Spring Celebration

Happy Spring!  We missed holding our celebration on the actual first day of Spring.  Oops.  

Today seemed as good a day as any to rectify that.  Come to think of it, it was better than some days this Spring as Winter seemed unwilling to move on for a while there.  But move on it has and the 76 degrees we had today felt positively scorching by comparison.

Off to the park we went and busted out the baskets.  I have discovered recently that if I have the boys say "booger cheese" instead of just "cheese" when I am taking pictures, I get more authentic smiles.  The downside is that they are often laughing so much that it distorts their faces a little bit, but I do get REAL smiles.

The boys each got a t-shirt, sunglasses and a fandex (check them out on Amazon - they are pretty cool).  Oh, and blue bunny peeps.  I would love to show a picture of the peeps, but I am not sure that any of the boys even breathed while consuming them.

Josh caught the spirit of his fandex right away and ran around identifying trees.

He had a very interested audience.  He identified American Holly, White Oak and one other before running off to throw a ball around with Jason.

Ben totally digs his sunglasses.  Camo is his thing and he loves that his glasses are reflective.  With this picture, I even got some evidence that I was there today!

Michael was disappointed that most of the bugs we say today were airborne as his fandex was Bugs.  Those flying bugs are hard to identify when they are on the move.

We brought the football, soccer ball and baseball mitts as well.  Hopefully everyone sleeps well tonight.

Happy Spring!

National Building Museum

Another happy and fun excursion to the National Building Museum!  We try to keep this one under wraps from the big brothers because they don't get to go with us.  So of course Ben kept telling them how much he wanted them to go to school so he could have his fun day.  Yeah, that blew our cover.  

Off Josh and Michael went to school, albeit a little bit more unwillingly than usual, and off we went to DC.  I discovered today that I have done a magnificent job training Ben:  Every time I said his name today, he would turn and look at me and pose for a picture.  

My name is Irene and I am addicted to taking pictures of my kids.

Poor Ben has borne the brunt of it.  It doesn't help him any that I think he is just so dang cute and feel the urge to document his cuteness everywhere we go.  So here he is:

In the monster Legos.

Experimenting with gravity.

Hanging out in the big blue building blocks.

More big blue blocks.

Building "bombs" in the big blue blocks.  Such a wholesome activity for a child!

Hanging out on some mega blue blocks with his buddies.

Birthday Boy

Photograph by Stephi Layton

I do not know who gave this child permission to grow up so quickly, but whoever it is should be shot.

Seriously.

When did my baby have the time to turn 5?

I really need to stop calling him my baby.

In any case, this post is a day late, but Ben turned 5 years old yesterday.  We've been involved in a countdown for the last month or so.  Every day he would ask how many days left.  Until the last week, then he asked how many days left about once an hour.  Luckily, Nana came out for cake and ice cream a few days before his birthday because I didn't think he was going to make it.

Wednesday morning he bounded down the stairs and into the kitchen.  He responded to my "good morning, birthday boy" with a "where's my present?"  I made the mistake of letting him look around on Amazon with me a few weeks prior to get some ideas.  And then an Amazon box showed up a few days later.  So, yes, the kid knew the gift was in the house and he knew it was his.  I told him he would have to wait until Daddy got home since the gift was from both of us.  Luckily, chocolate chunk pancakes and sausage was on the menu for breakfast and thus he was easily distracted.

Mid-morning we packed up his birthday brownies with sprinkles (oh yeah, I know how to make things fancy, alright!) and took them to preschool for him to share with his classmates and (some of) his teachers.  You can see a food theme here, right?  Chocolate for breakfast, chocolate for snack, chocolate, chocolate, chocolate.

That's my boy.

The afternoon we spent at my first PT appointment.  Not the most exciting birthday activity, but he gets to play on my Kindle Fire during my appointments so he was happy as a clam.  He found a bed with a pillow and got himself comfortable to play some Star Wars Angry Birds.  What else could a boy want for his birthday??

When we got home and Jason got home from work, Ben finally got possession of what was rightfully his: An Angry Birds Star Wars Darth Vader Jenga game.  Oh yeah.  Whoever invented Angry Birds is a freaking genius.  A stinking rich, freaking genius.

Dinner was black beans and rice - at his request and why he may possibly be my favorite son (at least at the dinner table).  Well, all my sons are my favorite sons.  It is just more difficult to think of some of them that way at dinner.

And dessert: chocolate cake.  Shockingly enough, we still had leftovers from the 4-layer cake Nana had made 4 days earlier so I was spared the effort of making a special birthday dessert.  Not sure I could have topped a 4-layer cake anyway.

There it is.  The day Ben turned 5.  We love our boy who is cuddly, hysterically funny, loving and sometimes appears to be channeling my grumpy grandfather.

Water, Art, and Chocolate

Talk about a packed Saturday!  This morning started with swim lessons.  

Wait, back up.  The day really started with chocolate chunk pancakes.  Which I guess means that today started and ended with chocolate.

For

the

win.

After pancakes, the boys packed up and headed to the pool for swim lessons.  It turns out that the pool was holding an Open House this morning, so the boys got to do more playing than usual and came home with goodie/promotional bags.  The boys are at an age when they are still thrilled by a free pen.  It is a beautiful thing.

After a quick noodle-heavy lunch, we headed to a local high school for the County Arts Festival whereat Michael's artwork was being showcased.   

So fun for him.  Slightly less fun for the lady on crutches who had to traverse an enormous high school to find the monster in question.  But we are very proud of him.  And his monster with twelve eyes.

Then it was home again, home again, jiggity jig so Nana could begin work on the four-layer chocolate cake that Ben had requested for his birthday.

A little background on the cake:  I have a confession to make. I have been watching a ton of Food Network shows lately.  This is a questionable activity on multiple levels.  First, I can't eat anything they make anyway.  Second, they make me hungry.  Third, I don't even like to cook.  Fourth, I really could find more productive things to do with my time.  And fifth, I watch them with Ben and then he gets "ideas."  Like the one he had while watching the Pioneer Woman's birthday episode wherein she makes a four-layer chocolate cake and homemade ice cream.  Ben immediately declared that it was the cake he wanted for his birthday.  Knowing that I don't like to bake with gluten these days and that his Nana can rarely turn down a chocolate cake challenge, I emailed her the recipe.

There may have been a few flaws in the recipe, because it fell apart and the icing didn't provide any support for the four layers.  Poor thing actually developed fault lines in the first 5 minutes of its existence.  Jason took these pictures quickly before large chunks fell off the sides.

Michael and Ben loved it.  Jason dubbed it the "mudslide" cake. Nana was disappointed and deleted the recipe from her phone.   However, I pointed out to her that if the success of a cake is measured by how much the target audience likes it, this cake was definitely a win.  Ben declared today the "best day ever" and would like Nana to make it every day.  

And after seeing this yummy chocolate monstrosity, Michael might be making plans on what size cake he wants for his birthday.

Doctors

I've had the pleasure of meeting with several doctors over the last two years.  This pleasure has been compounded by some truly fabulous conversations. (Please note that each of the following conversations was a different doctor.)

Me:  The pain in my foot has gotten much worse.
Doctor:  Well, let's get an x-ray.  I guess if it is broken I will owe you an apology.
Me:

Doctor:  So which bone did you break?
Me:  Fibular sesamoid.
Doctor:  I've never heard of anyone breaking that one.
Me:

Doctor:  So is it feeling better?
Me:  Well, it's been a week or so since the thought of going up the stairs has reduced me to tears.
Doctor:  Good.  It is getting better.
Me:

Doctor:  Do you think the broken sesamoid is what is causing you pain?  Do you really need it removed?  I have never heard of anyone being in pain from fracturing that bone.
Me:  The podiatrist seems to think so.  It is the only broken bone in my foot and the two casts, boot, and two rounds of physical therapy didn't help.
Doctor:  Well, let me know how it works out for you.
Me:

Not a Fluke

As I mentioned in the last post, Michael was sick Monday morning.  But then he seemed fine and ate everything he wanted, helped out with chores in the morning and went sledding in the afternoon and seemed none the worse for wear.  All of which made us hopeful that it was just a random occurrence and not the stomach flu.

Turns out, it was not a fluke.  Unless fluke means "infectious disease that spreads like wildfire among the children" rather than "either half of the triangular tail of a whale" or "an accident or chance happening" like dictionary.com claims.

In any case, our hopes were dashed this morning around 1am when the bug hit the child with the least ability to make it to the bathroom in time.  And thus it was that cheesy quinoa patties will probably be off the menu for a while.  Mainly because although a general favorite, I don't think that either Jason or I will be able to eat them for a while after scrubbing them out carpet this morning.

So this morning Ben is comfortably quarantined situated on a sheet covered chair with a blanket, his bowl, water bottle and pedialyte popsicle.  And I am covering every child I can catch in hand sanitizer and spraying a too-strong bleach mixture on all hard surfaces within a 5 foot radius of every place Ben goes.  Oh, and we are watching Harry Potter because nothing says sick day like a full-length feature film before 9 in the morning.

Snow Day

Today is snow day #......who cares anymore?

As far as snow days go, it started off really poorly and has since gotten much better.  And since I have a lot of recent snow days to compare it too, that is saying quite a bit.

I woke up this morning sometime after 3am feeling rather disoriented.  It took a few moments for me to come a few realizations.  In this order: Jason was not in bed with me, the hall light was on, and Michael was throwing up in the bathroom.

I heard a joke once that said that the most effective alarm clock for a parent would be one that sounds like a child throwing up.  Apparently for Jason that is true.  I sleep like the dead and am a little slow.  For middle of the night emergency situations, the boys (and I) are lucky to have Jason.

Not the worst way to start the day, but definitely low on the list.  Luckily, that was the last of that.

The rest of the morning went much, much better.

Although, admittedly, just the absence of any more vomit was an improvement.

The rest of the morning was full of school work and chores.  Since I had prepped the boys the night before with a liberal mix of threats and promises (I hear any complaints and I will add extra chores AND when they were done they could play on the Wii), the chores and school work went pretty smoothly.  Of course, it helped that Josh caught the spirit of many hands make light work and his brothers followed suit.

They dusted, vacuumed, picked up, washed windows, read scriptures, played piano and cleaned their bedroom.

Like I said, much, much better.

And then this afternoon the boys went sledding out back so I think they will most likely consider today a success as well.

Now I get to think up a whole new list of chores for the boys to do tomorrow and pray that Michael being sick this morning was a fluke and not precursor to other boys (or mom or dad) being sick in the wee hours of the morning (or really any other time).

And...wait for it...most likely plan a similar day for Wednesday because in this county we don't do school when there is snow on the ground.