January 24 with Cal

Friday: Whatever "bug" attacked me about 9 days ago has stubbornly held onto my system--I am better than I WAS ... but that's not saying much. I was truly hoping young Cal would be in a subdued mood today (a rare thing), and I asked the Lord to give me the strength I would need--and Cal was just about as laid back as I have ever seen him be! We stayed in my "dining room" almost the entire three hours he was here with me. We watched birds. We watched the squirrels! We played with magnets. We built castles! We laughed and played ... all while keeping a close eye on the bird activity outside. It was so much fun.

I will say this about Cal--he is interested in almost EVERYTHING. He loves books (my kind of guy)! He loves toys! He has a great sense of humor! Jeeps! What's NOT to like?

We kept trying to "catch" a bird inside my window feeder and snap it's picture; but they were too quick for us every single time! 

We also talked about dinosaurs and got a box of dinosaur cards out to play with. On one side of the card there is a picture of ONE dinosaur; but when you flip the card over, it becomes part of a giant dinosaur puzzle. Cal was very intrigued by this and was determined to put it all together.

We moved all of our cards to the floor where there was more room to assemble them.

Mr. Cal was super pleased when we had accomplished our goal. He loves dinosaurs.

I took out the MagniCubes and started playing with them and Cal took right over. We had built a dragon a few weeks ago, but Cal announced that TODAY we were building a castle.

It's very cool to watch this little one's brain at work. He sizes the whole project up in his head and then he goes at it with all of his heart.

Look how proud he is of his castle! Such a cutie.

I also have a set of tiny magnets (100 of them) that are very strong magnets. Cal told me I had to go into another room and hide my face so that he could add these 100 magnets to his castle as a surprise. Okay, then.

See the little round magnets Cal added to his castle? He was so pleased!

Cal fell asleep on the ride over to his house, but he woke up and was completely re-charged.

We played and waited for the other kids to come home from school. Brendan is always the first one home, since he is in Middle School.

Aidan and Erin get off their bus by about 4:10. These guys were all SO HUNGRY today! I usually bring fresh cantaloupe or strawberries or something healthy for them to eat; but this is not a good time of year in Michigan to find fresh fruit that is actually eatable. SO ... I brought Rice Krispie treats instead. Erin and I played a few games of "Sleeping Queens", and the folks came home at about 6:00 with yummy baked chicken for us to enjoy.

Back home at my house, I caught this sneaky squirrel eating all of the peanuts in my window feeder. We're friends, so it's okay. I talk to him while he looks intently at my face the whole time. I'd like to pet him sometime; maybe in the spring.