Snapshot of Life (October 2015)

Nathan

He is loving kindergarten, but struggling (some) with a good attitude during homeschool.  We are now focusing on taking a few breaks and letting him choose the order for his work, which is helping out some.  Brian also had a long chat with him and came up with the code "Your eyebrows are crooked" as a reminder for him to work on his attitude.  Our new phrase seems to be working with both kids, but they seem to be taking it literally though Brian and I didn't mean it that way when we came up with it.

I have found out the best time to get Nathan to tell me details about his school day is at bedtime after lights are out.  When I come in to kiss him goodnight, I lie down in bed with him and he'll tell me some things about his day.  I love it!!  I still don't feel like I know much about school, but it is fun having such grown-up conversations with him and I love how he looks forward to our chats just as much as I do.

Sarah 

She woke up from nap the other day really sad because someone at school had brought in pumpkin-face cookies but she couldn't have any because they had peanuts in them (Brian had picked her up from school while I was out so this was the first I'd heard of it).  She was so sad about it that I let her have a cookie for an after-nap snack.  Come to find out from Brian at dinner, her teachers had given her Skittles since she couldn't have the cookie.  I asked her "Sarah, why didn't you tell me about the Skittles?"  And she gave me the sweetest smile and cocked her head at me and said "Because!".

Our new naptime/bedtime ritual is that I cover her up with the sheet and comforter, then try to smooth out and smash the "wrinkles" in the bed.  Then I "discover" that its her under the covers, so I uncover her head and we give each other Eskimo kisses.  The other night after our ritual, she sighed and said "I love Eskimo kisses!" and my heart almost burst with love and thankfulness for my sweet girl!

Andrew 

His two bottom teeth are in, but the newest development is that he's back to fighting, fighting, fighting sleep.  He doesn't want to go to sleep at naptime or bedtime.  We are back to bouncing him to get him sleepy (thankfully I finally remembered to take the exercise ball to his room, so now I can bounce and sit which is much easier then standing), and doing the "bottom jiggle" to get him to sleep once he's in bed.  But then he'll start to kick his legs which wakes him up, then up pops his head and then he's sitting up and wailing.  I just remembered yesterday that I used to strap him into the carrier and bounce/walk him until he got tired - I need to try that again.  He's also waking up in the night, but mostly will go back to sleep if its the middle of the night, but after 5:45ish, all bets are off.  I try to not nurse him until after 5 am, which works out most nights.  Andrew has also been biting on and off as he's been cutting his new teeth - OW! OW! OW!

He's crawling faster and faster these days, but the big kids' favorite trick is when he pulls up and then balances on his knees without holding onto anything.  The big kids will clap for him when they notice him doing that. 

In the car 

We just finished up On the Banks of Plumb Creek by Laura Ingles Wilder (Book 3 of the series) and started On the Shores of Silver Lake.

Brian
 
On vacation this week.  He started the week off with hanging curtain hardware in the kitchen, building the black cabinets for the family room entertainment wall and replacing the thermostats in the house.  Granddad came over for the day to help him finish raising the garage door to accommodate the four post lift he ordered for the garage, then they started assembling the lift.  The plan is to stack the Oldsmobile over the M5 so that I can get the van in the garage for winter.  Nana came over as well to play with Sarah and put Andrew to sleep for me (she worked her magic for both naps and at bedtime!).  He's also still trying to decide what he wants to do about the new garage - do we build an addition on the house or just go straight to a free-standing shop?

Katie

I'm feeling worn out because of Andrews current fussing/teething/sleeping situation, plus I'm not getting to bed early enough to account for all his night wakings and early mornings.  But I did go out to lunch with Katie B and Robyn since Brian was off to keep the kids... I can't remember the last time I've done that!  And today I got to run more errands while Nana was keeping Sarah and Andrew.  My current "to do" list includes: hemming curtains in the family room and kitchen, Halloween costumes for the kids, figure out clothes for family pictures, decide what color to paint the powder room and the thrifted bench in family room, decide on a plan for new furniture and rug in the family room, catch up on photos and the blog, and figure out birthday plans/presents/parties/cards for the kids plus extended family.