Mommy, Look

Jr. Jr.:  I made a house.

Panda or Polar Bear?

International Polar Bear Day, February 27.  Nichole decided to be a polar bear trainer.  The boys were her polar bears.

 I printed out some polar bear mazes for the kids to do.

 

Jr. found and showed me a book with a polar bear in it.

Jr. also couldn't remember if it was panda or polar bear day.  He kept suggesting activities that had to do with pandas.  "No, we're not going to watch Kung Fu Panda.  It's Polar Bear Day, not Panda Day."

We did have fun with our celebrating... even if it wasn't Panda Day.

Carnival Day 2014

February 26 is Carnival Day.

With dinner, we drank pink lemonade.  That's a carnival type drink.

It was also our Family Home Evening night, so for our activity the kids played a carnival game- coin toss- trying to toss pennies in a ring.

Nichole and Jr. did some tricks.  They could be in a carnival side show.

Jeremy tried out a new magic trick on us.

And for FHE treat (this has nothing to do with carnivals), Jr. suggested snowman sandwiches.  This time, besides the raisins, everyone could also use carrots to decorate the outside.  This is how they turned out:

 Jr.'s

 Daddy's

 Nichole's

Jr. Jr.'s

The KAT's Meow... from the past

I found this written on a piece of paper as I was organizing today.  I don't know how long ago it happened.  Based on other things on the paper, it was probably after October 2012 (that doesn't narrow it down much, does it?)-

Mommy:  How are you doing, Jr. Jr.?
Jr. Jr.:  One.
Mommy:  Are you having a good day?
Jr. Jr.:  Two.
Mommy:  Do you like counting?
Jr. Jr.:  I like counting.



Here's another one I found on another piece of paper.  I also don't know how old this is.  Sometime after May 2012-

Mommy:  1 hour and 7 minutes.
Nichole:  Until what?
Mommy:  Until it's time to get ready for bed.
Nichole:  That equals 67 minutes.  I'm good at math.
Jr.:  67 equals 67.  I'm silly at math.

National Rationalization Day Post

I said I'd write about how we celebrated National Rationalization Day, February 23, so here we go-

Daddy:  I'm going to give the kids peanut butter pretzels instead of apple slices to wake them up since it's faster and it's already passed 8 o'clock.  I'm rationalizing.

Jr.:  Dad, do you think I should eat breakfast before I get changed because I might spill stuff on my church clothes?
Daddy:  That sounds like a really good rationalization.  Go for it.

Me (thinking):  I'm holding the baby.  I don't have to go help the older kids.  Jeremy will do it.  I'll just sit and read my book.

Me:  I'm rationalizing keeping this list so I can write a blog post.

Daddy:  Look at these kids.  I'm here lying down on the bed, and they're all getting ready for church.
Jr.:  Lucky's the one lying down on the bed.
Daddy:  You're right.  I'm laying more than lying.
Jr. Jr.:  Are you laying eggs?
Everyone:  Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha!
Nichole:  Daddy's a chicken.
Daddy:  No, I'm not.  Take it bwok.

Me:  I should have stayed in bed.

Me:  Should I call the kids in?
Daddy:  Yes, please.
Me:  In!  Oh, In!
It's National Rationalization Day.  I'm allowed to be silly.

And here's a picture of a castle Nichole built out of blocks that day.  I've included it just because.

National Rationalization Day 2014

I'll write about how we celebrated this holiday later. I'm too tired right now.

Snowman Sandwich

Jr.:  This is the way to eat a snowman sandwich.

I learned something new.  A snowman sandwich is any kind of sandwich (in this case, peanut butter and jelly for Jr. and peanut butter for Jr. Jr.) with raisins stuck onto the outside of it to make a face.


Jr. Jr.:  This is the way to eat a snowman sandwich.

Jr.:  I made a snowman plate.

Jr. Jr.:  I made a snowman table.

Happy Anniversary, Zelda

February 21 is the anniversary of when The Legend of Zelda came out.  You know we're fans of Zelda.  Simple celebrating- the kids took turns playing The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword.

On a related note- one day, Jeremy was working on a balloon sculpture and noticed that the light coming through a section of the balloons made a Triforce silhouette.  Heh.

 And a special wishing of this Happy Anniversary to our friends' little girl.  You know who you are.

Congratulations!

Congratulations!  

You've earned the opportunity to look through this fabulous blog.  

Have fun, make comments, and remember there are lots of reasons to celebrate. 

Here are some of mine:

Battle Creek

A year ago, I had an idea.  Look at my blog post from last year to read my idea and why I had it.  As it got closer to the anniversary of when William Kellogg founded his breakfast cereal company, Battle Creek Toasted Corn Flake Company (later changed to Kellogg's), on February 19, I didn't know if my idea was going to happen- wintertime, new baby, etc.  But it worked out.

This evening we went out as a family to several places around town where we found signs or plaques that mentioned the name Battle Creek.  Jeremy got pictures with mini cereal boxes and we all got to eat the cereal when we got home.

 Yay for planning ways to celebrate a year in advance.

Poor Abused Little Pluto

February 18th is Pluto Day. The day we celebrate the poor little planet that so many have tried to downgrade to nonplanet status. Pluto you may be more ice than rock and you may be smaller than the Earth's moon, but your heart is big and you will always be a full fledged planet in our book! (To point out the unfairness, Ganymede is bigger than Mercury but Mercury gets to keep its status as a planet.) (Ganymede would be one of Jupiter's Moons.) (For that matter Jupiter is much more gas than rock.) (In fact there is a debate if Jupiter has any solid mass at all.)


...


Anyway...

We celebrated Pluto Day by putting stickers on a Solar System sheet Jeremy brought home from the library last month (we actually saved them for today).

 

And then we introduced the kids to our new telescope by pointing it at the wall and letting them see their planets.

They were excited, they were thrilled, they took a quick peek and went back to reading.

Pluto, we are sorry, it looks like the excitement of Pluto Day just did not translate well for them.

But we will always love you this much!

Note the rocket and planet pajamas Jr. Jr. is wearing.

P.S.  Thanks for writing this blog post for me, Jeremy, so I could take a nap.  Here's a little bit more I'll add-
As we were preparing for Pluto Day, we got into a discussion about Pluto and what the kids learned about it at school.
Nichole:  Pluto used to be a planet but then it was called a dwarf planet for no reason, just because it was small.
Jr. started thinking up fairy tales involving Pluto.
Jr.:  Cinderella and the 17 dwarf planets.

Ice Castle

4 years ago I blogged about our family visiting the ice castle in Midway, Utah.  It's become really big over the last few years- both in size and popularity (including for some youtube videos by various artists).

Today, Jeremy took the kids on an outing to the ice castle.  They stopped by Big Springs on the way for a snowball fight.

When they got to Midway, they got to see our friend, Brent.  He's the owner.  He took them into the ice castle where they got to look around.

There are quite a few new things since the last time we went, including a fountain, a slide for the kids to go on,

and lots and lots of ice.  That's not so new.

Look, it's The Piano Guys piano.

Jeremy and the kids had a good time.  It was Jr. Jr.'s first experience with an ice castle.  They came home telling me it was fun, but cold.

Almond Roca... Yumm!

National Almond Day, February 16.  Great excuse to make homemade almond roca.  

Yumm!

We Earned It

We've all been working hard lately with cleaning and organizing (and keeping up with what we've done) and with having good attitudes (not too much whining from the kids).  So today we rewarded ourselves.  We sent the kids to their room to do some cleaning (and playing) while Jeremy and I set up a surprise.  When we were ready, we called them and told them to bring their blankets and pillows to set down in the living room.  We told them that because we'd all been doing such a great job lately, we were all going to watch "The Quiet Man."  It's a movie with John Wayne and Maureen O'Hara.  It was funny to see their reactions.  They didn't know how to be enthusiastic about watching that movie (great movie for Jeremy and me but maybe a little boring for the kids). 
We then sent them into the kitchen where they had snacks waiting for them to take back out to the living room.  They each got a bag of popcorn, a box of swedish fish, and a bottle of pink lemonade.  They were quite happy about that.

When we got settled in the living room, we pushed play on the DVD player.  The kids were excited to find out that the movie we were actually watching was "Planes."  They thought at first it was a preview on "The Quiet Man" but we let them know we had fooled them and we were watching the actual movie, not just a preview.  They took it well and enjoyed the movie and snacks.

We earned it.