Andrew's Wax Museum

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April in the Funai House

Books - We finally settled in on "The Enormous Egg" and the kids really like it.  We are almost done.  We are almost up to Christopher Columbus in history and are starting to read about the Solar System in science.

Movies - We watched half of "Once I was a Beehive" and need to finish it.  We also watched "Anastasia" - my choice, but I think the boys ended up liking it.  We also watched "ET" which the boys really liked.  We have been watching Amazing Race and Andrew and Seth really love it.  We also watched the new Star Wars movie a couple times after I bought it.  Boys LOVED it.

Sick - The really big event of the month was Noah being sick, basically for the entire month.  He started running a fever on April 1st and was sick for a good 4 weeks.  He still has some coughing and runny nose, but is finally mostly better.  We took him in after several days of a super high fever (104), though it would come down with medicine.  He had 2 ear infections, RSV, and pneumonia in both lungs.  They also diagnosed him with strep, but it turns out he didn't have it.  The fever kept going away and coming back.  So, as soon as we though he was better, the next day he would be sick again.  His blood oxygenation levels were kind of low, but went up enough that he didn't have to go the hospital.  But the first several days we had to give him his inhaler night and day every 4 hours.  It was an exhausting month!

Garden - We planted all the summer veggies - we might just add some pumpkins or other squash.  We have been eating greens (cabbage, collards, and broccoli) several days a week and asparagus several days a week as well.  We will stop cutting asparagus this week and let it turn back into its forest.  Andrew likes to eat the greens and asparagus, so the garden is already a success.

Fun Things This Month

• Seth got glasses.  It was spring break, but they had an opening so I took all 4 boys (!), but we survived.  Seth was 20/80 and pretty upset about having to get glasses, but it was neccesary.  They are small and cute on him.  I think they make him pretty handsome.  The first day he kept leaving him everything, but once we clarified ("face or case"), he got it.  He wears them mostly at school, but is starting to wear them more at home, but refuses for sports.
• General Conference - we watched with a sick Noah.  Boys watched on and off.
• Lots and lots of soccer games.  Seth had a couple practices, and several games were called off due to rain (and one even due to high winds).  But we usually had soccer games each weekend and several Mondays.  Katsu coached both their teams.  Seth is done and Logan's last game is tomorrow.
• Katsu took everyone but Noah to the ECU Art Fair.  Boys made lots of fun projects that they brought home and seemed to have a lot of fun, though Logan got a little bored.
• Katsu and I had a dance performance to go to, but since Noah was sick we had to stay with him.  So, Katsu and Andrew went to see Bodytraffic.  Andrew seemed to enjoy and felt really mature to go to an 8pm show with almost no other kids.  He liked the dancing.  I'm glad - but next time I want to go!
• Katsu took all boys sans Noah to Pirate Fest.  It was really windy, so the bounce houses weren't up (secretly happy about this), but they enjoyed seeing all the pirates, the bike shows, getting free chips, and playing all the little games to get candies on the Common.
• We have finally gotten into a good vibe of Family game morning on Sunday mornings before church.  Kids have been enjoying our pirate game, Ticket to Ride, Forbidden Desert, and others.
• Andrew went on a Field Trip to New Bern.  He had a lot of fun seeing all the buildings and came home with a whole goody bag.  If he wasn't telling you how much fun he had, he was enumerating all the reasons it was the "worst" trip ever - car sick on the bus ride (it's about an hour away), and they had to eat lunch on the bus because otherwise they wouldn't have enough time to see everything.
• Go Science - this time on the science behind the different dragons in "How to Train Your Dragon".  I guess we should have seen it first.  It was just our family again.
• Awards ceremonies - pretty low key this time.  Seth got an award for all S's and Andrew got an award for all A's.
• ECU earth day expo - we met up with Katsu and we saw a few exhibits before I ran off to office hours and Katsu showed them the rest.  They did art work, learned about the environment, and saw animals.
• Baseball - Seth started baseball.  He had tryouts, which were a little crazy.  The age range is 2 years and he is almost the youngest, so he is very very small and the other kids, a lot of them are crazy good.  We are already thinking about quitting because it really is way crazier this year.  No one seems friendly, the kids have crazy amount of gear(!), and they schedule practices basically every day.  We found out his team on Wed.  They had practices schedule Th, Fri, M, T, W, T, Friday and Sunday so far since then.  It has only been a week and a half!  Seth has gotten hit in the head several times and basically is not liking it at all.  I like the idea of his training and applying himself, but I think this is nowhere age appropriate.  And as practices are usually at 5:30, we are gone from 5-7:15 every night practically.  It is just wrong.
• Party - end of the year for the engineering department.  Boys always have a blast and eat too much.
• Star Wars at the Stadium - we had just seen it the week before, but this time it was on the big screen and you sat out on the field.  It was very chilly from the wind and we did not bring enough blankets, so we left after about an hour.  The boys loved playing with friends on the field before it started (I swear, we knew at least half the people there), getting their faces painted, eating the movie theater candy we brought, getting pictures with star wars characters and having a blast.  Can't wait for next year.
• Free Chipotle if kids wore a soccer uniform.  The boys ALL got free food.  I was shocked they were so nice and the boys have a new favorite place to go.
• Dave Barry - Katsu and I were able to go to the last show of the season, an hour of comedy with Dave Barry.  It was pretty funny and we spent the whole night laughing.  Nice to get out.
• Stake Conference in New Bern.  Hate the drive out there and of course, spent most of the time in the conference center hall with Noah with his balls, but afterwards we had a picnic (lots of wind!), saw some bears, and drove over to the History Center and watched a movie and then played on the little playground there before we drove back home.  Took the whole day of course.
• Boys had Field Day and had a lot of fun.
• Katsu and the older boys went to Brother's Keeper to feed the homeless and had a good experience.  Little boys were at a birthday party until Noah had a diaper blow out ...
• Had a picnic and all watched Seth's last soccer game together.
• Andrew received his Wolf Badge for Cub Scouts and about 6 or more different belt loops.  They said he must have been working hard - yes, but really it's just because they haven't given awards to him since December ...
• Andrew's class had a Wax Museum where they each dressed up as a different famous person they had been studying for that month.  When you pressed their button on the floor, they gave a memorized one minute speech about the person.  They also wrote up a report.  Andrew got Shinzo Abe.  Andrew picked out the asian people on the list, but Katsu was not so impressed since he does not like Abe's politics.  Andrew dragged his feet on actually doing the project, but he ended up dressing up well and gave a perfectly memorized speech (most of the other kids read their's).  He did great!
• Andrew had his big Math Masters Competition at ECU that he has been working towards all year.  At the beginning of the year, 3rd through 5th graders take a test and the best 6 from each grade get to participate and train all year.  I got a babysitter and went to watch.  They did an individual and group competition in the morning and then parents could come for lunch and to watch the best students compete on stage.  Andrew didn't win any awards, but he loved cheering on his teammates.  His school did great and had tons of team pride!  I can't wait for him to participate next year.
• Andrew started Battle of Books practice today.

Amanda - this has been a long month and a long semester.  We basically gave up on babysitters - they moved, or ran into our mailbox, or worked out really badly, or had sick family members, etc. etc.  The last straw was when we tried someone new and then their school was on lock down.  No matter who we got, it always ended badly,  So, the last month or so, Katsu just watched the boys when I needed to do office hours.  Next year, we have it set up so we won't need babysitters for the most part, so it will be much better.  Glad the semester is almost done - my students are taking their final right now.  I will be redeveloping the course over the summer, because it just didn't happen this semester (the books I ordered to review never arrived + no babysitters + sick kid), but I am ready for a break!  I have been really burnt out lately.  I really just need no kid time or just me and Katsu time but that seems almost impossible to get lately.  I don't have hardly any friends, so it's been pretty lonely here, but we did have 4 people at my book club yesterday (which is a lot, sadly), so maybe things will look up.

Katsu - he got a great score on one of his grants and a good score on another one.  So, he got a little bit of a break, but now is writing up another grant again.  He just had a tenure progress meeting which went well, kind of boring.  Lab seems to be going well, for the most part, although there is always some frustrations working with students who don't perform quite as well as you'd like.  He's always busy with bishopric stuff, but mostly just Sundays and Wed.  He has taken the boys by himself to church a couple times with Noah home sick.  He loves the garden and goes out to check it every evening and morning.  He has enjoyed harvesting and cooking all the greens and asparagus.  We had to get his green card renewal together and he has to go to Raleigh next week to get his fingerprints done.  Hopefully it will get renewed sooner than later, so we can renew his driver license and go visit Japan.

Noah - sick, sick, sick.  He has been a pretty good sport.  He has just been sick a lot this year with ear infections and wheezing.  When he got sick, he started nursing a lot more and now wants to nurse all the time.  Can not wait to wean him when he turns 2.  Every day, I talk about how he will have a party, we will go the mountains and celebrate his birthday and then when he comes home, he'll be all done with nursing.  He laughs and says No.  We'll see how that goes.

He has become obsessed with balls and sports.  He still likes his blanket, but what he really likes is his balls and they have become his security objects.  He took one home from a friends house and now he is firmly attached ... I hope they don't want it back.  His favorite are basketballs - he holds it all the time and points out every ball or hoop he sees.  He loves to look at any books with balls and hoops and read them over and over.  He loves to flip through Sports Illustrated and look at it all.  I swear, I spend half my day just saying "Yes, that's a ball".  "Yes, that's a hoop."  When he resists naps, which is often, I will take him on a walk till he falls asleep.  That takes forever, because he has to point out every single basketball hoop.  He also loves soccer balls and to a lesser extent baseballs and footballs.  I feel like he is saying less words, but that is probably just because half of his total words are related to balls.

He still like Thomas and trains and all characters.  He love super heros and pointing out Star Wars things as well.  Crazy boy!

He throws fits quite a bit.  He is quite a screamer when we wants to be.  He screams about half the time in the grocery store which makes shopping really pleasant.  He wants everything he sees, and in the grocery store, he wants to eat it all right then.  He is very picky about what cart he wants to be in at stores that have more than one.  He is just picky about everything and very vocal.  Definitely his favorite word is no.  Ranks right up there with ball.

When he isn't throwing fits, he is quite pleasant and loves to give hugs and kisses.  He loves to greet and say goodbye to people.  When we wakes up, he comes over and says "Hi hi".  Really cute.  Loves to sing which is also super cute.  He can kind of hum along with a melody.  He loves to rough house.  Loves to hide things.  Loves playing with his brothers.  Loves reading books.

Logan - pretty mellow month for Logan.  He is a bit on the emotional side for him, but he is definitely the most low energy child we have.  Still not getting anywhere with letters, so I am doing a trial of ABC mouse to see if that works for him.  He seems to learn in a different way than his brothers.  He loves it!  He loves getting tickets and doing his hamster cage and his fishbowl, but I am still not sure if he is learning his letters any better.  Maybe ... he is getting better at recognizing the letters from his name, anyways.  Good thing he is not starting kindergarten for another year, because he is not ready.

He loves sitting on my lap and reading and usually that is his favorite thing to do with me.  And he loves to eat.  That kid could eat every hour if he wanted to.  He liked soccer okay, mostly because Katsu was coaching.  I think he is more excited about doing T-ball again.  Not sure how I feel about whether he will like baseball based on our experience with Seth, though ...

Logan loves being swung lately and wants to swing all the time.  We took down Noah's swing because he hates swinging (although he will often want you to put up his swing because he is upset that I took it down).  So, Logan and Seth will swing and swing.  He is getting better about pumping himself, but still needs help.  He loves to water the plants and made me buy him a new watering can for him (the boys busted the other one ... how do they manage to break everything) and would love to water every day.  He loves to play with the neighbors and play outside.  

Sometimes, he will play with toys.  Mostly, he loves to find toys that need batteries and convince me to put batteries in them.  He is convinced that anything with screws is a receptacle for batteries.  I am trying to convince him otherwise.  He wants to learn the piano - I think he is too young, but when he gets the inkling, we will practice playing one of the songs from the primer.  I think we have gotten through two pages.

He mostly enjoys preschool and has fun with his friends.  He likes to bring things for show and tell.  He likes playing outside in the sand, playing tag,   He made a new friend the other day, which he was excited about.  They played with a parachute on Wed. in preschool and he really liked that.  They do a letter craft project every day.  Right now, they are making things for Mother's Day.

Logan was sick a little bit this month, too, with croup, I think.  And he seems just a little run down.  He took naps 3 days in a row, just falling asleep in random places, even the floor. 

Seth - anxious, high intensity little kid.  Still bored out of his mind - I took him and Andrew to church and he whined about being bored and how he was going to die for like 20 minutes till he feel asleep.  I think the family sitting behind us thought it was hilarious.  And once he woke up, even with only 5 minutes to go, he complained about being bored out of his mind.  When I'm not there, he doesn't complain, but his Primary teacher told me that he doesn't want to color and instead wants to write hard math problems on the back of his sheet during class.

He is still obsessed with screens.  He is very diligent and will always fulfill to the letter everything he needs to do to earn it.  But he tends to do things sloppily.  His homework will be slapdash.  If you ask him to put something away, more often than not, he will hide it somewhere.  I have found that setting standards works best.  I am working with him on his homework to make sure he has capitals, neat writing, punctuation, complete sentences.  He acts like I am killing him but it only takes a couple minutes extra.  If he knows the standards though, he will usually live up to them.

He loves the memrise app and is always trying to be the top in the world on the Leaderboard.  He has learned all his hiragana well and is starting to sound things out in Japanese books.  I want him to move on and learn something new, but it's tough because the other Japanese courses are really hard.  He also loves all kinds of math and problem solving websites.

I decided to leave out the art supplies and Seth will spend a lot of time making pictures that are usually pretty hilarious.  I will have to take pictures of some of them and post them.  It's nice to see him making art again and Noah has been good about not drawing except on paper.

Seth loves mostly playing outside and with friends and really does not like playing with toys. He still wants to be a professional soccer player when he grows up.  He told me his favorite sports are:  soccer, tennis, and swimming.  And baseball is not the sport for him.

He reads mostly in secret - loves comic books and books that are like comic books.  He also likes picture books.  I got this biography of athletes and what their lives were like when they were kids and he reads it over and over.  Maybe I should try more non-fiction.

He got his kite out this week for the first time and is loving it.

Andrew - he has been busy as you can see from what we did this month.  He will probably be involved in a lot next year at school, but he loves those kind of activities.  He also likes doing cub scouts, but doesn't always have a lot of follow through.  Generally, Andrew always gets everything done on time, whether it's piano practice or homework or Cub Scouts, but he does it only when he wants to.  He is often exasperating - always toeing the line - but is generally a good kid.  He is really into potty humor and rough housing.  He eats an enourmous amount.  At his Math Masters competition, he had two slices of pizza plus chocolate bar, air heads, brownies, pretzels, and all kinds of other candy.  He comes home and tells me that he had the smallest lunch ever and is dying and has to eat a can of soup right then.  I am sure this is normal, but our grocery bill has already climbed up, mostly from him (but also Logan and Noah are eating more, too).

Andrew has read a few of the Battle of the Books books for next year (Jake, Tale of Desperaux, Tuesdays at the Castle and Departure to Nowhere(?)) and has been reading a new series (the Inheritance series) that he really is enjoying.  It's on a 7th grade reading level, so he gets lots of AR points, which he likes.  This 9 weeks, he is actually trying to see how many points he can get instead of just quitting once he hits his goal.  School is going well - he did the wax museum and worked on researching and writing (finally!).

Andrew found a new friend in the neighborhood and has been spending a lot of time playing with him, which is great.  He still enjoys toys - making great big battles scenes, forts with toys or all of the blankets and laundry baskets and furniture.  He always has a plan and is rarely bored but always has some big grand thing.  He still is very quick to anger and is often hurting his brothers when provoked.  He is really into calling everyone babies which drives me crazy.  A big teasing age, but then, he will also spend a lot of time playing with his brother's.  No one quite like Andrew.