The Daddy Unit is Proud

Spoiler alert: if you have not seen Star Trek: The Motion Picture, what’s wrong with you? No, I mean, this will ruin the ending for you if you keep reading.  So, correct yourself by going and watching it now.  It is not the greatest movie by any stretch, and not the best of the ST movies by far, but it gets better as it goes and has a great ending… if you are a space geek. Plus, it is fun to MST3K some of the effects and excessively long fly-by sequences.  Of course, it helps if you are a fan of the original series. That said, if you are still reading, you do so at your own risk.  So, Lex and I cuddled up on the couch and watched it Saturday night, and when the big reveal of V’Ger comes at the end, he nailed it!  I whispered, “There it is! Do you recognize it?” “I don’t think so,” he said. “You’ve seen it before,” I assured him quietly. After many seconds of silence, but well before they showed the tarnished label, he said, “maybe they are just mispronouncing Voyager.” My bursting geek pride almost launched him across the room!  All the pains of parenting are worth it for moments like this.  Of course, you have to be a space geek to appreciate this particular moment, but both of us are, so such things work out well. =)

Little House in the Big Woods

Eve was sick today (cough, low fever) and I took the day off to stay home with her. Alan was with them Monday and Tuesday while I was doing parent conferences. She started feeling bad on Tuesday and Alan said she kept going to the window and asking if mommy was coming home yet. He said it started around 10am and he promised her I’d be home around 3pm… then I got lucky she fell asleep because I didn’t make it home until 4:30pm! But I was home to wake her up at 5:00. Anyway, she wasn’t up for school today and I wasn’t up for leaving her (and Alan wasn’t up for a third day off from work) so I stayed home with her.

We have been reading really stupid fairy books that she loves and she promised me that when we finished the series she would let me pick the next book. Today I chose Little House in the Big Woods and she protested. She argued and refused. I was annoyed, but tried to be patient with her. This evening she basically put herself to bed and when I went up to read to her I found her in bed with the lights off. I asked if she wanted me to read a few pages of the book and she agreed, granted I let her lay down and if she got bored we could stop.

Turns out she loved it! Also turns out I either have not read this book or completely forgot the entire first chapter. The whole thing is about them preparing for winter, which means killing and slaughtering many animals, and it goes into great detail! They even describe in detail how to roast a pigs tail and how delectable it is. Yuck! I kept asking her is she wanted to stop and she said no. Either she liked the book a lot or she liked seeing my yucked out face! When we finished the first chapter she said we should read more tomorrow.

I bugged her so much to read it I can hardly say no now. Note to self: preview books, don’t rely on memory from long ago.

Electric Fruits and Veggies

While I had to work today (so… many… parent/teacher conferences!) Alan was home with the kids and they did all sorts of fun things with Daddy! First they went to vote, then they went out to lunch and the grocery store (where Eve spent all her money on Easter junk), and then they came home and did some science!

They have been talking about doing this experiment for a few days now and I encouraged Alan to have the kids write up the experiment. Get some academics in there! He thought it was a great idea. I also asked him to write up this blog post, but he was less excited about that. :)

The experiment was to test the level of electricity generated by citrus fruits, and they decided to compare to non-citrus things as well. I would love to give more details, but I really don’t know them, so I’ll have to let the photos do the talking. When I left this morning I said, “I’ll leave the camera here on the counter, just in case you guys need it today!” They clearly picked up on my hint!

This looks yummy!

This looks yummy!

See the little bulb lit up?

See the little bulb lit up?

There seems to be some good energy in that orange!

Some 9v cells make it brighter!

Eve's notes

Eve’s notes

Lex's notes

Lex’s notes

The back side of Lex's notes.

The back side of Lex’s notes.

Quotes from Eve

“All they want is money! That’s all they care about!  That’s why I want to buy things from them.” said Eve, while looking through an American Girls catalog.  3/3/14

“I want to be a famous artist so I can make a lot of money and buy lots of cats!” said Eve. Moments later she amended it to “pets” because she wants dogs, bunnies, and hamsters too. 3/2/14 

Two little monkeys…

jumping on the bed.

One fell off and bumped her head. I didn’t get that on video though.

Alan and I got a new mattress and the kids were breaking it in. We need to get rid of the old one, but for now we just stacked the new one on top. Now we have a huge bed! My bedroom looks so small and sparse in this video. I seriously need an interior decorator! :)

I also added videos of the kids playing in the snow and our super fun sledding outing. You can reread those posts for the videos if you care to.

From the camera…

This is the final day of February vacation week. Last year we spent it in Florida, and this year we spent it with the stomach virus. Good times! Seriously though, it was a pretty low-key week. Mema and Grandpa Tom and Uncle Greg all came to visit. We played out in the snow, played inside, flew helicopters and flying eyeballs, and generally had fun.

lex

The RF devices set off our smoke alarm. Lex insisted on taking it down himself by piling pillows on top of pillows. Mema supervised.

greg

See the helicopter?

eyeball

Eyeball!

One day Eve decided to do some math, just for fun. She wrote it right next to a drawing she’d done of herself with her face painted like a butterfly. She got all the way up to 4096+4096 when Alan decided to teach her some stuff. She promptly lost interest. I guess math is only fun on her terms. :)

math p1

Multifaceted Eve with her art and math.

math p2

When Alan tried to teach her math, she lost interest.

We’ve had lots of snow this week, but we’ve also had a few beautiful sunny days!

snow

It was a beautiful day!

snowman

It was so warm the snowman melted by nightfall, but we enjoyed making it. :)

These days the kids wake up early on the weekends (well, that’s how it has always been!) and they come down stairs and play computer games. I don’t love the amount of time they get, but I do love sleeping in a bit on weekends! A little give and take. Usually they are on separate computers, but the other morning I found them like this.

kids

This is how I found them one morning. Cuddled in my chair, sharing a cracker-snack breakfast, and playing on Highlightskids.com together. Sweetness.

We are getting more and more use out of our nearly finished basement. I’ve started exercising down there on the twice broken elliptical, the kids have some toys down there, the guests report that it makes a nice bedroom (just wait for the mattress topper we just ordered!) and Eve decided to set up an art studio. The basement is the place to be.

art

Eve set up an art studio in the basement and worked on her drawings while I exercised.

I think we’ve hit the beginning of the end of the pet discussion. On Friday I took the kids to the humane society to visit the animals. I told them we should make it a research project. Eve promptly grabbed her notebook and a pencil. On the way down we discussed what kinds of questions we should ask them about having pets. Eve took notes. When we got there we found three cat rooms that were open for visiting. Apparently if you want to visit the dogs you need to go through the adoption interview process first and meet the dogs one-on-one. We weren’t ready for that so we just played with cats. Eve asked questions and took notes on the answers. She even found the cat of her dreams, or so she says. I think what sold her was the tag that said, “a cuddly little grandma whose only wish is to curl up by your side!” Eve thought that sounded just perfect. The discussion continues…

questions

She had lots of questions for the lady.

cat

Petting Smores, a pretty kitty.

cookie

This is Cookie, the “grandmother cat” that Eve has her heart set on.

sheldon

Playing with Sheldon, the somewhat skittish cat that had them both laughing.

Tonight is our final night of vacation before school starts tomorrow. Thankfully we are all feeling healthy, happy, and relaxed. We spent the day building a new Mindstorm robot, teaching animals about math and science, and going to a birthday party at the aquatic center. A nice mix of busy and calm. Happy Sunday.

Snow

We got a bit of snow today, like 18″ or so! The district cancelled school, thereby extending next week’s vacation just a little bit longer. I was a little bummed because today is Valentine’s Day and we had a kindergarten party planned, but apparently the Superintendent didn’t take that into consideration! Geesh! Eve’s teacher bumped their party up a day, though Eve forgot and didn’t bring in her Valentine’s cards. So now we have mine for two classes (K and 5th), Lex’s, and Eve’s all in a big pile on the counter. Everyone will celebrate at school on the 24th. :)

valentines

I made little Valentine’s for my fifth graders. It’s silly, I know, and will be extra silly on the 24th.

kiddos

Happy Valentine’s Day to my little valentines.

We spent several hours outside in the snow. Poor Alan had to go to work, so we started by shoveling out the driveway. That took awhile!

snow

We have a lot of snow around here!

eve sitting

Eve plopped down and we nearly lost her! :)

house

Our little house in the snow.

snow bank

Mountain climbing!

sliding

Eve slid down the banister face first and couldn’t get up. She started crying that her chin was cold so Lex warmed it for her while they waited for me to come to her rescue and haul her back onto her feet!

porch

I told the kids to go on an expedition to find the swing set… they made it as far as the porch.

stuck

They got stuck in the snowbank! Lex is in up to his waist and Eve up to her armpits! Lex managed to get himself out, but Eve was so stuck I had to shovel her out. :)

happy eve

I don’t think she minded too much being stuck in the snow.

dug out

Here she is, partially shoveled out.

Happy Valentine’s Day! Happy winter vacation! Happy Family! We were doing our highs/lows this evening and the kids had nothing but highs to talk about. Lex barely managed a low (snow down his back) and Eve’s low was she was too tired. :) Everyone is looking forward to a visit from Mema and Grandpa Tom tomorrow! Let the fun continue!

Valentine’s Day

We have been pretty low-key about Valentine’s Day this year. I only just got out decorations today and only because Eve said “I think it’s about time we decorate for Valentine’s Day.” Mostly it has been about getting the cards done.  I figured they deserved a little something sweet for the day though.

image

Happy Valentine’s Day!