Busy Week

It has been a busy week. We got a new mattress and box spring for our room so we had to get rid of the old ones and get the new ones in there. I had some helpers and "helpers."

 

Sure, Mommy, I'll help you organize things in your room. 

Hold me. 

Read me a story (or three). 

Blow bubbles. 

Oh, you've only got 20-something minutes left on the dryer. I'll push the power button then push random buttons and start it again. 

More books! 

I'll help you sort through clothes... by throwing them on the floor.

You mean you wanted to put the clothes in here?

Selfies!

Let's play dress up.

Hold me more.

I'll help you, too. 

Watch me juggle. 

See what I brought home from school?

I'll help you.

Monkeys jumping on the bed for National Monkey Day, December 14. I gave them strict instructions not to fall off and bump their heads.

Thank you, all my helpers.

Once the old mattress was gone, the kids wanted to play with Nichole's old dog toy since there was so much space before putting the new mattress in. The dog chases the ball around which they gave to Jet so the dog chased him around.

Then we got the new mattress in our room so there was room on the living room floor again.

 

Monday, December 13, was Violin Day. Nichole played violin. It was also Cocoa Day. Some family members drank cocoa.

 

Also this week the kids had a "snow day." Because of the weather overnight, the school district canceled school Wednesday. Well, sort of. They made it a "distance learning day," which means the kids still had schoolwork to do, they just did it from home. Remember when schools were shut down for the end of the 2019-2020 school year? The kids had to do all their schoolwork at home. Gone are the days of actual "snow days" when the kids have a free day to play in the snow at home. Now they can have a full day of school at home, which means an actual full day because the kids are all trying to share the computer and it takes so long.

President Nelson came out with a video on Thursday encouraging us to find personal ways to "help others experience the light of Jesus Christ this Christmas." It made me feel like I needed to try again to #LightTheWorld better even with being so busy. So I looked at the calendar for December 16 and made food to give to someone before running errands that evening. It felt good.

Saturday, December 18, is Maple Syrup Day so the kids made waffles and had syrup with them. It is also Ugly Christmas Sweater Day. Jr. wore what he wore to his last concert. His orchestra was performing at an end of the semester assembly. The high school and the junior high encouraged people to wear Christmas sweaters that day. 

Ice Cream for Breakfast

February 1 was Eat Ice Cream for Breakfast Day. It's not on our calendar because it's every first Saturday in February, not the same date every year.
I enjoyed some ice cream in a mug of hot chocolate for breakfast. Yumm.

I don't feel bad at all about having ice cream for breakfast. I also don't feel bad about letting Jr. Jr. and Lucky both veg in front of the TV. They both had coughs so TV is a distraction when people are sick.
Sweet little Lucky, when I went to set up the humidifier for him in the early hours of the morning, he told me not to get too close because he didn't want to get me or Jet sick. Awww. I love my children and I will be grateful when cold/flu season is over.

The weather was good that day and Jeremy and the two oldest went to a gull identification clinic like Nichole and I went to last year. Yay for birding.

While they were looking at gulls, they ran into some friends who were out looking for bald eagles. Birding is fun for the whole family.

It's a good thing Nichole didn't have the boys' cough because that evening she went to a girls' night at a friend's house. She had dinner and watched a movie and took brownies to share. She had a great time. The boys were happy that she had leftover brownies to bring home. Yumm. We like brownies.

What We Did for a Road Trip

Jeremy had a couple of fairs in Montana recently, which meant... road trip for the family.
I prepared binders for each of the kids with pens, pencils, colored pencils, and lots of printed activities and blank paper for drawing (oh, and spiral notebooks for writing).  One of the favorite activities to do together were the mad libs.  I found several online and we had leftover Quibbler Mad Libs from Nichole's party (I blogged about it on August 2).  The binders were good for in the van as well as in the motel.

Jeremy decorated the front of the boys' binders (we ran out of time for Nichole's so he'll get to hers later).  They all had glow-in-the-dark paint on them.

Lucky got the Flash symbol.

Jr. Jr. got the Bat symbol.

Jr. got a Minecraft decoration.

Jeremy worked hard and made some amazing sculptures at the two fairs (I don't have access to the pictures right now- catch me later).  The kids and I hung out in the motel and watched Disney Channel, read books, did scripture study, ate food, and Nichole worked on her homework (yes, during the Summer). 

We also got creative and silly at times. 

 
Nice to have cool air blowing on you.

This becomes this.  

Nice red cheeks.

Jeremy brought him and I a special treat again- "wagon wheels" and cherry 7-up (with extra cherry syrup).  Mmmmm.

The actual traveling had good times and not so good times.  Poor Lucky was exhausted on the way to the second fair.  His ear was hurting as well.  He kept asking to stop the van and be held.  Poor little guy.  However, at one point, while we were stopped at a rest area, he went and picked flowers for everyone.  What a sweetheart. 

I think getting out to run around a few times helped as well as those times he just needed to be cuddled.

Watching a movie was a good distraction as well.

 Overall, it was a good trip.

Distraction

The kids were cleaning up the living room.  Nichole got out a plastic grocery bag to put balloons in.  For some reason, she found it more fun to throw it up so it would glide down like a parachute.  Jr. and Jr. Jr. saw what she was doing so they got grocery bags out to play with, too.
Nichole started tying objects to her bag to glide down.  The kids also got into playing like they had just gone shopping and brought back groceries in the bags.

I should be careful what items I suggest the kids use for cleaning up.  They just might find other uses for them.