Additional uses for the cup!

A couple of weeks ago, I went downstairs to get laundry, and Kyle informed me he was training to be a ninja. In particular he was training to use the Bow-staff, and it was very difficult as he was failing at the spinning throw. I gave an appropriate, “That’s great, etc., keep on practicing, etc.” response and went upstairs to put the laundry away.

Kyle then comes in a few minutes later and asks if he could please use the new baseball cup we had just bought him! Sometimes the bow was spinning around to his front and hitting him. He was so serious about it! Totally adorable.

Later I was getting dinner ready in the kitchen while Kyle was playing Wii, and he points out how handy having his cup on was since sometimes he gets really energetic and might whack himself a little with all those fast, sweeping arm movements. He turns to me, and whacks himself hard in the crotch just to show me how well protected he was! It was really cracking me up.

The very best part of this story to me is how he only used the cup during one baseball practice and one game. After the game (2nd wearing), he let us know he didn't want to wear it during baseball anymore because it was just messing his game up! He did spend about a quarter of field time "adjusting". So much so, that within about the first 5 minutes of game time, my Mom leaned over and whispered to me, "Why is Kyle pulling at his pants?"

Stuff

Life is moving along WAY too fast!

Katie is learning to read in school. Just small simple words, but it is a relief to see how much interest she has in reading. Kyle, who reads fine now, was just not interested when he was younger and had me in a panic at one point. Anyway, she'll do great in Kindergarten since she's already learning sight words at the end of pre-school.

Katie is just utterly delightful now that she is five. It seems age five is just great all around. Although she can still be difficult and stubborn, it is much less frequent and less intense. And tantrums are usually followed by an apology! Hope that's how it is when she's a teenager! She has also picked up a new game that I used to play as a girl. I know this will delight my sister, Kim - she likes to walk around on all fours pretending to be a dog or a cat. She meows and barks and whimpers while shuffling around on the ground. I used to drive Kim crazy doing this; it makes me laugh to think about it. Anyway, most of the time it is pretty cute, but I do see now that it can be annoying sometimes. And she does something I never did - she licks my hand every once in a while. Eew! She's also made me put her hair in side ponytails every day last week for school - so she could have floppy dog ears.


Kyle has been busy getting better at handball. He had a rough time this year since he had a male teacher that didn't sympathize with his constant emotional outbursts at school. He also just started baseball, and that is toughening him up, too, since they finally play a more "real" game with outs and such instead of the T-ball version last year, letting everyone get on base, always getting to home and never getting an out. When Jeff was explaining to him that he might get called out, etc., Kyle said excitedly, "Oh, so there's going to be an emperor at the game!?"

Cute things

• I was reading a story to Katie about a bird named, appropriately, Swallow. But Katie had only heard of the swallow that you do with your throat, and kept interrupting - "What's the bird's name?" "Why is it named that again?" "Mom, that's not a name!" "Mom, you're reading it wrong - Swallow is NOT a name!" I finally changed the name to Sara for the rest of the story because she wouldn't let up!
• Katie made a decoration for school, and I was carrying on about how much I loved it, and said I would keep it forever. Her eyes lit up and she squealed in a kind of mad but happy delight, saying, "Really? Forever? Like, until we're all dead?"
• At night, I was singing a lullaby to her, and she got this goofy look on her face and started using her hands to conduct my singing, all the while making these silly eye rolling gestures and such. I was trying not to laugh, but gave up and couldn't sing for so long because we were both laughing so hard.
• We went to the church service on Christmas Eve. We sang the opening hymn, and then the pastor made a few announcements. One of them made the members of the congregation applaud for a few seconds. As the clapping died down, Katie said out loud, "Oh, is it over already?"
• I took Kyle to Universal Studios where we were waiting for the Waterworld show to begin. A voice came over the loudspeaker stating,"The show is about to begin. If you are still waiting for members of your party, please go the side entrances." Kyle got excited and started looking around, "Wait, Mom, is there a party?"

Katie Update

Some things that must be told about Katie:

I love that she calls ballet, "ballelet" with an extra "luh" in the middle. So cute.

She has learned the Eeny, Meeny, Miney, Moe speech to help her pick between things she can't make a decision on (for example, does she want the pink plastic ring or purple - ah, how to decide?). It cracks me up to watch her do this. Apparently, even though she says she doesn't know which one she wants, she'll put two "items" out and start saying/pointing "Eeny, Meeny, Miney, Moe". The end always goes something like this: "...and my mother said you are go-ing to...(silence, contemplating)...okay, wait, wait, wait. Eeny, Meeny, Miney, Moe. Catch..."

And last but not least, this is actually a story from the last day of Kyle's baseball season that I just kept forgetting to post. She was sitting on the bleachers talking to my sister, Kim, about getting along (or not, as the case was at the time) with Kyle. Kim looked at her and said brightly, "Well, Katie, don't worry too much. Most brothers and sisters fight a little, but when you grow up you'll be the best of friends. I must tell you, though, he does have issues with you coming into his room." And Katie quickly replied, "Oh, no, Aunt Kim, we're not allowed to wear our shoes in our rooms. We have to take them off when we come in the house!"

Cub Scout camp

Last week, Kyle spent 5 days (8am - 4pm) at Cub Scout Camp. They had all sorts of activities scheduled each day, including archery every day (Kyle's favorite)! I was able to volunteer at the camp on two of the days, and I was assigned to be Kyle's Den Leader for one of them. Here are some pics of Kyle at Camp.

Pic 1 - Kyle running to third in a kickball game for Sports session

Pic 2 - Hammering nails in Crafts session (pretty difficult task for most of our 7 year old cubs).

Pic 3 - Archery range - Kyle is 3rd from the right. I couldn't get a good shot because they were shooing us back behind the white line they stand on (for good reason!)

Pic 4 - Lined up for Telephone in the Community session - remember doing this as a kid? You get all lined up in a row and an adult gives you a sentence to pass on. Then each boy whispers it to the next kid and that last kid is supposed to tell everyone what the original sentence was. They had 18 kids and started with "The cow wears polka dotted pants." They ended with "Shock a baby." Only boys could end up with that!

April Update (in June)

The first story I’d like to remember happened around Easter. Ken and Lynda had sent Kyle an interactive email card game where one had to move a bunny with easter baskets across a road, and not get hit by the moving objects (a lot like Frogger). I think there was a timeframe, so if you’re bunny got hit, you just had to start back over with a new bunny. At the end, it would give you a score for how many baskets you got across the road in the specified time. So, Kyle played it once and by carefully guiding the bunny across the road, he saved 5 Easter baskets. Then Katie wanted to play and she just held down the right-arrow key and without regard for how many bunnies died in traffic, she saved 44 Easter baskets!

The second thing that we thought was pretty funny happened around the same time. Jeff was showing Kyle a portion of the Battle at Helm’s Deep from one of the Lord of the Rings movies. For those of you who aren’t familiar, the movies are based on a set of books by Tolkien that have men, dwarves, and elves fighting together against the evil forces of orcs and goblins in a feudal type time period. Anyway, so he’s watching the movie and Jeff is pointing out little odds and ends. Oh, they’re going to stay behind the wall, oh, they are going to try to climb the wall to get them, etc. So at some point the elves come in from behind the evil army because it has taken a long time for them to get to the battle. And Jeff points out, “Oh, there are the elves. They’ve made it and they’re going to help the good guys fight.” Then Kyle turns to Jeff and says, “Oh. But why would Santa’s elves want to go fight orcs and goblins?” I just about rolled on the floor laughing when Jeff recounted this to me later!

Katie still loves dresses. She likes lip gloss and painted fingernails, princesses and fairies, and shiny ribbon and colored paper. However, she is anything but quiet and dainty. She roughhouses with her brother and has no problem getting dirty when she plays. She’s incredibly and amazingly stubborn, but also really independent and a very good self-starter. If Mom and Dad are too busy to do something, it doesn’t take long for her to decide to just do it herself. Which is both good and bad, depending on whatever her objective is. More on this to come!

Apprentice Gardner

Katie got a certificate at school for helping out and being a good gardener. The kids are participating in an annual gardening program at school. Over the weekend, they were required to visit a gardening center and purchase potting soil, a flower plant, and a vegetable. They began planting this week.

When I picked Katie up on Tuesday, the director of the school, Asela, had nothing but praise for Katie. She earned two toys and a certificate for her hard work. Asela said Katie was so good at helping out the entire time they were planting. In particular, he was trying to get some children to help with the weeding. He was really impressed with how well Katie weeded, how much attention to detail she had, and how focused she was on the task. In the middle of weeding, she got called to the other side of the garden to plant her flower, and Asela was surprised when she returned to him afterward and began to weed more on her own initiative.

Maybe we have a future Master Gardener, like Washington Grandma, on our hands! The picture shows Katie with her yellow snapdragons.