The Summer Begins

This kid is now a first grader!!  Incredible!  Kindergarten ended today and Benjamin was a bit sad about it.  He really enjoyed school for the most part.  He hated getting ready in the morning and was often bored with the work.  "She never taught us much math!" he declared sadly as we drove home today.  I guess he'd held out hope all year and now realized it was never going to happen.  He loved the kids, though, and his teacher, and the craft projects, and art class, and gym, and he adored center time when he got to go around and choose to do whatever he wanted.  Kindergarten was a happy place.  I'm so glad he got to have that experience.

Now onto Summer!  Kelly kicked off the Summer by coming home with a kayak on the car's roof.  I assumed he'd borrowed it, but no, we are the proud new owners of a kayak.  I guess it was about time we got our own and stopped renting them every time.  The kids were very excited.  They played pirates all day in the backyard. 

 This is Benjamin being our ship's figurehead (the statue on the front of the ship).  I didn't get a pick of Bella purposely violently rocking the boat and throwing him off...or a picture of him pummeling her for it....alas, they fought like pirates too.

Spring soccer season ended last week.  I love their soccer league.  It's a non-competitive, instructional league and the kids love it.  Well....mostly.  Bella has issues when the mob is all charging at the ball.  She participates okay during practices, but once the game starts, she is most comfortable watching from a distance.  It'll come, though.  Benjamin was the same way when he started and now he's fearless.  It's so fun to watch.  So fun, in fact, that I signed up to coach in the fall.  I'm excited!

Every start of Summer we go to our city's safety fair at the police and fire stations.  The kids get to pretend to call 911, play trivia games with cops, sit in the fire engine, put on fireman gear, ride their bikes through a course, etc.  It's really a lot of fun, and it also helps me to discover what they need to know but don't like, I thought they both knew our address, but when they're talking to cops on the phone, they freeze up and practically forget their own name.  It was good to get them comfortable and the cops gave good ideas, like, if you call 911 and forget your address, you can always go outside and look at the numbers by your front door.

The bike course was hilarious because it so highlighted the kids' personalities.  Benjamin was very law abiding and did what the cop asked.  Bella, however, listened intently, answered the questions correctly, and then did whatever the heck she wanted.  She rode in crazy circles, ignored stop signs, and rode her bike in places he told her to get off and walk it.  The cop finally just gave up.  That girl is Trouble!

 This is how Christian shops - diaper bag and baby in the stroller.  He wouldn't go anywhere without these items.  I even tried to distract him a couple times and ditch the stuff.  Didn't work.  He screamed "dolly!!" with great distress in his voice and ran as fast as he could back to where I'd rolled them.  Alas, he loves his little babies.  He's incredibly loving in general.  Every morning as each person wakes up, (because he's ALWAYS the first up) he'll run to greet them and give them a big hug saying, "Good morning!" and then run around to everyone else and announce, "Bella wake!" or "Benjin" wake!"  Then he'll run back and give the person another hug.  Such a sweetheart. It's a great way to wake up.

Too Nice to Go Inside

What a wonderful day we had today.  The weather was so perfect that we couldn't bare to go inside.  We spent the entire day outside in the backyard enjoying ourselves.  We drew with sidewalk chalk, played tag, had a picnic lunch, danced to the neighbor's music which they had turned up sooo loud the whole neighborhood could hear it, and then the kids discovered a bee's nest underground.  I had no idea that bees do that, but I googled it and found that bumblebees sometimes take over holes left by other animals.  Bees were flying in and out of the hole all afternoon and the kids were riveted/terrified.

  They would all crouch by the hole and wait to a bee to emerge and then run screaming as soon as it did, only to come right back to wait for another.  Again and again and again.

 The bees were amazingly tame and never came after them.  Except for one who must have smelled the strawberries on Benjamin's breath because it flew right into his face and circled his head over and over again until I sprayed it with the hose (and Benjamin, ha!)  Benjamin didn't mind the shower, though, if it meant avoiding having a bee fly up his nose.  The incident didn't deter him, however, and all three were right back watching the bees moments later.

 I grew tired of the bees before the kids did and decided it would be fun to paint outside. I set up the stuff while they finished with the bees. By that time Christian had woken up from his nap and I have found it very hard to paint with all the kids together lately because he wants to be doing everything just as the others do and always makes a huge mess.  Benjamin and Bella were closer in age and so I kept the projects more age appropriate and we were okay.  But now I'm doing more advanced things with the older ones and he will not settle for a simpler one.  He must do what they do at all costs - and the cost is always spilled sloppy disaster.  Painting outside was the perfect solution because he could make all the mess he wanted and I didn't have to stress.

 It was a lot of fun.  I loved everyone's creativity.  We did one free form painting in which they could do anything they wanted and one structured painting - a tape resist painting - put the tape in a design, paint over and around it, peel the tape away and you have a lovely white picture amongst the color.  Bella spent the most time painting and was most excited about it from the get go.  She painted in a princess book that she got for her birthday for a long time first and then began her tape resist painting.  It was fun to see her mixing colors and imagining what she was drawing.  She was very proud of the result.  Such a cutie.

Benjamin took this picture of Bella and her buddy Shade, who spends every Monday with us.  I just found it as I was downloading the other pics.  Shade gets along so well with my kids. It's really fun to have him.