Piano Federation Competition

This weekend was the annual piano federation competition.  Bella and Christian did a fantastic job.  Christian got the highest score possible and Bella got one point less.  They practiced and worked very hard on their pieces and I'm always amazed that they have the courage to perform from memory in front of judges.

Our tradition, since they were little, has been to go to Wendy's afterwards as a celebration.  (Also, so that no matter how they played, there was something to look forward to) This year they changed their minds and decided they would much rather go eat sushi.  I was all for that.  Sooo much better than fast food burgers!!  The sushi was fantastic and it was a lot of fun to go out together.  Even Peter ate a bunch and had a great time.  Sadly, Kelly was in Las Vegas for a work conference and had to miss it. 

When these two aren't playing piano, they also play saxophone.  I don't love the volume of the saxophone, but it's fun to hear them play and especially when they play duets or Bella helps Christian practice.  It makes all the cost of music lessons worth it.

Driver #2!!

 Bella has completed the first segment of drivers' education and now has her learner's permit.  She had the same driving teacher as Benjamin and has learned really well.  She is a more cautious driver than Benjamin (thank goodness!), but she does a great job.  It's crazy to think we already have two driving kids!

Tales of Peter

 Peter grows and changes every day. He's so darn cute and so smart and amazing.  We're all completely smitten.  

One of his favorite places is the library.  All the librarians know him by name and they all greet him excitedly whenever we walk in.  He knows all their names too and if he needs something will call out, "Karen, can you help me?" or whoever happens to be there.

His favorite thing to do there is the giant floor puzzle.  It's a picture of a crazy space ship with aliens and astronauts and it's just barely longer than he is.  Every time we put it together he lays on it to see if he's finally bigger than the puzzle.  So far no luck.

His roller skating classes have been fantastic.  We go every Wednesday and every week he's a little better.  We bought him his own skates that light up when they roll and he loves them.  It's a class just for preschool kids so the teacher plays disney music and everyone else is just as stumbly and little as he is and it's the perfect environment for learning.  I'm really proud of his willingness to keep trying and falling and getting back up.  It's a great energy outlet in cold weather.  He comes home wiped every time.

He's becoming more and more creative too.  He loves drawing on the window.  Last week he drew an "alien" on the window - his first stick figure.  He went back again and again during the day and added things to the picture - mostly longer hair!  He wanted me to draw on it too and we added some words and practiced letters.  He knows pretty much all the uppercase letters and their sounds now.  Some lowercase ones still trip him up, but he's doing really well.

His favorite toys are building toys - legos, duplos, magna tiles, knex, keva blocks, foam blocks, etc.  Most of the time what he builds are weapons or geometric structures, like cubes or pyramids.  He loves building cubes and then putting little animals or marbles inside like a house.  Here's a sword he made and of which he was so proud.

It's fun to see how he comprehends every day things, like time and money.  The other day he set up a restaurant for his stuffed animals. He placed some animals in a circle and got out the play food.  Then he took their orders and served them their meals.  He wanted me to write up their bill for them.  I asked him to tell me what they ordered and how much those things should cost.  Here's what he dictated to me:

Better stick with the soup at Peter's because the sandwiches and cupcakes will really break the bank!

Christian is 12 and a half!

 We celebrated Christian's half birthday last week.  Per our tradition, he got to pick all the meals for the day and select one present.  He chose a new basketball.  We also often take 1/2 day off school, if desired.  He wanted to go to school in the afternoon because he didn't want to miss band, but he decided it would be fun to leave school at lunch time and go get MOD pizza.  So that's what we did. Peter and I picked up the pizza before getting Christian and then we went and ate the pizza at the park while playing.  Christian forgot to tell me he wanted to bring a football along, so we used the smaller pizza box from Peter's personal pan pizza as a football and threw it between us as we played.  It was really fun, except for when the wind picked up and carried our "football" in all the wrong directions!  Then we dropped him back off at school and Peter and I wet back to the park for another 3 hours of play on the playground.  It was a wonderful, unusually warm, winter day. 

Such a stark contrast to a week earlier when we attended the Ice Festival in Plymouth.  We bundled up in all our snow clothes and braved the sub zero temperatures to see the fantastic ice sculptures.  The massive crowds killed the joy a bit for me, but I was still glad we went and saw the sculptors creating their masterpieces.  Christian came along at the promise of hot chocolate.  

Finally Some Snow!

 It snowed a tiny bit on Christmas and then melted right away.  This week we finally had a real, shovel needed, stick to the ground snow storm.  School was canceled and we got to really play.  Peter loved it.  When he was little he'd cry every time he saw the snow suit come out, but he's really gotten over that now.  We've been sledding 4 times since the snow fell and he's completely independent on the sled now.  Walks it up and sleds down, no problem.  Even when he falls off occasionally and face plants in the snow, there are no tears.  He just gets up and goes again.

He and Christian built a slide from the trampoline to the ground.  Perfect for Peter, a bit small for Christian, but he was a good sport about it.

Sometimes after sledding a lot, he'd just lay in the snow and smile.  "I love laying in the snow," he'd say.

"Look, mom, it's my flag." 

Slides are a blast when they're snowy.  He and I shot off those things.  He handled the landings much better than I did.

One day Benjamin and his friend Pablo played in the snow too.  Check out this incredible snow man they built! I couldn't get one going because Peter jumped on every ball I tried to roll.  This one made up for it.  They named him Arnold.

Christian has decided drums are boring and he'd like to play saxophone in the band now.  So, here we go, another saxophonist.  He starts lessons next week.  I'm excited for him to find something he really loves.  I think it's funny that two of my kids are now playing the instrument I most wanted to play as a kid.  I guess I can live through them.

A Few Picture Highlights

 The beginning of January has been pretty routine so far.  School, church, etc.  Nothing new to report, except that Christian has been called to be Deacon's quorum president at church and it's been wonderful to see him stepping into that role and taking on the responsibilities of running meetings, teaching lessons, fellowshipping quorum members, and planning activities.  He's such a great young man and it's been so gratifying to watch him grow and learn.  Peter has left the world of nursery behind and is now in the primary - in the Sunbeam class.  He was sad that there wouldn't be toy time and snack time anymore, but he's adjusted to the new routine and is proud of being an older kid now.  Plus, they moved his nursery teacher with him so the teacher knows him well and has continued the snack tradition after all.  He especially loves the time they spend singing with the whole group.  I got to be in there the first Sunday and saw him get called up with his class as everyone sang a welcome song to the new kids.  Such little cuties.

Other than that, I'll just post a few more cute pictures of Peter.   I love seeing him interact with Benjamin.  Something about the visual of my oldest and youngest together is always intriguing to me.  Benjamin loves Peter but he is often annoyed by him and they don't spend too much time together, so I try hard to document any time they share, like when Benjamin says yes to the constant question of "Will you read to me?"

Random selection:  Playdoh with his friend after church. 

The morning he woke up WAY too early (5:15am) but refused to go back to bed, so I made him a bed in the kitchen while I made breakfast and packed lunches and he fell back asleep until 9:30 right there.

He's been playing with legos and duplos every day.  Up until now about 99.9% of what he makes are things he calls guns.  Yesterday he came up with a little guy he'd made which he called "muscle man."  So cute.  I love seeing his creativity flourish. 

Chicago

Once Christmas and New Year were over, it was hard to keep staying home from school every day.  The older two didn't mind but Christian and Peter and I were going a bit stir crazy.  "We should go somewhere," Christian suggested.  "Where should we go?" I asked.  "Let's go to Chicago!" he suggested on a whim.  Suggesting to me that we should go explore a big city is like suggesting to Kelly that we should go motorcycling. It takes very little persuasion.  Within 24 hours I had the hotel booked and the 3 day itinerary planned.  I couldn't convince the older two to come along, but the three of us (sadly Kelly had to work) had a blast.

The only thing Christian knew about Chicago was "The Bean,"  aka Cloud Gate in Millennium Park.  So we had to go there.  He was so cute there.  He had imagined the bean the size of a couch, so when he saw the size, he was like a little kid at Christmas with his amazement.  This entire trip Peter refused to smile or hold still for a picture.  He would run away, make faces, hide his face, etc. etc.  So it kind of looks like Christian was alone on this trip, but look for the black and white camo jacket in pictures.  Kind of like "Where's Waldo," you can try to find him.

In the winter they have outdoor ice skating there, so we watched that for a while.  Peter loved that, so much that he forgot to run from the camera.

We got a membership to the Field museum while we were there so that we could go for a little while each day and so I can get in free to the museums around here (deal made between science museums).  That was perfect because the subway was a direct line from our hotel to the museum and so we spent a couple hours there each day and Peter never got overwhelmed.  It was so full of interesting things, like the giant t-rex Sue, special exhibits on animals colors, Egyptian mummies, and whole areas of hands-on-stuff for kids.  Plus, with its location out on the peninsula in lake Michigan, the skyline views from there were fantastic.

                                                    

We also took the bus to the Lincoln park zoo.  Fantastic zoo.  I can't believe it's free!  So fun to spend the morning there.

We rode the city bus along Michigan avenue too see the shopping district (Miracle Mile), walked along Lake Michigan, swam in the hotel pool every day (although Peter hates swimming so he only played on the edge), had sushi and deep dish pizza to our hearts' content, walked around at night to see everything lit up, rode the L (the elevated train) just for fun, and almost got caught up in a drug deal on the subway! haha!

(Notice Peter's decapitated body?  He pushed his face up in the cover so I couldn't get a picture of him.  Little stinker.)

It was a great trip and we're so happy we went.  It was Christian's first time in an American big city and he was really educated on some of the aspects of life that he wasn't aware of - how the homeless and dirt poor live right among the richest of the rich, how packed and high everything is - Detroit skyline and downtown are NOTHING compared to Chicago, and he got quite good at navigating public transportation.  I think he could have learned it quite well if we'd had a few more days.  We also got to interact with a lot of different people which varied greatly from his usual white suburban neighbors and he did very well.  He's an adventurous, enthusiastic kid and he's a lot of fun to take places because he's always up for adventure and fun, and he never complains about something being boring or too far or too hard.