She didn't want Pluto to feel left out

If I told you she was a little excited about her scale model solar system, I'd be lying.

If I told you she was so enamored with her first science project that she has invited every friend that has stopped by, and every stranger who comes to the front door, to follow her upstairs to gaze in wonder at her creation, that would be more accurate.

Thankfully, the UPS guy was polite enough to decline her invitation and simply commend her for her hard work from the comfort of our front porch.

If this first week of lessons is any indication, it would seem that the Apologia astronomy curriculum was the perfect choice for first grade science.

I'm willing to bet this project is not coming down for a long, long time.

Sounding it out

We have lots of fun stuff planned for Pre-K this year.

But nothing on our syllabus is quite as exciting as this book. One hundred easy reading lessons, here we come!

Abby's pretty excited about having a reading buddy. Caleb's pretty excited about being able to read about Clark the Shark's back-to-school adventures all by himself.

And I'm pretty excited that my Clark the Shark reading days may be winding to a close soon.

School's in!

School's back in session.

Yes, I know it's the end of July. And yes, I know "real schools" don't start for another week and a half.

But I like April better than August, and I'm willing to sacrifice August in order to be done with school in time to enjoy April.

As headmaster of The Fisher Preparatory Academy for Excellence in Learning, I get to make that call.

And lest you worry that my kids are missing out on these final days of summer, remember that we're working with a 2:1 student-teacher ratio. School takes us about 90 minutes a day. That leaves 22.5 hours for playing, eating and sleeping. They're really okay with this.

And just so long as Levi keeps taking that 90 minute morning nap, we should have no problem staying on track to finish up Pre-K and First Grade before those warm spring days make school seem suddenly very unimportant.

Check back with me in April and we'll see how that worked out.

Toylessness

It was a long time coming, really.

I'd grown tired of the nagging, the empty threats, the vain promises that toys would disappear if they weren't cleaned up. The kids were tired of it, too. I'd made some halfhearted attempts to show them I was serious, but they just weren't getting it.

So in an effort to show them that I meant what I said, and to get them to take my threats seriously, I committed to taking my threats seriously. And I began following through on my promises.

I asked them to clean up the blocks, and they didn't obey the first time. So the blocks went away.

I asked them to clean up the trucks, and they failed to complete the task. So the trucks went away.

I asked them to clean up an assortment of other things that were strewn about the house at various times, and they whined and complained. So the other things went away.

They're learning to obey right away, all the way, with a happy heart. It's a tough lesson to learn, but I'm determined to help them as best I can. (I have a wise mentor to thank for this bit of wisdom.)

In a matter of mere days, we were down to a very limited collection of toys. And it didn't take long before the shelves in the playroom were nearly empty but for our library of children's books and a few baby toys that Levi was not expected to clean up on his own.

They were bored, but they were starting to understand that I meant what I said.

And then, something magical happened. Something I never saw coming. Something that will make me rethink every giving them their toys back.

First, without the distraction of so many things to fight and argue over, they began to play well with one another. Really, really well. It's as if they understood that with only a few things to play with, they would have to work together if they were to have any fun at all. It may have helped that in making myself "Mommy, the Toy Eater," as they called me, my children were also now united against a common enemy.

Next, they got creative. Caleb, in particular, excelled at this stage of toylessness. He set to work drawing trucks and cars and boats and sharks. He enlisted his sister--the only one with permission to use scissors--to cut them out for him. He requested my help in making a "shark pocket" out of a large piece of paper, then used tape and some ribbon to make handles for it. He's built up quite a collection of paper vehicles and paper sharks of all varieties, and keeps them safely stored away in his shark pocket when they're not being played with.

"They're in my shark pocket, Mommy," he'll remind me when I ask if he's cleaned up his mess. "So you can't throw them away."

He now begins most days by sitting down at the table with a big stack of paper and a box of crayons to design the "toys" that he'll play with that day. He has hammerhead sharks, fire trucks, race cars, working cranes, great whites, a number of stick people that represent our family, black tip reef sharks, front end loaders, boats, houses, and he's even pieced together some larger pieces of cardboard on which he's drawn roads and cities and oceans for his cutouts to play on.

If they ask nicely, he'll let his big sister and his little brother play with his creations, but he is adamant that they put them away in the shark pocket in his closet when they're done.

I think this lesson is starting to pay off.

It's her favorite color

A friend gave me some good parenting advice the other day.

"We should say 'yes' to our kids as often as possible," Liz explained. "So that when we say 'no,' it really means something."

And before you go filing that away for future use, I should issue this caveat: sometimes, when you take someone's good advice, it can have unintended consequences. So now that you know the back story, what follows is The Tale of How My Daughter and I Ended Up With Pink Hair.

It all began when I decided to take Abby to a fancy salon for her first ever hair cut. I've given her a trim here and there, but we all agree that I am not a professional stylist, nor do I have a clue how to handle her wild curls. But Robin is a professional stylist, and one whose specialty is curly hair, at that.

"What do people do at a fancy salon?" my daughter asked me when I told her what the day's adventure would be.

Oh, they get their hair cut, and colored, and styled, I explained.

(Looking back, I probably could have chosen my words more carefully.)

"I'm going to get a hair cut?" she asked. I nodded.

"And then can I get my hair colored pink?" she continued. I paused. I had told her that's what they do there.

I took that request up with her dad. Seeing no moral objection to pink hair, we declared it an okay move. Say 'yes' as often as possible, remember?

(Actually, her dad's exact words were, "She's homeschooled. It's not like anybody's going to care." Three cheers for homeschooling!)

Off to the salon we went, with nary another mention of pink hair. Until she sat down.

"When does it get pink?" she asked, as Robin worked her magic with the scissors.

I gave my consent, and a hot pink concoction was painted onto a strip of hair about an inch wide, directly in the middle of my 5-year-old's head. And she loved every minute of it.

"Are you going to get pink hair too, Mommy?" asked my daughter, as the pink dye soaked into that long blond curl.

Ummm. I hadn't really thought about it.

I looked into my daughter's eyes, and I saw in that moment the excitement of being at the fancy salon, of having a pink strip of hair, and the hopefulness that I would join her. In an instant, I flashed forward to the thousands of crazy decisions she'll face in life, and saw that I had an opportunity here that wouldn't last long.

Maybe, just maybe, one day she'll have another wild idea--perhaps more serious than pink hair, or perhaps not--and maybe, just maybe, she'll remember this day. Maybe she'll decide mom's okay after all, and maybe she'll run it by me first. It's a risk I'm willing to take.

I flashed back to the salon, and decided then and there to take my own advice.

Say 'yes' as often as possible, remember?

Abby happens to think the matching pink streaks in our hair are awesome. Mission accomplished.

Also, I think magenta highlights are totally appropriate for a first grader and a homeschooling mom of four.

The first grader agrees.

Pearly whites

You know what's not fun?

Teething.

Teething is not fun.

It's not fun for the teething baby. It's not fun for the brother who shares a room with the teething baby. It's not fun for anyone wishing to carry on a conversation in the same room as the teething baby.

There are a lot of stages of their childhoods that I'll miss. There are many moments that I am sad to see pass.

But not teething.

I can speak for all of us when I say none of us will miss teething.

But most especially Levi.

Lesson One: There should be words

Since all the big kids are reading or learning to read around here, Jacob wanted in on the fun.

So he affixed a few dozen stickers to a piece of paper, and took a seat in the kitchen. 

"Sit down, Mommy," he instructed. "I'm going to read you these stickers."

It was not necessarily the most compelling story I've ever heard, but for a two-year-old reading a page of multi-colored dots, it wasn't bad.

He even thought to put it away on the bookshelf when he was finished. 

Living room safari

Levi's two favorite things are pushing trucks around, and this little lion blankie.

Figuring out that he can push the lion blankie around on the truck pretty much made his morning.

He really does have a great life.

With one hand behind my back

Preparing scrambled eggs for a family of six is no easy task.

Especially when you're doing it one-handed.

A good night's sleep

For the first time in over four years, we're down to only one crib in this house.

This went much better than we expected.

Our big kid bed rule is this: If they can stay in a bed with nothing but our words to keep them there, then they can have a real bed. If us telling them to stay in a bed won't do the trick, they stay in the crib.

We had serious doubts that our words would be enough to keep Jacob in his bed. But the bars on his crib weren't going to keep him in for much longer anyway, with the lure of a fun baby brother in the room, so we figured we'd give it a shot and hope for the best.

He took to it like champ.

He loved the "diggers and dumpers" sheets he had picked out himself, he loved having a pillow for his head and covers to pull over him. He loved his puppy pajamas and being able to tuck all of his stuffed puppies in with him. (Except for Tess. Tess puppy stays tucked under his arm, no matter what.)

The back-up crib we've used during our dual-crib days for the past four and half years didn't survive the disassembly, and was hauled off and repurposed by a friend for a laundry room drying rack project.

Levi finally inherited the "nice" crib, the one that has held one of our sleeping babies for the past 2,123 consecutive days. He barely noticed the change.

And Jacob was so enthralled with the new set up that he lay perfectly still in his bed, barely rustling the covers except to occasionally lift his head and peek to see if Levi was still awake. I realized after we tucked him in and said our Good Nights that "sleeping through the night" is not just a newborn goal. I hold my full night's sleep in high esteem, and was seriously hoping we hadn't messed with a good thing with this transition to a twin bed. But you can only lie still for so long before you get bored and nod off, which is precisely what happened in Jacob's case.

Twelve hours later, at 7:20 this morning, his bunny clock alerted him that it was wake up time. He had been awake and staring at it for some time, and promptly climbed out of bed, ran to his door, swung it wide and announced to the world, "My bunny's awake! I got out of my bed!"

If this trend continues, I'll need to take back all the things I said about how poorly Jacob's transition to a big boy bed was going to go. So far, all my predictions were dead wrong.

Turns out, he can handle this big boy bed thing just fine.

Necessity is the mother of invention

Truly, this may be the next big thing in shark mobility.

Reports indicate that Sharky is having a much easier time getting to Starbucks, Target and the grocery store now. (These, according to his owner, are the errands he needed to run this afternoon. I heartily approve of the order in which he ran them.)

I'm thinking we should go ahead and patent this design now, before someone steals the idea.

Three guesses as to who spent his quiet time this afternoon designing and building this clever little vehicle.

Good, clean fun

Hours and hours and hours of entertainment. And the mess all dries up when we're done.

Yep. This is one of my favorite outside toys.

The big boys

Most moments between these two are not this peaceful.

But the ones that are? Those are the moments I treasure.

She's more fun than I am

We have this great babysitter who shows up and makes my life easier for a few hours a week. She comes bearing puzzles, and patience, and tons of energy.

And on this particular day, she put that energy to use to make cow costumes for my children, so that we could all enjoy free Chick-fil-a. (She earns her keep, I'm telling you.)

Abby was a princess ballerina cow, complete with spotted tights.

Caleb was a shark cowboy, because in his four-year-old mind, that made perfect sense. Never mind that it's the middle of summer and probably over 100 degrees inside that shark costume. He was not going to be dissuaded.

Jacob was appalled at the idea of taping construction paper to his clothing. We managed to stick one spot to his shirt, but only by promising him ice cream.

And Levi mostly wanted to eat his spots, but we got a few to stick long enough to earn him a kids meal.

They're going to be really sad when Rachel goes off to college.

Come to think of it, so am I.

Dinner bell

He's got a bit of his older brother in him.

(The older brother who could eat a horse. Not the one who refused to eat for the first 26 months of his life.)

From the moment the first fork is pulled from the drawer (or the dishwasher...let's be honest), or the first sippy cup of milk is poured, Levi is frantic.

"Dinner is coming! Dinner is coming!" I hear him chanting as he runs through the kitchen.

(He's crawling, actually. But briskly. And the words are really more plaintive wails than anything else.)

He clings to my legs. He reaches for the milk on the counter. He screams each time the refrigerator is opened and no one hands him a snack.

He is hungry, for crying out loud! And we're all ignoring him!

No, Levi. We're not ignoring you. Your big brother Caleb used to pull this same nonsense when he was your age. Still does, sometimes, now that I think about it. And I'll tell you the same thing I told him.

When dinner is ready, I will put it on the table. And you will be fed. Rest assured, we will not let you miss a meal. Now go play, before I trip over you.

We've come to an agreement, the one-year-old and me. I will put dinner in the bottom oven, and he will be permitted to stand there and watch it cook. He can even slobber on the window, if it will keep him quiet.

This arrangement seems to be working out nicely for everyone.

Things I wish they wouldn't pick up: Part 2

What is that, Abby?

"It's a snake, Mommy. Don't worry," she added. "It's dead."

Why do you have a dead snake?

"You said not to pick up the live ones."

That I did. She's wise beyond her years, I believe.

Circle of life

When we survive family trips to Target (and we often do), I reward the kids with stickers or candy.

In the long term, I'm hoping for a Pavlovian response that will eventually cause a manifestation of good behavior at the mere sight of the Target logo.

In the short term, I can bribe them with the promise of rewards to keep them quiet as we navigate the aisles.

On this particular visit, Abby requested the "cute little kitty cats and the adorable little mice" stickers, so she could make a story book when she got home.

"Snack Time for Cats" was not what I expected.

Maybe I need to stop referring to cats only in terms of their usefulness for killing backyard rodents.

The hap-happiest season of all

I take back what I said at Christmas.

This is the most wonderful time of the year.

This is the time when I can spend all morning at the big pool with four kids. Because three-fourths of my kids are confident swimmers, and a fourth is perfectly happy to kick and splash and follow us around in his little flotation device.

This is the time when my kids will spend almost an hour taking turns on the diving board. Because they are the crazy kind of fearless that makes me happy for my life guard training in a previous life.

This is the time when Jacob forgets he's only two, and does whatever it takes to keep up with his 4 and 5 year old siblings, including, but not limited to, jumps off a diving board that that is too high for him to climb onto by himself. Big sister is always more than willing to give him a boost. (Coincedentally, there are no pictures of this activity. I prefer to be in a ready-to-dive-in position on the side of the pool when this kind of shenanigans is going on.)

This is the time when Levi is exactly the right height to use his pool float as a walker in the kiddie pool. Any taller, and he'd tip over. Any shorter, and his feet wouldn't touch the bottom. But at his current height, he can motor all over the place with his little baby feet propelling him under the fountain and back and forth to retrieve toys that others have left behind. And he loves every minute of it.

And this is the time when we wrap up our morning with a poolside picnic before jumping in one last time and then heading home, where all my little fish fall asleep almost before their heads hit the pillow.

Any morning that ends with 100% naptime participation is a good morning, indeed. I pretty much love summer.

Quietest one-year-old ever

You know what's sadder than a baby with laryngitis?

Nothing. Nothing is sadder than a baby with laryngitis.

But do you know what you get if you lose your voice to laryngitis on your birthday?

Post-birthday milkshakes. And lots of them.

Because Mommy feels sorry for you. And you may be one now, but you're still the baby, after all.

Just us girls

There's a lot of testosterone in this house, and Abby and I were needing some girl time.

So on a whim, I decided it was about time to introduce her to the best ice cream ever.

A little while later, we were in the middle of the ghetto seated at a rickety metal table enjoying our sugar cones topped with scoops of Red Velvet Cakescream and Pismachio.

"Mommy!" she exclaimed. "This really is the best ice cream ever!"

Yep. We're best friends now.

Happy birthday, Levi!

What a difference a year makes.

This time last year, Levi was a sleepy, immobile newborn. We wondered what being a family of six would look like, and how hard four kids would really be. And now? Well...he keeps us on our toes, that's for sure.

For one, he's a goofball. And I mean that in the truest sense of the word. He thinks everything he does is hilarious, and he's usually right. With one kid, the blowing-raspberries-with-a-mouth-full-of-food thing was annoying. With Levi, it's hysterical. (Also, I think my defenses are shot at this point, and it's easier to laugh at his misconduct than to see it as, well, misconduct.) The stealing-your-brother's-stuffed-puppy-and-hiding-it-under-the-crib thing? Hilarious. The merging-the-clean-and-dirty-laundry-into-one-big-pile thing? Hilarious. He's got a practical joke streak that is going to be TROUBLE if it keeps up. And just when you're about to explain to the one-year-old why what he did is not appropriate, he flashes that big wide-mouthed Levi smile, eyes twinkling, dimple dimple-ing, and he completely disarms you. (Or maybe he just disarms me. Whatever. You try disciplining that kind of cuteness and let me know how it goes.)

He's perfectly content. Seriously. I've never seen a kid roll with the punches the way Levi can. This, again, I think is a by-product of being the last duck in the row, and essentially having no other choice but to go along with whatever's happening. Nurture, certainly, has made him an easy-going, happy little baby. But nature, too, played largely into it, and the end result is a kid with a great disposition and a very pleasant personality. (Except when he's teething. Then all bets are off, and he's pretty much the crabbiest kid you've ever met. Still cute, nonetheless, but teething definitely does not agree with this kid, and he's happy to make sure everyone within a five-mile radius knows it.)

He's on track to be the world's greatest roommate one day. Levi can absolutely sleep through anything. And by anything, I mean that ever-chatty songbird of a brother with no volume control with which he shares a room. I pride myself on raising good sleepers, but Jacob simply isn't one. He compensates for the sleep he doesn't seem to need by spending the first hour of naptime and often the first two hours after bedtime singing, laughing, and generally disrupting Levi's peace and quiet. Levi, for his part, couldn't care less. He wants to sleep for an hour and a half in the morning, so that's what he does. He wants to sleep for three hours in the afternoon, so that's what he does. He wants to go right to sleep when we lay him down at night and sleep soundly until it's time for breakfast, so that's what he does. And generally, no amount of Jacob's attempts at distraction will deter him. I'm not going to lie...his excellent sleep habits are one of my favorite things about Levi.

He's a charmer. Levi loves people, and in particular, he loves the next person that comes into a room. If you're standing nearby, he expects you to hold him. But if someone new walks in, he'll expect them to hold him. It's nothing personal, really. He just loves to be held, and loves people, and loves a change of scenery. He's never met a stranger, and is always eager to be passed off to the volunteers in the church nursery or the neighbor who stops to say hi while we're playing outside. He's too busy to stop and snuggle, but if you're going to be moving around, he'd love to be in your arms or on your shoulders.

He's a great eater. He eats most everything we put in front of him, with the exception of fruit, for reasons I still don't know. He drinks milk from a sippy cup and gets annoyed when we don't give him a fork at dinner like everyone else. And for a one-year-old, he's not too bad with a utensil. He'll eat his weight in Willy's burritos and roasted okra and baked oatmeal, and is a huge fan of smoothies and anything that comes out of a straw. Despite his voracious appetite, he's on track to be tall and slim like his sister, coming in at the top of the charts for height and the bottom for weight. Which is no surprise, because...

He's on the move. All. The. Time. He can't walk yet, but he wants to. He can't climb the stairs yet, but he wants to. He's fast and clever and seems to be everywhere at once most days. After "Keep your voice down" and "Is everything okay?" the phrase I most often yell around here is "Does anyone know where Levi is?" If we're upstairs, he's playing hide and seek behind the chair in Abby's room. If we're downstairs, he's hiding INSIDE the cabinet with all the plastic cups I let him play with.

He's holding out on us. He can say Mama, and sometimes Dada, but only if he wants to. Mostly, he likes to throw things down and say "Uh-oh" ad nauseam. He's a man of few words, but he understands everything we say and is quick to listen and obey, or smile and speed off in the opposite direction. He's only a year old, after all.

He loves books and trucks and his lion blanket and playing with his siblings. He simply adores Abby and still gives her the biggest smiles of all. He pouts when Daddy leaves for work and lights up when he comes home. He has little patience when it comes to meal prep and is always ready for dessert. His smile lights up a room and his laugh is infectious. He's a joy to be around and a blessing to our family, and I couldn't imagine life without him in it.

Happy birthday, little Levi! I'm so glad you're ours!

Workout buddies

We take personal fitness very seriously around here.

Just kidding. The kids do a lot of running around, and I do a lot of chasing them. And the hubby is sort of a glutton for punishment when it comes to roughhousing with his kiddos. Does that count?

For the record, three little fishes is his limit. Assuming none of those little fishes is Caleb. And assuming the youngest doesn't topple headfirst off the pile.

Guaranteed pick-me-up

Seriously, what's not to love about this kid?

I think I need to make Caleb a t-shirt with this picture on it and make him wear it around on days when his 4-year-old boyness is driving me batty. Because, for the most part, no one does good moods and goofiness and optimism like Caleb. And, let's face it...during those moments when his best personality traits aren't shining through as clearly as I'd like, I could use a little reminder that deep down, he's a great kid. 

I'll just pull out my picture of Caleb giving me two thumbs up, and I'll remember that things are never as bad as they seem. 

Even when he draws sharks on the carpet in a color Crayola calls Screamin' Green that makes me want to do just that, and even when he was only trying to open the closet door and manages to pull it off its hinges with that superhuman strength of his, and even when he gives Sharky a biweekly bath in the potty and doesn't tell me until over a month has passed and I ask what that smell is...

Even then, he's a great kid. He's enthusiastic, cheerful, kind, stronger than an ox, polite, compassionate, a little whiny at times, but just as sweet as can be.

He's the one who holds on little longer for those hugs good night to make sure he has time to tell me he loves me so much. 

The awesome moments make the less-than-awesome moments a little more bearable. 

And Caleb's two-thumbs-up cheese face is a pretty awesome moment.

I'll likely never accuse him of being our easiest child. But I just can't help but smile at this guy. 

I'm pretty sure I'm his biggest fan.

Rain delays

This July 4th was loads better than last year, for a number of reasons. (Even if it didn't happen until July 7. Silly weather. Don't you know it's not supposed to rain on outdoor holidays?)

The first and greatest reason being that this guy was in my arms for the fireworks instead of in my belly.

July 2012
Jacob (18 months old), Abby (4 years old),
Levi (in utero - T minus 6 days to launch)

Holding a squirming baby who's being kept up way past his bedtime beats being pregnant in July any day.

Second, though he began the festivities like he has every year by cowering in the car and insisting he's going to sleep through the fireworks, Caleb eventually worked his way out onto the blanket with the rest of us and bravely enjoyed the bombs bursting in air (with Sharky tucked under his arm, of course).

And lastly, Levi's reaction made all the drama of waking four kids up and driving to an empty parking lot in the dark totally worthwhile. He loved and laughed through every minute of it, including the minutes in between the fireworks when his doting big sister kept him entertained by making faces at him and spinning him around a little more enthusiastically than she should.

And thanks to the rain forcing everyone to reschedule their July Fourth events, we may have a few more of these late night outings to look forward to.

Summer school

"Mommy," she asked, "when can I start first grade?"

It's the middle of the summer, Abby. Not anytime soon.

And then I told her to go outside and play. Because that's what we do in the summer. Not school.

"Okay," she answered. "I'm going to take my magazine with me so I can study a little."

I know this insatiable hunger for knowledge is a trait to be admired. But every once in a while, I kind of wish my 5-year-old would chill out.

I guess I'd better get to work on some first grade lesson plans. I don't know how much longer I can hold her off.

Practice dives

Caleb is going to be a scuba diver when he grows up, because that is the best way to study sharks.

He starts most days by donning his official scuba costume, complete with shark hat diving mask, backpack oxygen tank, and Mater and hand puppet shark swimfins. In this way, he is fully prepared in case he encounters any sharks that need studying between breakfast and lunch.

Hopefully we can get him some better equipment before he gets in the water with any real great whites.

Riding in style

Best way to keep cool?

Steal Daddy's hat.

Best seat in the house?

Daddy's shoulders, of course.

This kid has it all figured out.

If you want something done...

A month and a half into summer vacation, Abby had finally had enough.

"Mommy," she argued vehemently, "you need to change the calendar. It's not May anymore. It hasn't been May for a long time!"

True. But I'm on summer break too, and changing the calendar was kind of a school activity. Ever since we finished up kindergarten in May, I really haven't cared what day it is. Or what month it is, for that matter.

If you want the calendar updated, I told her, you'll have to do it yourself. I'm not touching that bulletin board until school starts again.

I left her to ponder that conundrum and went off to do more important things, like make ice cream or blow up the kiddie pool.

When I returned, I found my determined little firstborn meticulously removing all the numbers from the calendar and moving them to their appropriate locations.

Problem solved, I thought. Now we can get back to doing summer.

Catch of the day

Ever since she caught that first fish on her third birthday, she's been kind of unstoppable when it comes to reeling in the big catch. Those weekly fishing lessons with Daddy are really starting to pay off.

I guess you could say she's hooked.

First fish
August 2010
Abby, age 3

Gentleman in training

He removed his hat when he needed to spit, "because that's what cowboys do."

We're raising 'em right around here.