Ice skating

We went ice skating on Saturday.  It was the first time for both of the boys.  We wanted to go last year, but Robert wasn't ready and we never found a good time to go alone with him. That is one of the disadvantages of the 5 year gap.  So Saturday was a lovely day, temps in the low 30s and we left early enough that the rink wasn't busy at all.  Harry started out with a cone, but quickly decided that he would rather make his way around the rink holding onto the side of the rink.  He did a good job and by the end, could go away from the side for a little while too.  I think he would enjoy skating lessons, I'll have to remember that.  Ice hockey is a popular sport up here, but I hesitate to put Harry into the sport.  He's such a sweet boy and he's rather small. I am afraid he would just get crushed.  (I don't know if I could take the tension either).

Our little dare devil enjoyed skating too.  He also ditched the cone early on.  He realized the cone was meant to help him stay upright and so he decided to get rid of it.  When asked to tell his sitter what he did earlier in the day he responded, "I falled all over the ice".  He did so on purpose.  He would take some steps and then say "Whoa, whoa, whoa" and plop down on the ice.  He didn't always fall on purpose, but he certainly didn't mind falling.  That said he thoroughly enjoyed himself as well.  I think we spent 1 1/2 hours - 2 hours on the ice with one break for a snack.

Here is proof that I was there and on the ice too.  Harry and I kept close together.  Robert spent so much time down on the ice and had trouble getting himself up on his own.  Kevin was better able to haul him back up, although I did it some too.  To toot my own horn, I am the only one in the family who did not fall while skating on this particular day. 

Here are the boys getting back into boots.  Winter seems to be an unending process of bundling and unbundling.  We pretty much have the process down.  Add in snow pants and it is a little more complex.  the boys wore snowpants for ice skating, more for padding than warmth.  It seemed to work well.  Robert's were drenched by the end of the session.  I just bought Harry another pair of gloves today.  One pair is sort of shredding and he lost one mitten.  We have baskets of hats, mittens and scarves.  I am the only one who wears scarves, so that basket stays pretty neat, but I am constantly rearranging the other ones.  Every year since we've been here, I have added some form of organization to the front hallway and I think I finally have it down, but do remember fondly the mud room of my childhood home.  

Snow days

The snowbank in our front yard is now taller than Robert.  We have had an inch away from record snow for January.

Harry is in his snow fort.  He worked hard on it, and then when the street was finally plowed it got destroyed by all the snow that the plow pushed aside!  Oh well, we'll find a better place for a snow fort next time.

Both boys peeking out of the top of the snow fort!  I discovered interesting things about both boys yesterday. Harry was busy thinking up inventions to put down in his new graph paper notebook (the highlight of his day yesterday) and when I asked him to tell me about them, I realized that he has absorbed and analytically thought about all the science he reads and watches.  He had some really great ideas.   What I learned about Robert is that he can whistle!  We were trudging down the street after sledding on the golf course and he just started whistling.  When I told Kevin later, he asked Robert and Robert promptly whistled again, so it wasn't a fluke!

We've been inside a lot recently.  So one day while tidying upstairs with Robert we pulled out R2D2 and brought it downstairs.  We juiced up his batteries and we have been enjoying playing with him again.  There are all kinds of programs you can ask R2 to do and the boys particularly like the dance program (he plays the cantina song) so here they are bopping out with R2.  As a side note, Star Wars music is one of the most often listened to selections when we are in the car.

One of the fun things about R2 is that he has a mind of his own.  Sometimes he just ignores you and does his own thing, or makes rude noises at you instead of responding to commands.  The instructions say to tell him "Behave R2" and tap him on the head.  Then he makes sort of a sad sound and sometimes behaves.  That's what's going on here.  R2 was a Christmas gift when Harry was 3 and although it was a bit old for him then it has proven to be fun for the past 4 years.

Sledding

We went sledding on Friday afternoon.  School was closed for a snow day and it all had cleared up and was lovely and sunny by noon.  Everybody got into the action.  The 2 toddlers were having fun and didn't seem to mind the wind whipping snow into their faces.  

Normal life

Here are the boys and their favorite sitter reading together.  It is a lovely thing to come home from a Saturday afternoon matinée to a tidy house, boys having already eaten dinner and sitting happily together reading on the couch.  We love our babysitter!

After much deliberation we decided that it is time to put Robert in a toddler program a couple of times a week.  Harry at his age had been in some form of childcare for 2 - 3 days a week since 3 months old.  Our circumstances are different and so Robert has mainly been with me.  I try to make sure he gets out to activities like story times at the library and has playdates and he is a social child.  However, now I think he could use even more time playing and now that he doesn't nap, I could use an hour or 2 to get things done around the house, without worrying that he is wrecking the DVD player (happened) or having to have him tag along and try to help with the cleaning and really make it impossible to clean.

So the picture above is Robert with what he thinks he will need to have to go to "school".  He's got on his dress shoes, backpack (full of toys he selected), Harry's mittens, and a winter hat.  He was rather disappointed because he wanted to head out of the house instantly and get on the school bus.  I have tried to explain that unlike Harry he won't take the bus to school, but hopefully he'll be happy once he gets there :-)  I'm still a bit uncertain about letting him go, but it has to happen at some point and we both seem to be ready overall.

This is Robert with my friend Susan and her daughter Willa.  They are reading a book on the cold floor of the kitchen (not that it isn't cold everywhere right now), because Harry was trying to watch Batman in the living room (the old version that I watched as a child - it is hysterical).  The little ones were running around roaring and then standing right up in front of the television.  I don't know if they were purposefully torturing Harry, but they were doing a good job.  I am also in the room, but I was putting together the last preparations on dinner.

two very different boys and yet very similar

This is Robert with his Star Wars characters.  At 2 3/4 Harry had never heard of Star Wars and Robert knows all the character names and has a couple sticker books about them.  He has never seen Star Wars and will not be allowed to for quite some time yet.  Really, he just likes to stand them up and arrange them.  These days he also plays with them and makes them talk to each other.  He does that with all his toys now.  It is very interesting to watch.

Robert is sort of my little engineer.  He arranges things and puts things in neat rows.  He enjoys drawing pictures and figuring out new toys.  Puzzles are still a very fun toy for him.  At the same time, he is very much a busy boy and is as active as Harry, in his own way.  He doesn't seem to need to move as much as Harry does (and did at R's age), but he needs the chance to run and play and get going.  That makes winter a challenge sometimes, but that's another story for a bit later.

Harry is currently interesting in detectives and mysteries.  Here he is in his Sherlock Holmes' hat.  We found it online and it came with a pipe which he is likely to be walking about with as well.  We took this picture for his detective ID.  He got a little kit with plastic handcuffs and a detective badge and ID.  We put a picture with the ID and he filled it out.  He currently thinks he'd like to be a police detective when he grows up.  There was a long time when he just wanted to be an astronaut and that changed to scientist in the last couple of years.  Now he is learning about all kinds of other professions and different things appeal to him at different times.  I remember as a teen, being envious of my sister, because she knew she wanted to do when she grew up and I didn't have any idea.  It still don't have a great idea of what I'll do next.  I just need to trust that something will occur to me or happen so I figure it all out.

We've been somewhat homebound recently.  Winter has left us with snow on the ground and very cold temperatures.  Today has actually been something of a sleety/rainy mess and we've been indoors most of the day.  Still at least the rain will melt the snow somewhat.  Over the weekend we found that we just had to get out.  So when it was finally in the upper thirties we took a long walk into town (maybe 2 miles roundtrip).  That was a nice change of pace and we stopped for a snack, so that made the walking more bearable (although there was some drama on the way home).  Yesterday was a day off from school and so of course the temps dipped back into the teens and twenties.  We decided to try bowling as a family and that went remarkably well.  Turns out everybody, even Robert, can bowl.  Also turns out the boys are all much better than I am at bowling.  Kevin still wonders how I broke 150 and beat him the first time I went bowling with him.  Must have been divine intervention.  I didn't even hit 50 yesterday.  Anyway, it was a fun outing and makes me look forward to the day when we can play all kinds of games together as a family.  It will be here sooner than I expect, I think.

Snow Day!

Our power went out at around 7:15 this morning and stayed out for a little over an hour, so the planned waffle breakfast became a waffle lunch.  As you can see the boys were still in pjs anyway.

I think we got about a foot of snow (it's still snowing).  There is a crust in the middle though when it sleeted and rained in the early morning which makes for a slightly more challenging clean up - not great for snowmen either.

The boys joined some kids in making a fort and snowballs.

It is wet snow, so we all came in wet and cool.

The obligatory parent shots to prove we were there, playing in the snow too.

We bundle well - we don't smile for the camera very well :-)

The fir tree at the end of the street on the golf course.

Snow fort the kids made

Pictures from the past

When I was home at Thanksgiving I gathered together some old pictures to make Christmas gifts for Jess and Dad.  Here are some I scanned into the computer in preparation for the gifts.

My maternal grandparents, who I never met - Jessie and Herbert Lee.

my maternal grandmother, Jessie Lee

My mom, Margie Lee (McLaughlin) at around 3 years old

My mother at around 6 years old - she used to say she was a tom boy - you can kind of see it here.

Mom as a teenager - Harry must get his thick hair from her :-)

Around 2?  Love the hat!

Elementary School - must of been at the dreaded parochial school.

Mom as a baby - Robert looked alot like her - apparently chubby cheeks come from both sides.

This is what Mom looked like around the time she met my dad (21 or so) - no wonder he came back from Wisconsin to find her again!

Finally, My grandmother holding my mother as a baby - don't you love how they bundled them back then!?

What happened to Christmas vacation?

Christmas this year was wonderful!  Harry is just the perfect age for all the preparations and for that excitement and magic that comes with waiting for Santa to arrive.  He helped with putting up the tree, he decorated cookies to the last cookie and he (sometimes grudgingly at first) read Christmas stories with me and he even understands that Christmas is Jesus' birthday not just when Santa comes.  He of course was despite that very excited for the arrival of a certain elf in red.  He even participated willingly in the pageant and was a very fine shepherd #3.  

On Christmas Eve, Harry came down about 8:15 and asked if it was time to turn out lights yet (usually we have to remind him and if we don't find him still awake reading much later than he should be).  We told him he had 15 minutes but he could turn them out if he wanted.  He just wanted to get to sleep so Santa could come!  He also was very upset that we set a wake up time, 7:00 and yet, when 7:00 rolled around the next morning, Mom and Dad were ready and Harry was still upstairs!  He is such a good boy - he was following to the letter and his clock still read 6:59.  Harry powered through his gifts and Robert was a bit overwhelmed.  We tried to slow him down a bit, but to no avail and really he didn't care that he was done far before the rest of us.  Robert actually opened his last gift in the evening, he was rather overwhelmed by it all.

It was a very fun Christmas Day and so nice to have Grampy and Auntie Jessie there too!

Christmas vacation is one I seldom am prepared for and which always goes by quicker than I expect.  This year it was a week and a day.  Today is the last day of vacation.  It is a church day, but an unusual one for me - I am not teaching, reading or preaching.  Since there isn't any Sunday School, Harry will be in the pew with me and hopefully Robert will be in the nursery.  He is currently in a difficult time for sitting in church, he usually wants to go visit with Kevin on the altar and he patiently waits until I am not paying attention to make a break for it.  On Christmas Eve, he got all the way up to the altar during announcements (I turned away for about 10 seconds) and when I came up to the front side of the church, he looked at me, said, "No Mommy, I want to be with Daddy" and then turned and was headed for the creche to play with the porcelain Jesus figure.  That's when I had to walk up on the altar and retrieve him and bring him back to the seat.  Then later at the altar Kevin did a double take when he looked at our 2 year old and the reason was, he had purple crayon all over his face!  He looked like he'd gone a round with Harry, but we soon remedied the situation with a visit to the bathroom.  That was funny - so much for my powers of observation - I watched him playing with the crayons near his face, but didn't notice his face getting covered in crayon.

Here is our Christmas tree.  It will stay up until Epiphany.  We've had it up since mid December.  We have gone and cut down a tree at a local farm for about 3 years now.  It is fun and this year it was lovely and warm on the day we cut down the tree, which meant that we could walk around in a leisurely way and choose a tree.  This year our tree looks a little different - fewer ornaments (go figure huh?), no garland, new lights and new star thanks to the Christmas tree shops.  Oh and we borrowed the tree skirt from Dad.  When we had the 12+ inches of water in the basement we lost all kinds of stuff and chief among it was Christmas stuff.  When I opened a box this December, it reeked of mold, so there went a few more things (a creche, some linens, some ornaments).  It is just things, but a bit sobering.

This is how I welcomed in the new year.  I think I finally succumbed to a stomach bug on New Year's Eve.  I don't know really if it was that or a migraine, but I was pretty much on the couch or in bed that day.  I was asleep by 8:30 long before Harry.  It was a 24 hour kind of thing at least and yesterday we all got out on another unseasonably warm day and took our first walk of the new year - the boys rode their scooters and we walked down to the water and wished it a Happy New Year.