What is Kingsport and What is the Scary Checkers Movie?

First I'll tell you what Micaiah said.
Then I'll tell you what I THINK he was talking about.
#1
"Mommy, remember when daddy went to that store.  It was called Kingsport.  We were all in the car and daddy and I went inside.  I think it was 45 years ago."
(If you know Micaiah, he says it all so fast he almost stumbles over his words.)
Several weeks ago, we went to Bays Mountain and then stopped at a hotel so that Micaiah could use the bathroom, and he and daddy went inside.
#2
"Mommy, when can I watch the scary checkers movie?  Next year on my birthday?"
He asked me this question about 6 times and I was starting to get frustrated.  "Micaiah," I said, "I didn't see the commercial.  I don't know which movie you're talking about.  Next time you see the commercial, let me know and I can talk to you about it."
Then it dawned on me.
There was a commercial for the Simpsons and the Family Guy and I flipped the channel, telling the kids that those were not cartoons for kids and that we weren't going to watch that.
We have a Simpsons chess set that was given to us when we got married and we've been teaching Ella how to play chess with it.
The Simpsons....looks like a cartoon movie....checkers....a lot like chess....scary...things that we don't let our children watch.  OK.  Now it all makes sense!

Brothers

I just realized I've posted about Ethan, I've posted about Ella, and I can't leave out the best big brother there is...so here's to Micaiah!

I had to post a lot--these were just too cute!

All I want for Christmas...

Ella has lost her 2 front teeth.  We might just have to dress her up in a Christmas outfit and take her picture.  Oh, and thank you, Ella, for losing that last tooth just in time for school picture day!

P. S.  I'll try to get a picture that is more close-up soon!

The first 6 weeks

Wow!  A first for me, I have been taking weekly pictures and have kept up with it.  It's a fun project and I hope I can keep it up for Ethan's first year.  See how he's grown!

just home

Prayer Time

Today I want to share a prayer that I stumbled across.  It's called "Save Us from False Ambition" but the reason I like it is because of how it speaks about prayer itself.  It comes from the book Prayers Plainly Spoken by Stanley Hauerwas.

God, I am just too busy.  Too many people, too many questions, too much to do.  We confess we stay busy because we fear acknowledging our emptiness.  How amid this busyness do we rest?  How do we worship you?  Please create space, which may be other people, to make time, our time, serve you.  Force us to rest through the activity of prayer so that all our loves and fears might be made perfect in you.  Help us see how such busy service, if it is service, may be just the rest we need---just the worship we need.  Finally, and most importantly save us from false ambition.  Amen.

I love this thought of prayer as rest, service, worship and space.  I'm not sure what he means by "Please create space, which may be other people."  Anyone have any thoughts on this?

the 39-second nap

This week I got to spend a rest time with Micaiah.  We were out of our normal routine, at my parents' house, and so I laid down with him to nap.  I closed my eyes and rested, pretended to sleep as an example to Micaiah, and was able to observe his most-interesting rest time habits.  At home, I let him play with his toys or look at books until he is eventually tired and goes to sleep.  On a typical day it takes about an hour for him to settle down and get some shut eye.

This week I got a bigger picture of what it is he actually does when he plays up there in his room.  This is how it went:  he laid down, then got up and played, and then laid down again.  If you know Micaiah, he's very quick.  So I think he went through this cycle about seven times before I decided to take a more detailed observation.

The detailed events happened like this:  he lays down 22 seconds, gets up, takes a drink, goes into the kitchen and does SOMETHING (not exactly sure what) for a few seconds, and comes back out.  Lays down on the couch again, this time for a total of 13 seconds.  He gets up, takes a drink, and looks out the window.  Then follows a series of climbing up on the couch (for about a second), getting back down  and looking out the window.  Next he comes over and tries to manually open my eyes with his hand, unscuccessfully.  He never says mommy or talks to me while doing this, but tries it several times. Since that didn't work, he lays down on a cushion on the floor for three seconds.  Then he sits up and starts pretend-reading some books that he has.  After a couple of books, I'm rested, have decided he is NOT going to sleep after an hour of this, and we get up.

The next day (after a very whiny afternoon) I put him in Yam Yam and Bob Bob's pack n play with a successful sleep time by himself.

By the way, he is 3 years and about 3 weeks!

Performances

Ella in the middle performing her nursery rhyme at the kindergarten program

performing in pigtails

Here she is receiving her kindergarten diploma/ certificate from the principal.

waiting in line to get her diploma

getting her hair fixed for the dance recital

Ella and her friend Hannah

Another performance--Elvis showed up at our church's mother's day banquet

And here's the kindergarteners again and their performance

Around the house

Ella and Micaiah enjoying their new sandbox.  Rather than buy one of those little sandboxes, we converted an unused flower bed into one.  It's much bigger than the kind you buy and it's protected by the side of the house.  They both LOVE it.

This is a view from our awesome deck.  This morning there was a deer laying in this part of the yard, like he was waiting for the kids to come out and play.  We have a container herb garden this year, which I love.  I always say, my plants are my pets.

 Ella plays dress up quite often.  Micaiah plays with her sometimes and on this particular day she lassoed me in.  I love having a girly girl.

Strawberries from the local strawberry farm, flowers from my parents' gardens, and cake from my new friends that I met on my retreat a few weeks ago.  They threw our new baby a surprise shower.  About the cake:  it was white cake with white icing and tasted like a really wonderful wedding cake--VERY good!

Science Fair

Our first science fair!  Ella participated in a science fair at her school, where the participation was voluntary, but we thought it might be fun.  She was one of 3 kindergartners who joined in the fun.  We first tried putting celery in colored water to change the colors of the leaves, but it didn't work for us.  We tried two different kinds of celery (because I thought maybe it wasn't fresh enough) but it still didn't work!  Once we got to the fair, though, several people had done this project so we were kind of glad.  Todd came up with the idea--comparing how big  my baby is with different fruits, seeds, and vegetables.  We were doing this anyway with Ella through a website that we'd found so it made a lot of sense.  She spent about an hour one afternoon typing out all the words of the fruits and how many weeks they represented for the baby.  She sounded out many of these words herself!

Balentime's Day

This has always been one of my favorite holidays--all the pink and doilies, the sugary sweets, and the good feelings you get when exchanging (at least) 20 cards with others.  We did something this year which I hope will be a new tradition.  We had a yummy breakfast together before Ella went to school with heart-shaped pancakes, our table decorated with Todd's lovely flowers and my satisfactory balloon.  And we gave the kids their Valentines.     

As some of you may have "heard" from facebook, Ella came home from her school Valentine party with plenty of Valentines and a special Valentine from an admirer.  I'm posting a picture of her gift so you can get the gist of it.  He did have good taste and I thought the owl theme was pretty cute.  Her box of animal crackers had an owl on it and stated "Owl always be your friend."

That is a huge marshmallow shaped as an ice cream cone.

We ended the day with our small group, hosting a Parents' Night Out for the community.  It was kind of like a mini-lock-in for the much younger crowd and you didn't have to stay up as late (my least favorite part about lock-ins, for those of you who know my sleep habits).  I did a craft with the kids and Todd spent much time among the Lincoln Log crowd.  And if you are worried that Todd and I didn't get a date, we plan on going to Asheville Friday night.

I'll end with a quote from Ella:  "Happy Valentime's. No!! (Sigh)  I mean Valentine's Day!"