Current Events

Okay, three catch-up posts done, a couple more to do, don't know if I'll make it to ten, that was perhaps a bit ambitious. In the meantime, lest I get further behind, here are a few moments and thoughts from the last few days, organized by child. 

I took the kiddos to the playground at their school on Friday. C couldn't get enough of hanging from these rather high bars. I stepped back to snap this pic with time to spare before she wanted down. 

Later that day all the kids got involved in this incredibly long game of restaurant, and C was just killing me with her little apron and notebook, just like the big kids. She's in the middle of a huge language explosion, suddenly repeating everything she hears, forming more real words for things, and happily giving far more verbal clues about what is on her mind. Prior to this we were in a few weeks of huge aggravation, as her cognitive skills took a giant leap forward before the verbal set caught up and she was really frustrated all the time. Always how it goes! We also switched her to a toddler bed this weekend which seems to be going well enough. 

She's still in our bedroom, alas, since we are short on upstairs bedrooms and only living here another year. Baby will be joining us in this room, too, oh my! Some day a Don and I will have our own room again and it will be AMAZING. But for now she's got her cozy Caroline corner and it's all good. It really is a pretty big room. This is also the first time we've ever used a toddler bed; A and W each went straight to a twin around age two, but because of space and her age we figured this would be a good interim step to free up the crib. 

Moving on...

Pokemon in the afternoon is still where it is at. Even C watches for a few minutes before she goes up for a nap. Here she got all snugly with William -too cute! 

Pokemon trainer by day, reading machine by night: Amy plowed through the last three Harry Potter books this summer, and after her completion of number seven last night, she declared that today would be a Harry Potter party. She and W cooked up all sorts of complicated games all day long. She also added up the total pages of all seven books, which was 4,102. I do believe that is more than I have read in any single calendar year. Ever.  

And my William, who seems to have escaped the camera lately, is in a bit of a transition-land right now.  He had a tearful meltdown over the weekend, upon realization that he would be going to kindergarten, like, this year. He cried through half his swim lesson today because he "missed me" (I was right there, translation of this was dislike of the noisy group lesson instead of the semi-private lessons he enjoyed over the winter). But OY! He's getting so big and capable and yet so fragile and clingy. I've been toying with he idea of homeschooling JUST him, because after all, it is only kindergarten, he's only going to be there for three hours a day anyway, and it would save a load of money, and aggravation of bucking him up for it each day. BUT, on the other hand, it is only three hours a day, he could use the structure, and I know he'd do fine once he got in the swing. I dunno, you know me and the homeschool subject... Thoughts? 

Anyway, this is getting long. I'll finish with two last pics from Saturday: the red rock crab D brought home from a kayak outting and the flour footprints C left on her chair after helping me make pizza dough. 

I think that covers it for now. Will check back soon with a few more back-posts!