Kindergarten . . .

Art!

Can you tell what it is?

Look very closely.

Think of an animal...

Got it?

No?

It's Benny the Bunny, can't ya tell?

(-:

By Livia!

Also in Kindergarten the kids occasionally bring home a stuffed animal in a backpack with a journal and a book that goes along with it. I always dread when I see that thing come home on a Friday because it's my job to write every cute little thing the animal does with Livia all weekend. If it comes home on a Monday, like it did last night, Boom...got it done by dinner! I've had practice.

Not only have I had practice but by the fifth child with these journals and animals and books, I've finally gotten over making this an assignment for myself and thinking that, "oh, other parents might read this better make it good." And just had fun with it, so much so that when I read it back to Livia her response a couple of times was, "You wrote THAT??" yay, mission accomplished!

Fourth ain't Last! . . .

Pinewood Derby time again.

Whew! Raced 6 times, got five fourth places and one fifth place. Notice his satisfied little clap in the video (he's second from the right), fourth place is a nice standing after last year's six races in sixth place!!

Waiting!

My other pics are on my camera camera...thus, no posting, too many cords to get to downloading.

Then, on our way home, William spied some blue and gold peaking out from behind some shops. We decided to investigate and found these...

See his car?

(-:

He was holding it at first, then, since we were right next to a line of cars at a carwash, and he thought everyone was staring at him, he hightailed it back into the car. (-;

There's no way anything can go wrong . . .

with this scenario!

(especially since the backboard for the basketball thingy was already broken by an errant baseball pitch two summers ago)

Um...yeah...those aren't little snowballs!

This is the handy work of the outer two boys (got that?), the younger of the two started it a few days ago, unbeknownst to me (though I'd find one or two balls in weird places and wonder...), and then a couple days ago I kept hearing, "PING"...pause..."PING" ...pause..."Ping" and then it struck me and I ran to the yard. "What are you doing?" I yelled at the older one. "Hitting golf balls," was the natural reply. "Well, stop that right now, you can't do that!" was my natural reply.  "Why not?" he asked, "who cares if there are golf balls in the woods?" . . . and then, because I may have been in this job too long and because I know this one has a strong, straight hit..."O.K., fine, just don't hit the neighbor's house whatever you do!"

As far as I know, nothing's been broken and one little guy is going to have a fun golf ball hunt before the first grass is cut!

And then there was cake . . .

 Cokecola Cake to be specific.

  Yes, Cokecola...that's how they say it in the south, says the recipe author. The link I have is the exact recipe I used because I had the magazine.  When I was googling around I found very similar recipes that also called for mini marshmallows in the cake batter and no reducing of the coke for the frosting. Also, not sure if the others had cinnamon in the recipe, I might leave that out next time. It sure was a rich, decadent cake. Livia called it a brownie cake, it was gobbled up by all!

I loved the littles (who really aren't all that little-ish any more )-:) watching, being enamored by the three big kid friends of Harrison's sitting across the table in this pic.

Got 'em all!  Harrison and three of his buddies came home from school together, had pizza at 5, headed out for an hour of bowling, tried to fit in a game of laser tag but discovered an hour and a half wait to play, came home for cake and ice cream, then proceeded to play video games all through the night. I have no idea what time they went to bed (we have no tv connection and both kids computers are on the blink so they just had their games), 'cause I have my bedside earplugs at hand for nights just like this!

Look who's hangin' around turning 12 . . .

HARRISON!

   One year away from three teenagers.

I'm sorry but that is MIND BLOWING!

And...I just discovered where my charger is by looking at this pic!

(-;

This guy continues to excel in school, loves to play as much tech as he can possibly get his hands on, is desperate to play tackle football but has a mom that thinks that's not the best idea and has signed him up for flag football once again (new report out, 50% of NFL players with head problems started tackle football before age 12!), plays percussion in the school band but doesn't proclaim to love it, sings like a nightingale but doesn't proclaim to like that either, (-: is a friend to many in his class with three especially close buddies, brought the fish craze into the boy's room and is by far our most steady, easy going kid!

After dinner tonight we gave him his present. Another fish tank! 

He had a used 10 gallon, the boys had four tanks in their room before this one, 3 ten gallons and a 40 gallon (their beds are all up in a giant loft so their dressers all have tanks on them). I naturally assumed that with this new cadillac of tanks (i.e. not from the resale shop and with an LED light), that his old 10 gallon would leave the room and this would replace it. Um...nope, they're like, "Mom, we don't have anywhere to put it," and were shocked at the mention of getting rid of one. Of course, being a mom, I have an answer for anything and suggested the old one go to the garage and wait for warmer weather to put turtles, frogs or tadpoles in with natural pond water. The eye balls popped right open on that one!

Anyhoo . . . 

Hard to have a mid-week birthday with a busy mom. I managed to hang the birthday sign just before he went out to school this morning but intended to hang it last night before falling asleep...yeah...! This morning William comes in my room and says, "It's Harrison's birthday and there are no posters or signs or anything up." Hmm-hmm. So, after ironing H's white band festival shirt for this morning's festival, trying to get myself ready for work, rooting through my closet for the Happy Birthday sign...only to find it in a basket of "to be put away stuff" outside the closet (from the January birthday), but getting it hung before school dog gone it, then I made the birthday boy tardy for school.  Oy Vey!

He'll have his friends (& grandparents) over for pizza, bowling and a sleep over on Friday...I think it would be fun to see the grandparents do the bowling and sleepover part of the party too, don't you? (-;

It all started with . . .

This.

Which for quite some time recently I couldn't even remember where I got them it was so many years ago. But then, as I loaded the pics up just now, it hit me...Thanks bro! (-:

I got a bunch of them. But had a grand idea for this one.

First got it painted one fall afternoon.

Then my assistant helped me with the "hook" thingys.

My assistant was able to help me because he was home from 1/2 day kindergarten.

He was in 1/2 day kindergarten two and a half years ago.

I have had these pics of him on my desk top waiting to be posted since then.

I am not kidding!

I thought it would be the coolest coat rack ever.

In our tiny, three foot wide entry space.

And, I kept with the "it is so cool" theme for 2.5 years.

I did initially think it should be attached to the wall to be more out of the way but that never happened and it was useful to tuck shoes or boot behind occasionally. It was not useful when it got pulled over on a kid, especially when it was loaded up.

Last winter, or the one before, can't remember, I even stripped it of it's coats and bags and took it for a walk in the yard to have a little photo shoot, because again, it is so cool.

See how cool?

(-:

And then, a couple Sundays ago, after a few months of a stirring inside me (hahaha)...I couldn't take it anymore.

And hung all these sturdy hooks my very own self, with power tools, a trip to Home Depot, wall anchors and good vibes all around...even when I discovered, by the second to last hook, that I really should just try the screws that came with the hooks to see if they work (I thought they'd be too short for the anchors) because the screws that came with the anchors were a shiny metal that didn't match the hook.  Well, low and behold, after screwing in ten hooks, I discovered that the matching screws did work...hmmm...7:30p.m....do I go back and replace every screw???...Yeppers...good vibes all around!

Wha-la! 

I LOVE my new hooks and shoe baskets...that the kids even STILL (it's been a couple weeks) put their shoes in!! I thought the dirty shoe bottoms touching other shoes would be an issue, and they probably will be in the spring, but for now, it's working. Plus, I have a whole shoe holder thing hanging on the back of that door, I'll keep mine in there.

And...I'm going to move my and William's super cool hook hanging system out to my garden area where it'll still go to good use!

I could not take my eyes off of the world today . . .

I wish I had more spectacular shots but time, as usual, was limited. Oh my goodness, driving around this evening was like a magical wonderland where every field looked like an ice skating rink, glistening in the full, or very close to full, moon and city lights. All the snow is covered with a fine, shiny, crackle layer of ice and it's absolutely stunning! I just couldn't take my eyes off it every single place I went all day and night. 

That being said...I heard it might be 40 degrees Saturday...that's appealing too!

(-;

Cooking 101 . . .

William, making pancakes for the family!

 Ready to flip?

 Great flip, uneven pan looks like! (-:

Then he walked around the house serving everyone.

No syrup needed with these babies.

They were awesome!

Chocolate Chip Cookie Pancakes!

You can't go wrong with that!!

So, this year I was given a great opportunity to be the after-school program piano teacher. I have 11 students after school, spread out over the five days so I have three days of teaching one hour after school, one day of 1.5 hours and one .5 hour day...it's pretty perfect! What does that have to do with amazing chocolate chip cookie pancakes? Well, instead of making the kids sit around during every one of my lessons (they do most of them), I've signed them up for some of the after school activities and that means William is in Cooking Club...now, we're full circle back to the pancakes. (-:

William is our most selective eater (haha) so I thought if he learned how to cook he could make his own, selective food (haha again). I'm kicking myself now that Harrison's not in there, everyone of these kids could use these skills! William's class made the pancakes at school in one of his classes and over the weekend he wanted to make them for all. I pulled his ingredients and measuring equipment out and let him have at it.  Literally, didn't do a thing...oh, I cut the butter...but he melted it.  I left the room so I wouldn't be tempted to butt in after that.

When he was ready to start cooking he came to me and said that he discovered (I'm not sure how, but he did) that he'd done teaspoons for everything, not tablespoons when required.  "GREAT MISTAKE" I shouted, kinda, "go google how many teaspoons in a tablespoon and figure out how you can fix this." It worked perfectly.  The other little catch I let him in on was crossing out the ingredient list as he went through the recipe...kinda hard to see them for the next time you want to make the dish. It's a fabulous work in progress. LOVE!