Two posts in two days! Can you tell I’m trying to get caught up before I start the kids scrapbooks? It’s my January project. And January is half over and I haven’t even started yet.
Found her sitting at the top of the stairs like this, just hanging out reading a book to her bear. That bear, by the way, is her A-1 companion. She drags him around everywhere, and won’t sleep without him. He’s been through a lot in his short year of life - good thing he washes up well!
In November we finally pulled the trigger on a project we’ve wanted to do since we bought this house – adding windows to the family room. This room was a bit of a cave and I found myself avoiding it. Which stinks, since it’s the family room after all. Our neighbor is a semi-retired contractor, and he did the work for us. In addition to adding two windows, he removed the fan and added can lights and added surround sound speakers to the TV wall. Here’s a before and after. The room is so much brighter and therefore more inviting now.
Another found-her-this-way photo of Oakley. Minnie dress, sitting in the library book basket, staring at a photo of Calvin’s preschool class. She is pretty good at entertaining herself, most of the time.
Calvin and I started doing reading lessons in November. We do one before nap and before bed. Sometimes I’m eager to get him in bed and I try to skip reading lessons, but he won’t hear of it. He loves it, and as a result he is much more interested in participating in family scripture study. He insists on “reading” out of his own book. It’s pretty cute. I hope he’ll learn to love reading.
Marie went to Phoenix to help Erica with her new baby, so we got to hang out with Nora for a few days. It was fun to have her around! She is the perfect age for my two youngest to play with. She’s about halfway between them in age, and she moves back and forth between the two and keeps them both happy for me. I really ought to hire her to come around more often. I had to snap a picture at Sam’s Club – I put a box of cookies in my cart and she looked at it and then turned back to me and said “Cha-ching!!” Made me laugh so hard.
Nerf battles are a common occurrence around here. Usually started by Will. I try to lay low until it’s over, but Oakley gets right in there.
Jacey had the chance to go to Junior Achievement City for a field trip this year. This is the field trip of all field trips for kids at our school. They talk about it for years. It’s the one reason kids look forward to fifth grade. I have to admit I thought it was being a little over-hyped, and I was afraid it was never going to live up to their expectations. I was wrong! It was amazing! I went as a parent volunteer and I’m so glad I did. It was so fun to see the kids completely running the “city” and they were so serious and into it. Jacey was appointed Mayor by her teacher. She did a great job, although I think it was a little stressful for her. I love that they got this experience, and I can’t say enough about how cool it was to be a parent volunteer and see it all first-hand.
Jacey also had a patriotic program at school right before Thanksgiving. I only got one (very lousy) photo. They sang songs and danced and did a cute little skit about some of the founding fathers. The entire fifth grade worked really hard on this program and they did a great job.
Thanksgiving was a little different this year. It was a Davis year, but my folks were in Phoenix with the new baby (and her parents) and Bryan & Alex weren’t able to travel. So it was just us and the Driscolls. Guess how many pictures I took? Just this one:
and the only reason I took that is so I didn’t have to copy it down. (PS – doesn’t Marie have nice handwriting? I’ve always liked it.) It was definitely a different holiday and much smaller than usual (although not any quieter – guess we bring all the noise!) but it was lovely in its own way. I made a turkey for the first time in my life and I guess it turned out okay. Hard to say since I don’t really like turkey anyway, but people ate it and nobody ended up with food poisoning, so I’ll call that a win. We did a little shopping and got our Christmas decorations up over the weekend.
Saturday after Thanksgiving we had the annual Robins Family Gingerbread Showdown. This is Calvin and Henson’s entry. I can’t remember exactly how they described it, but it had something to do with bombs and shooting explosives. I thought it was a pretty good entry for 4/5-year-olds, and the details they described were exactly what you would expect from adventurous little boys.
A couple more pictures to round out the month: Jacey and Oakley enjoying the new windows.
And another shot of Oakley, just because I think she’s cute.
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