Two Cute

Two year olds are delightful. They are happy most of the time. They are (somewhat) open to logical discussion. They are sweet and huggable. They like giving hugs. They love life. Really there are only two downsides to two year olds: 1. Diapers. 2. Sometimes they talk really fast and because their articulation isn't perfect yet, you have no idea what they just said and they think you do.

Everyday Life

Bentley missed a cub meeting where they earned a belt loop playing marbles, so we pulled out our marbles and helped him earn the loop. Great-grandma told the children that when she was little she wore a hole through her fingernail playing marbles!

Every Sunday Viva grabs the comics. 

She sometimes reads the comics in the daily paper, but not every day.

Opa purchased a small Lego set for Lincoln to build a train.

This set built one of three different train cars, so then Opa bought two more of the same set so Lincoln could build the full train to play with. Although we have hundreds of thousands of Legos we do not have the right ones to build three small train cars. (No joke!)

Lincoln and Evan have daily Duplos time when Jake watches them.

Since Duplos are now on the main floor, all the chidren have been building with them.

These cheap dollar bin ball poppers are a BIG hit with Lincoln and Evan.

Jake is taking up Viva's odd reading posture.

I can't say for sure, but I think Viva made this structure.

Lincoln and she both like the pegs a lot and Jake plays with them a little.

Evan mostly tosses them around.

We have been using the master tub a little more often recently.

All the children enjoy splashing around in the water.

Jake gets angry once or twice (or more) a day.

Viva not as often, but she glares at us at least daily, too.

Is it a six year old thing?

Cars, cars, cars, cars, cars, cars…...

Evan playing on great-grandma's exercise machine.

He is quite the little monkey.

This photo does not do justice to our princess.

Viva's Leprechaun Lego House

Viva likes to celebrate holidays with different craft projects. For St. Patrick's Day she built a Lego house. She doesn't play with her Legos that often so we were all surprised. After building her house she invited me to build another, larger house with her, but (sigh) we haven't found time to do it yet. (She must remember us building a house together last year. Cool!) Even with homeschool and the extra free time it affords the children, there is not enough time to do all the activities that we want to. It makes me sad...but happy about the activities we have done together!

Sword Play

Someday when I have sufficient free time I will take an inventory of the swords in our house. I don't think Kara owned a single sword when she was little. She never asked for one. Viva owns a sword and a light saber. She purchased both of them on our trip to Disney World when she was with her brothers and their decisions became hers (even though I showed her other merchandise!). Anyway here's the latest photos taken when the boys were doing sword play one afternoon.

Bentley and Lincoln

So boy!

Guess where Lincoln learned his sword play from?

I know this photo is blurry, but what do you expect from bodies in motion?

Science: Biology

This post is overdue, we have moved onto the next science unit. Nonetheless in the interests of full reporting, I shall post about our biology explorations. In a week or two I shall repost this to some random date in February.

The trio and I did the second science unit of the school year: Biology. We are using Rebecca W. Keller's Real Science 4 Kids series. The course suggested that you start with chemistry, then do biology. We finished chemistry so we moved on to biology. There are ten chapters in the book "Elementary Focus on Biology". We worked through the first six chapters at which point we were stymied. To do the experiments for chapters six and seven we needed a microscope. Chapter eight's experiment required a live caterpillar and chapter nine's required tadpoles. Caterpillars and tadpoles are hard to come by in Alaska in the dead of winter. Kara and I decided to end the children's biology explorations at this point in time. Next time we pick up biology we will do it in the spring so we can do the experiments.

The biology course is well written. Dr. Keller keeps the lessons short and interesting. An experiment accompanies each lesson. Some experiments worked for us; some did not.

Chapter 1: Life
Experiment 1: Classifying Objects
It was a simple, hands-on experiment that the children enjoyed it. They understood the concept taught. I liked that it didn’t require any unusual supplies that we had to track down before we could do the experiment! 

Chapter 2: Cells: A Small City
Experiment 2: What Do You Need?
The children did not learn the concept being taught. The experiment was a discussion on how the complexity of a cell is like the complexity of a city. We followed the questions in the experiment manual, but they were too broad and we got lost.

Chapter 3: Food for Plants
Experiment 3: Who Needs Light?
I confess: we did not do this experiment. Even in the name of science I cannot purposely kill a plant.

Chapter 4 : Plant Parts
Experiment 4: Thirsty Flowers
We did not do this one either! Eeks! It required that you buy some cut flowers. We did this experiment last year, so we didn't repeat it.

Chapter 5: Growing a Plant
Experiment 5: Growing Seeds
We did this one. The kids enjoyed looking at all the beans and peas. They stuck them in jars. They checked to see how they sprouted. We kept them for a week. We then opened up one of the jars---BIG MISTAKE. The stench was incredible. The experiment manual should have warned us. A nasty, nasty, nasty smell invaded our home. I will remember this experiment forever. (Just like I remember in junior high when the biology class visited Homer and brought back marine samples. Then next day the entire school smelled horrible.)

Elementary biology is a lot more work than the other sciences because some of the experiments require weeks of observations and special items or equipment. It's hard to maintain focus like that in a home environment. It's so much easier to start and finish an experiment in one session!

Confined

Evan becomes very sad and very angry when he is left behind on the main floor when an adult goes upstairs or downstairs. I try to sneak away when he's not near the baby gates. Unfortunately our baby gates are wrought iron and the closure mechanism is loud--CLICK! He hears it even when he is out of sight of the gates and he comes racing. If he's far enough away and I leap the stairs fast enough I might be out of his line of sight when he gets to the gate. Sometimes he'll be fooled into thinking it was a false alarm and he'll quietly go back to playing, but other times he is not fooled and he screams about the injustice of being left behind.

I don't always try to elude him--I let him come along--but if I'm doing a quick errand (changing the laundry from washer to dryer or grabbing something from my bedroom to bring downstairs), I don't want him to join me because I'll spend more time chasing him around upstairs than I will completing my errand. When Evan gets upstairs he runs into the laundry room and punches all the buttons on the washer--sometimes stopping the cycle entirely so we have to start it over. Or he runs into the kids' bathroom and tries to get the faucet on before he's stopped. Then he races down the hall to the family room and punches the DVR and grabs a fistful of Legos or opens the big jar of animal crackers and grabs as many as he can. He has an agenda when he goes upstairs. His agenda. 

Lincoln was never this bad...although there was that period of time when he would hold his breath until he passed out if he was left behind. Passing out on a hardwood floor is not a good idea. But still, Lincoln wasn't as diligent about watching and listening for anyone going upstairs. And if we let him come upstairs with us, he wasn't a tornado of chaos like Evan.

Oh So Fine

Here are some oh so fine photos of our oh so fine children:

Nuki Nuki

A few years ago the Nuki song was a big hit at our house and now that we have more little ones, it's popular once again. If you aren't familiar with it, google youtube nuki and enjoy the treat. (Warning: It's strangely addictive.)

Our Morning!

Opa is in Michigan visiting his parents. I sent him some photos this morning to entertain him and the great-grandparents. Here are some of the photos I sent:

Nearly every time he visits our bedroom Evan insists on taking a ukulele out of its case. 

He doesn't even always play, but he has to get his hands on it for a minute or so.

A new favorite activity in grandma's bathroom is looking through the drawers. 

Evan did NOT like having the mini links attached to his belt loop.

Back downstairs Bentley races cars with his little brothers.

Lincoln ran over his own foot (?!!)  and had to stop to massage it.

Evan helps Kara unload the dishwasher. 

(We have to unload very fast to keep him away from the Fiestaware.) 

Lincoln eating Chex with raisins. He asks for it every morning and every night.

Jake and Viva are doing a grammar lesson.

Jake!

Viva!

The Duplos have been temporarily relocated downstairs. 

(I love the sunshine, but it trashes my photos!)

Evan retrieved this from the trash. 

He keeps very busy.

He keeps us very busy.

 

Viva made this zoo.

The trio have a reading time every day.

They have to read books approved by mom during this time.

(This is how Kara gets the classics in.)

Aren't they just the most adorable set of six year old twins?

(Viva thinks she's in grade two because it's her second year of school! Her logic is impeccable.)

While the older children read, the younger ones attack a bag of marshmallows.

Which leads to attacking each other. 

And then they sweetly share with great-grandma!

These photos represent just a small part of our busy day.  Evan and Lincoln are napping now, so I had time to get this posted.

Joy!

Evan was joyful because he got his hands on great-grandma's iPhone. She's the only one who has an iPhone who would share it with him. Because he made changes to her screens she no longer is willing to let him play with her phone. She tries to keep it out of his sight. Poor Evan.

No Foolin': He's 18 Months Old!

Evan is a year and a half old today!  We had cupcakes to celebrate.  He doesn't have a LOT of words, but I think he approved (he ate four - in my defense, they are mini cupcakes!).

What's there to know about our Evan?  Here is my random trivia:

• He's fiery and passionate.  I believe he has twice the temper of his older brother Jake... and that's sayin' something! :)
• If you try to go upstairs (or downstairs, for that matter) without him he'll scale the gate to join you.  That's a first around here (gate scaling).  My older three never thought to climb the gate and Lincoln preferred holding his breath until he fell over.
• He has a great wave.
• He does a mean center split.  Just like his older sister.
• He is always SO happy in the morning.  He has a great big smile.
• When he wants something sometimes he stomps his foot.
• When he wants a snack, in a particular place, he'll point to the food and then go tap the location I'm to put it down.  Cuteness.
• He jabbers and has a lot to say, we just don't understand it all.
• Evan is always in motion.  Always.  He's not a cuddler.
• He doesn't stand for exclusion due to age discrimination.  He stands up against it with great vigor.
• When he is done with his food he throws it.
• He still has straps on his high chair.  I'm fairly certain the rest of my children had them removed by this age, but Evan has to be confined or he climbs on the big chairs and shakes them.  I'm hoping to avoid stitches.
• He still dances on the table.  Despite my many requests to cease and refrain.
• He gives the cat and his giraffe blankie daily kisses.  The rest of us get them on special occasions (or if we ask!).
• He's becoming a much better driver (on his motorized car).

We sure do enjoy our Evan!

Evan with his twins:

My attempt at getting a picture of Evan and Bentley (he did NOT cooperate):

Evan and Lincoln, you ask?  Zero cooperation at this particular photo shoot. :)  Although, for the record, Lincoln does refer to Evan as HIS baby.

We love you SO much, spunky little man!