First Snowman of the Year

Amazingly, we've had so little snow here that this week was the first time we were able to build a snowman. The kids were so excited. We picked Benjamin up from school and didn't even enter the house - we just went right into the backyard and got started.


You can see in the picture, that just our little snowman nearly cleared the yard of snow. I don't mind not having to drive in the snow, but I sure do miss a winter of sledding and snowmen.

Yesterday Bella asked me to help her get her "jumping jeans" out of the closet. I had no idea what she was talking about, but I curiously followed her into her room to have her point them out to me. Turns out it was her jeans jumper. So cute that I had to take a picture of Bella in her jumping jeans.


Bella's preschool went on a fieldtrip to a bakery last week.


They got to decorate their own little cake. Bella took it very seriously. It was so cute to see.

Sizing up her project.


Getting to work.



I stupidly forgot to take a picture of the final product, but believe me, it was well covered. Who knew that cake started out as white!?

Tried a new math game with Benjamin this week. Put up a strip of paper, cut holes, assign point values to the holes and roll the ball through them. Add up your points. Rolling the ball through the chairs is minus points. It lasted a lot longer than I thought it would. Christian got really into it too. So cute! We ended up playing until 50 points, so I considered it a success. Will have to do this one again sometime.

The 7th Dwarf

We've been into theater this month. The last three Saturdays in a row we've been to see a play or concert. The first week we attended a chamber concert which told the story of "The Mermaid and the King" through instruments. The kids loved it. The musicians allowed them to come up and play the viola and the flute afterwards too. The following week we saw "Cinderella" at a local high school and Benjamin insisted on meeting the Fairy Godmother afterwards. He was star struck that she could do such magic! ;) This week we saw "Snow White" performed at the library. I loved this week's one because it was completely interactive. At one part a single dwarf came on stage and the narrator stopped the play and pretended to be confused, "Who are you?" he asked. "I'm a dwarf!" was the reply. "Where are the others? There are supposed to be 7!" The dwarf acted shocked that the other 6 were missing claiming "They were right behind me when I left the mine!!" and she decided she needed some help. So she asked for volunteers from the audience to be dwarfs and Benjamin's hand shot up. I was shocked. It's not like him to volunteer to go in front of strangers like that. However, he'd seen many others go up during the course of the play at various times and I guess he thought it looked fun. Luckily he was called on and he spent the rest of the play on stage as one of the dwarfs. It was so fun to watch him up there. I only made a movie, but I cut out a few stills. He's the dwarf in the black shirt with the blue and red hat.


Crying over the death of Snow White:



He was so happy about it. "That was really brave, right mommy?!" he asked when he returned. I really was proud of him. It certainly made the play even more entertaining!

Being A Little Brother

Christian wants to do everything his older brother and sister do. Everything. If they are getting extra salt on their scrambled eggs, he wants extra salt on his food too, even if he's having peanut butter and jelly. If they are screaming, he screams. If they are laughing, he laughs. If Bella and her buddy Ava are getting dressed up, then he has to get dressed up too! Of course, Bella and Ava were more than happy to oblige. The three beautiful princesses (Bella with her "make-up"):


The kids, specifically Benjamin and Bella, have been fighting a lot lately. It's mostly a lot of "I had that first!" "No you didn't!" "Give it back!" which quickly turns into hitting and screaming and lots and lots of crying. It's been really draining and frustrating. So I love those moments when they play happily together and I come down to find them all involved in something without hostility, even if it's just seeing if they could all fit into/onto the kitchen together.

Christian's 1/2 Birthday

Christian's 1/2 birthday falls on Valentine's Day, so we got to celebrate twice last week. We had our traditional pink cream of wheat for breakfast, the kids had parties at school in the morning, and then in the afternoon we made muffins and sang happy half birthday to Christian. (Sorry for the strange pictures - they are stills cut from a movie Benjamin filmed of us singing.)


That was pretty much the extent of our Valentine's festivities, but we had a fun time and we made several fun Valentine's crafts, like this cute one Bella made from just a bunch of cut out hearts.

Early Valentine

Benjamin gave me an early valentine poem and card today. Thought it was so cute!



Translation: Roses red Violet Blue / is ok I Love You.

Such an adorable little charmer - valentines for his mommy. So glad that girls are still a non-entity to him. Even when little girls in his class give him pictures with hearts and I love you on them, he just shrugs and blows it off. He couldn't care less. Stay little and innocent forever, Benjamin.