February 27 Stuff

Thursday:  It's been a quiet week around here! I did get to pick Cal up from school Tuesday afternoon and bring him back to his house. It was fun to see this little guy mid-week and laugh with him for awhile.

In the last few weeks, I've been trying to get a few new games to play with these kiddos. They are good at games and they really like to play. I asked a few weeks ago if any of them had ever played a game of checkers; and they hadn't--not one of them! I went online (via Amazon) to look for the PERFECT checker board--but none of them suited me one single bit! Probably because I remembered seeing this one at Cracker Barrel years and years ago and always wanted to purchase it but never did! So after a futile search online, I just got into my car and drove across the city to the Cracker Barrel near 44th Street and bought one! There are quite a few games you can play with this: regular checkers, "give-away", corner checkers, and "fox and geese!" (on the reverse side, there is a special "fox and geese" configuration and rules--I tried it, but their rules give the geese too many geese! The way I always played it was just on the regular checker board with FOUR geese against ONE fox. But anyway, I am excited to teach the kiddos some new games when I see them Friday.

The other day, I finally caught a few close-ups of my friendly squirrel up in my window feeder. I have quite a few different squirrels who visit this feeder throughout the week, and I truly cannot distinguish them apart from each other. Sometimes they come in pairs, and other times, there is just one.

This little guy is quite unafraid of me, so I get very close to the window glass and speak very kind words to him. He stops eating the peanuts to watch me, and every now and then I could SWEAR he is smiling at me! I wish I could pet this little creature.

Oh! And I ordered a new piano bench--this time I was successful on Amazon and ordered this one for a total of $44.95! It arrived today and I opened the box hoping I could figure out how to attach the legs like the directions show; but my technical/mechanical ability goes only as far as changing light bulbs--so I messaged Jesse and asked if I could bring it over to him for him to assemble. Which I did, and HE DID and VOILA'! Look how nice it looks with my piano. My old bench was rather chewed up by dear Belle-Belle and looked quite shabby. Looking at it began to get on my nerves--even though I liked to be reminded of Belle. I was going to drive over to the piano store to see if they sold separate benches, but then I checked Amazon real quick and found this one. It opens up for music storage as well--my other one did not have this feature.

Tomorrow when I see Erin, I'm bringing this little container of pretty beads, string, and everything necessary for her to make herself a sparkly necklace. Erin is a very "girly" girl, and she will love this. I've actually had the beads for a very long time ... but Erin seemed to young to be patient enough to string them, etc. But I think she is ready now.

All of this is rather random ... but like I said, it's been a quiet week around here!

February 21 Joy

Friday:  I picked up young Cal this morning at 11:30 over at his house and we drove over to the Beach House and played for hours! We had such a nice time together. I am super thankful for this one-on-one time I get to have with this small person ... and I've only a few months left to enjoy him this way.

Cal requested we build another layout for our trains today; so we did. Cal is quite a good track builder; but sometimes he needs assistance getting all the tracks to join into one BIG twisty-turnie track. That's where I come in! We played with this layout for quite awhile, trying all of the various trains in different combinations.

I purchased a few more heavy-duty, but small, magnets from Amazon. We played for an hour with these, combining them with our other magnets, and really having a lot of fun.

Cal is quite an intense little builder. The sun was in his eyes, so he requested that I lower my blinds. I was just glad to SEE the sun!

I hardly took any photos today. I'm getting lazy at photographing lately. Maybe it's just that my camera is getting old and a bit worn around the edges. I don't see myself replacing it anytime soon; so I should just continue snapping away with it. Also, I haven't been on one single winter walk yet--mostly because I don't want to break a leg (or hip) somewhere in the middle of nowhere. That would not be good.

We returned to Cal's place around 3:15, and Brendan came off his bus about 5 minutes later. I brought "Boggle" with me and he and I played two games of it. Brendan is very good with words and spelling; but I did win twice. He declared that I was VERY good at words--and I am! I was just glad that Brendan was actually happy to play a game with me. He tries to get me to play Pokemon, but that game is just beyond me! I cannot seem to get the hang of it whatsoever.

When the littles came home at 4:10, we played a bunch of different games I had brought with me. Aidan was excited to show me a website called ABCya, which is an educational site the kids get to use on the main floor computer. It's a very fun site! Super good for learning! Erin and Cal are excited about it too. Yay!

I had such a nice day with the children today. I am so thankful for them. I am also thankful to the Lord for feeling healthier these past weeks, stronger, and more able to be helpful to my family. This is true JOY for me!

February 18 A terrific Tuesday

Tuesday:  Well! Elementary, Middle, and High-schoolers' mid-winter break was over today and all returned to school EXCEPT not preschoolers like Cal! So I was asked to fill-in today, which I did. Kelly dropped Cal off to me at 9am and we played for five out of five-and-a-half hours (30 minutes was taken with Cal watching Dino-Dex while I was picking up toys). 

Here are a few pictures from our day--I set up this paper cup "wall" before Cal arrived. He thought it was pretty cool. I told him that I bet the two of us could "huff and puff and BLOW it down"! if we tried real hard. So we did! And down it came.

We rebuilt several different walls to see how high we could get our cups--could we stack them taller than Cal? 

We could, so we DID! Cal's favorite part (naturally) was the knocking down and crashing of whatever we had built. He is getting closer to being FIVE now, so he has more patience to let me build longer before he begins wrecking everything.

Cal found that he was pretty good at building with cups! "Rocky" (our T-Rex puppet) was pretty intent on destruction; but Cal kept him at bay until he was finished building.

We also played with cars and trucks for quite awhile back in the spare room. Cal gets no end of joy out of cars and trucks--me too! I always preferred playing with Kevin's toys (he and I were 12 months apart) than dolls.

Cal set up quite a truck carrier thing-a-ma-jiggie and was quite proud of it.

We also did quite a bit of reading today, which is always enjoyable with Cal. He really gets into a good story--follows closely, laughs, anticipates the next event, etc. I love reading to him. We read "Limu, The Blue Turtle" (by Kimo Armitage), and "Elephant Joe, Brave Knight" (by David Wojtowycz) today.

We also built a very nice train layout in the room closest to my outside bird feeders. We kept a close eye on the bird activity outside while we played trains.

Can you believe I am STILL playing with trains after 22+ years? Little Cal and I found a lot of joy today zooming the trains around and blowing our train whistle.

We also got our Play Doh out and spent 30 minutes having fun with it. Cal immediately designed an "Orange Monster" and commanded that I build a purple monster so that our monsters could fight. Mr. Cal created his monster all by himself.

Cal said the HORN on his monster was modeled after the dinosaurs, and it was his main weapon of defense.

I made a purple two-headed happy monster who wasn't at all interested in fighting. Cal drove the horn of his monster right through 2-Heads heart and "made him dead." 

Cal really wanted me to build a few more monsters, so I did. I built an orange monster, as well as a hot pink monster (not pictured). Neither of them could defeat Mr. Cal's orange horned-monster.

I took Cal back to his house, arriving at 3:00. Two neighbor girls were set to take care of Cal from that time until they would no longer be needed, so I came back to my house. It sure was a fun day to have Cal over. He's quite easy to entertain. He didn't eat much of anything today, which always troubles me--but usually, he is a very good eater; so I decided not to worry about it. He was just too busy to bother with food today! He did eat a half sandwich (peanut-butter and jelly), and had a few chips. He also drank several glasses of chocolate milk.

February 15 Brendan's Party

Saturday:  This year, Brendan asked for a surprise party--well--almost a surprise! He knew he was having some friends get together with him to celebrate his birthday, he just didn't know WHERE.

It turns out that there is a place in Grand Rapids, right at Woodland Mall, that I have never heard of. Dylan told me it has been here since right around 2020--but I had never seen or heard of it! It's called MAIN EVENT. It's kind of party venue with food, bowling, laser tag, an arcade, etc. 

Since Kelly is still sick, it was good that I was wide open today to be whatever help I could be to Dylan; so I showed up at 12:30. What a nice place! Kelly messaged me earlier in the morning requesting that I pick up a cake along the way--so I stopped by at Sam's Club and got that really nice rectangle cream-filled chocolate cake that is extra special yummy. 

Here are a few pictures of the party:

Everyone had pizza first--which was quite yummy--and then we sang "Happy Birthday" and cut the cake.

Brendan has very nice friends. Joanna, his long-time friend from Trinitas is sitting on the left corner of the table--see her?

A few of his friends came from his youth group at Holy Trinity (two fellows by the name of "Peter", one of which is ONE day younger than Brendan), and also three siblings from a life-long family friends: I can't remember the oldest girl's name--but then there was Jude, and the youngest, Mirielle (I'm probably not spelling that correctly). These three siblings are super nice both to each other and to others. They really enjoy each other AND they've known my grandkids for their entire lives--so they are pretty good friends. 

These three stinkers were enjoying themselves hugely as well. 

Isn't Erin a riot? She LOVES to be in pictures! Aidan didn't mind me taking his picture today either! Yay!

Cal REALLY enjoyed his cake! I had a small piece too!

Look at how grown up Aidan is getting to look! He will be EIGHT next month!

After eating was over and done with, the kids all had a bowling game. TEN kids divided into two groups of 5, two lanes. It was so much FUN to watch them with these heavy bowling balls. Cal was thrilled to be included. Look at his little face!

The first lane included "bumpers" for the smaller kids, but the second lane did not. Cal was in the first lane and used a little "hill prop" to roll his ball down the lane. He ended up with the highest score in his lane! He was very proud.

Aidan was very unafraid to bowl. He lifted the ball quite easily (7# was the lightest ball) and quite intensely (always) threw it down the lane ...

After bowling was finished, the older kids moved on to Laser Tag. I had to leave at about 2:30 because Jesse asked if I could come and visit Kaity while he was having an MRI of his knee this afternoon. So, that is what I did! I sure enjoyed being at Brendan's party, though.

February 14 Valentine's Day

Friday: The kiddos are off school for mid-winter break, which coincided with Valentine's Day this year! YAY! I got to have all four grands over for a few hours today. We had a lot of fun. I had a small box of chocolates for each of the kids. We also blew up balloons and launched those around my house for a little while. These guys LOVE balloons.

This is a new STEM toy I got via Amazon. It's kind of a mind twister to see if you can place the little square inserts in such a way that the wind-up car will be able to get to the red circle and dump out a little marble into it without crashing into the tree or reaching a dead end. I didn't show the kiddos this game until later in the day while we were actually back at their house.

I KNEW they would like the Magnetic Tile Creation Book for Kids! I love this book--it gives TEN step-by-step instructions for building very cool things. Aidan got right into this and built several very cool models.

Brendan played for a long time with the 100 tiny magnet circles (he is holding the whole 100 in his hand in the picture below). He had a fun time experimenting with the N and S poles and how he could get them to attract and repel ...

Our littlest boy had fun re-arranging the ocean window stickers while watching the birds at my feeders ...

Erin played with a few of the dolls back in the playroom, but then she came out and played in the main rooms too. Here she is examining one of my larger shells. She also had a few of my music boxes playing.

Erin constructed a little house for her bear stuffy ("Honey") ...

Cal decided to build a huge car ...

Aidan was busy drawing and making a book ...

Here is little "Honey" in her colorful Magnatile house.

I have had a Jenga game for a really long time and I am so glad the kiddos are old enough to play some of these games now! Brendan and Aidan and I played two games--these guys are VERY good at this game!

Look at Cal's HUGE car! It looks like something from ... another planet!

Cal is very particular about his projects and has a LOT of patience ... but then, all four of these kiddos possess that wonderful quality.

I asked the Lord to give us a nice time--especially for strength to handle four very talkative, active, creative children--and He gave me grace. I truly enjoyed the entire four hours they were here.

We returned home to their house at about 4:45. I brought three containers of various games along with us and we enjoyed playing them for the next hour or so. Dear Kelly has been sick (like the kids were) the last few days, so I didn't get to visit with her today. Hopefully, she will recover soon. I remember (way back in time) dreading with all my heart getting sick and still being caregiver to the boys. Thankfully, it didn't happen often!