The joys of democracy

As I was cleaning my kitchen (finally), Chloe ran up to me and asked if policemen were allowed to be in charge of the president. "No," I told her, "the president is in charge of the policemen."

"Good!" She said, & ran off down the hall, shouting at Zachary, in a snotty voice, "I'm the president, so I'm the boss of you, and you have to do whatever I say!"

This just would not do. I followed her back to her room and informed all of the children that it's important for a president to treat her people well, otherwise they might vote her down --or worse: form a military coup to bring her out of power forcefully. This pleased the other children greatly, and as I walked back to the kitchen, they were debating what to do with their president.

A few minutes later, they were all marching around the kitchen chanting, "Vote! Vote! Vote! Vote!" 3 year old Evelyn interrupted her chanting, turned to chloe and said maliciously, "We are the enemy! Vote! Vote! Vote!" And they marched out of the room.

Back in the playroom the political debates continued.

Gideon: "Well, I'll let you play the Wii!"

Chloe: "I'll let you play whenever you want!"

Gideon: "I'll give you candy!"

Chloe: "I'll give you candy too!"

Zachary and Evelyn cheer!

Then Zachary runs to me, "I'm the congress, and I'm making a law that Chloe can't be president anymore."

The chanting resumes: "Vote! Vote! Vote!"

As I think about it, this doesn't sound much different from how adults behave when it comes to politics. As I go back to my dishes, I congratulate myself on a successful moment of minimal-effort homeschooling. And then I'm jolted back to reality as I'm whacked in the head by a foam dart that one of my darlings just shot at me. (who's idea was it to buy those dart guns for christmas, anyway?)

Childhood Magic

We've all felt it. The childish excitement. The wonder. The desperate hoping. We wake up in the morning, throw the covers off, pray a silent prayer, and run to the window. Is it there? Has it come? We peer outside to see the rooftops covered in white. The ground has been frosted with a sparkling blanket, and tiny little flakes flutter magically from the sky. They pile neatly along the edges of our window, and if we look very closely, we can see the detail of a tiny flake that has just landed. The dirty old world of yesterday has been transformed in to a stunning land of white. And then it hits us. It's happened! It's actually happened! The moment we've been waiting for has arrived! We run out of our rooms, shouting the joyful proclamation to anyone who can hear. "It's snowing! It's snowing!"

Beyond the constraints of time, this feeling of expectation and excitement has remained the same in children throughout our country - and perhaps even the world. And it's no different for my children today. As I tucked my little ones into bed on Sunday night, their final thoughts were full of anticipation for the next morning. Will the Glorious Change take place as they slumber? What magic will greet them when they awake? As soon as the clocks in their bedrooms change from 5:59 to 6:00 they know they can finally get out of bed. They run to their windows and look outside. It's here! It's come! Sweet elation! I hear the sound of my children running to my room, as I snuggle deeper beneath my warm blankets. And then I hear the rejoicing of my children. "Mommy! Daddy! It's raining!" I'm suddenly awakened to the stark contrast of my childhood versus my children's.




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My Children Are Missing

I'm convinced that someone has abducted my children and replaced them with perfect little angels.

The other night, for dinner, I made chicken with stir-fry veggies. The second we were done praying, my boys were begging for the vegetables. "I want *lots* of vegetables, please!"
and then, "Wow, Thanks for making such a great dinner, Mom! This is my favorite meal *ever*"
"MMM! This is *so* good!"
"Can I have *more* vegetables??"
"I *love* this broccoli!"

As far as I'm concerned, whoever took my children can keep them. I like the new ones *just* fine!" :)

For Heidi

I made this video for Heidi's birthday, but i'm only just now getting it onto the computer. Happy very late birthday, Heidi. :)

Right Here in River City!

Trouble! With a capital "T" And that rhymes with "E" and that stands for Evy!

Siiiiiiigh!

Picture Day!

Every year, we go to The Picture People to get our photos done. They're not the best in the world, but they have cute poses & they're cheap. I get a membership every year which gives me lots of discounts. Well, our membership was going to expire in a couple weeks, so i called to make an appointment, & found out that they closed down! Well, i've got no clue where else to go, so we decided that just for the year, we'd drive an hour & a half away, to the nearest picture people, so we could use up our discounts.

anway... thought you'd like to see the pictures.

These are from last year:

And this year:

Zachy was very shy. Every time the camera people got him to smile or laugh, he would turn his head & hide. Finally, i told him that I'd give him a penny if he smiled. :)

Me & Chris pretending to love each other. :) They told us to kiss. I held it for about 3 seconds & then burst out laughing. I mean, really. How long could *you* sit there & pretend to kiss with a camera in your face? made a cute picture, though. --way better than the kissing one.

And Evy finally smiles!

Shaving Cream

we had a fun time playing with shaving cream the other day. :)

2 cans of shaving cream! very fun 'til Evy's rubbed her eyes with her creamy hands & they got pasted shut. :)

summer photos

well, i've finally gotten around to going through some photos from this summer. I took all of these at swim lessons one day.

chloe does the backstroke:

Chloe swims!

Gideon LOVED his new goggles! he said he liked to look underwater at all the pretty bathing suits. :)

Zachy goes under

Zachy loved making big splashes!

A visit to the Dentist

Monday, I took the kids to the dentist. I love my dentist. He's *so* gentle and soft-spoken with them. And they love him. Chloe cried on Monday, because I had to postpone her appointment. Even though she got a treat along with the others, she was heartbroken that she didn't get her check up. :)

So apparently, they have a rating system for how well the kids' teeth are brushed. The dentist said that Gideon brushes his better than most parents. Yay, Gideon.

We'll be going back to visit in about a week, because Gideon's going to need a palette expander. Apparently, the roof of his mouth is too narrow. As his body continues to grow, this could cause problems with is breathing, not to mention giving him a serious underbite. Gideon is very excited about getting a "brace thing". :)

Zachary will also be having a procedure done. When we noticed that he was tongue-tied as a baby, we asked our pediatrician about it, & he said that nothing needed to be done. the frenulum (the piece of skin that holds the tongue down) would just stretch as he grew. However, Dentist says that a person should be able to stick their tongue over their teeth a *minimum* of one centimeter in order to have proper speech. Zachy can't even do that. Also, he said that it's pulling the gums away from his teeth. So... we'll be "untying" zachy's tongue next thursday. eek!

The Zoo

We went to the zoo awhile ago. Here are some pictures that I took.

The lion exhibit at our zoo has a big glass "window" so you can get up close. This one was napping right in front of the window. As she got up to turn around, all the kids squealed with excitement. I love how her tongue was hanging out. :)
Up close & personal. :)

long day

We went to the park the other day, and the kids crashed as soon as we got in the car. :)

Peter Pan pays a vistit to our house

In our living room, we have a ledge in front of the fireplace. It makes a perfect stage for any performance and is probably one of the favorite spots in the house, for the kids. This day, they were having a blast jumping off of it. :)

Just think Happy thoughts!!!

And the children fly happily away to neverland, while Evy waves goodbye. :)

A baby!

Awhile back, the kids were begging me to have another baby. Finally, Gideon said, "Mom, if you have another baby, we promise we'll take care of it."

When my friend Angie brought her baby over the other day, Gideon was *so* proud to be able to hold him. Chris came home for a few minutes, & Gideon was so excited to be able to show him how he was holding a baby.... kinda makes me want another....

I love this picture of chloe & the baby.

You may remember that I posted a few months ago about Angie's baby. When he was just a week or two old, he had to have surgery because his intestines were twisted. It was such a difficult time for their family. But now he's a big healthy boy. Thank you, Lord, for your kindness and mercy.

Dinosaurs

Heather sent me some fun CD's a couple months ago. One of the songs she gave me is "We are the dinosaurs," by I-don't-know-who (heather?). Every time the kids hear it, they start marching around, and roaring. So cute! I just had to share the pics, but they're not near as good without the music. :)

Marching, Marching

We stop and take a rest, over in our nest.

ROOOOAAAAAARRR!!!!!

Boxing

you may remember me telling you that every monday, after ballet, the kids visit a boxing gym and hit the punching bags for a few minutes. Last time I was there, i took a few pictures. Here are my favorites.

The Fair

well, i've *finally* finished posting all of my pictures from the fair a couple weeks ago. You can see all of my pictures at flickr, but here are my favorites. :)

Every time we drove by the fair, zachy would say, "mommy, sing the roller coaster song." So if you want the full effect, you can listen to this song while you look at the pictures. :)

update(5/08): Erik has informed me that my itunes songs won't work on here. >:( so i'll just have to give you the lyrics instead:

Last night I took a walk after dark

A swingin' place called Palisades Park

To have some fun and see what I could see

That's where the girls areI

took a ride on a shoot-the-chute

That girl I sat beside was awful cute

And after while she was holdin' hands with me

My heart was flyin' up like a rocket ship

Down like a roller coaster

Back like a loop-the-loop

And around like a merry-go-round

We ate and ate at a hot dog stand

We danced around to a rockin' band

And when I could, I gave that girl a hug

In the tunnel of love

You'll never know how great a kiss can feel

When you stop at the top of a Ferris wheel

When I fell in love down at Palisades Park

--Freddy Cannon

Chloe's butterfly.

Wide-mouthed Frog

Evy has begung to pose for pictures. Any time she sees my camera pointed at her, she cocks her head & smiles, and says, "eeeeeeeeeeeeeeee" for cheese. :)

Evy looks at her butterfly.




I thought i'd see how close i could get to the moon, between my zoom and some cropping on the computer. If you click on the photo, to see it large, you can see some craters at the bottom-right side of the moon.

I love how Gideon is looking at chris. :)




Nobody I know. just thought it looked cool. If you view this large, it's fun to look at the people's faces.

Traffic Jam

"You'll never know how great a kiss can feel til you're stopped at the top of a ferris wheel."

"I took a ride on the shoot-the-chute. The girl I sat beside was awful cute. And when it stopped she was holding hands with me."

The ticket lady didn't want to take Zachy's ticket.

"We ate and ate at a hot dog stand..."

Every time the kids see a flag, they shout, "stars and stripes forever!"

Gideon goes on a helicopter ride.

These are show lambs, freshly shorn for the show.

The kids got to go on a real-live meri-go-round (how do you spell that?). Their first time ever, to ride real horses.

Evy feeds a goat. I, of course, have pictures of all the kids feeding the goats, they're on flickr.

Chloe looks for stones in the water. --this is probably my favorite picture.

Panning for gold. (the theme of the fair was "how the west was fun") They actually got to find gold in the pans. --but they didn't ge to keep it.

Zachy & this little girl have very similar personalities. I thought this picture was funny, because they're standing the exact same way, holding their bodies the same way, etc. they should've been twins.

This was just so sad. Zachy wouldn't hold the food close enough for this poor goat to reach it. He'd stick his tongue out as far as he could, to no avail.

The milk goats were SO friendly, because they're hand-fed when they're babies. This one was really cuddly with Chloe.

Evy loved petting the goats too.

Baby alpaca

I just loved this guy's smile!