Tis the season...

There were a lot of great gifts, visiting with family and friends, working on the house, crafts, activities, but the biggest change for our family happened on Christmas night.

Right when we were getting ready to eat ice cream cake, courtesy of Grandma, William started wiggling his loose front tooth and it finally came out! Finally, William's smile is evened out!



Now we're all looking forward to seeing how those beautiful new teeth look, hopefully in time for his birthday!

Elf On The Shelf

William, thinking he's figured out the mysterious nightly change in where the Elf On The Shelf sits...

"Mommy, are you sure you aren't moving the Elf around after we go to bed with a shovel?"

(He knows that people are not allowed to touch the Elf...)

A little holiday hike

This morning the Regans joined us for a hike in the woods at Washington Grove, followed by lunch at a greasy spoon, then apple and popcorn buying at Schutts apple mill. It was an awesome way for the kids to get out of the house for several hours.

Here's a few photos from the hike.

William's memory surprises us!

This morning we were driving home from the public market and listening to FM 91.5, WXXI. An old song came on, sung by a woman and after about 1 minutes into the song, William says from the back seat "Daddy,this song is from the Wizard of Oz".

Now, he's only seen that movie once or twice and the last time was at least a year ago. So I listened to it a little longer and told him that it wasn't from that movie. He disagreed at first, then relented and agreed with me.

At the end of the song, the DJ announced it was by Judy Garland! So although he got the fact that the song was in the movie wrong, he recognized Ms. Garland's voice and associated it with the movie.

Pretty impressive!

Here's the song. It's cute, especially for those parents raising 'tweens.

William's shark

We got up this morning to find that *someone* had ripped the head off of William's coloring book shark cutout.

So William asks Anne and I if we ripped his shark. We both respond no.

Then he asks Mary Grace:

William: Mary Grace, did you rip my shaak?
Mary Grace: No, I did not rip your shark
William: Well, I'm going to blame you anyway.

Thankfully there was no swift retribution.

Can you guess where the heat comes out?

Halloween!

This year, like the last, we group trick or treated for maximum enjoyment. Here are the kids walking down to the meeting house in costume.



Although we were a little late, we got a pseudo-group photo anyway, this one in front of our house.



After 1.5 hours of candy collecting, the kids rushed home to sort their candy, they even think this is the best part.




William proclaimed before falling asleep that THIS WAS THE BEST HALLOWEEN EVER!

More words that William has misunderstood

I think I've blogged it before, but he still pronounces his last name "Schriver". You wish, W.

Also he still says "eye bulb" instead of "eye ball"

And a new one is "apple cidern" instead of "apple cider".

As I lay in bed with him at night listening to him talk about the days events, I remark how amazing it is that at 5 year old (and even earlier), kids have so much ability to communicate. He's constantly adding new words to his vocabulary and can express his thoughts very clearly.

Little Mr. and Mrs. Wake Daddy Up

Even when the little munchkins in the house sleep well, they still have this habit of coming into our bedroom when they first wake up in the morning. Up until recently, they (one, the other, or both) would just climb into bed and snuggle with me. (Just me; they know better than to interrupt Mommy's sleep. :)

Lately, they started this new thing. They stand in front of me while I'm sleeping. Then they start tapping my shoulder or head. Three times. Followed by a pause. Then three more times. This goes on until I wake up.

Maybe it's just me, but I find this particularly annoying. I imagine they somehow learned this from watching Sponge Bob, which as you may know is the most annoying show known to mankind.

I think it's a great idea for an alarm clock. Rather than waking to audio, wake to TAP TAP TAP... TAP TAP TAP.

So lately, my response is to tell one to wake up the other and go downstairs to watch TV. I believe I learned this statement from my parents.

I know someday they'll be getting themselves up, will be self-sufficient, and I'll yearn for the days when they depended on me for something as simple as walking down the stairs in the morning, so I'm trying to grin and go with the flow.

Hi Uncle Ricky

This post is for you. The following happened at bedtime tonight

William: Daddy, did you have any brothers or sisters when you were a little boy?
Daddy: Yes, I had two brothers. Mommy had three brothers.
William: Uncle Ricky is bald.
Daddy: Yes, he is.
William: Was Uncle Ricky bald when he was a little boy?
Daddy: No, he got bald when he got older. There's a picture of Uncle Ricky with a full head of hair at Mamma's house.
William: I think Uncle Ricky would look scary with hair.
William: Maybe he could wear a wig for Halloween!

Mary Grace FINALLY loses her first tooth!

It's been a very upsetting year and a half for Mary Grace. It all started when William lost his first tooth (naturally). My little girl cried and cried because she is the older sibling and she should lose her tooth first!

Then as all the kids in her classes have lost teeth, poor Mary Grace was the only little girl that still had all her baby teeth. Imdeed, at school today, she was the only one in her class to not have lost a tooth yet!

Very upsetting indeed.

Well, all that is behind her now. Her very wiggly tooth got looser today, then it started to bleed a little, then she decided to just pull it out. Of course, Mommy had to consult our dentist, but by the time she typed out a message, Mary Grace had already pulled it out!

So here's a picture my my angel showing off her new missing tooth at the garage we walked to tonight.



She's so relieved!

Tooth fairy, you've been waiting a LONG time to visit this little girl!

I'm trying to save up $100!

Mary Grace just told me that she wants to save up to $100. I asked how she plans on getting money.

Her response? "Every time I go to Aunty Rose's house, she gives me $5."

So I told her she has to go 20 times, and she's good with that. Aunty Rose better get to the bank!

Naples Grape Festival and Soccer

The weekend summary:

On Saturday morning we went to Seton soccer practice. I've been hanging with Mary Grace and letting William venture on his own. Every week during the scrimmage, Mary Grace can be found in the middle of the field, all alone either looking up at the sky, down at the ground, or admiring her finger nails. She does great during the warmups and drills, she just does not like the scrimmage part.

This week she started crying. Alone. In the middle of the field. I went and got her and talked her into trying again, which she did, until one of the kids kicked a ball that glanced off the top of her head (she wasn't looking, thankfully). That was enough for her. As Mommy says, maybe Mary Grace is not an athlete.

I think next week I'll switch it up.

Today we went to the Naples Grape Festival. It was a long ride there, but I told the kids to watch out for the bear at the side of the road where I have always stopped for grape pies in the past. Here are the kids at said bear.



William decided to frisk the bear and found a bunch of tools in his apron. Thankfully he didn't ask if he could keep them. And here's the deliciousness that we bought this year.



The grapes were sooo sweet and tasty that we upgraded to the large basket so that Anne could try making a homemade grape pie or two.


We proceeded to the festival and scored a decent parking spot on the main road then walked to the festival. It wasn't very far, but the crowds made it take forever.

We immediately went for food and decided to keep it simple with hot dogs all around (Zweiglers, as my mother-in-law calls them)

As I stood up from our shady picnic spot behind the vendors, I saw a look of horror on Annes face, then she says "THERE'S A GIANT BUG ON YOU". Now I don't dig bugs. When there's a bug on me I usually swat it away, and run away screaming, but this message was confusing. What kind of bug? Where exactly is this bug? So I stood there. Looking at my wife looking at me with a look of fear and disgust on her face. Then she swatted it off my shirtsleeve, screaming the whole time. What was this horrible pest that was about to consume me you might be wondering? Here it is:



Yes, a cute caterpillar. Lets just say the people working the booth that we were picnicking behind definitely knew we were city-folk. :)

After all the commotion, William entered into a single-minded goal to get some cotton candy and Mary Grace scored some new doll clothes. We walked the festival for a little over an hour, then made our way back to the car.

On the way back, we stopped at our favorite scenic overlook in Naples, looking down almost the entire length of Canandaigua lake. Here's my favorite girl enjoying the view with me



After we got home, the Regan kids came over and everyone got to play while Daddy worked on the basement. Continue on to http://rickdidit.blogspot.com for more on that.

Best dream

Mary Grace has unfortunately acquired her back-to-school virus and is home sick today. I'm working from home while mommy is working. So far she's slept, then watched "Night At The Museum". She just told me "Daddy, I had the best dream ever last night!" I asked what the dream was about and she replied "Mommy was hiding all my birthday presents in my closet and I saw all of them! There were two American Girl dolls and a bunch of pretty outfits!" Now she's watching American Girl doll stop-motion videos on YouTube using Darrick's Android tablet.

End of summer, 2011

It was a whirlwind end of summer for us. It started in July with our wonderful family from Arizona visiting. The kids had a great time with their cousins. They looked forward to the visit all spring and early summer and when the day arrived, they were uber-excited.

The "kids"

Crazy swinging on the kids new swingset!

The girls enjoying time at the big summer family reuinion

After our visitors returned to Arizona, we had another cousin come stay with us for almost a week. Sarah was a great guest and the kids had an awesome time playing with her. She even babysat the kids one day so that Anne and I could (independently) go to work. Here are some photos of a little summer marshmallow roasting we had one evening:

Not sure who's expression is better in this shot!

Cousins!

Next, we took a trip to Boston and Deerfield to both visit the American Girl store and to visit the Thiels. The American Girl store was a huge hit with Mary Grace and Anne and William and I lasted about 15 minutes there, then we went off in search of miniature golf. We met back at the store a few hours later and had a nice dinner at the restaurant right in the store!
Then we headed to Deerfield, fully aware that hurricane Irene was approaching. We spent a night and a day both enjoying our hosts company, their beautiful house and their wonderful kids. We saw the Eric Carle museum, a cool dinosaur museum, then attended a tomato festival! After a great dinner, we checked the weather. We had hoped for the best, that the storm would dissipate or veer off to the ocean, but that was not meant to be. So we sadly packed up and left that night at 9:00pm, returning to Rochester a little after 2:00am. In retrospect, it was the right decision as there was a LOT of rain and flooding and our return trip would probably have been 10x worse the next day.
And that brings us to the final week of summer and the first day of school.
The kids had plenty of time to consider the end of summer and the coming school year. Mary Grace was excited to start a new year and William was a little anxious to have a new teacher and new friends. All-in-all, it was a painless first day. The kids were up early because of the excitement. Mommy had everything in order and ready to go, and off we sent the kids on the bus. Mary Grace was a great big sister, showing William the ropes and even sitting with him on his first day.
Mommy followed the bus to school and took some more photos when the bus arrived. Here's our memories of that day.

All ready to go out and wait for the bus! Looking so beautiful and handsome!

William looking slightly nervous	The expressions tell it all!
Mama came to help out!	And off they go. Let the tears flow!

Private screening of "Tangled"

This weekend, William was all about playing his Scooby Doo game one the Wii. He loves watching Scooby Doo, and add in an interactive component and he's all over it. It's actually a pretty well done game and I enjoy it too!

Anyway, suddenly, I notice that Mary Grace is nowhere to be found, so I pause the game. I go to the second floor and call "Mary Grace?" No response. Again "Mary Grace?" "I'm in here Daddy."

So I got into her room, which is empty, and open the closet door. Way in back of the closet, behind all of her clothes, a little head pops out. "What are you doing back there?" I ask.

"I was just playing on the iPad." "Ohh, What are you playing?"
Umm. I was... Ummm".

At this point I'm sensing some potential deception coming my way

"I was watching something." "Oh, what were you watching?"

"I was watching Netflix." "Oh, Netflix. What were you watching on Netflix?"

"Ummm. I was watching...." "You don't remember?"

"Well, there's this movie that I've always wanted to see"

"So I saw it on Netflix and I was watching that" "Oh, what movie is it"

"Umm... Umm... It's Tangled"

Anne had been scanning that movie to make sure it was appropriate for the kids, since Disney movies cannot be trusted blindly. Mary Grace must have launched Netflix and that movie came up to resume.

Long story, I know, but it was just so cute that she went to such lengths keep us from knowing she was watching a movie that in the end was target marketed to her

The chessboard incident

Anne was recently organising some things in the basement in preparation for the upcoming basement remodel when she came across something disturbing.

I had gotten a beautiful marble chess board as a gift in college. It had a nice marble base with black/gray marble squares and carved marble chess pieces. I had kept it safe ever since, placing it out of harms way and storing it in the upper shelves of closets when I wasn't using it. I've had it for nearly 26 years.

Well, it got organised from it's safe resting place to a shelf along with a bunch of kids toys in the basement. And this morning, Anne discovered the base cracked into 7 pieces, hopelessly ruined.

Anne asked Mary Grace and William what happened to it and both denied any knowledge, both equally convincing.

I got home from work and upon inspecting the damage, Mary Grace stepped up and admitted she broke it a few weeks back while taking a different toy off the shelf. She also got hurt when it happened, with a little cut to her shin but kept that to herself too.

She took the pieces and stacked them in the back of the shelf, then put a bunch of other toys on top of it, obviously hoping that nobody would find it. But mommy finds all.

I'm proud that she admitted breaking it, and her only punishment was a hug and a kiss for Daddy. I'm also a little disappointed that it's gone, but not disappointed enough to replace it (right now).

So we have some lying, some shame, some confession, some forgiveness and some gratitude for a good lesson learned.

Mary Grace's photos

Here are a bunch of photos from summer 2011 that Mary Grace took

4th Friday off in July

This week was a wash. Plans started forming for a fishing outing after William woke up on Monday morning telling me that he dreamed that he and I went fishing and he caught a big fish. I asked some of my friends about fishing in Rochester and got some good information, but ultimately, my lack of experience and lack of any sort of fishing tackle shot down that plan.

Then I had another plan to take the kids to a canoe rental place near Genesee Valley Park, but after discussing it with Anne, we decided that the kids are probably not mature enough to be trusted on a boat in deep water.

So, we opted for a morning at home playing on the swing set, doing some gardening, and playing some games. Mommy came home at around noon and then we all did something or another. :)

3rd Friday off in July

This week we all did what we intended to do last week, that being going to kirshaw park in Canandaigua! I somehow managed to get the kids out of the house by 9:30 am and we arrived there at around 10:10.

The parking lots were still empty, but there were a lot of parents and kids heading in to the park to set up. We paid our dues ($3) and found a nice spot under the pergolas that was somewhat shaded and somewhat sunny.

Although we had just finished breakfast 1 hour ago, the kids demanded a snack before swimming. Pretzels and popcorn consumed, we headed into the water. It was smooth and clear as glass, and stayed somewhat shallow almost the entire swim area. We headed to the deep part and practiced our swimming for a while, then moved back and played beach ball catch. Some other kids joined in, so that was fun in the sun.

Next, we returned to the beach and built sand castles for a while, a very long while for William. I had sun screened him, but he was hanging out at the beach aso long after Mary Grace lost interest that i had to keep returning to add more clothes and a hat.

Aftere finally prying William away from the beach, we relaxed in the sun/shade for a while, then grumbling tummies directed us to McDonalds for happy meals and fish sandwiches. After lunch we drive to DiDi's house and spent several hours there playing with old school toys.

Finally homes, we chilled for a little while, then took the wagon to Park Ave to have dinner at Collies, followed by ice cream at Abbotts.

The kids are sleeping now, hopefully dreaming up a plan for my next Friday-daddy-adventure! Two more to go, making the most of it!

Second long weekend in July

This was my second 3-day weekend in July.

Working backwards, we had a campfire tonight with toasted marshmallows and/or smores. Before that, we spent the afternoon at Seabreeze amusement park and water park with the kids and Nate and Jon. Lots of fun.

Before that I weedwhacked and cleaned up the hill.

Saturday we all went to Lyons and unfortunately missed the Peppermint Festival festivities but had a nice relaxing afternoon on Maple Street instead.

On Friday I had a date night with Mary Grace while Anne went to a swim birthday party with William (where he "crashed and burned"). Before that we went to Durand Eastman park and played on the beach for a few hours.

Before that, and to kick off the weekend, I took the training wheels off of the kids bikes and started the learning process! They both did a fine job, taking a few revolutions on their bikes themselves. I think it'll be a quick job getting them riding, but I think Mary Grace is a little more anxious than William about it.

And Bob's your uncle.

Mary Grace's dance recital 2011

I've finally successfully uploaded one of Mary Grace's recital performaces (out of two). You can't miss my little dancer right in the front center at the beginning!

She did very good and we were all very proud of her!

You're a GRAND OLD FLAG!

Part of Mary Grace's kindergarten celebration was the singing of "You're a Grand Old Flag", and it was very cute. Afterwards she adopted the philosophy that whenever she sees a US Flag, she will sing that opening verse of the song. And every time she sings it, it gets stuck in my head too!

So I was just looking at a picture that Mary Grace drew on my wall in my cubicle and noticed that I was humming "It's a Grand Old Flag" to myself. I guess my brain has become conditioned now!

EDIT - After writing this briefly this morning, I thought it would be prudent to include the picture. Background: She drew this at the Midtown child care by looking in the mirror and making facial expressions then drawing what she saw.



I can't decide if I like the pictures or the misspellings more!

William and "Break The Ice"

I'm sure some of you are familiar with the game "Don't Break The Ice", where there's a platform of little plastic cubes held up by pressure One of the ice cubes has a little skater guy attached. You tap on the ice cubs with a little hammer trying to knock out the cubes without knocking out the guy.

Ever since William got the game from Santa, he has cried ever since he won, because the other person got to break the ice (make the remaining ice cubes fall down, resulting in the guy falling). Our attempts to explain that he actually won were useless. If anyone broke the ice, William had a mini-tantrum! In response to this, we renamed the game "Break The Ice", since that was the new objective.

Well, he finally come around some time ago and now plays the game like a big boy. Little things like this remind me that my boy is becoming all grown up.

William is cracking me up.

He just referred to Saran wrap as "Plastic Ratburn". I think he's mixing up "plastic wrapper" with "Mr. Ratburn" from the TV show Arthur.

He also just instructed me to go catch the spider in the basement to release him outside. He added "I'll be hiding in the corner of the basement behind the garbage can".

Fathers day = Strawberry picking

36 holes with my son

Today William and I had a boy day as Anne and Mary Grace had both dance recital photos and a baby shower. I gave William the opportunity to choose anything he wanted to do, and while his initial choice was for Rochester Museum and Science Center, I convinced him that an outdoor activity might be more fun.

So he chose miniature golf. We drove to Henrietta and played 18 holes. During those 18 holes, William got two hole-in-ones. In fact, he had so much fun that we played a second 18 holes! That's right, 36 holes of (miniature) golf with my boy today. And it was fun!

After golf, we came back home for a quick lunch, then off to the Midtown swimming pool for an afternoon of fun in the sun Mary Grace and Anne joined us for the last hour or so, so it turned into an enjoyable outing for the family.

Also, "in fact" is something that William says frequently, as he has been since he was 4. "I like summer. In fact, it's my favorite time of the year!"

William's mis-hearing

Heard William utter the term "eyebulb" instead of "eyeball". He's combining eyeball and light bulb.

When he was a few years younger he also thought I was talking about a thunderstorm when I uttered the term "undershirt".

I remember having a lot of these growing up. I encourage the kids to ask questions, but for some reason they've already got it into their heard that learning is what goes on at school and fun is what goes on at home.

Photos by Mary Grace

I was luckily enough to score a "Bag Of Crap" during a Woot-Off on woot.com a while back. One of the items I got was a cute little caribener digital camera with a whopping 640x480 resolution, no on-screen preview, and no flash.

Mary Grace recently rediscovered it and here are the photos she took (all pictures were run through Picasa "I'm feeling lucky" filter due to lack of flash).

Anne suggested I tell you that there are 2 decent photos out of the 45 in this slide show. :)

Waking up to a spanking.

Last night William climbed into my bed at about 5:00am. Since I was awake, I almost started to wake up and start my Sunday super early, but the prior day work got the better of me and I decided to stay in bed and snuggle.

That lasted about 45 minutes, at which point I was awakened to William rapidly spanking my arm, probably 10 times. I asked him what he was doing at which point he opened his eyes and said "I'm spanking you...". If there are any social services folks reading, please trust me when I say that we've never spanked our kids.

Next I asked why he was spanking me? He turned over and went back to sleep.

Bet when you read the title you didn't think Daddy was getting a spanking, right?

Internet savey Mary Grace

Talking with Anne about my upcoming bike ride, and suddenly I hear "Friday" by Rebecca Black start playing on the ipad, followed by Mary Grace, with a beaming smile, saying

"I did that all by myself!"

Yes, she went to YouTube, typed "Friday" and played the video.

Straight up with a chaser!

After coming down with a pretty mild case of Strep throat, Mary Grace had to go on antibiotics. Since both Anne and I have a penicillin allergy, I should have figured that Mary Grace was a candidate too, but I didn't. Well, don't you know after a week of being on it she developed hives ALL OVER.

Freaked us out a little, so much so that we took Mary Grace to her pediatrician who pronounced judgement. Benadryl at such and such an interval. Duhh.

So the brave little thing decided to take it without any mixers, as have always been a requirement for medicine in the past. And she's done well with it. Tonight I gave her the dosage and asked if she wanted it "straight up".

Mary Grace: "What does that mean?"

Daddy: "It means, you don't mix it with anything"

Mary Grace: "OK, I'll take it straight up with a chaser"

My little daughter, tossing around the big girl bar terms. Too funny.

BTW, the chaser was apple juice.

Bedtime with William.

Tonight William lost 15 minutes of evening play time because he was naughty at the vet's office. So we're going to bed and he says "we didn't even have any time to play because you were washing the dishes".

I explained that everybody who eats also washes dishes, and the he could have helped me so that it would take less time.

He replied "But I want to be a boxer when I grow up, not a guy that washes dishes!".

So now he's successfully stalled bedtime and having a "bedtime snack" in the kitchen, which will inevitably lead to stalling at teeth brushing time, stalling a book selection time, stalling at book reading time. So much for going to bed early...

A warm spring day

Here's a few photos I snapped of the kids after having our first dinner on the back deck on May 13, 2011. The weather was sunny and the high was near 80. The kids had their bathing suits on and were running through the sprinkler in the back yard, just having a blast!

The new playhouse and swing set, part 1 of 2

Please, oh please, let this only be a 3 weekend project...

Starting with last weekend, I started gathering and prepping my supplies. Pressure treated wood and fasteners, then cutting, routing, and stacking. The wood then got to relax and dry out for a week as I made plans for assembly.

My awesome brother from Buffalo volunteered to come to Rochester to help put it together! We started at around 10, and by 3:00 we had the structure assembled. After some time leveling the whole thing, we moved on to the deck support boards and deck. This went pretty well despite some missteps using the chalk line. We next moved on to railings for the side and back. At this point we decided to wrap it up for the day.

The weather actually mostly cooperated except for the rain from noon until 4, when some of the assembly had to be done in the garage. We had to don ponchos for some of the outdoor work. All in all, it was a productive day and we're all pleased with the progress.

Next weekend should be final assembly and prototyping the swings and slide and sandbox.

After that comes the nonstop fun that a play set in one's yard will bring!

Miss Preston

William's teacher has an assistant this year and her name is Miss Preston. Ever since the beginning of school William has been talking about Miss Preston. Tonight at bed time I asked him why he likes Miss Preston so much. Here's his response:

"I like miss preston because she never gets mad at me... She never puts her eyebrows down".

I just loved that he put the angry face into a few simple words like that. He continued:

"Miss preston has the prettiest blue eyes. I just like her so much! Even when I do something naughty, she says 'William, you shouldn't do that' instead of getting mad. I LIKE HER SO MUCH!

My first bike ride with my kids!

We finally got William a big boy bike and Mary Grace got upgraded from her 12" bike with training wheels to a 16" bike. Ever since then they have both been so excited to go on bike rides.

We took a ride up and down the street a few nights ago and I was having trouble keeping up with William (aka Cannonball - thanks Michael Bell). So tonight, I got my bike out too and all three of us took a little ride together!

We rode down towards the pedestrian bridge, then rode up the ramp to the playground at School #1. I was most impressed with their ability to ride up the ramp, then on the way back with their ability to use the brakes on their bikes to slow themselves down.

William lost some of his Cannonball energy towards the end, and I noticed that when Mary Grace's helmet came off after the ride that her hair was a little sweaty. So we had fun and got a little exercise too!

Next time, Anne has offered to come along as well!

At the Farmer's Brunch

Last month I was asked by Mary Grace's school to volunteer for the Farmer's Brunch. To go along with what the kids were learning at that time they had parents donate food and time to run a parent/child brunch.

The parents helped the kids cook various foods, then we got to eat what we cooked! It sounded good to me and I had all the fixin's for a good cowboy costume, so yeehaw...

Mary Grace got a new bandana and a pretty red straw hat and just looked so cute!

Mary Grace and I and several other kids all ended up on pancake duty, which was perfect since we've been making pancakes together since she was 3. The kids measured and poured and mixed, and even poured the batter onto the skillet. The cowboy took over from there.

When the food was all done, all the parents got to join the kids for a nice brunch.

The parts I'll remember for a while are: being called "Silly Mr. Daddy man" by a bunch of kids, because Mary Grace told them that's my name. ??? Also, getting to meet a bunch of Mary Grace's friends from her class that I'd never met before.

Here's a few photos of the fun event!

The Big Birthday Party

William has been looking forward to the Big Birthday Party at Bernies Bouncers. He invited his whole preschool class to the big shindig, and there were a few regrets, so he got to invite a bunch of his friends from the neighborhood too!

Bernies Bouncers is highly recommended. Rather than subjecting your party to the public and losing most of your party most of the time, they have a private party room with big inflated slide things, games and a self-propelled train things on a track. Only your group occupies this room for the duration of your party. It's far superior. :)

We had very good luck at the event as nobody misbehaved and there were only a few small bumps and scratches. William got a naughty scratch on his tummy that is now being covered by a cool Dracula band aid (Thanks Andrea and Larry!).

The pizza and cake were delicious and then the party was over! No prep and no cleanup made it much easier on Mommy and Daddy. Now if we could only find a place to store all the toys this birthday season has brought William!



Happy 5th birthday, William!

William's parsing skills

So we've noticed that William is getting better at listening and parsing out important (to him) information from what people are saying. Here's an example.

Anne: William, it's time to get dressed for school
William:
Anne: William, you have to get dressed. I'm not going to tell you again!
William: (does something else)
Anne: William, get dressed now or you'll be late for school!
William: Mommy, you said you weren't going to tell me again!

He finally did get dressed though...

Anne notes that he's also started quoting commercials in his hard-sell to get her to buy him things. For example:

William: (watches butterfly garden commercial)
William: Mommy, I want a butterfly garden
Anne: Well, we'll see.
William: Mommy, if you buy me the butterfly garden, you can get twice as many butterflies for only a little bit more money!

William's birthday cake, and his reaction to it

Mommy decided to make William's birthday cake, so he got to choose the flavor (chocolate) and the design (easter egg). After spending hours in the kitchen baking the cake and decorating it, here's the final product:




And Mommy called the kids into the kitchen to see the final product. William's response upon seeing it? "It's awful". He was apparently expecting the cake to be in the shape of an egg.

Happy spring; first day of kids swimming season at the pool this afternoon from 1-2pm. April 23 as the first day, what will be the last day??

Rainy afternoon at the movies with the Regans

William got a watch

As a gift "from Blast"... Today he asked me if he can pause his watch while we go outside to play.

I really love the refreshing thoughts like that which we've been programmed not to even consider!

He also said that a watch can be turned into a clock if you stick it to a wall...

William looses a tooth!

We all know the story about how William lost his first tooth. According to Mary Grace "Daddy knocked it out". It was actually a really bad fall on the stairs, but I accept responsibility since I put him here. :(

Anyway, William's second tooth has decided to meet the tooth fairy. It had been loosening but William was content to leave it in place. Then one morning he was eating my homemade bread and I hear him scream "MY TOOTH!" Mary Grace came running and sure enough that cute little tooth was in William's hand.

So now he's got a gap that he can fit a straw into with his teeth clenched. Surely that's worth something?




It should be noted that during the shooting of this video, Mary Grace was in her bedroom crying because she hasn't lost any teeth yet. I tried to convince her that little girls should lose all their teeth at the same time. I'm not sure she bought into it though.

Afterwards, William placed the tooth in his special "tooth fairy pillow" under his regular pillow. And don't you know that the tooth fairy came overnight and left $5 and a quarter too! Yikes, inflation; when I was little, it was just a quarter!

A snow William!

William and I played for hours in the snow last weekend, but sadly our goals for an epic snowball battle did not materialize as the snow was not good for packing.

We also had to shelve our plans for a snowman for the same reason. But I was able to make a SNOW WILLIAM! With him posing, I shoveled the snow all around him and stuck a carrot in his mouth. Doesn't my boy make a convincing snowman?



The next day it warmed up and we had our snowball battle, with a uniquely designed fort for each of us. After the battle, we started digging tunnels in the snow. We had some quite involved tunnels made, then exhaustion set in and we retired indoors for some relaxing TV and hot chocolate. A great few days as winter winds down!

Mary Grace is officially 6 years old.

So far this year, we had a friends party for some of her kindergarten friends. Sadly, Mary Grace couldn't invite everyone on her list, but we had a good sized group for our house size.

It was a Tinkerbell/Pixie Hollow theme party with each room decorated for a season and costumes optional. It was a windy and snowy day right after a big mid-winter melt and we all stayed cozy in the house. The party lasted a little over two hours and consisted of a butterfly decorating craft, lunch, bag decorating, another craft, a pinata and finally cake and ice cream.

	All ready for the party
	Cake time!
	Opening presents!

On Mary Grace's birthday proper, we got her a surprise -- a stay at a local hotel with a nice swimming pool and hot tub in a heated atrium. Walking in to the hotel, William was first to ask "does this hotel have a swimming pool?". Upon hearing yes, the screaming started.

After checking in to our room, we swam for a little over two hours. Then as hunger began to kick in, we went back to the room and changed, then headed out for Mary Grace's dinner of choice, pizza. Dinner at Pizzeria Uno, ice cream sundaes and William falling asleep there (at 7:45!), then back to the hotel. I offered more swimming but the kids were tuckered out.

The next morning, we had an early brunch in the hotel restaurant, then it was back to the pool until checkout time.

The kids had a great time mid-winter swimming and they've been asking to go back to the pool to swim ever since...

	Hamming it up, poolside
	Mary Grace and her daddy

Leg Hair.

William: Daddy, why do you have hair on your legs?
Daddy: Why do you think?
William: Because you're an alien.
Daddy: LOL!

I wish I remembered all of these micro-interactions. Sadly, some of the funniest ones have been long forgotten.

Better than a Happy Meal toy!

As the kids and I were leaving the gym the other night, they were running and playing near the tennis courts and ended up running into each other and bumping foreheads pretty hard. They were both crying and as I dual-consoled, I offered up Happy Meals from McDonalds. It worked their tears turned to smiles.

Then I called Anne to tell her I was bringing home Happy Meals and she told me she had chicken nuggets and french fries in the oven already. The kids were disappointed and the crying resumed until I suggested Anne get a toy from her secret stash and give that in place of a Happy Meal toy. (note - confirmation that the toy in the happy meal is the key ingredient)

So after dinner, we unboxed a "Mystical Garden" toy. Just put the cardboard pieces into the plastic tray, add the magic liquid and in a few days, you get a beautiful garden. To my surprise, it actually worked! Here's the proof.

First saying her R's now chewable medicine

Mary Grace has a tummy ache today and Anne just confirmed a fever too, so Anne wanted to give her some medicine. Now giving Mary Grace medicine has ALWAYS been a huge problem. She often prefers to feel miserable than to take something that might taste bad.

This has been the situation for the past almost 6 years. We've tried sneaking mess into foods and drinks with very little success. We had just about given up trying until this morning.

Anne offered Mary Grace some chewable childrens Tylenol, and she took it. She even said she liked it.

Our minds have been blown!

Rrrrrrrrrrrr!

Anne mentioned that Mary Grace had a surprise for me and what a surprise it was!

She started out trying to get Mary Grace to say some words by leading the witness, but that wasn't working (the witness is way too smart for that). Once Mary Grace left the room, I learned that Mary Grace learned to say her R's!

Now we've been trying to get her to say her R's for like two years. And while she's mastered some of them, the ones that come at the end of the words like car, bar, etc. Have been elusive.

Well, TODAY is the day that's learned it. She's tossing our the "car", star", and even "guitar" like it's no big deal! She is even acting like it's no big deal!

So I had to ask, how did you learn? Did mommy work with you? Did your teacher at school help you?

Her answer? And I am not making this up, and I had to ask twice to make sure I got it right...

"my foot taught me"

Wait, what?

"I learned to say my R's from my foot."

Hmmmmm. Ok, whatever, at least she's saying them now. Yay, no speech class!

Then tonight, Anne was trying to get Mary Grace to tell me the temperature (twenty FOUR degrees), and we asked her 2 or 3 times, until she finally responded "24 dude!!!"

LOL

Sledding at Tay Lodge

Brrrr, it's a cold day outside, but we all decided to brave the cold and go sledding with the Regans. After piling on layer after layer we made our way to the car, where I realized that William looked like that kid from Christmas Story. He's nearly the right age, too. I guess it's time to forbid him from putting his tongue on a flag pole in the winter.

Anyway, we arrived at the hill to find it deserted! Very strange, but hey, we had the hill all to ourselves. Once we exited the car, we realized why; the wind up there, combined with the cold made it downright in-hospitable!

After the first few runs, we had our first case of frostbite; Joe decided he had enough, so Patrick took him to the car to warm up. His little brother Dan was tettering between being cold enough to give up and having so much fun he wanted to stay. The rest of the kids were way on the fun+stay side.

After about 45 minutes though, everyone had enough of the wind blown snow slapping us in the face and called it quits. It was our second sledding adventure this year, and while the ground conditions were better than the first, but air conditions were considerably worse.

We got home and drank hot chocolate and played mouse trap, and relaxed in the warmth of the house.

William and Daddy
Mary Grace and Catherine
Mary Mary Grace and Daddy