entered. Too bad we couldn't put a silencer on the Suz, as she treats nearly every outing like it's a contest for who can be the Loudest and the Busiest. She wins again!

Library Art Day - Eric Carle

I took the kids to the homeschool class at the library again where they study the style of an illustrator and then make a craft along that theme. This week's illustrator was Eric Carle, author of the infamous The Very Hungry Caterpillar, Brown Bear, Brown Bear, and The Very Quiet Cricket. 

Did you know that Eric Carle would paint tissue paper, let it dry, paint it a different shade, let it dry, and then cut out shapes from the tissue paper to make his illustrations? I thought that was fascinating. I have read his books for years and could never quite figure out how he accomplished his art. 

The kids were given scraps of paper, in all different patterns and colors, and were told to cut out shapes to make a collage. Campers made a dolphin coming out of the water...

Ziggy made a night scene, complete with a boy peeking out of the window in the house...

And the Suz (with a lot of help from Ma and the Brown Bear book) made a duck...

I know. I did a craft and it was awesome. Mark it down. Doubt it will happen again.

The Talker, She Writes

My Suz knows how to write most of her letters now. Not all of them correctly, of course, but we're working on that. Lately she'll jot a bunch of letters on a page and bring them to me to read. I'll say, "Well, these don't spell words, they're just letters," and she'll act like I'm some sort of brainless zombie. "READ THE PAGE, MOM!!!!!!" 

She sent me her first message the other day. Took me a while to decode it.

"Hi Mom Haw R U?" Clever. Very clever.

A Nice Sunny Day

Every time the sun comes out, my girl will gleefully shout, "It's a nice sunny day!" And then she'll list all the ways we should take advantage of the rare delight. They usually involve a trip to the park, which we managed on a Monday afternoon, which was followed by a stop by Burgerville for some ice cream. Hey, it was a nice sunny day--what was I to do?!

The Tooth, It Fell Out

If there's one thing our Zig does well, it's to take his time with things. We know that at the first sign of a loose tooth, we're looking at MONTHS before the thing is finally out. He'll wiggle the tooth, but in reality, he prefers to wait for the permanent tooth to completely shove the baby one out of his mouth. Lately his front tooth has been hanging by a thread for what felt like weeks, and then one morning, he woke up and it had dropped right onto his pillow. No effort required. I assume the tooth had finally called "uncle."

Four baby teeth out; sixteen to go:

 

The Tooth Fairy always leaves a note (in my handwriting) and a pack of fun gum for each tooth. I've had this round's gum bought and set aside for weeks now. However, the Tooth Fairy got so busy and distracted with many things that it slipped her mind to do her duties. Of course, she didn't know this until she was greeted by a rather outspoken Zig, whose first words the next morning were, "THE TOOTH FAIRY DIDN'T COME! I AM VERY! DIS! APPOINTED!!!"

And of course I felt awful. Just awful. There were tears coming out of both of us. Of any child to let down, this one's the worst. I kid you not, I'll be hearing about The Time The Tooth Fairy Failed til the end of my life.  Maybe longer.

Fortunately, I came up with a plan (with help from Campers, who knew the situation was dire, simply dire--my firstborn was even offering me money, candy, you name it) to turn lemons into lemonade. I sat down and wrote five little clues and made the trek to the "loot" a scavenger hunt. Plus I might have put some extra candy in with the gum. And paper hearts. Lots of paper hearts. But I didn't try to buy my boy's forgiveness. I didn't. Happily, that seemed to soothe the pain and Campers has decided he wants the Tooth Fairy to fail when it's his turn to lose a tooth. See what fun we're having?!

Gotcha Day Plus Five

February 5th was the fifth anniversary of our meeting the Suz for the first time in China. February 5th was also the date of the Superbowl. So guess what we did while 95% of America was at home in front of the TV? We went out for Chinese. It was lovely. And shock of all shocks, all three kids liked some or all of the food that we ordered. Another milestone, you see.

We also gave Suz a gift we had purchased in China--this year she received a "lucky drum," which she luckily gets to play to her heart's content in her room. With the door shut. And my earplugs in.

Snippets From The Week: The February 18, 2012 Edition

It's not unusual to sit down for a family meal, and have the Suz spend the first five minutes talking. I guess a) she hates the silence and b) she knows that while the rest of us value eating, she values talking and is hungry for attention even more. Anyway, one lunch time she started her meal with a song about the colors of the rainbow, and did you know there were seven colors, and I saw a show about that, and won't Dad be proud, and sing sing sing, talk talk talk, on and on it went until she finally said, "Whew! I need to stop talking cuz my tummy says it's hungry!" 

To which Campers replied, "Great. Now her stomach is talking, too."

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I asked Campers to take his dirty dishes to the sink, and not thirty seconds later he said, "Mom? What'd you ask me to do?" So I reminded him (nothing new), and he went on to explain that there's long-term memory, short-term memory, and mom-term memory. "Mom-term memory," he said, "is like short-term memory, only shorter." Good to know where I rank.

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The Suz keeps telling me the word "drink" is spelled with a "g." I couldn't figure that out, and couldn't figure that out and then finally one day I heard her say the word, "jrink." Huh. No wonder my girl can't spell. Might be that NONE OF US CAN SPEAK.

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I was reading this elaborate story to the Suz about a man who worked in the storeroom at the emperor's palace. I kinda gathered that she wasn't trekking along with the story, so to check her comprehension, I asked what the man did at work. Her answer? "Dwink coffee." This all harkens back to the day she told me what Pa does all day: "He goes to wook, does stuff, and dwinks coffee!" No wonder he's exhausted.

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I've discovered that the Suz has a rather, how shall we say, "interesting" take on the world, including her vocabulary. And with her--if she doesn't know the meaning of a word, she just makes something up and to her, it is RIGHT. I asked her recently what the word "rich" meant. "Happy!" she says. So then I asked her what "poor" meant. "Sad!" I told her otherwise, but I'm guessing she'll still hold strong to her own definitions.

Pa and I used to joke that it'd be "fun" (read: twisted) when we had kids to mess with their vocabulary, for example, call a banana an "apple," call a pair of socks "shoes," and on and on and on. Apparently our fate had been set.

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Snippets From The Week: The February 11, 2012 Edition

Suz: "Mom, can I play Wii?"

Me: "Go ask the cat. If he says 'yes,' then you may."

Suz: [runs up to cat, starts talking to him, and then shouts] "MOM! IT'S NOT WOOK-ING!!!"

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That Suz. She talks from the moment her feet hit ground until her feet are tucked back in at night. She can't think unless she's talking. And she has a zero-tolerance policy on silence, which means she can't stand it and will do anything to fill it. GOD BLESS US EVERY ONE.

I have her sitting right behind me in the van, which means I get the Stream of Consciousness the entire time I'm driving from here to there. I've mostly learned to tune it out, or when it gets bothersome, to turn the radio up Nice And Loud. You'd be amazed at how enjoyable commercials are to listen to when you need some Alternate Noise. 

One day I tuned into the Suz channel and this is what was playing: "Some day I'll get a dad [husband]. And then we'll get a house and you'll come see me and he'll get me a ring! And we'll have kids and I'll be a mom." Then there was a big sigh and she said very matter-of-factly, "BUT FIRST I NEED A MAN." Indeed, my girl. Dream big.

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I started using a different fabric softener recently, and Campers came up and said to me, "Mom? You smell like programming." Come to find out, I must have used this particular scent back in the day when he'd sit in the basement and program on his computer, which happened to sit next to the laundry room. 

"Smells like programming," what a funny boy.

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The boys have created their own game they play pretty much around the clock. Literally. They look at the digital clock (any one of them in the house) and either turn it into a math problem or flip it upside down and make it "say something." So all day long I hear Campers and Ziggy shouting, "Look-at-the-time-what-does-it-say?!" and then I'll hear something like "12:34! 1-2-3-4!" or "6:42! 6 minus 4 equals 2!" or "8:08! 8:08 is BOB upside down!" And on and on it goes. When will it stop? Nobody knows.

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I sat down to do piano lessons with Campers, and he played a note wrong. I said, "You need to play a B." To which he replied, "And you need to call that B an F, because that is how I learned it."

I just laughed and laughed. That's just the kind of ridiculous thing my firstborn would come up with--that he would assume the whole world would change the name of a note simply because he learned it incorrectly.

Winter Swim Lessons

I like to have the kids take swim lessons in the winter, when they're all cooped up inside and needing a place to blow off steam. For the first time in their childhood, the boys were at the same level in their lessons, so I signed them up for a class together.

Ziggy told me each and every week that having his brother in the class is the Best Thing Ever and Gives Him Confidence and Makes Him a Better Swimmer. They have loved being in class together for the ten classes they have done. Campers will be advancing to the next level up, though, while Zig will continue at the same level he just took. No surprise there, as this was Zig's first time at this level and it was Campers' fourth time. It takes a while to "level up."

It's good to see the boys in the pool, loving the water and their teachers and the chance to move and groove.

Mail Chimp

Pa got a free hat in the mail from MailChimp. Guess who wears it the most?

Bob's Red Mill

One of my favorite things about homeschooling is the ability to make little Pit Stops Of Fun while we're out doing something during the day. Right after our art class at the library, I surprised the kids with a snack at Bob's Red Mill. Their headquarters (and big mill) aren't far from where we live and who can say "no" to fresh bread or a cookie? Not me, apparently.

Library Art Day - Lois Ehlert

As homeschooling gets to be more "popular," I'm amazed at the resources made available to students during the day. It's awesome, really.

One of our local libraries has a class twice a month geared for kids five and up. And WHEW, we are finally there. The class is in the afternoon and I have zero children who need a nap or a rest or a diaper or a snack. Okay, so I still pack snacks. Can't help myself. I get hungry.

Anyway, this series of [FREE] classes is focused on children's book illustrators and their style of art. During the session, the kids listened to a story written and illustrated by Lois Ehlert, talked about her style of art, and then were sent off to create their own collages.

I particularly like outsourcing our art classes as my skills, they are nil. And it was nice, so nice, to have someone else in charge of the chitlins for an hour during the day. 

Who's The Bestest Of Them All?

It's a regular occurrence for the Suz to draw pictures of her family. Over and over and over again. This particular one sums up what she thinks about her mom:

Smartest, bestest, biggest, brightest. As you already know.

Carry on.

Snippets From The Week: The February 3, 2012 Edition

[Just random stories from the week.]

At dinner one night, the Suz asked if I could make "corn on the HOB" sometime. "Corn on the WHAT?" we asked. "HOB," she insisted.

While the kids were all warming up in prep for gymnastics class, the teacher had them sit with their legs stretched out in a "V." From there, they would reach and pat forward to "put their toppings on their pizza." The teacher went around the circle, asking each child what s/he wanted on the pizza. "Pepperoni!" one said. "Cheese!" said the next. "Pineapple!" said the third. On and on it went until it came Susie's turn. She immediately shouted out, "MAC AND CHEESE!!!" I looked at the lady beside me and said, "That. That is the girl I've been given to raise." Everyone else was amused, after all, I mean, if you like mac and cheese then OF COURSE it should go on a pizza! But I was bumfuzzled. Where does she come up with this stuff?! So later that night, I was telling Pa this story and through his expert interrogation skills, he determined that she meant to say "Parmesan cheese." She loves Parmesan cheese on her pizza. But during class, she was so excited and her impulsive brain shouted out the close-enough answer of "mac and cheese." See? NEVER DULL. I should also mentioned that the Suz has called "Parmesan cheese" "CARmesan cheese" for years. So maybe this is progress.

Speaking of gymnastics class, the Suz got her first turn on the big trampoline. If you can imagine a bouncing, exploding stick of dynamite with hair, you've got the image about right.

The boys spent a good portion of one day this week talking in only three-word sentences. They got the idea from some book they had both read. Honestly, it was great exercise for their brain. But it drove me nuts. Nuts. And just when I thought I'd get a breather from the word game, Pa came home and joined in the fun. He is a sucker for a good word game. I kept speaking normally and they all insisted, in three-word sentences, of course, that "Mom has lost!" "Mom's not playing!" "She's no fun!" Nothing new, you see.

And that's all the news that's fit to print.

OMSI Field Trip

Each year, our field trip group likes to head to our local science museum for a one-hour class for the kids. Since our group is quite sizable now, we can split the kids into "older" and "younger" and easily fill two rooms of twelve or more kids. The older kids did a class on magnetism and electricity while the younger set headed to the planetarium for a class on constellations. I ended up with the older kids, so that's what pictures got taken. We also packed a sack lunch and had a good ol' time in the lunchroom with all of our friends. We love going to OMSI (Oregon Museum of Science and Industry) in January as there is *no one* else around. Most little kids are sick and most schools avoid field trips in January. Yay for an empty and super-cool museum!