Week of 11/27/2016

Last week wasn't too exciting.

Monday - tennis.

Tuesday - Andrew wasn't feeling too well, so we picked him up and he came home early.  He mostly rested and all the boys watched a lot of movies.  Seth got picked up from school by a neighbor and was happy to go to Sonic for a treat.  Andrew must have been worn out because he went to sleep super early.  Cub scouts was cancelled (again ... sigh), so he didn't miss it.

Wednesday - Boys were up super early (before 6) with nerf gun wars, so Andrew obviously seemed like he was feeling better but he told me he couldn't go to school since he'd thrown up the night before.  But obviously, he wasn't sick enough that someone needed to sit at home with him.  So, Andrew came to work with me.  He sat reading his Battle of the Books books underneath my desk while I lectured, and mostly sat quietly in my office afterwards while I graded projects.  Logan and Noah had a fun day going on a field trip at preschool to the library to watch the puppet show of Jack and the Beanstalk.  They even got to sit next to each other.  The rest of the day was a lot more movies unfortunately.  Tennis was cancelled due to rain.

Thursday - Andrew and Seth had performances at Barnes and Noble, although Andrew had no idea about his.  We got there just to find out that he didn't have a performance, but we saw Seth's class sing Feliz Navidad.  His teacher was finally back this week after maternity leave for having twins (and she has a 1.5 year old!).  I hate Barnes and Noble night because it is super crowded, but we only lost Logan once, so I guess it was a success.  Andrew spent most of the day trying to answer questions on his battle of the books site online to get enough points to ensure his place on the team.

Friday - I spent a busy morning at work confronting people who cheated on their projects (ugh), but had to leave early and pick up the boys at preschool because our regular ride was out sick.  Andrew found out in the afternoon that he made the Battle of the Books team, which was great.  We had pizza and opened an early mystery Christmas present - Home Alone - and watched it.  The boys were rolling over in laughter, even Noah.  So fun!

Saturday - we started out the day making cookies.  This continued over 2 days and we finally finished right before church - sugar cookies with frosting (everyone wanted to help with this one and it was chaos and yelling about turns), gingerbread cookies, nut cups, and candy cane cookies (Katsu and the boys made the candy canes, he is 1000x better than me).  We were going to go out for ice skating, but the neighbors had an emergency so we had to watch their boys for about 6 hours.  So, it was a lot of nerf guns and games and they watched a movie at the end.  Finally, we went to our church's Christmas party - Night at Bethlehem.  It was fun.  The boys were excited to run around and get food, even Noah.  Andrew and Seth spent most of the time running around at the end trying to gather all the extra coins so they could buy one of the booths.  Two hundred coins later, they finally bought the drink stand from Katsu's PhD student.  ha ha.  We were supposed to sing "O Little Town of Bethlehem" as a family, but Seth had been refusing to do it and at the end, it was just me and Katsu singing a little duet.  Oh, well.  We drove around and tried to find Christmas lights on the way home, but really the best we found was in our neighborhood.

Sunday - we finished the Christmas cookies right before church.  After church, we had our second Advent Sunday with lots of screaming by Logan because he wanted to light one of the candles - he gets next week.  We somewhat compromised and he was appeased because we played with his new dreidel.

Amanda - busy with grading (finally caught up!) and confronting all the cheaters.  Some really hilarious (but sad ones) this time.  Tried to get back into my workout team.

Andrew - worked on (but procrastinated till the last minute) a STRIDE assignment for advertising about candy lights.  Also, very busy working on Battle of the Books and also working on his Science Olympiad.

Seth - had almost nothing to say about his teacher being back.  Lives mostly to tell me how I am the worst mom ever as I want him to practice the piano and won't let him watch screens all the time.  When he does his work and there is time, he is on the computer game Prodigy learning long division - he is ahead of where Andrew's class is.

Logan - lots of screaming and fits this week.  I keep putting him to bed early, but it isn't helping too much - maybe a growth spurt.  Thank heavens for preschool where his teacher says he is delightful.

Noah - lots of cuteness, but also lots of hitting and whacking his brother.  He knows how to stand up for himself, I guess.  He is talking so much more and it's amazing to hear what he says.  He was sitting on my lap today while I was playing Christmas songs on the piano and singing along - but the words he was singing (Bring me toys!).  I guess he gets Santa.  Everytime he sees anything Christmas he says "Oh ho ho ho" - always an oh at the beginning - or Halloween.  And he still wears spiderman everywhere.  He wore it to the ward party, even (no Bethlehem attire for him).  I realized it actually is pretty functional when we were at Barnes and Noble - harder to lose and easier to identify and notice if we ever do lose him.

Week of 11/20

This was a really busy week with Thanksgiving and prep, but we spent lots of time together and not too much time working.

Monday we had tennis. Logan is loving it.  Andrew is bummed to be in a group with younger kids than Seth, which is hard for him, but hopefully they'll all learn a lot.

Tuesday, Logan had his Thanksgiving feast in the morning.  Katsu went and basically watched him eat in his cool outfit and say a little prayer.  I really wanted to come but couldn't get a sitter for Noah.  Oh, well.  Then, we grocery shopped, made a cherry pie, and cleaned the house for our pie night.  I was kind of worried no one would come, and no one did, at least for the first 30 minutes, but then it was packed afterwards and a lot of fun.  Everyone just brought a pie and chatted.  The boys were upstairs playing with nerf guns and kids were on the drums and running around and it was just crazy and a nice way to start out the weekend.

Wednesday, busy cooking most of the day and trying to watch key Gilmore Girls episodes.  Boys had a half day of school and spent lots of time playing outside and watching screens, but fun was had by all.

Thursday, we started the day at the turkey trot.  Katsu, Andrew, and Seth ran.  It wasn't too cold, but it did rain near the end.  There was lots of other people we knew there from the neighborhood, ward, and work, so that was fun.  We told Seth he could run as fast as he wanted, so he did and Katsu and Andrew ran together.  Seth ran the entire time and finished in 26 min 38 seconds.  We were at the finish line and got him when he finished.  He felt pretty sick for the first couple minutes and told me he didn't want to do that again, but then after that he was just proud.  He ran faster than any kids his age or younger.  Out of the kids under 10, he was 4th.  Not bad for his first race.  Katsu had to motivate Andrew some, but he finished in 42 minutes or something like that, so a good 5+ minutes faster than his last race.  Good for him!  There were lots of his friends from running club running too, so that was fun.  And Seth was just proud of how fast he raced.

We went home, threw the turkey in oven, and watched the Macy's Day parade, and then finished cooking dinner.  It was just - kind of anticlimatic - and we had way too much food because the boys don't really like any Thanksgiving food.  Next year, we need to have less or more people to share it with.  We had turkey, stuffing (sausage, pecans, and apricots), gravy, rolls, mashed potatoes, sweet potato casserole, green bean casserole, cranberry sauce, apple pie, chocolate pudding pie, and pecan pie squares.  We rested and then had dessert.

Friday we put up the Christmas tree and decorations and tried to play games together, but each one ended up in fights and chaos.  Andrew was particularly awful and spent a lot of time in his room.  We had the elf on the shelf out and we played the elf games he brought with him.  The boys loved it and were making up their own games of hiding the flashing rudolf nose outside - until they broke it!

Saturday, we spent most of the day with me taking the kids shopping individually to buy presents for the rest of the family members and then wrapping them up.  We also went with Brother's Keeper to feed the homeless/poor.  The boys just played at the park, but it was a good time and the stuffing we brought was gone in a flash.

Andrew - lots of trouble as always.  He loses his temper like crazy and then will lash out verbally and then physically attack to the point where he hit me this week.  Not good.  At all.  But when he's good ... he's good.  He has worked hard on getting ready for the battle of the books because they are making the team next week.  He really enjoyed decorating the tree and then putting toys around it.

Seth - super anxious to open Christmas presents.  He was the one insistent on buying them and then has been giving out clues, so basically everyone already knows what his presents are.  He has been loud and whiny lately, but also spending lots of time outside with friends.  His main thing is complaining about how everyone he knows (including the smart kids!) get more screen time than he does and how I am the meanest mom ever.

Logan - he seems really tired this week and has been having lots of tantrums.  On Saturday, we cleaned up in the evening so we could finish getting everything done.  He hates picking up, so before we knew it, he had put himself to sleep and was already asleep.  This is not the first time it's happened either!  He spends a lot of time playing with our neighbor, riding his ziggle up and down the driveway or playing in the sand box.

Noah - he was happy to be at home a lot this week and wore more costumes than I can count.  He is always dressed up as something!  He is talking a lot more and has been enjoying talking about the parade in Raleigh and how he saw Spiderman.  He is loving all the Christmas decorations and presents and wants to open them already!  He bought his brothers' Christmas presents - ornaments - so he could give it to them right away and I think he got the concept of giving.

Recent pictures and a video from Logan's party

Fall - Oct & Nov

I can not seem to get enough time to blog, so I'm going to do the last month and then I'm going to try just a little weekly update.

We have been really busy the last month with Halloween, Logan's birthday, Katsu out of town, and then Logan's birthday party and just normal busy-ness.  So, we didn't get a lot of reading time in.  We need to get back to reading, too.  Plus, Seth has been sleeping with Andrew and so we are all in different rooms and haven't gotten into it.  The boys have been doing lots of reading.  Seth has finally started reading chapter books and taking tests on them for school.  He read the Poppy books from Avi and just finished them all.  He also read one of the Battle of the books books - he really wants to be just like Andrew.  Andrew has been reading the Tennis Shoes books and another series.

Fun Things

• Katsu and I went to see the Parsons Dance Company and really enjoyed it.  So nice to get out!
• Noah had lots of fun carving pumpkins in preschool.  He loved Halloween so much and loved to see all the pumpkins and say "Halloween".  He keeps saying Halloween all the time.
• Noah & Logan went to a truck birthday party.  Noah didn't warm up till near the end because there were tons of kids there, but then he didn't want to leave.
• Trunk or treat.  They had a carnival first and the boys liked that - Seth and Noah were too scared to do the spooky room, but they liked playing the games and getting little treats.  And of course, they loved getting treats at the trick or treat.  Someone took pictures of the families, so I'll have to get one because that is the only halloween picture we have of us.  Whoops.
• We were going to try out a couple other trunk or treats, but Katsu had a migraine, so we ended up just having a quiet night at home.
• Noah and Logan had Halloween parties.  I brought the treat bags for Noah's party and had fun making them - glad it's done, though.  They both got to wear costumes.  Andrew had a party at school, too.
• Halloween - we had people over for dinner which was a little crazy!  They came earlier than I expected and I had laundry everywhere, but oh, well - I just kept folding it.  The last year or so, it has become really hard to stay on top of the laundry.  The boys didn't want to eat the chili and at one point, Seth's chili "accidentally" flew over the fence ... finally, they went out trick or treating.  They were so excited.  They wanted to do the whole neighborhood.  The whole family went out most of the time, but Katsu felt sick near the end.  We should have all gone home, but the boys were demanding to see more, so I took them, but they were too tired to even stop and ask for candy. Monday on Halloween is a little crazy and not my favorite.
• Wed. was Logan's birthday.  He had a little cake and got his presents - some Imaginext Batman things from his grandparents, which Noah promptly decided were his and we fought that battle for the next week, and we got him a Ziggle and a sticker book.  He loves the Ziggle and wants to play with it all the time.  Then, Katsu took him and Noah to school, and then left on a business trip to Phoenix.  We brought in cupcakes for Logan's class.  We got a pizza for his birthday and maybe watched a movie - we took it really low key.
• Saturday while Katsu was gone, Andrew had his running club race.  It was pretty chilly and I wasn't thinking and didn't bring chairs, so we were standing there waiting for a long time.  But Seth found his friend and they played his video game thing for a while - poor Logan and Noah were more bored.  I was so proud of Andrew - he finished the 5k!  And he wasn't even the last person!  The boys have been so excited since then they are planning on running a 5k for Thanksgiving and want to go running all the time. We went to Chick-fil-a afterwards to celebrate.
• Election day was busy.  Andrew ran for student government president (he made his class representative and barely even told us!).  He had made some posters and made a speech.  He didn't win (he told me it was because some of his friends didn't vote for him ... poor thing), but he didn't seem too sad about it.  He is so busy already with being a representative, running club, battle of the books, leadership, plus all his gifted pull-out programs, it is probably for the best.  Seth and Andrew voted for president at their school (Clinton won).  Logan voted for president at preschool, too.  His classmates were trying to figure out who to vote for, asking questions like "well, who is the boy?" or voting for whoever's name they liked best.  Then, apparently, Logan said "Well, let me tell you what it's all about it.  There is a boy and he wants to build a wall.  And the girl does not want to build a wall."  The kids were so fascinated (they thought it was a lego wall) and his teacher was impressed he had a clue what was going on.  Their class voted for Trump.  Noah went with me and voted with me - no lines.  I should have done early voting, but I procrastinated forever who to vote for in all the 30ish positions I had to vote for.  Katsu and I stayed up for a while watching election coverage ... I am still not too happy about the results nor are the kids.  Today they told me that they think the popular vote should win, not the electoral college.  At least they are learning some civics ...
• The next morning, Logan had his postponed (from the hurricane) trip to the pumpkin patch.  Katsu went with the first part while I gave my class a test, and then I was there the second half.  They had tons of fun at Briley's.  I went to see the little animals and on the hayride.  They only had the big pumpkins (all the little pumpkins were destroyed in the hurricane flooding) and we each picked one out.  We never got to actually carving pumpkins this year (whoops!), but they still are going strong as decorations outside.  It was fun to spend some one-on-one time with Logan.
• Boys got a couple days off school for Veteran's Day and parent-teacher conferences, but no scheduled any conferences, so they just played and had a babysitter when I went to work.
• We had Logan's birthday party on Nov. 12, because I figured I really didn't want to do it without Katsu home.  I was worried that no one was coming when there were only 2 people after 15 minutes, but almost everyone we planned on showed up.  It was a fun party and went much better than last year.  The boys ran around for a while and Andrew/Seth led them in some Jedi training, I think.  Then, they did nerf gun shooting of death stars.  Then, we did donuts on a string (that was a hit!).  Then, the kids ran around for a while.  Then, we did the egg race (eggs colored like storm troopers).  We also did little lego guys frozen in ice and they had to try to break it with a spoon.  They LOVED that one.  We had cake and chips.  Logan insisted on a darth vader cake, so Katsu and I cut out a stencil out of a file folder and then used it to powder sugar the top of the cake.  It looked pretty good - even better in pictures for some reason ... ha ha.  Then, we opened presents.  Did a Darth Vader pinata.  And then played some more games - we tried volley ball with a huge ball, but the boys all started to fight.  And so the party really ended up at just an hour and a half long, which was just perfect.  It was pretty fun and I am always so glad when they are done!  We went to Chick-fil-a for dinner because the boys got free nuggets with their report card and we were worn out.  A nice evening.
• Monday we had to bring healthy snacks to Logan's class, so we sent in a sampler of 4 or 5 different kinds of apples, which they loved.  The boys also started tennis.  Logan, Seth, and Andrew are all playing.  Logan is LOVING it.  He wants to practice all the time and is doing a pretty good job - you have to be 5, so he was just old enough.  Seth got moved up on Wednesday to an older group, which is harder for Andrew.  I hope it won't stay like that.  I love tennis because it is not too far away, they are all at the same time, and it's not evenings or weekends.  Hopefully, they will enjoy that and running as life-long fitness pursuits.
• Tuesday, Seth had his awards day at school with a little party since they didn't have a party for Halloween.  Seth got all S's on his report card with weirdly only like 3 other people.  He has had a sub for about a month now while his teacher is on maternity leave.  His sub loves him.  But it has sure made some weird dynamics at school for Seth.  Supposedly he was supposed to be pulled out for some enrichment, but that has still not happened.
• I also had my Book club and it was fun with like 5 people.  We read Serafina and the Black Cloak, so it was a quick easy read.
• Andrew had his award day on Thursday and got an award for all A's.  He also started Science Olympiad.  Originally, his teacher didn't turn in the paperwork on time, so he didn't make it, but she talked to them, and now he is on it.  He is doing the competitions for data crunchers and one about earthquakes and that kind of science.  He is excited.
• Friday was a play for the boys and Katsu took all but Noah to see it - Skippyjon Jones - Snow What.  They enjoyed it mostly, but mostly just like seeing it together and then going to McDonalds for ice cream and playing chess.
• Saturday we drove to Raleigh to see the Raleigh Christmas parade.  We hit random traffic, but got there in time and sat at the end of the route which I really liked.  The weather was fabulous - like 70s by the afternoon.  Unusually warm for the Christmas parade.  It had 3 balloons - a penguin, a shark, and Shrek.  We could see them coming from far away, so that was fun.  They made the shark go into the crowd, which was pretty fun.  The boys sat and ate cookies and enjoyed it, even though there was no candy.  Lots of bands, some cars, lots of floats and dancers.  Noah loved the people dressed up in costumes, especially Spiderman (he showed off his ever-present Spiderman costume) and the star wars characters.  Everytime he sees someone with a Santa hat he says "ho ho ho".  Then, we ate a picnic lunch by the Duke Energy center and walked to the natural history museum.  There was also a Native American festival going on, so we looked at the dancing and the amazing costumes.  It was really fun.  The boys were a little crazy at the natural history museum, but we survived.  We stopped at Trader Joes and picked up our favorites and some holiday food and then drove home.  After some bickering, we finally picked a Japanese restaurant and went to Osaka to celebrate Nichi-go-san for boys who are 3 or 5 or 7.  It was a buffet, sort of.  It's one price and then you mark off which food you want to eat on a little sheet and they make it and bring it out for you.  The boys LOVED it.  Katsu and I were not super impressed with the quality of food, but, it was a fun experience.

Fall 2016 - Fun Things

It's been a while, but let's see what we can remember ...

Books -

• Lion, Witch, and the Wardrobe - we are going to the play next week, so we read this one.  Logan sometimes got bored, but eventually he really wanted to hear it.  Can't wait to see the play.
• Emil and the Detectives - just finished this one.  An older book, and the kids weren't sure at first, but they LOVED it.
• Jenny's Moonlight Adventure - a cute not too scary Halloween book.
• Andrew and I have been reading in bits and pieces Tennis Shoes Among the Nephites.
• Katsu and Andrew have been playing chess in lieu of night time reading.

Fun Things - 

• Odd Squad the movie - this was a major event for the kids this summer, but they loved it.
• Noah had a little birthday party.  We had a few kids over for a play date and sang and then had cupcakes.  He even got a couple presents.  It was fun and felt somewhat festive.  And then Katsu came home and we gave him our big present for him (a sand / water toy).
• OLYMPICS - we had a little opening ceremony party, though the kids got bored after awhile - let's be honest, I got bored after awhile.   We spent a lot of time watching the Olympics.  The boys loved the diving and the gymnastics.  Seth and Logan want to take gymnastics classes now.
• Katsu went to the youth baptismal trip, so we all drove out to Raleigh and dropped him off and then we went to the natural history center.  I was kind of grumpy, but the boys really enjoyed it since it's been a long time since we went.  Then, we picked up Katsu and drove to Chapel Hill.  We ate some yummy food at McAlisters and then went to the Planetarium.  We looked through the exhibits and then we watched a Magic Tree House Planetarium Show.  The boys loved it, except Noah who had a hard time sitting still.  So, I had to take him out at the end, but then I brought him back in for the Night Tonight.  Now, Logan wants a telescope and stars for his room.
• Birthday parties
• Andrew got new glasses.  His prescription changed quite a bit and the boys were somewhat well behaved during his appointment.  In fact, the doctors commented that this was the first time kids were there that they didn't have their eyes twitching by the end.
• Aunt Sarah came in town for several weeks to help with the kids while school started and to have fun with us.
• All the kids had dentist appointments.  It was pretty traumatic for Noah - he cried the whole time - but they all did fine and Logan is getting much better.  No cavities.  No concerns.  Seth still doesn't even have any wiggly teeth.
• Ward movie night - we watched Good Dinosaur.  We thought we had a party beforehand (it turned out not), so we ended up eating at Sonic beforehand.
• ECU started!  I am teaching two classes.  I lecture 9-10 M, W and 8-12 on Friday.
• My birthday.  It was a busy day - the kids had their open house at school.  But Sarah cooked dinner (chicken cordon bleu and cake) for me while I was at that, so that was nice.  I got 
• Watermelon Festival - we went to the parade and it was pretty fun, but so hot and humid.
• Elementary School (Andrew) - the kids started a week after ECU.  Andrew is in Ms. Zell's class and is also in the gifted program.  Ms. Zell seems to be a good teacher for him, but really Andrew is gone for the gifted program so much, it seems like he is hardly there or catching up on things all the time.  He goes to STRIDE (Gifted program) all day Monday.  He also has enrichment math (Thurs), enrichment reading, and super enrichment reading and super enrichment math (I think those are all on Friday).  So, he is gone almost 2 whole days each week.  Plus, he is taking orchestra and learning the viola in place of his regular music class.  It is supposed to be twice a week, but then he was missing all his PE (due to STRIDE) which isn't allowed, so it's just once a week for now.  He is doing pretty well at keeping up with practicing and also piano, though heaven forbid he practice when you tell him.  He does it whenever he feels like it.  He is also doing Battle of the Books (read 18 books and then answer quiz questions on them as a team), Leadership (helping the PE teachers again), and Running Club (they practice twice a week after school for a 5K next month - he is not very good or fast, but he is getting better and seems to somewhat enjoy it).
• Elementary School (Seth) - Seth is in Ms. Herring's class.  She is a new teacher this year.  She was also pregnant with twins boys (in addition to her one year old boy) and just had them a week ago.  So, he now has a permanent sub.  I am still not sure how I feel about her.  She seems fine, but I don't think she is engaging him as well as he should be.  He hasn't had any enrichment for math even though he is super far advanced.  As far as I can tell, the only thing that he has done is get a sign up to play the computer game Prodigy at home.  He LOVES this game and is always begging to play.  It gives math problems and then it is kind of like Final Fantasy type game.  The problems have been super hard - long division, greatest common multiples, graphing with coordinates, but he seems to be picking it up.  He didn't get a good grade in writing, but it was based on only one assessment, which I am not very happy about.  He is advanced in reading and has been loving to read Geronimo Stilton books.  They have been doing AR now in second grade, although the teachers don't seem to really know what they are doing.  Seth had a hard time taking the test on chapter books, but got to his goal super fast.  He always tries to take out the very hardest books that they will let him.  He has been learning about sound and music and just turned in a project making an instrument.  He had lots of ideas about using cleaning bottles and made some sort of blowing thing.  He worked on it all by himself and really didn't want any help or input.  Seth is still doing really well with piano.  Both boys are in the book 2B of Alfred Premiere Course.
• Seth went to a birthday party at AirU - a jumping trampoline place and he really wants to go back all the time.
• A couple football parties.  Aunt Sarah even came.
• I don't think we did much for Labor Day.  I don't really remember.  Maybe Katsu painted the walls?
• Sarah went back home.  Andrew was glad to get his room back, but Noah was really sad to miss his little buddy and cried about it for a couple days.
• Noah and Logan had their tea party at the preschool to meet their teachers.  Noah had a rough few days at the beginning of the year, but now he loves preschool and always talks about his friends at preschool and is sad when it's a day when Logan goes and he doesn't.
• Logan is in Ms. Shelley and Ms. Kim's class in the pirate room upstairs and goes 9-12 five days a week.  His room has pirate toys and all kinds of pirate decorations and has had several pirate crafts.  They even celebrated and dressed up for talk like a pirate day.  Ms. Shelley loves Logan and just thinks he is delightful and easy.  Logan is really enjoying the class and seems to be making friends and having fun with the other kids.  He also seems to be learning the letters they study at school pretty well.  Hopefully he will know all the letters by the time he starts kindergarten.  It has been a long slog (he knows all his numbers, though ...)  He keeps getting more literary skills and has started really picking out beginning and ending sounds in all the words he hears, so I am not too worried.  A funny thing from his preschool class - there is another boy who moved into his class who is named Logan F too.  So, Logan goes by Logan Funai.  He especially loves playing in the sand and I finally figured out why - his teacher brings back lots of shells and hides them there.  It's like a treasure hunt.
• Noah is in Ms. Jennifer's class.  He is in a 2 year old class that meets Monday, Wednesday, and Friday.  He really loves the class now.  He plays and has circle time and reads stories and brings home simple crafts.  He plays on the playground for a long time and really enjoys that, too.
• Ward picnic - we had to pick up the meat, but it was at the wrong barbeque place and so we had to drive all around town.  It was kind of crazy and stressful, but the food was good and we brought home tons of leftovers.  Too bad the kids don't like north carolina bbq - more for us!
• High priest breakfast.  They remembered how much Logan liked bacon and got a whole pan full for him to bring home!
• Soccer - Katsu is coaching both teams (Logan and Seth).  It has been a little crazy, especially when it was so hot and we were worried about Katsu getting migraines.  But he has mostly enjoyed the teams (even though so many games have been cancelled due to weather).  And they have basically won all their games for both teams. Kind of crazy.  The season is almost done now - last games on Monday and then there will be a tournament for Seth's group.
• Curriculum Night & Preschool Orientation.  Lots of busy school meetings.
• Andrew had a cub scout activity at the nature center and went hiking and had lots of fun.  Noah and I ended up joining them in the nature center after their hike.
• Talk like a pirate day - Logan dressed up for school and then Logan and Noah and I went to Krispy Kreme with the boys dressed up and each got a box of donuts.  It was a fun day.
• We celebrated Angel Moroni Day by talking about how he appeared to Joseph Smith and then finding little scripture treasures made of chocolate.
• General Conference - we went though the 72 hour kits and ate up all the expiring food (probably a bad idea since the hurricane went through the next week ...) and the boys listened to a couple of the talks even, especially when they played bingo with the M&Ms.  It was a pretty fun weekend and nice to all be together at home.  Soccer games were cancelled due to rain, so we didn't even have to go anywhere.
• US Marine Band - Katsu took the boys.  Seth and Logan both fell asleep almost instantly, but Andrew really enjoyed the band and was very interested in the music.
• I have been in charge of the walking school bus - and we had our walk to school day.  The police accompanied us in the morning and we had banners.  The kids were a little wild, but they had a lot of fun.  They got goody bags and snacks in the afternoon on the way home.  Low key, but fun.
• Noah went and saw the puppet lady at the mall.  He didn't want to go, but he enjoyed it in the end and wants to go back another time.
• Andrew had a field trip to go and see an orchestra performance.  He enjoyed it.  We were supposed to have a performance that evening, but it was cancelled due to the hurricane.
• The hurricane blew through on Saturday Oct. 8.  Everything was cancelled, of course.  We sat at home and waited and watched.  The wind and rain were something treacherous.  We brought in everything from outside, thankfully, because it was much worse than we expected.  I have never seen such a storm.  Poor Noah was so scared - he was just wandering around saying "Rain hurt me" over and over again.  The other boys were a little nervous, but not too bad, but Noah would not go to sleep at all unless he was between me and Katsu.  He is still scared of any rain or storms, poor thing.  Our neighbor's trampoline flipped over their fence, but thankfully, other neighbors tied it down before it could have caused any damage.  We didn't lose power or anything harmful.  There was a huge amount of flash flooding in town, even the road behind ours was flooded badly in parts and many many roads were closed on Saturday and Sunday.  We did get a bit of water damage from rain coming through around the outdoor outlet cover, but thankfully nothing too bad.
• We just had a combined sacrament meeting service on Sunday.  Kind of crazy to see the damage from the storm.
• School - all of them - was cancelled for the entire next week.  We didn't venture far beyond the store and once to the library.  Many streets were closed and then Greenville started flooding from the Tar river through the whole week before finally peaking water levels on Friday.  Far from us, but not too far.  The whole region was flooded really.  Craziness.
• Preschool finally started the next week, but Andrew and Seth were still out on Monday.  We finally got our piano tuned (which the boys found somewhat interesting) and then we played a rousing game of Monopoly.  Boys finally went back to elementary school on Tuesday with a 2 hour delay.  And ECU started as well.  Katsu couldn't go to ECU the very first day it was closed (Monday the 10th), but he went into the lab most days the week it was closed, though sometimes came home early.  Thankfully the weather was good the week they were out, so they spent lots of time playing with friends and outside.
• The fire truck came to preschool.  According to Noah's teacher, he was petrified of it and refused to get on it.  I guess it was a little too big - he loves looking at them from afar.  Logan seemed to enjoy it.
• Thursday, on the way home from preschool, the car broke down.  Thankfully, Katsu could come and help out.  And thankfully, we were able to drive the car to the shop without needing a tow truck and the shop could look at it right away.  They had to order a part and the car could just stop anytime, so we have been down to one car, but hopefully it will be done on Monday.  We'll see!
• Friday, Katsu took Andrew, Seth, and Logan to see ECU's family fare production of The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe.  Katsu wasn't super impressed, but the kids enjoyed it and enjoyed spending time with him, of course.  They went to McDonald's afterwards and played checkers and had ice cream.
• Saturday, ALL the boys went and cleaned the church, then a full day of soccer boys, and then ALL the boys went to a church's fall festival.  We drive by it every day on the way to preschool or ECU and decided to try it.  The boys LOVED it.  There were 8 bouncy houses!  Plus cotton candy, hot dogs, and games and candy.  They stayed for a long time and loved it.

Noah in July 2016

Noah - turned 2.  I can't believe he is so old already.  I brought him into the doctor when we went to Logan's ear appointment and the nurse asked where the baby is - no one can believe he is so old already.

And, oh, boy, is he 2!  I swear, from the day of his birthday, he has been throwing the biggest fits ever.  I think they are maybe the worst of all the kids.  Or maybe not quite as bad as Andrew.  He will scream and writhe around on the floor for like 20 minutes and nothing will calm him down.  It could get interesting.  And, in typical toddler fashion, they are for ridiculous things, like when we couldn't figure out what he wanted for breakfast, so I let Andrew eat the fish because I thought Noah didn't want it, but in fact, he just wanted it cut.  He is a handful.

Noah sleeps pretty well.  He doesn't wake up every night anymore, maybe just every 3 nights or so.  It is so nice to pretty much have everyone sleep through the night.  Thought that would never happen.  He is pretty resistant to going to sleep, though.  Unless he is really tired, it can take a good hour of laying next to him to get him to sleep.  If he had his way, he would read 10 million stories, but I am trying to get him into a pattern of 3 books only.  He takes naps at least half the days.  But often, after laying down for 30 minutes, he still won't sleep.  On the days he does sleep, he will take a long nap usually and sometimes we have to wake him up.  So, kind of a weird schedule.  Maybe when school starts up again, it will be better.

Noah still loves to eat.  He also knows exactly what he wants to eat.  He can eat more fish than almost all of us.  He is done with sippy cups and does pretty well without spilling.  He is also done with his booster seats, so he pretty much eats like the rest of us now.  He just needs help with cutting things, which he is very demanding about.

Noah is starting preschool next month.  I am a little worried about him being in 3 days a week, but it will be better for my work schedule.  He is loving nursery finally.  They said he is talking and playing and laughing and just participating really well, so hopefully preschool will be good, too.  We have been talking it up a lot, so we'll see.

Noah is really good at playing by himself.  He also loves to play with his brothers.  He loves to run around in costumes and hats and swords and rough housing with everyone.  He likes to play with trucks and trains and little animals and people and blocks.  He is obsessed with guns.  He loves any and all guns.  He also loves ducks (which are any birds), so he had the best time at the farm.  He loves baseball and soccer and really any sport.  He loves to walk around with a bat and a hat on - all the time.  He likes to talk about "foul ball" and is starting to say baseball, too.

Noah loves reading and wants to spend a long time reading with me every day.

He loves to look at letters.  He calls them all "s", but he is interested in how they work.

He is talking more.  He has a pretty big vocabulary, but he isn't really putting words together in sentences.  They said if he still isn't in a couple months, call for a referral, but I think he might be starting to put some words together in the last couple days, so hopefully not.

Noah is a really sweet boy.  He kisses and hugs, but he is going through a huge Mommy phase.  He loves Katsu and runs to say goodbye to him in the morning and runs to him in the evening when the garage door opens.  He also really likes Seth - I think because Seth is athletic and they are a lot alike.  He talks about Seth all the time.  He will probably be sad when school starts again.

I am probably going to have a go at potty training with him this week to see how it goes.  I got annoyed when Noah was pooping in his swim diaper, so he started telling me when he needed to go to the potty and he will.  So, he will poop in a potty, at home or away, probably every day.  He is interested, so maybe it will work.  We'll see ...

July 2016

Books - Finished the Tale of Despereaux.  I think Seth liked it though I'm not so sure about Logan.  Almost finished with the Lemonade War, but not enjoying it, with Andrew.  I started the first Moomintroll book, but am not really enjoying it anymore than the one we read before, so maybe I won't read it.  Katsu spent the last two nights telling the boys fun stories, which they love.  Andrew has mostly been rereading books, loved the Seven Wonders books, read some of the Series of Unfortunate Events, but didn't seem to love them, and has been reading more of the Warriors books.  Seth has seemed to enjoy Geronimo Stilton books, especially the comic book ones.  Logan likes any and all books and Noah is in love with Froggy and Pookie.

Fun Things This Month:

• July 1st, we went and watched our neighbors put on fireworks.  One of them is a firefighter, so we felt pretty safe and they loved it.  Poor Logan missed it because he fell asleep and was super tired.  Andrew and Seth had a blast.  And afterwards, the other neighbor put up a big screen and projected "Zootopia".  So me and Andrew and Seth at least got to finally finish the movie.  It was a fun late night and even after putting on bug spray we all got eaten alive.
• The weekend of July 4th, we went to beach on Saturday.  It was a beautiful day and we had so much fun.  We went to Atlantic Beach, there has been several shark attacks in the weeks preceding, but we went anyways, because Fort Macon is our favorite.  The boys all love the beach and have fun making sand castles, running in the waves, on their boogie boards.  We went to the aquarium after dragging the boys away from the beach.  Noah was super excited to see the fish.  He loves fish and had a great time!  We stayed until it closed and then were super hungry so we stopped at Buffalo Wild Wings for dinner and the boys loved it of course.  We had a great, busy, tiring day.
• July 4th we had a low key day with a cookout for lunch.  In the evening, we headed over to a neighbor to watch the neighborhood fireworks.  They always have an amazing display.  This year, the rain looked like it was going to start, so they started a little earlier than usual.  I bought the boys flag glow sticks, which they loved.  But once the fireworks started, Noah got scared and I had to keep going in and out with him.  It was a beautiful huge display.  I have never seen anything in a neighborhood like that.  Then, Katsu set off a whole bunch of fireworks while the kids played with sparklers.  He got them back at his conference in Florida.  I guess now he will be a firework man.  It was really a great Independence Day.
• We saw Despicable Me 2 at the movie theater with friends.  Lots of fun.
• Noah got a fever right after the movie, so only the older 3 boys went and played at a friend's house.  They had a blast.  When I went to pick them up, Noah was so sad he couldn't go in the pool.  
• Play date on Thursday.
• Thursday was also Tanabata.  We went to the garden store and bought a little bamboo plant and that evening we wrote all our wishes on pieces of paper and put them out on the bamboo plant.  They were pretty cute.  Logan wished for pizza (he got his wish on Friday).  Seth wished to improve on video games.  I don't remember all the rest.
• Next Tuesday, we started Logan's swim lessons.  He only got in two lessons before he got his ear infection and we had to cancel the rest.  He was doing really well.  I guess next year ...
• We played in a friend's pool that afternoon.  The boys loved it.
• Chick fil a cow appreciation day.  We all loved dressing up as cows and had a yummy dinner.
• We had another play date.
• TRIP TO ASHEVILLE & GREAT SMOKY NATIONAL PARK
• As we got back, Seth had soccer camp from Monday to Thursday.  It was SOOO hot, the poor kid was worn out and dehydrated every day we picked him up.  I was very worn out just hauling the kids in and out and in and out of car seats.  High nineties with high humidity.  What a miserable week.  But Seth really had a fun time.
• Lots of dr appts with ear infection and well visits.
• Kung Fu Panda 3 at the library.  No M&Ms in the nose ... so we got to watch the whole movie.  Horray!
• Katsu and I went on a date finally (!) and tried out a new Jamaican restaurant.  There was no where to sit and we didn't want to just bring the food home, so we ended up to eating in the car and then went and got some frozen yogurt at a new place.  It was fun and the boys loved having pizza, cookies, popcorn and watching a movie with the babysitters.
• Saturday was just a lazy day at home with finally some rain!

Trip to Mountains, Part Eight

On a sort of side note ... Logan woke up on Saturday complaining that his ear had hurt the night before.  I saw where he had scratched his ear, but it looked okay, and he said it didn't hurt anymore.  I figured he got bit by something.  Later that day, it started draining yellow, then green, then black.  We were on the way home, so we just waited till Monday morning to go to the doctor, but the poor thing - it looked awful.  And by Monday he would complain if anyone so much as touched it.  The doctor couldn't even see his eardrum and swabbed it and sent it to the hospital to culture because she thought it must have something terrible in it.  Thankfully, it didn't grow anything that an antibiotic wouldn't cure and he was on antibiotics and ear drops.  It looks a lot better now.  But poor kid - I am betting it must have hurt a lot on Friday night.  I wish he had told us.

Saturday, we packed up our cabin (Dogwood Cove) and got into the car to drive.  Katsu had hurt his foot the night before at Fontana Lake, so we need to get bandaids and antibiotic cream at the pharmacy, but then we were ready to drive.  We drove all the way straight to the NC Transportation Museum - once we got in town, we ate some lunch and then headed over.  We meant to stop sooner and we were all starving, but we couldn't find anything!

After our stomachs were full, we went to the Transportation Museum in the town of Spencer, which looked really cute when we were driving through it.  It was super duper hot, especially after having been in the mountains.  Like 100 practically and super humid.  When we got there, we were just in time for the last train, so we bought our tickets (free again with our museum pass) and waited for the train.  It was nice and air conditioned and the boys, especially Noah, was super excited.  I had been a little bummed we didn't go on the (super expensive) train in Bryson City, but I think this was actually perfect.  It was a pretty boring train ride - just backward and forward, but Noah loved it.  The museum was actually a lot bigger than I was expecting.  We got off a bit earlier to get out at the Roundhouse.  We saw all the trains and go on any you could get on.  The roundhouse was pretty cool and the exhibits and trains were too.  I liked where they talked about the employees the best - horrible story about a person who fell in a vat of lye they used to clean all the engine parts. We went by the shop were they were working on trains.  We also went into the huge shop they used to work on the trains and saw some old cars.  They had another building with old bicycles and also the giftshop.  The gift shop had a train that went around the top of it and also a train table to play with.  It was so hot, but we sweltered through the heat and enjoyed ourselves, and on the plus side, it was practically empty - very few visitors.  Once we could pry the kids away from the train tables, we went back to our car and drove the last 30 minutes to Asheboro and our hotel.  We watched TV, relaxed, and then went to Cicis because that is the only thing the kids could agree upon.  Then, we were ready to watch TV and the kids went to bed too late.

Sunday, we woke up and got packed and went to the zoo.  Again, super super hot, but we walked around for a few hours.  We started in Africa, saw like one animal, and then took the tram to the North America side of the zoo.  Seth and Andrew were our navigators and everyone had to have a map.  We bought a teeny umbrella stroller at Walmart just so we could push Noah around and not rent a stroller.  I swear, we spent almost the entire zoo trip with one or another child at the bathroom.  Seriously.  At one point, the boys were walking and talking about poop and why they spend so long in the bathroom (the joys of having 4 boys).  Seth says "I had a poop so big it was like a poop tower".  This guy walking next to us burst out laughing and said "You can not tell me that was not funny."

Okay, back to the zoo.  Really enjoyed the air conditioned parts.  The polar bear was really cool - he would swim right up next to you on the glass and it is just amazing how large they are.  Also liked the puffins.  Andrew wanted to see everything at the zoo - by the time we got to Africa, the rest of us were fried, so he and Katsu went off to see more and we took the tram back.  The lady on the tram was really nice and stopped the tram by the animals until all the boys saw them.  There were a lot of yellow jackets everywhere at the zoo, too.  Yuck.

Anyways, it was nice couple hours.  Then, back to the car, and we drove all the way home.  It was so nice to be there!

Trip to Mountains, Part Seven

On Friday, we spent the day a little closer to our rental.  We went to the Deep Creek area of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park.  It is only about 15 minutes from our rental.  We went on a waterfall hike – walking on different trails to see all 3.  The boys were a little reluctant to hike at first (they would rather watch TV or play video games every day), but it was a nice hike.  The first waterfall was pretty quick and nice.  We took pictures and then we were off on a horse trail.  We walked along, pointing out all the mushrooms and rocks along the way to get Noah to walk part of the way.  We saw a few horses near the end of the path and then walked to the second waterfall.  This one was magical.  There were butterflies everywhere.  We walked down to the falls and then Katsu and then little boys walked down across the stream to take pictures and see all the butterflies.  Then, we walked along the stream and saw all the kids tubing – we will have to go back another time and try it when Noah is older.  We got into the water near the third waterfall and played with rocks and made little towers.  It was cold, but so fun.  We went back to the car, drove to the picnic area and had our lunch.  We were pretty worn out, so we drove by the Road to Nowhere and then we just headed back to the rental and then went swimming in the lake.  Boys had fun, though Katsu hurt his foot playing with the boys.  So, we headed home, had dinner, and made another fire for marshmallows.  Boys played a game of National Park Monopoly.  It was a lot of fun, but we were all ready to head home.

Trip to the Mountains, Part Seven

Thursday we spent in the main part of the national park.  We went to the Mill first.  We hiked around first and saw where the water went into the Mill and then we went inside to see the Mill.  The employee didn’t seem very cheerful and it wasn’t too interesting.  But, we found the Junior Ranger program on bugs.  We hiked up just a little bit, saw an interesting slave graveyard and then got the tools to look for some bugs.  The boys really enjoyed it.  The ranger helping was Ranger Seth which we thought was interesting.  Seth and Logan had a little kit and had a harder time finding bugs at first, while Andrew and Noah got a spider and other little bugs which we tried to avoid the poison ivy.  Then, Logan got a really big centipede and it was super excited.  I was really impressed with the program and wished they had had more the couple days we were in the park.

Next, we drove to Clingman’s Dome.  We should have bought the brochure so we knew more about what we were driving through, but we didn’t really stop anywhere.  It was not quite what we expected – not like the Blue Ridge Parkway with all the nice overlooks.  But it was a nice drive up the mountain.  There was no parking, so we had to park way out just pulling off the road – a little nervewracking, but we ate our lunch in the car and  we walked up to the top and hiked up the trail.  It was pretty steep and I was carrying Noah and Logan was whining, but I promised him he could climb up the rocks at the beginning if he didn’t whine.  At the end of the hike is a huge observation tower.  We went up and the views were pretty good – stormy though.  We could see Mt. Mitchell and all around in all directions.  We hiked down to the bottom and then the boys clamored over the rocks.  We went back to the car.

Next, we drove a bit further to the Gap and took pictures and took a long bathroom break (Noah wanted to use and flush every single toilet … I think Katsu thought we fell in the toilet).  We were worn out, but we went back to the visitor center (this time no elk but also no rain).  We saw the mountain farm museum – again, kind of boring without brochures and it was SO hot.  Noah was happy to see the chickens and Logan tried one of the apples.  Then, Andrew and I went on a very quick hike to finish up his Junior Ranger badge.  Then, Andrew got his Junior Ranger badge, we drove to the grocery store, back to the rental, out swimming, with a big fire and smores and catching fireflies.