Goal: Achieved!

I did it! And I didn't even have to *cheat* by counting the books I read to Isaac. I did at one point several H.G. Wells books to catch up.

Roughly in reverse order of when I finished them:
Born a Crime, Gulp, Unfollow, The Library Book, The Orchardist, Artemis, One Hundred Poems from the Chinese, Food Rules, Invisible Women, The Invisible Man, The Time Machine, The Island of Doctor Moreau, A Constellation of Vital Phenomena, Ballet Shoes, The Mosquito, Jupiter, The Testaments, Inspired, Circe, Of Mice and Men, Interpreter of Maladies, The Lost Gate, Moloka'i, Steelheart, The Boys in the Boat, Quackery, Transcription, The Sparrow, The Next Mormons, Where'd You Go Bernadette, Good Omens, Salt, Pastwatch, New Earth, Feed, David and Goliath, Before We Were Yours, The House of Spirits, My Abandonment, Flunking Sainthood, Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, Hotel and the Corner of Bitter and Sweet, Understanding Exposure, How We'll Live on Mars, Spook, Packing for Mars, Blessings, The Remains of the Day, How to Change Your Mind, The Air You Breathe, Becoming, Being Mortal.

2019 Miller Missive

A brief recap of our year:

Jason is still working for OSPI helping Title I schools and was promoted to Assistant Director. He continues to do some traveling around the state as well as to Kansas City this year for a national conference.  He also worked some more on his mad Tai Chi skills which the boys mock as being the only martial art designed to help you defeat really, really slow-moving people. And on the side, he spent some time with the nice people of Rotary Club serving and learning more about our local community.

Irene continues her job of wrangling feral minions. Her time is increasingly filled with chauffeur duties so it was quite exciting when we got a new (to us) minivan with heat, air conditioning, and a radio that didn't have temperature requirements. She also braved her old nemesis and took a college chemistry class. She was thrilled to set the bar high for Josh next year, but slightly disappointed that there were no explosions in the lab.

Josh continues on his quest to create the ultimate fighting stacking robot with his high school robotics team. He voluntarily attended summer school since it involved hours and hours of video game programming. His bedroom has become the place where old electronics go to die and, hopefully, be re-purposed. To keep balance in his life, he is taking an Enduro-Burn class for P.E. and we get weekly updates on how much weight he can lift with various body parts.

Michael has yet to meet an instrument he doesn't like. And he's met quite a few. He switched over to a jazz piano teacher mid-year and his life may never be the same again. Attending all of his Jazz Band events is practically a part-time job, but the music is fun and he really rocks his piano solos. We require him to keep going to school on the off chance that he doesn't become a jazz rock star, which is good because he always comes home with fascinating tidbits of history and science to share with us.

Ben is shaping up to be part Niels Bohr, part David Beckham, but without the tattoos and he doesn't speak a lick of Danish. All right, maybe he just plays some great soccer and geeks out with chemistry and math. Since Nana moved out here, he's spent some quality time with her and flour, sugar, eggs and the oven. So far there have been no complaints about the pies, cookies, and cupcakes they create. Under extreme duress, he started swim lessons this winter so now he won't die. He'll thank us later.

Isaac also started swim lessons, but he loves them. Except the part where his mouth, ears, nose, or eyes may get in the water. Or near the water. His love of Legos knows no bounds, nor does his ability to get his possessive little hands on his brothers' creations. He has a dance style uniquely his own that we try to catch on video whenever we can. As a bonus, he makes a great alarm clock for his older brothers.  Teenage lethargy is no match for his indefatigable enthusiasm.

Christmas and Eve

Per our tradition, we started off the holiday with games on Christmas Eve. I added some new ones and kept a few oldies but goodies in the rotation.

We did a penguin waddle balloon relay that had everyone a little knock-kneed.

There was also a snowball fight (with white balloons) which got pretty intense. Not naming names, but somebody did try to kick balloon to the other side after the timer went off.

There were a few games which involved "Santa bellies". In one game, we had to pop our bellies (can't use your hands!) which had Mom laughing so hard. She had *conveniently* worn a shirt that wouldn't stretch enough for a balloon to fit under it so she had to resign herself to being a mere spectator.  The other game was Santa limbo. Isaac had a distinct advantage in that particular game, but Michael made a decent showing as well. But first I had to get a picture of all these "bowls full of jelly".

Then there was Cookie on Your Face which is a messy and silly game.

Ben might be a cookie pirate.

After the crumbs were swept up and wiped off faces, we played Spoons with candy canes. In our version, every round you lost you earned a letter ultimately spelling C-A-N-D-Y.  It got a little heated. Mom may have grabbed a candy cane right out of the hand of one her grandsons. Josh may have made it his goal to grab the candy cane in front of Jason. And Isaac may have "helped" Jason into spelling CANDY first. Isaac was convinced that was how the game was won so we all gave a loud cheer when Jason earned his Y.

There are also no pictures (ironically) of holiday Pictionary, but the highlight is when Rachel yelled "LOSER" when Mom was trying to draw a picture of "Home Alone" (a sad person in a house on one side of the board while there were several other stick figures together on the other side of the board).

Good times. Good times.

When everyone had their fill of fun, we let the boys open one gift. Isaac still hasn't caught onto the tradition that it will always be pajamas, but the other boys guessed but were still happy with this year's version.

Everyone changed into their jammies, Mom and Rachel went home, and then we all got some sleep.  Christmas morning was soon upon us. Josh woke up but wished he was still asleep. The younger three wandered around upstairs waiting for Mom, Rachel, and Michelle to finally get here at 8am.

I LOVE getting pictures of the boys in the matching pajamas Christmas morning.  I LOVE that I have years and years of these pictures. But some years are more real than others: Josh was cranky because he was awake, Michael could not stop moving, Ben smiled nicely in the hopes that this would be over soon, and Isaac could not believe we had to do this before opening presents. Just keeping it real over here.

Then the faces all turned to smiles as we opened presents. I put down the camera so I don't have any pictures of the unwrapping fun or the delicious dinner Mom made, but it was a fun and lovely day.

'Twas the Week Before Christmas

Because nothing says fun for a 5-year-old like a long tour at the Governor's Mansion, I got tickets for Mom, Isaac, A, and me to do a tour of the mansion with all the decorations the Wednesday before Christmas. We did try to turn it into Santa scavenger hunt, but he did still struggle a bit listening to the tour guides. But, hey, not many people can say they've rolled around on the carpet in the dining room of the Governor's Mansion in Washington State. 

Afterwards, we wandered next door to the Capitol building to check out the huge tree decorated with fun toys and games. Isaac loved finding the dinosaurs and stuffed Disney characters.

It was a pretty huge tree.

Friday night was Jason's work party which coincided with opening night of Star Wars IX. We had three tickets through Josh's orthodontist so Rachel, Josh, and T got some resolution on that whole Rey and Kylo thing while Jason took the rest of the boys to the party. Santa made his usual appearance and gave Isaac exactly what he asked for (even though Jason didn't tell his boss) and thereby completely solidified Isaac as a believer. If you try to tell him otherwise, well, them's fightin' words!

On Monday, Isaac had his first (of likely many) visit(s) to the allergist. I think this looks like the beginning of a beautiful friendship.

We knew he had allergies. I was just so, so, so, so hoping it wouldn't be dust mites. So, of course, it's DUST MITES. Oh, and grass and dogs and cats. The allergist assured me that trees and molds are in our future. We're going to start calling him mini-Josh.

Okay, maybe not the greatest week leading up to Christmas from Isaac's perspective, but it's going to get more exciting soon.

Isaac Birthday

December is full of all sorts of anticipation for this little guy.  His birthday and Christmas are only 10 days apart and the passage of time is still something he is trying to figure out. After a great deal of waiting and waiting and waiting, the day finally came. 

Actually, some of it came early. Last Thursday, Nana and I took him to Build-A-Bear to get his gift from us and Aunt Rachel. I'm not sure what show this stuffed animal comes from (it has an orange headset attached?), but he is now called Megaman.  He has a heart that beats, a hand that talks, and (when he's not naked) a batman outfit with some kicky boots. Afterwards we took Isaac and Megaman to Chick-fil-A for lunch and it was a good day.

Sunday was the big day with chocolate chip pumpkin pancakes for breakfast, corn dogs for dinner (for the kids), and vanilla cupcakes with strawberry frosting, blue sprinkles and a cherry on top.

After we got our sugar on, it was time for presents. He opened up his card from Oma and Opa and squealed with delight: "TWO MONEYS!" Josh, Michael, and Ben thought that was hysterical and kept trying to correct him to let him know it was thirty dollars, but nope, it was TWO MONEYS! 

(sorry for the photos - used phone camera instead of real camera. I chose...poorly) Then we brought in the Batman tower which was also exciting.

Interestingly enough, it was exciting for his older brothers as well. We had to beat them off the little kid toy so Isaac could check it out.

Because I am lazy trying to save the environment, we used Josh blindfolding Isaac with his hand rather than wrapping paper.

It worked pretty well! No mess and Isaac was still happy to find a Lego Ninjago set in his hands.

Poor Jason. I think he is probably missing the good old days when I bought the boys legos so Jason would have something to "help" put together. Now the older boys step in to help out. They are all super self-sacrificing that way.

All in all, a pretty good experience I think. And he spent a bit of time that morning showing me how his legs, arm, and body are all bigger now. And racing around the house showing me that he is faster now.  Love our littlest minion.

Christmas in the Forest

Compliments of a kind friend, we ended up with tickets to the Christmas in the Forest event in town.  We had a lovely time (okay, the adults had a lovely time) checking out all of the elaborately decorated trees.  Some were ornately gorgeous and others were just plain fun.

We also found a lovely Santa who was willing to take pictures with both our shy 4yo and our grumpy 15yo.

Definitely a fun family activity for this time of the year!

Robotics Competition

I have four children and three of them are involved in activities that I just barely understand. Don't get me wrong, I definitely appreciate what they do and enjoy seeing them participate in activities they love.  

BUT, I still can't seem to remember what off sides means (though people seem to get pretty worked up about it at times), I learn about new instruments at every concert I attend (who knew there was such a thing as a piccolo trumpet?), and the scoring system at robotics competitions continues to elude me (the other team stacked more blocks, but they still lost the round?).

So sometimes I just show up with two big bags of potato chips for the robotics team and just smile and nod when Josh tells me what is going on. 

 

And sometimes I dream that Josh will build robots that drive on Mars. No, The Martian isn't one of my favorite movies, why do you ask? (Kidding - it totally is.)