Mr. Contrarian and the Gingerbread Houses

This fall AJ has declared his love for the Green Bay Packers.  In a household with a lifelong Bear's fan, it is the equivalent of declaring war.  The day AJ announced his new-found love for the guys in green, Joe (jokingly) told him to pack his bags and hit the road.  AJ seemed to relish this way to disagree with his dad that was accepted.  Since then he has started wearing a Green Bay Packer's stocking hat to school and has discovered that it creates an instant connection with his gym teacher, older boys at school and other people who he admires, and the love has only grown.  He also views it as a way to establish his independence, proudly telling people that he is the only one in his family who likes the Packers. 

The love for the Packers has taken new forms lately, including a green and gold bracelet he made on the Rainbow Loom (and the Rainbow Loom is deserving of its own post), and (my favorite) the yellow and green-themed gingerbread house that he surprised Joe with last week.  When Joe got back from a trip to Costco, AJ greeted him with "hey dad, welcome to the Packer's house!"  Joe just groans and AJ beams with pride at having his own team.  AJ has recently requested his own Packers giant foam finger, but I am not sure that will be allowed in the house by Joe.

The Snow Queen

We had our first snowfall of the season here a few weeks ago and the kids were itching to go out and play, play, play.  I had cleaning, cooking and work to do, so I put in a quick call to our snow queen, Grandma Julie, and she was game for coming over to take the kids out for sledding, snow tasting (Julia) and snowball making (AJ). I thank my lucky stars that I have a mom who grew up in Minnesota and loves all things snow.

Mr. Fox

David had his holiday performance at preschool, which was a rendition of The Gingerbread Man in which David got to play...the fox!  What a perfect fit for a boy who is mischievous and wily.  He was very excited about the performance and talked about the preparations for two weeks straight.  And anyone who knows David knows that he has only about two volumes, which are normal and LOUD.  So you can imagine my surprise when the teachers said he was extremely shy about saying his lines and whispering his parts in rehearsal only after many prompts.  Whaaaat?!? Is this is the kid who talks constantly at home?

On the big day, many of the kids were clearly a little bit nervous about having a parent audience, but they seemed to enjoy it, too, at the same time.  David managed to come through on his lines nicely, which were:

Come closer, I can't hear you (said to the Gingerbread Boy)...
Come closer, I can't hear you...
Chomp!  Mmmm! Mmmm!

Thankful

Grandma Francie, Papa, Uncle Roger and Uncle Will came in for Thanksgiving and it was fun to have our first houseful of overnight guests in this house.  We had board games, puzzles, football on tv, a little driveway basketball, and of course, lots of cooking and eating.  Julia was very interested in Thanksgiving for the first time and loved helping grandma make pies.  It was also the first year that all of the kids were able to sit in chairs at the big table (no more high chairs!) to eat dinner with the family.  It was a little sad not to have any more babies at the holidays, but then again, it was much more calm and sane.  Next year we will have to convince Auntie Nicki to bring her new baby who should be born this winter!

This is my favorite picture from the weekend of Julia and Grandma Francie making a pumpkin pie.

The One

This was one of those afternoons when we weren't really doing much of anything but it ended up being a pretty great day.  The kids and I were raking leaves in the front yard and they were having a blast jumping into the piles.  I took about 20 pics and none were good except this one, which might be my new favorite picture of the kids.  It's the little moments like this that I want to remember.

Kinnick in Purple

We braved Kinnick Stadium in purple with Willie the Wildcat and lived to tell the tale.

Trick or Treat

Oh, this photo is a classic.  We went trick-or-treating with my Dad and Susan at the Night Eyes event at the zoo.  This picture captures AJ, who reminds me so much of my dad, with a look and mischievousness that I think my dad probably had at the same age (and still has today).  Happy Halloween!

The Birthday Girl

Well, Miss J was very excited to be the birthday girl.  She started talking in mid-September about how her birthday was coming up, and then she tried to milk it throughout the entire month of October by saying, "Mama, it's my birthday coming up, so I should get (insert one of the following: [a cookie, the first piece of pizza, to go first in go fish, etc. etc.]).  I admired her ability to claim the day and even the month for her own.

On the actual birthday, we had a family party.  The boys did some secret shopping with Joe for a present. This was the first year when the boys were excited to buy Julia a present.  She is no longer into "baby things" and wants to be just like her big brothers.  Instead of liking an age-appropriate show like Thomas the Train or Caillou like the boys did at that time, she prefers Scooby Doo, Octonauts and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.  Joe recently took Julia on a solo trip to Chicago without the brothers.  I packed movies that included Sesame Street, Bambi, and Strawberry Shortcake.  When they were pulling out of the driveway, Joe said to her "Okay, Julia, you have the car to yourself.  What would you like to watch?"  She said "ummm...do you have any Ninja Turtles?"  So the boys were thrilled to choose the Octopod toy for her and I don't think she got the wrapping paper off that thing before the boys were trying to open it "for her" and "just show her how it works."  She basks in their attention and relishes just being one of the big kids.  We finally kicked the pacifier around the first of the year this year, and her talking and vocabulary have exploded, which combines to make her seem like she has suddenly stopped being a toddler and entered the realm of preschooler.

Julia still loves all things pink and purple.  Originally it was pink, pink and only pink but somewhere along the line purple crept into the mix as well for a little change up.  She also loves helping in the kitchen, playing with MagnaTiles and sorting/carrying things around, like sorting little plastic pieces of fruit into piles by color and carrying various collections around in one of her many "purses" (a few of which are real purses and the rest of which may be random bags, plastic baggies, shoe boxes, etc.)  She is also starting to show more of an interest in dolls lately and will carry one or two special ones around with her.

 The coveted Octopod

Fascinated by her gift from her cousins...a purse!  *loves it*

Happily blowing out the big girl candles

Cousins!

Nothing makes me happier than a visit from my sissy and our adorable, brilliant, adventurous and fun cousins, Violet and Zoe.  They came for eight days, and we had fun going to the pumpkin farm and taking in the Covered Bridge Festival in our old stomping grounds.  Julia was giddy for weeks leading up to the event, asking regularly if this was the day our cousins would come.  It is fun to see her play with the girls, because their play is so different than how Julia plays with her brothers.  With the boys, Julia is all bravado and posturing, trying to impress them with roars, one-upsmanship, boy humor ("I just farted, brothers!") and eventually some physical wrestling/hitting/alpha dogishness.  She is so driven to fit in and impress her brothers that she even literally insists that she has a penis.  It usually goes something like this:

Julia: (Using her loud and proud announcement voice) "Brothers, look at me! I have a penis right here!" (points in general vicinity of her lower torso)
AJ (a.k.a. Mr. Logical): "No, Julia.  You are a girl and girls do not have a penis."
David (a.k.a Mr. Dramatic): "Julia, No!  You do not have one BECAUSE. YOU. ARE. NOT. A. BOY!"
Julia (sobbing): "Mama, AJ and Davey said I don't have a penis!"
Me: "Sorry, Charlie, but you do not have one."
Julia: "My name is NOT CHARLIE and I DO have one wight (right) here!" (gestures vehemently to lower torso)

With her girl cousins, it is a different scene.  They pretend, hold hands for no reason, giggle, and coordinate play.  There is talk about ponytails, hairbands, painting fingernails and shoes.  There was also a lot of "Do you want to do this?" or "Would you like to do that with me?"  (Or perhaps this is just that my sister's girls are very well-trained and polite...)  Don't get me wrong--the girls also play in the mud, ride horses and climb the furniture, but there was a noticeable increase in the coordinated social play with the girl cousins around.

The boys seem to do less coordination and more pushing their way into play if they like what their brother is doing.  It was so much fun to see the girls together and notice the differences.  Before I had kids, I thought gender differences were almost exclusively due to nurture, not nature, but now that I have my own children of both genders, I think it is more of a balance between the two (and varies based on the kid, of course).

Here's to years of cousin visits with more apple cake, games, pumpkin patch visits and pony rides.

Coffee, Earrings and Mustaches

With Julia's third birthday coming up, we have been talking about getting older and growing up.  Most of the time Julia is excited about growing up and proudly talks about being a big girl now.  Every once in a while, she will cling to her status as the youngest and talk about how she is still our baby.  One night she asked me if she could get earrings like mama, and I told her when she is older, she can get her ears pierced. She asked if she could please, please pretty please have pink earrings and I said that would be fine by me.  Another morning AJ and Julia were watching Joe shave when AJ started talking about how he would have a mustache one day (he is convinced it will be in second grade.)  And Davey has been interested in coffee lately, asking me if he can help make the coffee and how old he needs to be to drink it.

So one night at dinner, Julia put all of these things together in her fascinating, soon-to-be-three-year-old mind and said "Mama, one day when we're all growed up, I will have pink earrings and the boys will have mustaches and we will all sit around and drink coffee with you, Mama!"  It was like a momentary glimpse into a time warp.  Usually it is hard for me to picture the kids all grown up, but with these little details to focus on, suddenly I could picture them all as college students home for winter break as we sit around with coffee.  

Mr. AppleHero

One of the greatest things about our new house is that we have our very own apple tree in the backyard.  We watched it anxiously all summer as the fruit grew, waiting to see if we would truly get full-sized, edible apples in the fall.  The kids patiently shook off the annoying beetles that plagued the tree this year, saying "Shoo! shoo!  Get away from our apples!"  When picking time arrived, they were delighted to roll out the back door and finally get to pick the apples after being told all summer to wait until they got bigger.

But the most memorable part about our first season of apples by far was AJ's discovery of his own abilities to climb the tree and be a helper.  He has a general fear of heights that has frustrated him on the tall slides at the park and on the tall inflatables at the bouncy house places.  But this tree and its low, climbable branches have held his attention all summer.  At first, he would only stand on the lowest branches if Joe or I lifted him up.  But on apple picking day, he was so excited to help that he climbed more than halfway up the tree to help us reach more fruit.  That night he said to us proudly "What would you have done without me today?  I really was a big help in picking those apples!!"  It was awesome to hear him so happy and pleased with his accomplishment.

And then came the apple cake, the applesauce, even the apple pie. Grandma Julie really spoiled us.

Merry-Go-Round

I have developed a new appreciation for the merry-go-round.  Something so simply really stands the test of time.  It has a magical quality to it with the painted animals and the music.  Add me to the list of fans.

Kindergarten!

We have an official kindergartener!  I am so excited for AJ to get the chance to go to school that I haven't had mixed emotions about it, just pure happiness and anticipation for him.  Maybe it helps lessen the sadness or anxiety of feeling like it is the end of his young childhood years to have another in preschool yet and a third still in daycare--there is no time yet for sadness.  I took AJ to school on the first day, and while he tried to humor me a bit for my first day of school photos, I think he was anxious to get started and quickly lost interest in smiling for the camera.  He has really loved taking pictures recently and quickly wheedled for a chance to take his own first day of school picture.  Very fitting for a new elementary schooler to want to be the one to explore something new, and it turned out to be my favorite of the bunch.

Gold Friends

We had a lovely visit from our dear friends Kaitlyn and Mary Kay in August.  Kaitlyn brought her sweet pea twin girls who are three and a half, and both Julia and Davey have not stopped talking about the girls since they left.

It's true what the girl scouts say:

Make new friends
but keep the old.
One is silver
and the other gold.

I adore the kind of old friends who you can just pick up with right where you left off.  We had so much fun catching up, working on decorating ideas and dreaming about a possible mother-daughter trip in the coming years.  My mom even played the guitar for Kaitlyn's girls one night while the girls were in the bath.  I hear the girls thought that was quite fun and now have two mini guitars they are practicing on at home.

Credit goes to AJ who took the last two photos in this post and seems to love being the guy behind the camera. Julia found my blush and attempted to be her own makeup artist prior to the group shot above.  Looks like we might need another six year-old to take over that job.

Then and Now

We made another trip to the apple orchard, which is easily becoming one of my favorite fall activities.    The orchard has a fun little board at the entry that sets up an annual photo complete with growth chart.  AJ is being a goofball in the picture with his head to the side, but he is now over the 4 foot mark.  Davey is definitely taller this year as well and talks at least twice as much as he did last year, which is no easy feat.  But I think the award for the biggest change goes to Julia...no more pacifier, no more baby girl. She is definitely a big girl now.  We also started potty training in earnest this weekend.  With her 3rd birthday coming next month, I feel like it is time to get serious about saying good-bye to the diapers.  Maybe by the time they are 18, 17 and 15 I will be able to get one of all three of them looking at the camera together.

Missing Something?

Pssst...notice anything different about this kid? Three weeks ago:

Today:

After weeks of hanging on by a thread, the tooth finally came out last night in his sleep.  I have been thinking quite a bit today about when the same tooth first came in, as I documented here six years ago and seen in photographic evidence here.  It's true what they say...the days are long but the years go fast.  And also, based on the location of the adult tooth that is starting to push through, I'm thinking a savings account for braces may be in order.

On the Loose...

Guess who has his first loose tooth??  The tooth fairy had better get her act together, pronto, before this thing falls out.

Sixth Sense

We had AJ's 6th birthday party at the Science Center this year.  Three cheers for birthday venues where the parents just have to mail out birthday invites and show up!  The Science Center even handles the cleanup and provides the goody bags.

All of my kids are in a Scooby-Doo phase, and AJ is the leader of the pack in generating the enthusiasm.  He loves the mysteries, and I like that the old cartoons are less violent than Transformers, last year's obsession.  I also don't mind saying things like "Jinkies!" and "Zoinks!" when we read them as bedtime books.  And I just could not help myself when AJ chose the Scooby theme for his party...I ordered a Mystery Machine cake.  I am not sure who liked it more, me or AJ.

A big thank you to Carefree Patisserie in Valley Junction for such a great job on the cake!  Everything was edible, down to the tires.

The party started off with a ridiculously sweet movie about orphaned baby elephants and orangutans that were rescued and nursed back to health on two separate sanctuaries.  The five and six year old crowd was heard whispering (or sometimes shouting) in the theater "Awwww! That's so cute!"  We also had a little 15 minute science lesson that ended with the birthday boy getting to shoot off some water bottle rockets that went so high they landed on the building's roof.  This shot sums up the kids' reactions:

And here is AJ's pride in getting to be the guy to do the launching:

All in all, it was a great, easy birthday party, and I would recommend it.  Which is good, because David has already requested it for his 5th birthday. 

And little sis, contemplating the awesomeness of water bottle rocket physics.  And perhaps starting to think about a career in science one day?  

AJ building a dam in the water exhibit.  When did he lose his baby cheeks?

Happy birthday, AJ.

Birthday #4...and #5?

Well, I told myself I would really be in trouble if I tried to do AJ's 6th birthday post having not yet done David's from December.  Both birthdays have one thing in common this year...I could not get my act together on either to get the parties planned and invites out in time to have the friend celebrations on or near their actual birthdays, so Davey's was a month late in January and AJ's was a month late in July.  I kept trying to explain to them the brilliance of getting to milk the birthday celebration longer by spreading things out, but they found it pretty hard to understand why their parties were not on their birthdays and even harder to wait for the party to arrive.

Davey wanted to have his 4th birthday be exactly like AJ's 5th birthday...same venue, same pinata, same decorations, etc.  The main difference was that Davey was very excited to have a robot-themed birthday, and specifically a "WALL-E Party!" in honor of his favorite Disney movie.  I thought it would be a piece of cake (wink, wink) to find cups, plates, etc. in a Disney movie theme, but apparently this one is old enough now that they do not stock it anywhere.  The only things I could find were balloons and cake toppers, and I had to order them from somewhere in the UK.  Good thing I had that extra month to wait for those guys to arrive in the overseas mail.  I guess they still like WALL-E over in Britain.

My favorite part of the party was the craft where the kids made little robots out of paper lunch bags.  I think Davey's favorite part was probably the pinata.  That kid loves to have permission to whack at something with a bat while indoors.  After looking back at the party pictures, I would have to amend that statement to say his favorite part of the party was the Tavern pizza.  He ate no fewer than five slices and stayed at the table eating long after his friends had all run back to the swingsets to play.  Davey's love for pizza has only grown through the year, and he is a huge fan of thin-crust sausage pizza in particular.  I think he would choose sausage pizza over dessert any day.  I guess that's the Italian blood kicking in.

Davey was very sweet to his party guests and excited that they came to celebrate.  He also became a little shy and self-conscious when it was time to sing to him.  If he knew the phrase "aw, shucks, guys!" I am pretty sure it is what he would have said based on the look on his face.

The last thing I want to remember about Davey at this age is that he is so excited to be four, mainly because it brings him another birthday closer to AJ.  He did his thing again where he was insisting to AJ around the time of his birthday that he was going to catch up to AJ in age, and it predictably made AJ, Mr. Logical, blow a gasket again.  This time it was the two birthday parties (one with family, and then the friend party a month later) that Davey used to make his case.  "AJ, guess what!?!  I am going to turn 4 in December and then I will have another birthday in January and I will turn 5 like you!!  And we will be five together!"  I thought AJ's head would explode.