An evening at the table

The other evening when Tim was gone for the evening I was thrilled to find that all three kiddos found something to occupy themselves with at the table for quite a while.



Michael had come home with a math game to play for homework.  In the game you draw a card and then have to take away 1 from that number (or 2 if you play the "minus 2" version) and then mark your score card with that number.  They were suppose to play it with someone in the family and we suggested that Michael teach the game to Jon.  While the game is quite easy for Michael he had fun teaching his little brother and it was just perfect for Jon who has just begun to understand subtraction.  So he wanted to play it again and again.


Becca was easy to satisfy with one of her favorite passtimes - play-doh.  Here she is rolling a play-doh ball back and forth.


And Michael had another math game from school where you roll two dice and subtract the smaller from the larger and graph the answer.  He has a running commentary going throughout the game.  "And the twos pull ahead.  But not for long because the threes are starting to make a comeback....."

More Becca Stories

My boys must be reaching ages when their growth slows a bit, because I feel like I talk about all the new things Becca is doing more so than for them.

She has really been displaying quite the personality lately.  One of her newest faces is her thinking face.  When I ask a question and she says "mmm" and does this:


She has also been into counting a lot recently.  Here is a video of her.

(I should say that this video took a couple takes.  She usually starts with "two" with two fingers up, followed by "three" with four fingers up, and ending with "four" while showing all five fingers.)

She still dislikes most vegetables, but unlike her brothers can't even be talked into eating them for a treat.  She will just sit out of dessert, even if everyone else at the table is eating it.  The only thing that works sometimes is to leave her alone at the table and not let her get down until she eats a couple bites.


And of course she still is all cuteness.  Nothing like sunglasses to soften the bright lights in house when you just wake up.

Scarecrow Day

Michael's first grade class had scarecrow day.  They were to come dressed like a scarecrow and do scarecrow activities.  Unfortunately we just don't have clothes for him that look scarecrowish, but we made do.

At school, the kids have access to an ipad and do some work on them throughout the day.  One of the cool things about this is about once a week I get an e-mail directly from Michael's ipad sharing something he did that day.

Today I got this story that he had written:

Just made me laugh!

I Can Cut

Becca continues to amaze me with the motor skills she has developed much earlier than her brothers.  I contribute it to a mix of the fact that she is a girl (and girls tend to be more coordinated toddles) and the fact that she sees her brothers do amazing things and doesn't want to be left out.  One of the skills she figured out completely on her own was how to use scissors.  She asked to cut one day while I was working on a project and cutting some things out.  I gave her some paper and the scissors and thought I'd see what she could do before I stepped in to help.  All by herself, she showed me her skills.

1. Use two hands to pull the scissors apart.


2. Stick the fingers from one hand into the holes.


3. Add the paper and cut!

My brilliant first born!

I have been loving watching Michael grow so much as a reader this year as I have talked about in previous posts, but he is also growing a writer. It is so funny for me to see him coming home with work sheets that I use to give my students to do when I was teaching. Yesterday he came home with a writing project that he was so excited to show us. They had read a story about a boy who spent a week with his grandpa and they needed to take the pictures from it, organize them by day, and then write what happened that day.



And then they wrote a story about themselves:


Way to go Michael!!

Doll Clothes

As Becca is getting more and more into her baby doll I thought that doll clothes might be a fun birthday present for her this year. So I went out looking and ran into two problems. 1. Most doll clothes seem to be for 18" dolls (the height of the ever popular american gill dolls) and the baby we have is 12". 2. People are asking $10-20 (or even more) for a doll dress. I have a problem paying more for doll clothes than I do for clothes for my kids.

So I started rummaging through our baby clothes to see what I could find. Of course even our newborn clothes are too big, but I am having fun altering them for the doll. Now, I do know how to sew a button or fix a small hole in something, but I have only ever used a sewing machine once - a couple of months ago when Michele came over to teach me. However, I brought the sewing machine up from the basement along with an old newborn onsie. After some work relearning how to operate the machine, here is what I made:



It turned out to look a lot like a nightgown so that is what I decided it was. :) To those of you who know how to sew, this probably looks a bit anti-climactic, but I'm so proud of how it turned out, especially since I even had to take the sleeves off to thin the top and then reattach them. I decided to give this first attempt to Becca right now and I'm already at work on some more clothes for the upcoming 2 year old birthday.

Check these out

I found a fun article about 25 clever ideas that is well worth the read.
Click here to read.

Here are a couple of my favorites:

Overhaul your linen cupboard – store bedlinen sets inside one of their own pillowcases and there will be no more hunting through piles for a match.


Bread tags make the perfect-sized cord labels.


Win friends at breakfast with this heart-shaped egg tutorial. Aww shucks!


Turn your muffin pan upside down, bake cookie-dough over the top and voila – you have cookie bowls for fruit or ice-cream.

Jon writes his name

Jon loves to practice writing his name. We have done it together many times and he has scribbled away on his own some too. The other day he was working by himself and told me he wrote his name. As I was busy with some other things, I responded with something, "Great job Jon," but never actually looked at what he had done. The next day I happened to glance at the desk where the paper still sat. Wow! He had done a fabulous job. Jon has been pretty good at the O for a bit now, but I've never seen anything I recognize as a J or n before when he writes on his own - I usually only can tell it is Jon because there is an O between a couple scribbles.

Check it out:


Oh, and while we are on the subject of Jon, I have to share another thing. At home I often make spaghetti with rotini pasta since it is easier for the kids to pick up and we call it Pasta. At the restaurant we ate at this weekend Jon got spaghetti and without being use to the new name he kept calling it "PaTeddy" - so adorable!