2014 :: week 8

February 16

Sunday afternoon I had a lot going on. Visiting teaching, training with the Stake RS, and then a committee meeting. When I was done I walked into the TV room and found Will and TJ resting on the couch. Don't let the picture fool you--Will was awake. He wore Anthony out playing some of his favorite games--Spot It, Let's Go Fishing and Memory.

February 17

Will spent four nights sleeping on his mattress in the office while we painted his room. I had hoped it would only be three, but was still pretty pleased with how fast we got things done.

February 18

Tuesday evening was our Relief Society monthly meeting. Anthony came and helped with childcare. If you look closely at the Cultural Hall floor in the picture you can see where the floor is bowed. Back in January some of the pipes burst which led to flooding in parts of the building. The chairs are over the bump to keep people from tripping over it, though I still did at least once.

February 19

Wednesday after preschool we did our mega grocery trip hitting up Aldi, Hy-Vee and Costco. Will was upset because I wouldn't let him take rocks home with us "for his collection." The rest of the day he would randomly bring up how sad he was because he missed his rocks.

February 20

Thursday night as I was putting the kids to bed they both claimed to be "very hungry," despite both eating a pretty good dinner. While we read scriptures I let them each eat a piece of bread.

February 21

Our kids really love music. Here they are rocking out to a Elton John song, played by TJ (not pictured).

February 22

Saturday afternoon our friends the Porters invited us to join them at Jumping Jax for a few hours. In between all the bouncing, Will really enjoyed shooting hoops. His shooting is really starting to improve. It is worth noting that he came home and slept for almost THREE hours. This is the first nap he's taken in the past 6 months when he wasn't sick. It was awesome.

2014 :: week 7

February 9

While we were at Stake Conference on Sunday it started to snow again. It was coming down fast and by the time we got home the roads were pretty slick.

February 10

Lauren has a scab on her chin. While she was watching a TV show Monday morning she picked it off and when I looked over at her her entire chin was covered in blood. We put a band-aid on it and she did a surprisingly good job at leaving it alone.

February 11

Will had a check-up with his ophthalmologist on Tuesday. Because his eyes are continuing to improve she told us we can take a break from the daily patch wearing. If the progress holds we may be done patching forever! Will was so genuinely excited it. I was pretty excited about it too.

February 12

Will had fun picking out Valentine's to give to his school friends. The cards he picked had fish and he addressed each one himself.

February 13

The kids and I made a few batches of sugar cookies Thursday afternoon. Will and I started making them and then Lauren started to "help" when she got up from her nap. She was really good at pressing the cookie cutter into the dough, but really struggled getting the dough out of the cutter.

February 14

Will is enjoying having a new cache of treats. Thank goodness for holiday candy or Will would never be motivated to eat. 

February 15

I've wanted to paint Will's room since we moved into the house, but have been intimidated by this shelf/drawer thing. We finally bit the bullet and started painting his room this weekend. Will is sleeping on his mattress in our office while we paint, so hopefully we can get it done quickly.

patch rewards

As mentioned previously, we reward Will with an activity of his choosing for a successful month of patch-wearing. He did it again, and chose an afternoon at Little Monkey Bizness (bounce and climbing house tailored to kids ages 5 and under).

The kids had a blast. They climbed and bounced and slid in a wide variety of forms. 

 Even Anthony got in on the action!

 The drinking fountain was an unexpected highlight for both kids.

Will rocked the zipline with a little help from Anthony.

We had a fun evening and I think the fact that Will "earned" the trip made it extra rewarding. He was pleased with himself for earning the outing, and we were pleased because he really is working hard to earn it. He hates wearing an eye-patch with a hatred that just seems to grow. But he still wears it every day with the only daily reward being a star on his chart.

a wintry mix

The average temperatures in Kansas in January are in the 20-40 degree range. 2014 ranks as one of the coldest Januaries ever. I have no (cold, hard) facts to base this on other than my own memory, but I'm pretty sure it is true. This past month was cold!

 Jan 5

The first Sunday in January church was cancelled due to subzero temperatures and a late-night snowfall. Late morning we all ventured out to "enjoy" the snow, if that's even possible when it's that cold.

We got about 4-5 inches of snow.

The snow was powdery and easy to shovel.  TJ and I made good time clearing off the driveway and sidewalks. Will was disappointed we couldn't build a snowman or have a very effective snowball fight.

This lady never stepped foot in the snow. She insisted on coming out, and I spent about 5 minutes getting her ready, but she whined and cried as soon as we got outside. Two minutes later I was back inside taking the snow clothes off and bundling her up with multiple blankets. I don't blame her for her icy reaction. But is there anything that takes as much work and yields as little satisfaction as getting a toddler ready to play in the snow?

Will lasted a bit longer. He did the best job he could with the kiddie dirt shovel. He's a hard worker when he wants to be.

January 26th

Not every day in January was freezing. Three weeks later it was unseasonably warm. I think it was almost 50 degrees. After church and naps the kids and I ventured over to the park to soak up as much Vitamin D as possible.

Climbing

Swinging

Hiding behind a tree pretending to be Swiper (from Dora)

Hiding under the slide pretending to be Swiper. The kids are really into that right now.

After I got tired of playing Swiper (basically hide-and-seek) we went on a "nest hunt" around the neighborhood. Because all the leaves are finally off the trees the bird and squirrel nests are quite easy to spot.

It was a gorgeous, abnormally warm January day. Why is that I enjoy unseasonable warmth so much more than the extreme chills?

2014 :: week 6

February 2

Anthony has meetings before church so we drive separate cars to church most weeks. The kids love looking for Dad when we drive home. Don't worry, I took this picture at a stoplight.

February 3

Target has some workbooks in their Dollar Spot right now and we picked out several to keep Will entertained in the afternoon. He loves doing "worker books," but he gets so frustrated with himself when he makes mistakes. I keep telling him that you have to practice to get things right, but that just doesn't make him feel better.

February 4

Tuesday was a snowy, cold day. School was cancelled and it snowed all day long. After dinner we made no-bake cookies, or monkey poo as Anthony called it on his mission.

February 5

By Wednesday night I was starting to feel a bit stir-crazy. It was too cold and snowy to do much of anything and many things around town were cancelled. Luckily our library's family story time proceeded as scheduled.

February 6

We traded babysitting with our friends this week. I found it very amusing that the two 4 year old boys were so captivated by the 8 year old playing video games.

February 7

Will likes to take pictures of himself while he was "wearing" his patch. He's supposed to have his entire eye covered, but when we aren't paying attention he likes to loosen it up a bit. Unfortunately for him he took this incriminating selfie so now we are watching him extra close.

February 8

We've noticed these 4 birds (2 cardinals and 2 bluejays) perched on one of the trees in our back yard several times this weeks. Their bright colors catch our eyes against the gray skies and white snow-covered roofs. This picture does not do their beauty justice.

2014 :: week 5

Sunday the weather was gorgeous and we took full advantage by spending over and hour at the park.

January 27

When Will went to put his glasses on Monday morning one of the sides fell off. Apparently a screw fell out. Lauren and I went to Wal-Mart to get them repaired while Will was at school. The technicians were great and gave us a brand new pair of glasses in less than half an hour.

January 28

Will loves to roughhouse. He is always excited to play with Dad when Anthony is done with work.

January 29

Wednesday we went to Wonderscope. Things started out fine, but turned ugly when Lauren needed a diaper change and I had to go out to the car to get a fresh one. Will threw the biggest fit he's thrown in years. But before that Will and I had fun building this "house."

January 30

Thursday I picked up a pizza for dinner. We did a pretty good job with meal-planning and eating what we have in the kitchen for dinner in January, so we had our full "eating out" allotment available.

January 31

Friday evening we went to Chick-fil-A for dinner. We decided to get our monthly quota of fast food in two days.

February 1

Will took this super-flattering picture of me putting Lauren's hair in a ponytail Saturday morning. It is getting easier to do her hair, but that hair on the sides is still growing at a much slower rate.