March 7, 2014

11 months & 5 days old!

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• Another weekday means another day at Dennie school.  Since it was Friday, I made muffins-I used 2 of those mixes that come in pouches, one chocolate chip and one blueberry.  But am sadly realizing that 12 muffins isn't enough to feed my crew.  They almost came to blows over the last half of Keaton's muffin. Unfortunately, I am also realizing that our grocery budget is going to continue to climb-today was Robby's second day this week to "run in" to the grocery store for me and come home with a trunk full of groceries.
• Today was a lighter day at school-most everyone worked on their math facts on the computer, Anderson looked up a word in the dictionary (but I forgot to show him the definition of dictionary or explain how/why to use it so I missed that teaching opportunity), Reagan never got around to work on her oral report and Graham loved having a day with no phonics in his boxes.
• School was over around 10 this morning and as the kids left the school room, I headed in.  Yesterday, I pulled out Reagan and Anderson's school work for the next month.  So today I pulled out Graham's work-it seems like it takes forever (probably 30-45 minutes) but it makes me school day run so much smoother so it is worth it.
• Reagan did stay in the school room with me and worked on making her bracelets.  Since yesterday, she has figured out how to complete more advanced bracelets.  She was the one who would get them ready and then I would have to do the hard part but now she can do it.  Reagan has learned how to operate my computer so she can watch the bracelet how to videos on youtube.  That girl is so proud of all of her bracelets, necklaces and even rings.
• Campbell is spending the night with Nonna and Pops and she spent the rest of the morning working on packing.  I made sure that she stuffed the required amount of clothing into her backpack but then let her add whatever else she would like.  I have no idea what she shoved into her bag-last I heard was her kindle and a soccer ball.
• We did some reading during lunch and then started on our chores.  The boys flew through their chores and had one last item on their list "Mom's choice."  I didn't really have anything so Graham suggested cleaning the bar stools.  Well, that sounded like a good idea and passed out scrub brushes and set them and Campbell loose.  They worked on the cabinets, bar, barstools, table and chairs scrubbing them all-I am not sure how clean things got though.  I guess that the floor did get cleaned some with all of that soapy water falling and then those little socked feet scrubbing it around.
• Nonna and Pops came to pick up Campbell and she was pretty happy to leave but she really wanted for us all to wave at her as she left.  When they left, the little folks went to bed and the big folks had a snack and watched a movie.  
• When Robby made it home, we had our Friday Mexican supper and then it was game time.  We played Race to the Treasure and Mastermind.  Robby was just pulling out all of the stops because next he suggested ice cream sundaes.  I thought the evening was coming to a close but he then turned on our Let's Make a Deal.  The kids were beyond excited with this Friday night.  
• Oh on one of mine and Keaton's many trips to the bathroom tonight, while the others were playing the games, we came out and saw 2 deer right near our house-like 10 feet from it.  Then we counted 6 more out in the yard.  Keaton was so excited to see the deer so we called the others to come and watch too.  So neat to see around right near the house.  

March 6, 2014

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Soccer season is upon us!

• Thursday morning and that meant blessed pop tart morning.  Though it was nearly 8 when we all started on breakfast and I had to go upstairs to wake Reagan up-that child doesn't know how good she has it!  
• The kids worked on school and the big accomplishment this morning was Graham finishing up his reading book.  I love that book yet I hate it too.  I love it because it has taught 3 Dennie kids how to read yet I don't like it because we work in it every single day-Reagan then Anderson then Graham and tomorrow will be Campbell's turn.
• I would have started her turn on it today but I had to go to her conference for Ms. Hannah's class.  Campbell understood where I was going and must have been very concerned about what I was going to find out there because as I drove away, she was hanging out of the front door of the house saying "I've been good, I've been good."
• And indeed she has been good at school.  Ms. Hannah was very complimentary of Campbell.  She had mostly Cs on her report card (that's good) and only 3 Es (emerging).  After Ms. Hannah finished, I asked the question that I was most concerned about: Does she obey?  And the answer was that she certainly does.  I took a sigh of relief then and Campbell was very happy to know that she got a good report too!
• The kids were playing on their kindles when I came home and soon it was lunch time.  We had our lunch and worked around the house for a few minutes.  The afternoon was spent as usual-except I made smoothies for snack time.  I have almost perfected my recipe: strawberries, blueberries, diet sprite and yogurt today.  The kids were pleased with them but after eating just one bite, I had a horrible brain freeze.  On chilly days like today, I sure wish that I enjoyed coffee.
• Right before 4, I started waking up Keaton and Whitman so they could load up with me for a few minutes at Nonna's house while the big ones rode on with Robby to soccer.  I dropped them off and then met Robby and the kids.
• My house has been so excited about soccer-all 4 of my big kids are thrilled and can not wait.  They have been playing soccer inside and outside of the house for days.  Try outs were quick and painless and my Campbell was the happiest to be out on the field.  She has been waiting for years to play a sport and tonight was the best night in the world to that little girl.  I can not imagine how thrilled she will be when she gets her uniform.
• We went into Nonna's house on the way home so we could wait around and see Pops for a bit.  The kids played a round or 15 of limbo.  Then we loaded up and headed home for showers and supper.  We were all showered and eating supper when Robby made it from soccer evals.  
• After supper, I tried to help the kids play a game of charades-it was definitely something to watch.  I do believe that their charade skills will need a bit of practice!  Then it was bedtime for the crew-they have been in bed for at least 30 minutes now and Reagan and Keaton are the only ones awake.  Keaton just called me upstairs to tell me that Reagan was waking her up.  

March 5, 2014

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A little support for brother doing his math...

• Graham seems to get louder and louder every single morning.  He came hopping downstairs and the first thing he said was "I saw you last night."  My first thought was "oh, no" since I had a bit tooth fairy work that I did in their room last night.  But then I realized that boy didn't have a clue about what he was talking about.  So I took a sigh of relief and rolled back over and tried to close my eyes for just a few more minutes.
• Reagan sure didn't buy Graham's story about seeing me last night.  She quickly explained that the tooth fairy was invisible.  And laid beside me happily holding her dollar bill.  We started this tooth fairy thing before we figured out how much this would cost us!
• Since Bible study was cancelled, we did a bit of school.  I only had everyone do 6 boxes so it was easy for some (Reagan and Anderson) and not so for others (Graham).  Poor Graham's math has gotten a bit harder for him so he has to work to answer the problems.  He is now adding 9 + some other number.  And then even when he gets a problem correct, half of the time I make him erase it and write the number legibly.  
• No worries though because he was finished right after the others and ran upstairs to play.  I soon had everyone to come down for science and then passed out their chore list.  The kids all worked together so well today doing their chores.  Today I did pass out a pretty hefty list of chores-cleaning potties, folding laundry and emptying trash.  I worked along side of them and soon the house was straight (enough) and everyone was able to enjoy some free time.
• During their free time, I made some banana bread with Campbell and Keaton.  Our plan was to give one of our loaves of bread to Beebee.  My first problem was that the tops of my bread took forever to cook while the sides were getting brown.  Finally, it cooked and was quiet delicious.  Then after wrapping it up and hauling it all over town, I walked out of Beebee's place and forgot all about handing her the banana bread.
• I gave the kids lunch-cheese and crackers, strawberries, banana bread, apples and some other little thing.  I tried not to give them too much because I knew that we were quickly heading to Beebee's place and they would be gorging themselves with candy from Beebee.
• The kids were good at Beebee's place and didn't cause too much of a scene.  I tried to work on Beebee's address book and Reagan was busy corralling Whitman.  He had happily sat in Beebee's lap for a while but then he was ready to get down and go.  So she tried to make sure he didn't lick the nursing home floors!  
• Back at home this afternoon, the kids rested and the afternoon flew bye.  Campbell, my shadow, did go upstairs with me when I was on the treadmill.  She talked the entire time but since the treadmill and tv were so loud, I could hardly hear her.  Then she saw a short exercise segment on Dr. Oz so she begged for us to do it together when we were finished.  Reagan came up in time to giggle at us as we finished.  
• When Robby came home from work, we had our supper and then headed to church.  Everyone went in their classes fine but 2 came out with wet paintings!  Really?  We did manage to get everyone back to the car with little paint on ourselves.
• At home the kids had a quick little snack before bed and then as I walked out of their room tonight, Campbell said "I have a lot of energy."  Oh, my!

March 4, 2014

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Homemade Pizza Night!

• Another snow day for most everyone but for us, it was just another school morning with Robby working from home for a bit.  He actually entertained Campbell and Keaton upstairs while the rest of us worked on school.  I am sure that he enjoyed running on the treadmill while watching Caillou.  Those girls were also worked for a long time on playing Connect 4.  As Robby was running, he watched them try to play for a long time-each one putting in the chip and then watching it fall out.  He got off to try to fix the game but had to send them down to me.  I didn't know what they wanted when they came to me so I didn't fix that part but another part.  I sent them back upstairs and again they continued to play with the chips falling out.  Robby sent them down again and I was able to understand what they needed and sent them up to play correctly.  They worked hard to play that game but probably only played for 4 minutes. 
• School went much better this morning.  I had decided that I wasn't going to try to work individually with the kids until Whitman was asleep or when he was contained (high chair, exersaucer)  That did seem to help a bit.  Poor Reagan is used to me running here and there while trying to work together.  Today when she brought spelling for us to work on, she brought other work to do as well.  She said "I know you will have to get up while we are working."  When we were almost finished, she said "I guess you didn't have to get up today."  It really helped a lot that my 2 little girls were upstairs.   
• Robby finally decided to drive to work.  He had determined that he was going to leave this house one way or the other today and work was as good of an excuse as any.  He was going to run to the store as well sometime during the day.  Robby said that it was slicker than he thought it would be on his way to work but thankfully, the roads had thawed some on his way home.  
• Pops and Nonna didn't want to be stuck at home for one more day.  So they brought lunch for everyone and the kids.  We all had our lunch and then the kids wrestled with Pops.  Anderson and Pops played a game of Battleship.  Nonna played with Whitman and Keaton was happy to show off her potty skills (3 accidents today but that is still okay-I wash clothes every day anyway-just trying to remind myself of this)
• Reagan and I tried to make another "advanced" loom bracelet today.  It was almost perfect and I think that I could have figured it out if I could have sat down and worked on his tonight in a quiet room but alas there are no quiet rooms in the middle of the day at our house.  So we went ahead and tried to make an "intermediate" bracelet.  We made it and as soon as we took it off of the loom, it started to come apart.  We were able to salvage it and she is pleased and I am crossing my fingers that we do not have to make another hard bracelet for a long, long time.  
• When Nonna and Pops left, it was nap and movie time for the kids.  I worked on the garage sale stuff and then on the treadmill.  I enjoyed working in the cold attic much more that my treadmill time.  When the kids were all awake they played upstairs some-nothing like a game of dodge ball in your house!  Nice to have enough kids that they can pick teams and then play a game like that upstairs-some times they probably wouldn't even miss me if I just ran to Target for a few minutes (kidding, kind of!)
• Robby made it home and we started on supper- homemade pizzas.  Years ago we had made pizza dough and it was just too doughy and not good at all.  We thought we would try it again and tonight the pizzas were perfect.  But even better was how much fun the kids had making their own pizzas.  They worked so hard on make them just the perfect shapes.  And you wouldn't believe how long Reagan worked on sprinkling her cheese just perfectly.  Everyone but Campbell used sausage on theirs.  Campbell asked me "will this taste good with out that (sausage)?"  I said that it would just taste like cheese pizza.  
• The kids loved, loved eating their pizzas.  We decided that pizza making needs to be one of our stand by meals.  The pizza making took a bit longer so we were running late when we all finally sat down for our nightly show.  Everyone must have been tired tonight from our big day because we didn't hear a peep out of anyone when they went to bed.  

March 3, 2014

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HOLD ON!

• I know I have been talking about the deer a lot lately but last night I was walking out of our bathroom into our bedroom and a deer was probably 10 feet from the house.  He saw me, I saw him and we both jumped.  Actually, I startled the deer so much that when he jumped high turning and fleeing, I jumped myself.  By all of my jumping and squealing, Robby wasn't really sure what or who I was seeing out the window.
• The kids were up way too early this morning but I think the white ground outside was just too exciting for them to stay in their beds.  They played upstairs for a while and then I finally passed our leftover cinnamon rolls and cereal for breakfast.
• We then started school.  It went fairly well except for the constant interrupting.  I do not know how to quickly end being constantly interrupted.  I can hardly help anyone because I am dealing with my main excusable interruption-Whitman.  But the other kids are constantly needing me too.  Most of the problem is the boys.  If they can not figure out a problem, then they can not skip it and go to the next one or even find some other school work to do.  I hope that skill emerges soon with them.
• Robby was working from the bonus room today and came down for lunch.  At one point, Campbell sat on the steps and said "I will just never see Daddy."  I tried to explain that he would soon be finished or at least take a break from his work.  
• After lunch, we did finally do what the kids had wanted to do all day long-go outside.  I wanted to stay in but I just really didn't want to miss them (and pictures of) playing.  I was still debating going outside when I saw the kids walk out and Anderson give Reagan and push on the sled and she dodged the trees and made it to the bottom of the yard (about 100 yards)  Well, I couldn't miss out on that and Keaton would need someone to ride on the sled with her.  We have gotten more use out of that sled that probably ever before this season.
• Reagan and Anderson were pretty good at steering the sled and would even go over a stump.  They tried to get me to go over the stump and as I slid by it, I was sure that wasn't wise for Keaton and me so we skipped the stump and headed for the woods.   
• Graham was the first one to go in and Campbell really wanted to go in next but she couldn't open the house door and had to wait on me.  I was trying to stay out so I could push Reagan and Anderson one more time on the sled.  Keaton wouldn't keep on her gloves and I could see her fingers getting redder and redder so I hurried trying to get her in.  
• When I came in, Graham was getting out of the shower and his little cheeks were still bright red.  We were all pretty chilled but after warm showers, sitting by the heater and then hot chocolate with their snack.  
• Whitman and Keaton had their naps and oh, yes, my Keaton has been wearing her big girl panties all day.  She did have 2 accidents this morning even with me taking her to the bathroom every 30 minutes.  But I still think that is pretty good and she surprised all afternoon and evening in her panties so we are calling the day a success.  
• The afternoon was pretty relaxing and we all worked on the toy room before supper.  Robby must have even glanced at my Monday's to do list which had vacuum on it.  He vacuumed the house which I never do.  I just have it on the list because I feel like I should even though I really do not intend to vacuum.  
• We had supper and then I played catch with the kids and then it was time for our nightly Let's Make a Deal.  The kids continue to tickle me watching this show.  They get so excited but I guess that Robby and I do too.  
• Tonight at prayer time, Reagan asked that we could pray that the ice would stay around a few more days.  I sure wish it would be icy for a few more days too but it will be nice being the only folks at the pool for a week or two while everyone else finishes making up their snow days.

March 2, 2013

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Ice Cream Truck Night!

• I tell you the deer are everywhere around (well, not tonight with the sleet).  Last night we saw a group of 6, our lone deer and then as Robby and I were laying in bed watching tv, I spotted a group of 4 outside.  They are venturing closer and closer to the house.  We did hear today at church that deer are hungry right now since they have been eating on acorns for months and are finishing them up and there is no green grass yet.  I guess we are going to have to buy some deer food.
• I was helping in a preschool class today so we tried our best to get to church early.  The kids had time to watch a movie while they were eating breakfast so it was a wonderful morning for them.  Clothes were laid our so in no time at all everyone was dressed and in the car.
• The kids did well in church with Robby and I survived back in preschool Sunday school.  Then I went to church for a bit and Robby headed to work in Whitman's class.  
• We then had lunch at Nonna's house-lasagna.  And since church tonight had been cancelled, we were in no hurry and the kids had time to play-actually the boys spent most of their time watching some Alaskan show on tv. 
• Then we came home-we unloaded the car and unpacked from the day.  The kids played on their kindles while I put Keaton and Whitman to bed.  Robby ran on the treadmill and I am made soup for tonight (it was a pinterest find but not a keeper-I thought it was too salty)  
• It was a fairly restful afternoon and then we had supper.  After supper, the kids played some and then our Sunday night ice cream truck (really just Robby bringing in the ice cream from the garage freezer)  Whitman was probably the most excited about ice cream tonight because he was given his first ice cream sandwich-being a Dennie kid is a wonderful, wonderful thing.  
• We then watched the Price is Right.  Whitman was up tonight so everyone loves to touch and love on that child.  He can take some of that but eventually, he has enough and lets everyone know about it.  Graham and Campbell could hardly leave him alone-they had quite a bit of extra energy tonight and I am surprised that they are quiet upstairs right now.  
• During our movie, Reagan drew a picture of the whole family.  Whitman was standing up and each of us had a caption over our head saying something.  It was a cute little picture and I will try to get a real picture of it tomorrow.  That sweet girl did spend her afternoon making bracelets for two girls in her Sunday school class.  
• As Robby was tucking Campbell in tonight, she looked up at him with her big, blue eyes and sweetly said "I hope you don't die in your bed tonight."  

March 1, 2014

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Finger Fancy!

• I guess that Graham is the one who wakes everyone up around here.  We all sleep until almost 8 but Graham and Cash were at Grannymom's house waking up right after 6.  I am going to have to up that boys dose of benedryl.  (Kidding about the benedryl but maybe I should start!)
• Robby made the kids a breakfast of cinnamon rolls this morning and then he went off towards the treadmill.  So we ate and then I worked with Anderson on his oral report.  
• The next big event was nail cutting-100 nails were trimmed before 10 and that is pretty good!  Then the girls wanted nail polish so that was the next thing done.  Poor Keaton's polish was all off by this evening.  I don't know what she does to her polish and I had her sitting down on the counter for a long while after painting those nails.  
• I did my few minutes on the treadmill and then it was time to leave.  When we were putting on shoes, Anderson said "seems like we haven't left the house in a long, long time."  It had only been 2 glorious, wonderful days!  I think I am becoming a hermit.  
• We picked up Graham who had had a wonderful time and came bearing lollipops for the kids.  Then we went to Whole Hog to eat lunch.  My Graham had eaten lunch at Grannymom's house but devoured half of a bbq sandwich.  And Reagan ate 1 and a half sandwiches.  Some meals the kids eat a tiny bit and other times they eat a ton.
• Then we went to Sams-Sams on a Saturday afternoon is crazy, crazy.  There were free samples on the end of every aisle so we had to stop at each and everyone.  The kids kept on eating and they tried just about everything they were handed-the fried steak and grapefruit were not hits though.  
• When we finally made it home, the kids did a bit of school work (don't worry, it was only easy stuff) and then the littles slept and the big kids watched a movie.  Robby and I also went sound to sleep while watching the kids movies with them.   
• When we all stirred again, we had supper and then it was time for hair cuts.  Robby cut Graham and then Anderson's hair.  While the girls and Whitman had a shower.  I later cut Robby's hair but before I started, I saw 6 deer outside.  I called Reagan and Graham (the only 2 out of the shower) to come and look.  
• I walked back to the bedroom with them watching the deer from the kitchen.  I looked out the window to see 2 deer standing up in their hindlegs and were trying to paw each other.  Seriously, I would have never believed them if I had not seen them.  I ran to the kitchen to make sure that Graham and Reagan had seen this and they were standing at the window with their mouths wide open.
• Soon everyone were out of their showers and we let them have a tiny snack while watching our evening movies.  The kids love shouting at the tv when watching.  Tonight Campbell asked where Price is Right and Let's Make a Deal were and I told her California.  Then she said "Good, we can drive, drive, drive there."  
• After the show, we had a short prayer time.  Campbell gets so upset if she does not get to pray at each and every meal so the other night Robby told her that they would pray together after supper.  Well since you don't do anything alone around here, everyone joined her.  They wrote out a few prayer request (Anderson's knee, more people going to church, Beebee) and then everyone went in a circle praying for one of those things.  So we did that again tonight which was kind of a nice way to end the evening.