Beware The Wind

One windy day, Jet and I noticed that some of the Halloween decorations had been knocked down because of the wind. When we went inside, we found a tower Lucky had built of Jenga blocks and foam building blocks. When Jet saw it, he immediately went over to it and said, "Oh no. The wind knocked it down," as he knocked it over.

Fall Break- Definitions

October 16 was National Dictionary Day. Throughout the afternoon, certain words came up in conversation that we looked up in the dictionary so we could give a general definition to those who wanted to know. Here are some of them:

juxtaposition- having things next to each other so you can see/experience the contrast

posterity- descendants of someone

irate- angry

delirious- "Wild with excitement, enthusiasm, etc." 

Jr.: Wild with Etcetera! 

Everybody: Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha.

The kids also had fun with blocks and the blocks box.

That night, Jeremy and Jr. Jr. went out owling. While they were gone, I sent Jr. and Lucky to bed. I was so tired that Nichole took Jet while I slept on the couch. She watched a movie and later Jr. came out and took Jet and got him to sleep. When Jeremy and Jr. Jr. got home, Nichole had gone to bed so Jeremy told Jr. he could watch a movie Nichole had already seen. Jet and I both woke up while he was watching the movie so I took Jet and watched the rest of the movie with Jr.

What They Missed- August 17

Monday, August 17-
The day they came back.
I sewed two more masks before putting the sewing stuff away. Lucky and Jr. Jr. were having fun with them.

Lucky: My precious.

The boys were saying, "If you want your precious, you have to wear a mask." They are silly.
When they found out Dad and the other kids were coming home that night, they said they won't be able to get in. I told them Dad has keys. They started brainstorming how to make some sort of magnet that would get his keys away from him. They tried to get Jet in on it, too, asking him to distract Mom so they could do these things. They interpreted his looks as his willingness to help out.
I love the creativity in this family.

Jet had fun cleaning Mommy's face since she cleans his so often.

There were more things due at the library so we took back library items and recycled glass. I remembered to put the glass in the van this time. In the van, the boys had paper and clipboards to work on their plan for when Dad got home. They also challenged each other to draw different things.

We drove up to Bridal Veil Falls again. Jr. Jr. didn't want to get out (it was too hot at 97 degrees). Lucky did want  to get out. We parked in a spot where we could see the falls well from the van and both boys ended up getting out. They threw rocks while Jet slept.

Both boys put masks on without me asking them to even though there were no people near our van at all. I think they'll be able to handle getting into the habit of face masks for school.
I tried to take pictures of the boys with the falls in the background. Lucky explained that it was "too sunny."

When we got home, the boys "locked" me in my room with Jet as a distraction so they could "carry out their plan."

Later Jr. Jr. fed Jet so I could do dishes.

Lucky helped make pizza.

The boys took out the garbage and fed the birds.

For my Family Home Evening lesson, I used The Friend magazine for August 2020. We sang "The Wise Man and the Foolish Man." We read Helaman 5:12 and talked about building our foundation on Jesus Christ and not something else. If you follow him you'll be okay even with the storms of life.
Jr. Jr. built a structure out of cards that was easy to knock down.

Lucky built a structure out of blocks that was... easy to knock down. He kept redoing it until it was hard to knock down. The cards were always going to be easy to knock down. Anyway, they got the idea and had a lot of fun.

Jr. Jr.'s treat was marshmallows dipped in chocolate. We had to hold off on the activity because we ran out of time.

Jeremy, Nichole, and Jr. came home. Yippee! I love them so much and was happy to see them. Jet was a little hesitant at first but quickly warmed up to them.

They were exhausted. But they're home!

What They Missed- August 13

Thursday, August 13-
I had another rant I wrote down on this day's notes that I am again not going to put on here. Instead here is a sculpture Lucky made out of puzzle blocks.

It's a person sitting on a couch watching TV. It even has couch cushions.

We sat down to dinner of sweet and sour chicken (since Jeremy wasn't there and he can't stand pineapple but I love it) and talked about The Food Nanny and sitting down to dinners together (as a family, not with the food nanny).

We also talked about a little riddle thing from the Gospel Living app. It was originally from The New Era magazine from June 2017.
You figure out a word that fits two different clues with different meanings. The example they gave was "1/60 of a minute and a silver medal." The answer is "second." Get it?
Jr. Jr. got creative after we went through all of them and came up with a few of his own. They all ended up being about bowling but that's just fine. He's clever. Themes are fun.
Here's what he came up with. See if you can figure them out and I'll put the answers at the end of this post.
1. "Water comes out of me when it rains."  "Dang it! I missed all the pins."
2.  "Could you leave a few cookies?"  "Yes! I got the last two pins."
3.  "Ow! That really hurt. You hit me with a bat."  "Yes! I got all the pins in one try."

After dinner, we celebrated Alfred Hitchcock's birthday with cupcakes. We put a candle in one and took turns blowing it out after singing "Happy Birthday" to Alfred Hitchcock each time. I took pictures.

I had too much fun trying to get different angles with the knife and reflections, not unlike how Alfred Hitchcock would direct the cinematography in his films.

I also watched three different versions of The Lady Vanishes (one of my favorite Hitchcock films). One in the middle of the night/early morning, one in the middle of the day, and one late that night/early morning.

We fed the birds at sunset and saw the evening star while it was still pretty light out. The evening star is actually a planet- it's Venus. That's always fun.
We didn't stick around or come back out to look for meteors or UFOs that night.

Did you figure out the answers based on Jr. Jr.'s clues?
Here are the answers.
1. Gutter
2. Spare
3. Strike

Problem Solving

Jr. Jr. didn't have any rectangular blocks so he put two triangular blocks together to get the shape he needed for his tower.

Mommy, Look

It's the Lincoln Memorial.

[It even has a purple Abraham Lincoln sitting on a blue chair.]

Block Houses

The kids built "houses" out of blocks so I took pictures of them with their houses.

Nichole with something that looks like a house.

Jr. with his tongue sticking out again. I think he let me know his wasn't a house, it was candy or chocolate or something like that.