February 26

February 26:  I had the unusual pleasure of sitting "the tinies" this afternoon before picking Brendan up from school at 3:00. I had about an hour's worth of 1-on-1 with this darling baby girl ...

 Erin likes to play "nap time" including getting tucked in with a blanket, fake snoring, and the whole nine yards. Her naps are incredibly short (a blink of the eye) and then she is awake and smiling, wanting to do the whole routine over again ... and over again ... and let's do it ONE more time!

 Aidan was real-time napping and woke up rearing to go! I love this darling child so much.

 Dylan came home very soon after and Aidan declared he was "hung-a-ry" so Dylan fixed some nuggets for the babies.

 We sat together while they played with their food ...

 Erin is a really good eater at this stage in her little life. It's so enjoyable to watch her actually EAT food. Aidan will announce that he is hung-a-ry and then just kind of plays with food once it is all ready for him to eat it. Mustard helps, but not always.

 I snapped a picture of Aidan's little toes-ies because they are so cute. Erin decided to wear Aidan's banana shoes this afternoon. She is almost as tall as Aidan now ... but Aidan is super short.

I picked Brendan up from school at 3:00 and we headed over to my house for a brief visit. Brendan sat right down on my computer and connected himself to PBSkids before I could barely hang up our coats and say "hi" to Matey-Bird! He played a few games and was super intense about the entire thing ... it's difficult for me to "break through" when Brendan is this focused on a game. I decided to just let him play for a little while.

 Thankfully I had baked fresh banana bread this morning and I enticed Brendan away from technology to eat some bread and chocolate milk. I brought a book over to the table to share with him while he was snacking: "How Far Underground? Burrowing Animals" by Monika Davies - Illustrated by Komina Marti. We had started reading it last week, but ran out of time to finish it. Brendan loves books about animals and this one is super interesting and very well written and illustrated.

 We naturally played a great deal with Matey ...

 Brendan brought over a Harry Potter Chess Game to play. He said that he brought this for his dad long ago and his dad gave him permission to bring it today.

 We kind of played a very unorganized and completely odd game of chess until it was time to go!

We left my house early tonight because Brendan had a church activity to attend. I got to bring him for it and stay throughout. Very nice people over at Brendan's church. I watched the children make "Holy Bread" and watched them interact about that subject. Brendan has a lot of friends there, which is a happy thing--it was neat to watch him play with kids his own age--Brendan wasn't even the most over-active child there! It was a very good Wednesday and I am thankful for it!

February 24

Monday: So ... the littles were here again ... and I think I finally have "the hang" of having both of them here at once. It's pathetic of me, I know, but I LOVE having one-on-one time with little ones--and Aidan has been such a fun little person to spend time with. Having Erin here too, does change that dynamic rather drastically ... but it's worth it. SHE is worth it. 

 Look at our precious Aidan. He has a SHINER! Dylan said he kind of fell between the porta-crib and the wall and was "stuck" and his face bore the brunt evidently. He is still the cutest little person!

 Oh my word ... I love his little face, made all the cuter by this shiner.

 Little Erin was watching Matey eat his lettuce--we had put some out on the table for him to enjoy--and then ...

 Matey just hopped right on Erin's tray! Look at her little face watching him.

 She wasn't exactly sure what to do with him at first, but she got used to it pretty quickly.

 She enjoyed this whole interaction very much--I think Matey did too!

 We had a very nice few hours here at the Beach House. Matey dominated most of our play time, but we did build a nice train layout too, and Aidan played and played with it.

 Erin played trains too! I'm so glad I have these tracks and such a nice open space to build ... each week it's a little bit different, and the kiddos love to see it all come together.

Thankful for God's help this day. I have a sore throat and a yucky headache, but I asked the Lord for strength and He answered! I loved spending time with these two today!

February 23

Saturday night and Sunday:  Emma spent the night at the Beach House. We arrived a little after 8:00 and visited for awhile. Emma had her "Shrek" music with her and was checking some notes out that she is supposed to SING (a very HIGH "G") that we think is probably impossible to reach! It's always nice to sit and chat with Emma, though. I love to hear what she is thinking about. I'm glad she is involved in this theatre production--she really loves it.

We watched the movie, "The Case for Christ" which is the true story of how Lee Strobel came to faith in Jesus. It was really well done, I thought--better than most "Christian" productions. The acting was very good and the story line flowed quite well too. This was the second time I watched it this week and I learned so much about the suffering of Jesus from the research he did, beginning as an atheist trying to prove that Jesus never actually died on the cross, etc. Emma followed the movie closely too. I'm not certain what she thought of it exactly. I'm struggling to find decent movies for us to watch together. We really love laughing together, and we've seen a bunch of funny movies--but what if this is the last year I am alive? Don't I want to impact Emma, teach her all I can about the Lord? 

Sunday morning we worshiped together. Jesse met us at Calvary for the fourth week in a row! Dear Kaity went to Sunday School. Emma and I came home and ate a good lunch and then studied a little bit about the end of the kingdom of Israel and their exile. NOT a happy story--but from there, we are moving on to talk about King Hezekiah--one of my very favorite kings! It may take us more than one week to study his life and I am really looking forward to it.

February 22

Saturday:  Last Sunday, Kaity's class talked about the story of Nehemiah and rebuilding the walls of Jerusalem. I thought it might be FUN to expand on that story a little bit and set up a visual for us to re-enact the story.

 So I set up the royal throne in Persia and put the king on it (Artaxerxes)--and that's Nehemiah, the king's cupbearer, holding up the royal cup of wine at the bottom of the golden stairway to the throne.

 And over here are the king's royal stables and horses ...

 And THIS is the ruined city of Jerusalem! Kaity was immensely UNenthused with my efforts. She really was not at all interested in "rebuilding" the walls of Jerusalem and actually was super glad when we had finished the story (!!!) and she could knock the entire thing D-O-W-N! Sigh. I just thought it might be good to go over the story again and talk about all of the cool parts--because Nehemiah is SUCH a good story!

 Kaity tolerated our rebuilt Jerusalem only long enough for me to snap a few pictures, and then she became a mighty enemy and completely destroyed the city (not pictured). I tried, and I think I succeeded in not showing too much disappointment in our failed story time. I even had printed out some nice pictures of the story for us to color, but Kaity was NOT going to have any part of that, no m'am!

 We did play with Matey throughout our afternoon, but Kaity was frustrated with him too! For some reason, Matey would NOT let Kaity pick him up or come to sit on her finger--only when she pretended to be a BIRD, would he come and give her kisses.

 We did get out the foosball game and played one entire game--which Kaity WON, but then she was finished with that! I silently prayed and asked God what to do with our next TWO hours, and then I remembered (thank you, Lord) that when Kaity is "out of sorts" she really likes physical activity. I went to our ping-pong bin, got out one of our colorful balls and paddles and began hitting the ball around the house a little bit. It did not take long for Kaity to want to get HER paddle out as well. She announced that we would NOT use a table today (she can be a little bit bossy) and we would instead just bounce the ball back and forth between us--which, believe it or not, we did for the next hour.

We pretty much limited ourselves to the hallway by my laundry stuff, but we had such a lot of fun. Kaity snapped out of her "mood" and laughed and played more like herself. I need to remember how different each little child can be! Kaity, dear Kaity, is PHYSICAL. I am so looking forward to being able to explore playgrounds again when the weather breaks and it is no longer so cold. 

February 21

Friday: Isn't our budgie bird SO cute? We tell him that constantly. "Matey! You are SO cute!" I hope he doesn't get conceited about it.

 Here he is last night, using my reading glasses for a perch. He could see his reflection in my lenses. Any time he can see his reflection is a GOOD thing. He immediately falls in love with the "other" bird and that's it ... he's obsessed. He has claimed each and every mirror in this house and has all kinds of "friends" in any room he roams.

 Just thought I'd post these darling pictures of him ...

 He reall IS super cute!

 He DOES have his moments, however, where he is a real nuisance. Such as ... when I am using my computer keyboard and he will not move his body OFF! And then when I try to type, he bites my fingers--the nerve! I told him NOT to bite the hands that feed him, but so far, he does not heed ...

 Here he is cleaning my fosset ...

 And here he is posing for a picture ... he's a real ham. I love you, Matey!