Cute pictures for a sick family

We are sick ... boy what a couple of weeks. First Katsu got sick. Like 103 fever flu that went on for a week. Andrew succumbed last Thursday and Seth on Friday. Katsu started feeling a bit better and then Logan got it. Then, Katsu got the fever again on Sunday. Secondary infection, perhaps - no, in fact, it was the flu AGAIN. And after a few days of coughing, I finally got the fever yesterday. And not thinking took Sudafed for a couple of days before it finally occurred to me that it was reducing my milk supply, making Logan even more unhappy. And the flu seems to have brought on a pretty bad case of eczema for Logan that is just weeping everywhere and he won't stop scratching ... and of course, it took me a while to figure out what that was. But somewhere in the middle of all that, I got Logan's portraits taken (pre-eczema). And after missing 8 days of work and his boss even calling in very concerned, Katsu was finally back at work today (of course, leaving flu-y me with 3 kids in different combinations of sickness/wellness. And yes, with the exception of Logan, we all had flu shots this year. Oh, yes, and when I took Logan to the doctor (conveniently right after his fever broke, and thus was a pointless $25 visit), he weighed 22 lbs, meaning we have to switch his car seat like right now. Yes, he is only 4 months. Big boy.

So, enjoy the pictures.

Andrew is 4 years 10 months old!

Andrew has been a little melodramatic/sullen this month.  His new favorite thing to say “Nothing is going right in my life”.  I have been working to help him identify the good stuff that goes on, but he gets really focused on the bad stuff – basically, anything that isn’t exactly as he wants it.  He tends to throw a tantrum (i.e., run off), but is back pretty quickly or gets distracted in something else.

Andrew is SO sweet to Logan.  He takes care of him and talks to him several times during the day … like for 10 minutes or more.  He will bring him toys, talk to him, sing him songs, give him hugs and kisses, and even try to teach him to roll over (he likes to roll him over, too, but that makes me nervous).  He is a good big brother to Seth, too, when they aren’t fighting and he is trying really hard to choose the right and not get mad at him.  He will kiss Seth at night very sweetly.

He is really into building.  He builds very elaborate “cars” with his trio sets, but honestly they are more like buildings on wheels.  He also is really into the Lincoln Logs, as well.  He builds big buildings.  Guns built out of Trio or Lincoln Logs are very popular.

He is still really really into drawing and writing.  His drawings are starting to get a lot better with recognizable people and pictures.  He made a whole book for his friend’s birthday party this week.  He is really getting into spelling and probably spends like an hour a day spelling words on a page.  He LOVES it.  He has some creative spelling (Hphy Bhwrstdy – or something like that for Happy birthday).  But I am glad he is really working on the sounds.  He always runs out of room and writes words starting on the next line but he lines the letters up very nicely.

We had a parent teacher conference this month and he is really doing well at everything.  His teachers said he has made great strides and surely will before kindergarten starts as well.  He has improved with social skills (though he still has a hard time negotiating and talks to the teacher about situations a lot) and is playing with the boys now.  It is tricky since they said he is a gentle soul and there really aren’t any other boys like that in his class.  Hopefully in kindergarten.

We also went to a meeting about kindergarten next year and I told Andrew about it.  He is SUPER excited and can’t wait.  He says it is everything he likes to do, which is pretty much true.  Seeing that he spends hours upon hours drawing and writing and reading everyday, I think he will love it.

Andrew really loves nature and science.  He absorbs everything the preschool’s nature lady tells him and loves to tell us all about nature.  Everytime we go to the library, he loves to get books about animals and nature (non-fiction) and also movies about animals.

Andrew has gotten really skinny – I feel like he is mostly skin and bones, now.  I was a little concerned when I weighed him this month (to see if he’d outgrown his car seat harness) and he was only 35 lbs – if anything he has lost weight since he turned 4.  But he eats quite a bit.  At the birthday party Andrew went to, the hostess said he ate a ton!  She was shocked.  So, I guess it’s not from underfeeding.  Maybe Logan will be skinny one day … ha ha ha.

Andrew is convinced he doesn’t sleep at night and tells us about it all the time.  He says he only takes a couple naps, but most of the time he is awake and he comes out of his room and does chores.  I wish!

Fun Things Andrew Did This Month:

• Watching airplanes at the airport when we took Katsu there.  Andrew sure missed his dad while he was gone.
• Valentine’s Day – Katsu was gone, but we started the day with a box of chocolates each, we had heart-shaped sandwiches for lunch, and had fun looking through Andrew’s valentines.  Andrew spent a lot of time writing out each of his classmates names and putting heart stickers on his Cars valentines for each of the girls.  He was so excited to go to Valentine’s party at school this year – he was sick a few days that week, but I made sure he got to go to his party.
• Magic House – Andrew loves to climb up the tree they have there and the slide.
• Jambalaya for Mardi Gras.
• Making cheese, yogurt, and treats with Mom.
• We made lots of dumplings this month – twice when friends cancelled so we did it at home, and then we finally got to do it with our friends.  This is pretty exciting for Andrew since he loves dumplings!
• Another movie night at the History Museum – Horton Hears a Who.
• A science themed birthday party.  Andrew was so excited to tell us about the experiments, but especially about the rockets.  He thought the goo was the best thing ever and played with it for like an hour at home.
• We tried out letterboxing – you follow a set of clues online to find a “treasure” – a box with a little log that you stamp and also a stamp for you to stamp your book.  We found our first one in Rocket park.  Andrew was fascinated and told everyone he met that we went treasure hunting, including the family going by when we found it.  They had a pet snake with them that they were eager to show us.  It was an adventure.
• We went out to eat at Fitz and Andrew had his first root beer float while we watched them bottling root beer.  It was pretty cool!

Logan 4 month Stats

Weight: 20 lbs 12 oz – > 98%

Length: 26.25 in – 85%

Head circumference – 43 cm – 90%

Cute as ever.

Logan is 4 months old!

I can’t believe he is already so old.  I know I say that every month, but his life is just speeding by.

Logan is enormous.  I will update with his stats when he goes to the doctor on Monday, but last time I weighed him he was 20 lbs!  He is so chubby, just rolls and folds everywhere.  You can barely see his wrists and ankles, it seems like.  He is pretty long, too, I think, though, because he isn’t as chubby as I would expect based on his huge weight.  He just keeps growing and growing and growing.  I put out all the 6-9 month and 9-12 month clothing and just use whatever fits.  I swear, most of the 6-9 month stuff seems too tight on the arms as soon as I brought it out and some of them seem too short, too.  He wears size 3 diapers but they leak quite often – I am hoping to finish them up soon and put him in size 4, where I hope he will stay for a long time.

Logan got his first hair cut this month with the clippers.  Mostly in the back and along the ears because it was getting seriously long.  He didn’t mind too much.  I was worried the first day because his trademark sticky-uppy hair was gone, but after a day it was back.  Yay!  I just think it is so cute.

Logan has had a tough month of sleep.  The first couple weeks were great – he was consistently doing 7-3 or 7-5 every night.  I was completely spoiled!  But then, he started to break out of swaddles and now he detests swaddling because he wants to suck his hand, so we have been trying to rework his sleep.  I try to get him to go to sleep on his own in the night sometimes, but he is not ready for that, yet, most of the time.  Last night was better and he at least slept from 11-5:30 without waking up so hopefully he is getting used to the non-swaddling.  He prefers to nurse or be rocked in our arms to sleep, but he goes to sleep much easier than Andrew did.  And if he’s tired enough, he can sometimes go to sleep on his own.

As I said, he is now a thumb sucker.  He is sucking on his thumbs quite a bit, but not quite vigourously enough to be self-soothing.  But I bet he will get there.  It is pretty cute and I am hoping he will self-soothe better than the other boys because of it.

Logan is working on rolling and sitting up.  He did roll from tummy to back completely on his own this week, but we’ll see if he really has that skill.  I can tell he tries to do it, though and I can see him working on trying to rock on his arms.  But when we are trying to get him to roll or rolling over, he is much more content on tummy-time.  He will tolerate it for a lot longer now and we do it a lot during the day.  He also likes to sit in my lap or between my legs on the floor.  He is also starting to sit up in a high chair.  when I prop him up on the couch, he uses his muscles to pull himself forward into more of a sitting position but then falls over.  He is gripping things pretty well and is starting to grab for toys if they are sitting in front of him.  He gets really excited to sit on his activity mat and grab the toys and will kick his legs.

I can tell that he is starting to be very attached to me.  He loves Katsu and is excited when he is home, but he really loves me.  He will watch me wherever I am and stare and wait until I come back.  I am worried he will get separation anxiety young like Andrew – twice this week he burst into tears when a stranger was talking to him.

Logan is still nursing about every 3 hours during the day.  I think he is starting to show some interest in food – he even seemed to like the rice we fed him on his 100-day Japanese feast.  I might start him on solids earlier than the other boys.

He is a huge cat napper, but the last few days he has taken a consistent 1+ hour in the morning and maybe one other nap that is over 45 minutes, so I am hoping his naps with consolidate a little bit.  He generally wakes up around 7 and goes to bed around 6:30-7 at night.

Logan loves to talk and have conversations.  He loves to laugh, especially when you are laughing and he will laugh along with you.  He smiles whenever you pay attention to him.  He also loves being kissed and will give kisses back (mostly to me).  I love it!  He opens his mouth wide and then lunges forward to your cheek or lips.  So cute!

Logan enjoys going outside and gets excited about being in his stroller and loves looking around.  He generally has fallen asleep by the time we get to the park.  He likes being in a sling outside as long as he is facing forward, but he still probably prefers being held.  He likes to be held facing outwards.  He likes standing in my lap and also likes laying on my legs when I am on my back.  He loves doing the rhyme “The Grand Old Duke of York” and is so smiley and happy whenever we do it.  He is starting to sit still through me reading stories to the other kids – for maybe 10-15 minutes or so.

Fun Things This Month:

• Lots of days at the park.  It has been such a mild winter.  Logan even enjoys the baby swing most days.
• Celebrating his 100 days old.  We took video instead of still photos, so we will have to post it sometime.  We actually did it closer to 110 days since Katsu was out of town.  Logan really seemed to actually enjoy the food, much more so than the other boys.
• Outings with the boys – to the zoo, the history museum, play dates, the library.
• His first baby story time.  He seemed pretty interested in the songs and books for such a little guy.  We will have to do it again.

Amanda is 29.5 years old!

I guess I missed my half birthday and didn’t even think about it.  Oh, well.  I feel like the last few weeks have been kind of a brain fog since Logan hasn’t been sleeping as well.  Katsu lets me sleep in pretty much every morning so I get enough hours almost every day but the breaks are hard for me.  I also gets tons of insomnia in the night if I wake up, so that doesn’t help.  I am just a bad sleeper – probably the worst in the house!

Well, I totally jumped off the healthy eating bandwagon this month, but I think I will try it again next month.  I did pretty good for a couple weeks with working out, but not so well this week.  I need to get back to working out in the morning – it really makes the rest of my day feel SO much better.

I got a new calling – YW secretary.  Initially I have been pretty excited because I have always wanted to serve in YW and never have.  I think I can easily do the secretary stuff and it will be fun to get to know the girls.  I am not so sure about activity every week and a presidency meeting every week in the evening – that takes two whole evenings where I will basically get 0 time with Katsu and I am not excited about that at all.  Maybe we’ll be so super efficient we won’t need a meeting every week!

I didn’t try too many new recipes this month.  But, I am back into the cheese making – Katsu bought me some new rennet and spices for Valentine’s Day and so we tried our hand at mozzarella – did not work at all, so we ended up making it into ricotta and having lasagna (which the boys wouldn’t eat – they never want to eat anything … I swear, we could beans and rice for dinner every night and the boys would be in heaven).  I tried again and I got curds using powdered milk, but the flavor and texture were blech.  On the other hand, I finally broke out the yogurt maker I bought and have been making yogurt all month and with powdered milk it still seems to turn out well.  I am really enjoying making yogurt and Seth loves eating it out of the little cups since we usually get the big containers.  Andrew is not impressed.  I am excited to try it out with Logan, too.  I am also day dreaming about making hard cheeses with a press once we have a house.  Something to save my fun cash for (yes, Katsu and I get an allowance every month).

We finally got Katsu’s raise this month (yay!) and also with the tax return, it is super exciting to be able to add to our house payment savings account.  Our goal is 20% down plus closing costs (but I would love to put even more down … though that is unlikely).  Let’s hope we ultimately move somewhere not too expensive (i.e., East Coast or California) because I am super pumped to buy a house.  Surprisingly, I have not been spending every spare minute looking at houses in Madison, even though Katsu interviewed there this month (like I did when he interviewed in NC).  I don’t really know if we will move there.  I guess I have other things to occupy my time.

I haven’t been to much into reading books and have been wasting my time reading blogs when I’ve been nursing.  But books I’ve read or skimmed this month:  Bringing up Bebe – not too impressed with this book – I found some of the ideas about parenting from the French interesting, but the lady seemed way too pessimistic about American parenting and seemed to much idealize the French.  Also, it seems like the French don’t actually spend too much time with their children and delegate their child-rearing to others.  I did like the idea of the cadre, however, and also some of the food stuff and would like to implement.  I am trying to get the kids to like the idea of a vegetable course first … hmmm.  You Believers – I read about 75 pages of this book and then decided it wasn’t worth my time.  Peas and Thank You  - hoping for veggies recipes the kids would like, but was none too impressed with the carb heavy, fake soy stuff.  Yuck.  I am interested in vegetable-dishes not just vegetarian pretend meat dishes.  It probably had some good stuff, but the lady looked a little too Utah-mormony and kind of scary to me.  Hard to explain.  The Sibling Effect – still reading, just okay, we’ll see how much more I read.  Reassuring to read that kids ages 2-4 generally fight every 9.6 minutes – I think ours is less than that, but at least I am not the only one who feels like she is referring all day long.  Eat to Live – somewhere recommended this diet book, but sorry, I think I would die on this plan and the weight recommendations are scary thin, in my opinion.  They recommend a weight that when I was at as a teenager people though I had become anorexic.  No thanks.  Making fine cheeses – a fantasy book for me, but oh, a girl can dream, right.  How Eskimos keep their babies warm – the book was okay.  Not greatly written, and I have to admit, I am getting a bit tired of this new parenting genre book, but I thought some of things were interesting.  I still don’t understand how Argentinan babies stay up so late.  Attachments – this was kind of a fun chick lit book.  A little fluffy, but a little fun.  Reminds me of You’ve Got Mail.  The Reading Promise – This looked promising but I couldn’t get past the first couple chapters.  I just found it boring and unremarkable – or at least not as remarkable as they think.  However, I do love the idea of reading to children all the way through high school.  I would love to make that happen.  Hmmm … just thinking about that makes me want to try the book again.  I just didn’t like the style.  Sigh.  Stiff – okay, I was so excited about the premise.  I have always wanted to donate my body to science and found the beginning interesting.  But the author was somewhat crude and just way too … casual … unprofessional … gross?  I mean, obviously a book about cadavers has to be a bit of that, but this was still further than I expected.  She just seemed immature to me.  I am not even sure if I finished the last chapter or so.  Raising Cain – I didn’t get to finish this book because I had to take it back to the library before I was done.  I found it quite interesting and it made me really think about how important it is to connect to boys and their inner thoughts and not just blow it off.  This is kind of hard for me because Andrew is SOO verbose and always going on and on about his feelings, but it is really important to not shut that off.  I should pick this up again sometime, maybe when he is a bit older.  Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet – I really really enjoyed this book.  Maybe it was the Japanese aspect.  Maybe it was the easy-to-read-but-enjoyable fiction.  Or just the thinking about family relationships, about heart and soul.  But I really liked it.  Highly recommend.  Boys Should Be Boys – a bit similar to raising cain, but I liked it.  Not too much to say. 

Seth is 2 years 8 months old!

Seth is another month older.  What to report.  Well, this month seems like it has gotten a lot smoother than last.  Seth is sweeter to Logan and enjoys holding him, talking to him, getting toys out for him, and playing with him.  Sometimes, he even shows his stories.  He likes telling Logan how much he loves him.  So sweet.

Also, potty training is big.  Seth is doing pretty well.  He is dry most days, though some days he has more trouble than others.  He no longer wants to use little potty or even the insert that goes on the toilet.  He has to be a big boy, just like us.  Whenever he has an accident, he strips himself and puts on new underwear all by himself.  I’m lucky if he even tells me.  Or as often as not, he just runs around without anything on bottom.  I think he was actually like that when the UPS guy came by this week.  Whoops.

And Seth isn’t quite done with naps.  He still takes one or two a week.  But it is starting to affect his night time sleep, so I’m not sure.  We’ll see.

Seth has started running around and running off everywhere.  It’s like he’s little again.  One minute he is with you and the next he is off.  I can not keep up with him.  He even ran across the street this month without me along and it scared me half to death.  I’m going to have to keep a tighter leash on him (metaphorically, of course).

Seth is the most well-behaved kid in nursery, according to his teachers (or at least so Katsu says).  He loves nursery and tells me when he sees nursery kids that they “go to his school”.  He is very excited to go to Andrew’s preschool next year.

Seth is a little violent boy.  He is always beating up on Andrew.  Time outs have been pretty ineffective on him, and we have been focusing more on “cool down” times and natural consequences.  But boy, that boys loves to throw and hit!  Only to Andrew, though, thank heavens.

Seth has also been throwing some tantrums lately.  The other day, I was near the Nature Center, so I drove him there, but he thought we were going to the Science Center and threw a HUGE fit.  HUGE.  HUGE!  We ended up just leaving and he slept in the car.  He also threw a huge fit today because he wouldn’t pick up, but I think he was just feeling kind of sick, too, and he ended up falling asleep on the couch without eating dinner.

The most likely way to see Seth – sitting at the bookshelf with a pile of books surrounding him, looking through picture books.  He loves book.

Fun Things Seth Did This Month

• Another movie at the History Museum – This time it was Dinosaur.  We tried to get the kids to look around the museum, too, but Seth just kept running away from us.
• Lots of days at the park – it has been a super mild winter, so we try to take advantage of every good day and walk over to the park in the double stroller.
• Celebrating Setsubun and throwing jelly beans at goblin Daddy.  Seth thought this was fascinating and fun.
• Watching the Super Bowl with Daddy and eating leftover jelly beans.  Seth loves to watch sports with Katsu and always asks if there is football or baseball or something on the TV.
• Voting with Mom.
• Watching a really awesome Anansi puppet show at the library.  Seth loved sitting next to Andrew the whole time and watching the show and laughing his head off.
• Watching airplanes at the airport when we took Katsu there.  Seth sure missed his dad while he was gone.
• Valentine’s Day – Katsu was gone, but we started the day with a box of chocolates each (Seth was SO excited for weeks before for the chocolate), we had heart-shaped sandwiches for lunch, and had fun looking through Andrew’s valentines.
• Magic House – poor Seth – his very favorite part is the giant slide that he goes down with Andrew.  This time, the guy at the top asked for his age and Seth said 2.5 and he wasn’t allowed to go.  He was crying the whole way down the stairs and was heartbroken.  The poor boy.  I think he had fun with the rest of the night, though.
• Jambalaya for Mardi Gras.
• Making cheese with Mom.
• Baby story time at the library.  Seth is a little old, but he still enjoys it.

Funny Things Seth has Said:

Seth to Andrew:  Do you love me?  Am I your friend?

Andrew:  Well, you're not my friend right now, but almost.  You will be my friend this week.  You will be my friend on Valentine's Day.

Seth:  Well, do you love me a little?

Andrew:  You will be my friend soon.

Andrew is 4 years, 9 months old

Pictures:

Monthly Update:

Oh, it has been a hard month – well, more like a hard week for Andrew, poor guy.  The girls at preschool decided they don’t really want Andrew to be part of their group and it also sounds like they are having all-girl playdates and he is heartbroken.  I feel so bad for him.  He keeps telling me how they are so mean (and then Seth chimes right in … I was mortified when we saw one of the mom’s and Seth said that her daughter was mean).  And he keeps telling me how he has no idea who he is going to marry, even though I reassure him that he has plenty of time.

Otherwise, I think we’ve all adjusted to having Logan around, Andrew included.  His stomach aches are gone (I think having a bagel on the way to preschool every morning helps, too).  And we are at least getting some one-on-one time every day (or at least I am trying).  He even is starting to internalize how far he needs to be away from Logan so he isn’t right up in his face.  He has had a little frustration when I am spending lots of time feeding Logan and has hit Logan a couple times (but really gently), but overall, I think he is just an adoring big brother.

Andrew’s writing and spelling keep getting better.  He can usually identify beginning and ending sounds of words.  He is very creative at finding words to put in his letter bags, like he though he could put a “cube” in his Q bag.  How cute.  He is working so hard at his writing and is learning how to hold a pencil properly.  He addressed all his valentines himself (and could read all the names from his class list himself, too) and they are mostly legible.

Andrew has really gotten more creative at building with his Trio blocks, blocks, and Lincoln logs.  He makes this elaborate cars and structures and is peeved whenever anyone messes with them.  No matter what he builds, it is almost always used to play bad and good cars, roughly based on the movie Cars 2.

Andrew has his annual assessment through the school district.  He is doing quite well, but a little below average on some gross motor skills (like hopping on one foot) and also on replicating block towers.  He is above average in verbal abilities (no surprise there).  I do notice he still doesn’t say the sound “u” like in “use” right.  I think he is starting to get excited about going to Kindergarten.  As soon as our plans for next year are a little more firmed up, we will register him.

We love Andrew!

Fun Things He Did:

• Movies at the history museum – we saw Ice Age 3 and Dinosaur.  Andrew LOVES all the snacks they provide and seemed to enjoy both movies.  Free and with snacks – even better than the theater.
• We went to a Chinese new year party that someone in our stake threw for this group of people that meet for Chinese Sunday School.  Somehow, we always get invited along and we’ve been a couple times.  Anyways, after getting pretty lost going there, we made it.  The boys had a blast.  The adults all made loads of dumplings together and then we ate lots and lots of Chinese food.  Then, they had a presentation about the Chinese new year and the host had made a Chinese dragon out of paper which all the kids held up with sticks and ran around and around the house.  It was pretty fun!  Andrew was the smallest one running around with it and he had to reach pretty high, but he loved it.
• On Martin Luther King Day, Katsu took the day off and we went to go look for Bald Eagles near the Confluence where the Missouri and Mississippi rivers meet (about 20 mins from our house).  Andrew tired of hiking pretty quickly, but seemed to have fun.  We first went to Chain of Rocks bridge and walked part way before they closed it.  Then, we went hiking around the Confluence and had a picnic lunch there (the weather was lovely!) and then we went to West Alton to the Audubon center.  Andrew and Katsu finally spotted a real bald eagle using their binoculars.  Then, we went out for dinner at Dickey’s BBQ.  They even have free ice cream cones.  A beautiful January day.
• Making snow man and having a snow ball fight with Katsu.
• Lots of days at the park.  It has been a super mild winter.
• Donuts with Dad at preschool.  Katsu went to preschool with Andrew and they dined on donut holes and did a presentation.  Andrew always has a lot of fun on those days.
• Having our friend George from Ann Arbor and his wife over.  Andrew’s favorite old babysitter.
• Celebrating Setsubun by throwing beans at daddy-goblin.
• Watching the Super Bowl with Dad and having lots of yummy snacks and leftover jellybeans.
• Voting with Mom.
• Watching a really awesome Anansi puppet show at the library.  Andrew was laughing his head off during one part of it.

Funny Things He Said:

Today:  A: “I think I need to start shaving now.”  Mom:  “You are not old enough.”  A: “But my beard is growing.”

Setsubun & Cute Logan

We celebrated Setsubun on Saturday.  This is a Japanese holiday where you scare away some winter goblin – okay, Katsu just corrected me and says that you scare away the goblin to get rid of unhappiness, or something.  Anyways, you throw beans at him.  This year, we decided to make it a more fun holiday by throwing jelly beans at him.  The kids loved it and were not fooled – they knew it was Katsu.  But it was still fun.

On Sunday, we watched the Super Bowl and had lots of snacks, which the boys loved.  They only watched the first half.  This morning, Andrew asked me how many touchdowns or “underdowns” there were.  So cute.

And here in the really cute one in the house.  Logan.

Family Home Evening

We’ve been having a lot of fun with family home evening lately.  We’ve been teaching the boys the Old Testament.  At first, we were relying a lot on the new Old Testament Visual Resource DVD the church put out, but I’ve expanded a lot and found SO much material from different churchs’ Sunday School classes.  I thought I would share some fun lessons we have done.

Baby Moses

Read book from library “Miriam and her brother Moses: a bible story”. 

Craft – we weaved paper strips together (or at least that was the idea) and made baskets and then glued a baby moses in the basket.

Moses and the Burning Bush

Story from http://www.dltk-bible.com/exodus/moses_the_shepherd-cv.htm

Puppet show (an application of how God calls us to do different things and he will help us do it) http://www.dltk-bible.com/exodus/moses_the_shepherd-cv.htm

Craft – painting burning bushes

Ten Plagues and Parting of Red Sea

This lesson was so fun.  For the story, we read “The Miracles of Passover” by Josh Hanft from the library.  The kids still want to hear the story every day.  For each of the plagues we had a little activity.

1 – turned water into blood (red Kool-aid)

2 – had frogs hop around and in our clothes

3 – threw bugs at the kids

4 – had toy wild animals attack us

5 – had play animals fall over dead

6 – drew boils on our bodies with washable markers

7 – threw hail at each other (giant marshmallows work perfect and even hurt some)

8 – threw bugs at each other again

9 – went into the dark bathroom without the lights on

10 – nothing for this one.

Song – plague song from here http://www.kidssundayschool.com/Gradeschool/Songs/1song01.php and listened to the classic “Let My People Go”

We also watched part of the video Prince of Egypt where the plagues are

Then for a treat we had red jello and recreated the miracle of the water parting (see here http://www.dltk-bible.com/recipes/moses_crossing_the_red_sea_snack.htm).

Manna

Tomorrow, we are talking about wandering in the wilderness, water coming out of the rock, and manna.  I am excited.

First, we will read from the library “Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs” and then we will talk about manna (based somewhat on this: http://ministry-to-children.com/not-meatballs-but-manna/)

I like the idea of active participation, but like the way they tell the story better in here http://www.missionarlington.org/d/OT-2YR-27-Manna.pdf

If I can keep their attention (or maybe later in the week, I’ll tell it), I found this story from the friend really interesting: http://www.lds.org/friend/2007/07/manna-for-mother?lang=eng&query=manna

And I think our snack will be a snacky-kind of dinner (it is the Super bowl after all) found all over our floor that we will need to gather and then we will have  picnic.  And maybe make manna cookies … I don’t know.

And for the Ten commandments, we already got the book “Ten Good Rules” from the library which I really like and the kids already like.

Logan is 3 months old!

Logan is still getting bigger but I can not believe that he is 3 months already.  On the other hand, this kid is HUGE – I took him to the doctor on Friday (he has a lump on his bum that he’s had since December that is just not getting better) and he weighs 18 lbs!!!  He hit it a whole month earlier than chubby Andrew.  He is starting to outgrow 3-6 month clothes and will probably grow out of size 3 diapers soon.  Big boy.  I swear, his head looks the same size as Seth!  And his hair is really long … like an inch past his neck.  Yikes – he needs a haircut.  His head is flat, but at least it is symmetrical, but I am hoping we can avoid a helmet, though our doctor already told us she could give us a recommendation (sigh).

Logan is going through a bit of a growth spurt the last day or two and is eating a lot more frequently, but he was settling into a 3 hour or so stretch at a time.  He is still a pretty good nurser.  At night, he usually wakes up at 3ish and 6ish to eat and sleeps roughly 7ish to 8ish.  So, pretty good, I think.  He has slept till 5 a few days, but I think 7-3 is probably best for his age anyways.  He sleeps in his crib pretty well and still likes being swaddled, though he pokes his hand out so he can chew on it, though he is figuring out how to suck him thumb, too.  I think he might be a thumb sucker.  He is getting closer to a nap routine, usually a nap in the am while Andrew is at preschool, another in the afternoon and then a catnap early evening before dinner.  But, especially with running errands or going to the park and driving to preschool he is a little erratic.  He still takes some naps in his car seat or in the stroller, but I would prefer to do it all in the crib, if only the schedule were a little better.

Logan is getting very smiley and very chatty.  He loves to coo and have little conversations.  His face lights up and smiles tons with me and Katsu.  It was so sad – he had a bad cold this last week or so.  He was coughing, sneezing, nose running, and he wouldn’t even smile.  It was so sad.  But he is smiling again now.  I can start to tell that he really prefers me and he gets excited when he sees me or Katsu or the kids.  He really lights up for Andrew, especially, because Andrew loves to spend time and talk to him.

Logan has pretty good head control.  He loves to kick his legs and try to support his body on his legs.  He also likes to sit on my lap and practice sitting a little bit.  He hates tummy time, but he is getting good about pushing up a bit on his arms and looking around.  He’ll do it for a few minutes, but then he gets upset and crying and will just lay with his face down and suck on his hand.  I am trying to teach him to roll over, because at least it makes him tolerate tummy time a little bit better.

Logan can track really well and loves to watch the fish on his mobile on the swing.  He’s not a huge fan of the swinging, itself, but loves to sit and watch the fish.  When they stop moving, he cries, because he is sad.  Logan also likes to try and grab and kick things when he is in his baby gym.  He loves to do this and is pretty happy doing this for quite a while while we cook dinner.

It has been beautiful weather here (especially for January) and we’ve been able to spend some nice time outside – and Logan seems to enjoy spending time in the double stroller going to the park.

Fun Things This Month:

- Zoo and science center.  Movie at the history museum (the highlight for Logan, of course, was nursing in the bathroom).

- Chinese new year celebration.  It was a little intense for Logan because it was very loud.  I had him in a sling and he fell asleep for a while, but I think the paper dragon that all the kids and adults were running around the house was just a little too loud and he woke up, poor thing.

- Hiking on Martin Luther King Day on the old Chain of Rocks bridge and then at the confluence of the Missouri and Mississippi rivers.  Logan slept a lot, but it was nice to get out and get some fresh air.  He missed seeing the bald eagles because he was sleeping, but somehow I don’t think he would have seen it anyway.