Pirate School!

Today's plans changed several times. For weeks the plan had been for Paul to take the kids to Lowe's for a 9:00 workshop to make a train and then to Bucknell for David Engel's Pirate School at 1pm. Paul's family was going to come to our house for pizza and birthday cake at 4pm. We had to cancel their registration for Lowe's when Paul found out he had a basketball coach meeting this morning, and we moved Ian's birthday party to tomorrow when we heard how many inches of snow we were supposed to get today (Paul's family live an hour away from us). Paul showed up at 11am for the basketball meeting only to find out that it had been moved up to earlier this morning due to the snow. We didn't get the message. Nadia will be one of five kids on her basketball team - the Leopards. She'll be the only girl on her team. The K-2nd grade teams play three on three on a half-court. Paul is going to hold his practices on Friday nights. The only thing that happened as planned was that Paul did take the kids to see the Pirate School show.

This morning while Oliver was napping and I was mopping the kitchen floor, I looked over and saw that Nadia was reading a book to Ian. I had to grab the camera and snap a picture of that priceless memory. Nadia was so proud that she could read to her brother, and Ian was enjoying the book. I get books from a public library every Thursday night, and yesterday Nadia picked up a library book I hadn't read her yet and started reading it herself. Once I realized what a great job she was doing, I ran and got the camcorder and recorded the rest of the story (see above). It is SO exciting watching Nadia and Ian learn to read. Paul and I both love to read. I recently read John Grisham's newest book and am currently reading Karen Kingsbury's newest book. We both hope that all three of our kids are lifelong readers! All three of them enjoy being read to that is for certain. :)

Last night we took the kids to see Santa. Last year was the first time we did this because I'm not a big Santa fan. I decided though that we encourage the kids to have their picture taken with Curious George, Cinderella, or Cookie Monster and having their picture taken with Santa is no different than that. Last year I got a great picture with all three of them, but this year Oliver is in the "terrified of Santa" phase. In hind sight, I should have taken a picture of him screaming on Santa's lap as plenty of parents have taken pictures like that, but I am not accustomed to taking pics of my kids when they're screaming. It's free to visit this Santa in our town (unlike the small fortune they charge at the mall), and they gave the kids each a candycane, a plastic Christmas cup, coloring pages, and one free toy. Ian picked a little matchbox car, and Nadia picked a Disney princess figurine. Amazingly they had one she didn't already own (Tiana)! They were VERY happy that we visited Santa. The next two videos I want to take are Ian's birthday interview and one of Nadia doing her addition flash cards. Our plans for tomorrow include Sunday School, church, me taking Nadia to see the musical Narnia while Paul watches football at home, and Ian's birthday party. We shall see if those plans change or not. I'm sure the kids will be playing in the snow later today as it's really coming down!