Out like a lamb

We have experienced both the "lion" and "lamb" sides of March within the last two days. It was really cold yesterday and very, very windy. Most of the school districts around us had a two hour delay this morning, and one was closed (for 10 inches of snow). Our town escaped the snow. We just had some hail yesterday in the late afternoon. Fine by me! On the last day of March (today), it warmed up a LOT. Our high today was 61 degrees! We celebrated by spending 2.5 hours outside, and we plan to do the same tomorrow. It's a whole new experience for Oliver now that he can walk around the playground. I'm working on teaching him the boundaries (stay on the mulch) and other rules like only going down the slide feet first (on his belly or bottom). Last Monday it was in the 30's when Nadia had her soccer practice. It was much nicer this evening!

My Sweethearts

We discovered recently that Ian loves mustard! Put some mustard on the hot dog, and he will eat it IN a bun. WOOHOO!

 As we were playing Uno last night (Nadia LOVES this game - she laughs SO much while playing Uno), Nadia played a wild card which left her with only two cards. When she said what color she had chosen, Paul said that now we knew what color she had left in her hand, to which she replied, "I said the opposite color" and laughed hysterically. We were pretty impressed with this bit of strategy on her part. :)

This morning as we entered the church building, he started running toward the gymnasium and was saying "ba ball" (basketball). Nope. The nursery is where you are headed on Sunday mornings, Oliver!

Giving Thanks

1. I got a haircut this afternoon for the first time in a little more than 3 months. Ahhh...

2. It warmed up this afternoon to almost 60 degrees! The kids and I had a short walk and spent a little time at a playground in conjunction with a trip to the grocery store. We can't wait until spring weather is here to stay!

3. I got to do a little bit of shopping at the mall without any kids while they were rotating Paul's car's tires at Sears this afternoon.

4. Paul received an invitation to interview at Bucknell next Friday! It's the typical all day affair. This means that 9 of the first 26 applications this time around have resulted in at least a phone interview. Next week we have three interviews between the two of us. The interviews on Monday and Wednesday are phone interviews for permanent positions, and the on-campus interview on Friday is for a one year position.

5. Another position was posted today for Paul (#33). Three of the last four have gone/are going to North Carolina! The interview on Monday is with a different school in North Carolina. The position he's interviewing for on Monday sounds really interesting - it's to teach two calculus based physics classes and physical chemistry. The university currently doesn't have any physics or physical chemistry professors. This would be very different from what he's doing now (teaching non-majors) and the classes would be much smaller (40 at the most compared to 130 right now). Please keep praying for a job for one of us!

6. I keep forgetting to mention that Oliver's rash is doing much better (usually isn't there any more).

7. Nadia finished her third chapter book today! We also finished our 50th chapter book on Wednesday that I have read to the kids. Right now I'm reading the The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe and Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle's Magic. We love both books!!!!

8. Both kids did a great job at the dentist on Monday! I have heard horror stories, and I'm grateful that thus far it has been no big deal. They can't wait to go back, lol!!

Thankful Thursday

1. Paul enjoyed being on spring break last week. It was nice to see him a bit more than usual.

2. Paul received an invitation to participate in a phone interview with Mars Hill University (application #26) in North Carolina for a position teaching physics and chemistry. We got a rejection email from AACC today (his most recent phone interview and the 20th application). I'm praying that he is picked to interview at Mars Hill. All along we've said that NC and VA would be our top two choices of where to live.

3. Oliver has been communicating his wishes more clearly lately. He'll walk up to the refrigerator and say things like "cheese" or "juice" or "milk." It's very helpful to know more precisely what he wants! Sometimes of course he doesn't get what he wants. At the library yesterday he walked to the door and said "go bye bye" when it wasn't time to leave.

4. I discovered on Monday evening that Nadia's soccer cleats didn't fit her any more. I sent her to practice in sneakers and planned to buy her some new cleats, but it turned out one of the coaches had a pair that her child had outgrown, and she gave the to Paul. They fit Nadia perfectly!

5. Paul's parents came up to see Nadia's last basketball game on Saturday.

6. For about two weeks I didn't see any new ads for myself or Paul, but the last couple of days I have been working on applications again. I'm up to 14 for myself (considering a 15th) and 32 for Paul. I check HigherEdJobs.com and ChronicleVitae.com ALL day long. I am grateful there have been more positions listed, but I also cannot wait for the day when we are done with applying for jobs and participating in interview. Praying that one of us is offered a permanent job for August.

Finding Balance

It is very easy to say "yes" to too many things and end up with an overly hectic schedule. On the other hand, the kids and I get a bit of cabin fever if we stay at home all day too many days in a row. That will be less likely to happen once the spring weather finally comes to stay (we had snow this morning - ugh!) because we will be taking walks to the playground, and then once summer is here we'll also be going swimming on a regular basis. In the fall we did two different homeschool co-op groups. The one that met on Thursdays in the fall for six weeks began another six week spring session a couple of weeks ago. Originally I had planned on signing up for it, but then I decided I would rather be at home on Thursday mornings. Surprisingly, Ian was the one asking when the classes were going to start up again. These decisions will be a bit easier to make once the kids (particularly Oliver) are a little older.

Nadia lately has been saying she wants to do ballet again. I said she can do ballet again, but she will have to wait until the fall to join a class, and she'll have to stop going to gymnastics. Today Ian asked me when he can start doing gymnastics again. If he wants to do gymnastics, I hope maybe Nadia will change her mind and pick gymnastics rather than ballet. Nadia did gymnastics when she was four years old, but Ian just didn't have the maturity the last time he was enrolled in a class. I didn't feel that we were getting our money's worth. Once the current gymnastics session ends (end of April), we're going to take at least a four month break from gymnastics.

I inquired about t-ball recently, and both are old enough to be on the local team. We could walk to the field where they have their games and practices, but it turns out the weeks they have games is almost identical to the weeks that Nadia has soccer. That just seems like too much to juggle at one time. I am planning on signing both of them up for soccer in the fall (U6 for Ian and U8 for Nadia), but maybe next spring they could both do t-ball instead of soccer. I'll let them decide. They took a t-ball class at the YMCA last summer so they have some concept of the sport. Neither Paul or I enjoy watching baseball, but I am trying not to let our own preferences influence the kids. I want them to try a variety of sports until they find the one or ones they like the best.

5.75 years old

Nadia will be six years old three months from today. Say it isn't so. Over the past three months:

1. She's made terrific strides with reading! She's started reading chapter books such as ones from the Magic Tree House series. She's currently half-way through the Level 3 All About Reading curriculum.

2. We worked on breaking her thumb sucking habit. She wore the thumb guards for four weeks, and then we switched to putting a foul tasting nail polish on her two thumbnails every other day.

3. She participated on a basketball team for the first time. She has begun to learn how to dribble a ball and to play some defense.

4. We added science to our daily homeschooling routine.

5. She's made slower progress with her spelling skills. We have been working on spelling words with a silent "e" and knowing when to use c, k, or ck. She's about one-third of the way through Level 2 of the All About Spelling curriculum.

6. She finished her first Sparks book for AWANA for the second time and started completing the extra credit cards.

7. She switched from wearing dresses almost every day to wearing pants far more often, in part because she gets herself dressed most mornings, and she can't reach the things that are on hangars in her closet.

8. She's continued to make progress with math. In particular she's been learning about place value and has begun to add and subtract with two digit numbers that don't involve any regrouping (ex. 72 + 25).

9. She finished the 1st grade textbook from Handwriting without Tears. Today we started another Draw Write Now book.

10. She lost her first two teeth, and the two permanent teeth came in. The hygienist today at her 6 month cleaning appointment said that her 6 year molars have started to come in. She loves the Strawberry Shortcake balloon she got at the dentist today!

11. She fell in love with the Liberty Kids dvds. She would watch them EVERY day, if we let her.

12. She switched from her favorite ice cream flavor being cookies and cream to chocolate chip cookie dough.

13. She had oatmeal for breakfast far more often than she had in a few years.

14. She had her very first case of a full blown stomach virus.

15. She made improvements in gymnastics. Lately she's been saying that she misses ballet. We shall see whether she picks ballet or gymnastics in the fall. I told her she can't do both since she also does soccer and basketball.

End of the season

I wish the season I was referring to was winter. Technically it's spring, but generally it doesn't feel that way quite yet. The kids are dying to start wearing their spring/summer clothes. I compromised with Ian and let him wear short sleeved shirts with pants the last few days. He was thrilled! I was happy that the transition from long to short sleeves went smoothly for the first time. In the past it's been hard for him. What I am actually referring to is the end of the Upward basketball season. Last night Nadia had her 11th (and final) practice, and today she had her last game. It was the 8th game for the team, but it was her 7th game because she missed last week's due to the stomach virus. Paul's parents came up and watched Nadia's game today. We just went 6 weeks without seeing them, and now we saw them two times in three days! :) They noticed how much Nadia had improved with her defense and dribbling over the season. She wants to play again next year.

This evening there was a special program at the High School for our Upward program. If I had to do it over again, I would have stayed at home with the boys because now that Oliver is walking, he does NOT like to be cooped up. We learned this the hard way recently when we had dinner at Friendly's. Let's just say we have no desire to go to a sit down restaurant as a family any time soon. The other two went through this phase as well. This too shall pass. We didn't get home until 8:30pm so the kids went to bed 45 minutes later than usual. Oliver has learned how to do a bounce pass and say the word basketball (he says ba ball). On Monday Nadia will be starting the next soccer season!

Oliver's first 40 words

1. Dada (or Daddy)
2. Mama
3. Hi
4. Yes
5. book
6. bye bye
7. Pop Pop
8. amen
9. up
10. Yay! (one of the times he said it was when I gave him a pretzel, which cracked me up)
11. uh oh (before knocking down a tower of blocks)
12. Naia (Nadia)
13. Baby (referring to one of Nadia's dolls)
14. Weee! (said out of the blue when he was riding the carousel)
15. That
16. Cat
17. I
18. Want
19. My
20. Love
21. You
22. Grandma
23. No
24. Mi(lk)
25. Ia(n)
26. phone
27. juice
28. eye
29. go
30. ball
31. Bob
32. room
33. cracker
34. pants
35. more
36. all done
37. teeth
38. please
39. La(rry)
40. pray

His favorite words right now are definitely:

want, more, cracker, Mama, Dada, juice, milk

Thankful Thursday

1. Paul's parents came up and watched the kids for a few hours today so that Paul and I could go on a date! We did some shopping and had a very delicious dinner at Texas Roadhouse. I brought home a lot of pulled pork, which we can enjoy tomorrow!

2. We are done with the stomach virus! YAHOO!

3. We enjoyed watching "Frozen" as a family a few days ago, and Paul and I enjoyed watching "Saving Mr. Banks" (about the making of the movie Mary Poppins) last night.

4. I did our taxes today. We only paid $31 in federal taxes throughout the year, so I was assuming that's the biggest our refund could be. Boy was I wrong. I had no understanding of things like an "earned income credit." I didn't realize you could receive a "refund" much larger than what you paid (doesn't really seem to fit the definition of a refund). We usually either owed a little bit with our state taxes or received a very tiny refund. I discovered this evening that if you make under a certain amount that all your state taxes paid are refunded to you. We are going to be getting the largest tax refund we've ever gotten from the IRS and state of PA.

5. Paul received a communication from Bucknell today asking if he is still interested in being considered for the position. (YES!) We are encouraged that this is still a possibility. We thought maybe he hadn't been selected for a phone interview. We are very glad that we were wrong!

6. I've been invited to participate in a phone interview for a position at McDaniel College on April 2nd.

P.S. When Oliver is hungry, he goes to the cupboard that contains all the Tupperware and gets a large container. Then he goes over and stands by the pantry and points. He is asking for some dry cereal or animal crackers to be put in his container. His eyes are bigger than his stomach! HA HA!

Feeling Better!

Nadia threw up last night right after she went to bed. Thankfully she ran to the bathroom and so there wasn't a big mess to clean up. Just in case it was the beginning of a night like we experienced on Friday night, I put a vinyl tablecloth on her bed (over her fitted sheet) and took her comforter, extra pillows, and doll off the bed. It proved to be unnecessary precautions as she didn't throw up again after that. It came out of the blue, as she had seemed fine for more than 48 hours at that point. She went to gymnastics yesterday evening, etc. Because she threw up last night, I decided we shouldn't go to ladies Bible study this morning because #1 I didn't want to share our germs if we were still contagious and #2 I didn't want her to throw up there. Nadia was very upset this morning when I told her we weren't going. In hind sight we could have gone, but I still think I made the right decision with the information that I had at the moment. Today was the last session on Hebrews. If we don't move this summer, I plan to join again next fall. I woke up feeling back to normal. I had the mildest case of anyone in the family, but still it felt good to feel normal again today. Yesterday I felt like I do in the first few months of pregnancy. It felt like "morning" sickness all day (I am not pregnant but just making the comparison). As of a few minutes ago, we have now gone 24 hours without anyone throwing up in our house (aside from Ian gagging on some food he didn't like at dinner but that is not about due to a virus). YAHOO! It would be awesome if we could go another six years before we have the stomach virus again, but that's probably wishful thinking.

This afternoon we rented Frozen from a kiosk at our local grocery store. We turned off our cable last month and switched from a DVD subscription with Netflix to a streaming subscription. We've been checking DVD's out from the library instead, but the wait for the Frozen DVD from the library was really long so we splurged and paid $1.59 to rent one because everyone has been talking about this movie for months. I've never taken the kids to see a movie in a theater before, and I considered doing it for this one because everyone kept talking about what a great movie it was. Paul and I haven't been in a movie theater for ten years, but I do want to take the kids to see one sometime in the next year or two so they can see what it's like. Frozen would have been a good choice for that experience. We watched the movie this evening. It was a special treat for the kids because we never let them watch a Disney movie in one sitting. We usually limit them to 20-45 minutes of tv watching a day, and that means it takes 2-3 days to watch a Disney movie, but we let them watch the whole thing (1hr 40 minutes) this evening. We enjoyed it.

P.S. The photo above was taken on Sunday afternoon. Ian fell asleep on the couch earlier than our usual 1pm nap time. You can see he's wearing his beloved R2D2 socks and holding Ricochet (two other Incredible Vegetables are on the couch beside him).

Happy St. Patty's Day!

We started our morning with Lucky Charms cereal for breakfast. It didn't go over as well as I thought it would. Oh well. Next year I'm going to make beef stew and Irish soda bread for dinner on St. Patrick's Day, but we recently had beef stew so I wasn't going to make it again today. It's one of Paul's most favorite meals, but Nadia does not like it (Ian eats it, but it's not his favorite either to be sure). Last night I had Nadia and Ian eat "real" food for the first time in 48 hours (meaning something more than a cracker or pretzel), and they kept it down so I decided that today life would return back to normal for those two, which primarily meant eating normally (fruits, veggies, dairy, etc.) and greatly reducing the amount of time the television was on during the day. Paul came down with the stomach virus early yesterday morning, and Oliver threw up once after lunch yesterday and after breakfast this morning. Even though I felt queasy all day, I stuck with my plan to make Irish soda bread and Irish flag sugar cookies.

Before 3/17/15 I want to buy some shamrock cookie cutters. We experienced mixing colors to make orange frosting for our cookies. Oliver's contribution was to eat two of the cookies. I made a small batch (1/3 of the recipe) because we already had some yummy pineapple cookies on hand. We listened to the Irish national anthem in both Gaelic and English and read about Leprechauns and such today to wrap up our unit on Ireland. All five of us were wearing green today!

Paul was supposed to go to the dentist today, but I went instead as he didn't think he was up to doing that yet. I told the hygienist I was feeling queasy today and didn't feel up to doing the flouride treatment at the end. I was supposed to go this Wednesday; I am sure Paul will be feeling fine by then, and he can get his teeth cleaned that day. I'm hoping that all of our bellies will be doing well tomorrow. It's nice to have at least Nadia and Ian back to normal! Oliver hasn't had the runs today, which also is an improvement. He hasn't had much of an appetite today, and he did throw up once this morning; so I know he's not 100% back to normal yet. I felt badly that Paul got the bug the kids had, but at least he was able to make it to the toilet in time and didn't produce copious amounts of laundry and messes to clean up like the kids did. I hope it's a LONG time before they get that sick again. Yuck. Yuck. Yuck!

Paul even had a fever yesterday, and he almost NEVER gets a fever no matter how sick he is. I on the other hand get a fever with almost every illness I have. The kids were of course wanting to cuddle even more than usual. I love to snuggle, but it became a problem at times because they were fighting about who was on my lap, and Oliver in particular doesn't like to share my lap (although there's definitely room for more than one child at a time on my lap). I love all the hugs, kisses, and snuggles. I dread it when the kids get older and these become less frequent. I am trying to soak it up as much as possible while I can! When both kids were throwing up at the same time I thought to myself it could be worse, I could have six children all throwing up at the same time, but truth be told, I would love a fourth baby even if it meant I might have four kids with the stomach virus at the same time at one point or another. I love these kids dearly, even though I can't stand cleaning up vomit. I am so grateful for my three precious blessings!

Tummy Troubles

Oliver had "the runs" from 7-9am on Tuesday morning, but then he was fine until Thursday afternoon when he started throwing up all over the place. Yesterday he had the runs again, and he still wasn't eating very much. Yesterday evening while Nadia and Paul were at basketball practice (she got her very first basket!), Ian started throwing up all over the place. By 10:15pm, Ian was already on his fifth pair of pajamas and third set of sheets, and he changed clothes a few more times during the night. Nadia started throwing up around 8:30pm, and the two kids kept us busy throughout the night. Paul took the shift from 11:30pm-3:45am. I took over at that point, and Paul slept until 9:15am. Ian ate a little dry cereal and kept it down at breakfast, so I made the mistake an hour later of giving him some Tylenol for his fever. He threw up a few minutes later all over the couch and carpet. Nadia only had water for breakfast, and that was enough to cause her to throw up.

Oliver still has the runs and diaper rash, but for the first time in several days his appetite returned. Nadia and Ian haven't thrown up for several hours, and they both have kept down a tiny amount of food (pretzels, crackers, or tortilla chips). Neither of them liked the 7up Paul got them. All three took a nice nap. We actually woke Nadia up after she had slept a little more than three hours for fear she'd have trouble going to sleep tonight. I took Oliver and Ian for a walk during part of her nap. She missed her 7th basketball game this morning, and Paul asked the assistant coach to coach the team today so he could help me with the kids. We won't be going to church tomorrow, and the King's Kids choir is singing in the worship service tomorrow. Bummer.

Oliver just threw up again all over me. It had been 48 hours since he had thrown up. I thought he was done. I guess not. We have not enjoyed having the stomach flu, but I am thankful for these things:

1. This is the first time either Nadia or Ian have had a bad case of the flu. We almost made it six years as parents before we experienced this ordeal.

2. Paul let me sleep for four hours last night and took full responsibility for the kids and the laundry during that time.

3. We have greatly appreciated our washer and dryer. I lost count of how many loads we've done. I'm also thankful for our bathtub. The kids usually get 2 baths a week, but the past 3 days they have been getting 1-2 baths a day.

4. So far, Paul and I haven't come down with the bug.

5. We've used our tv and Roku (for Netflix) FAR more than usual today.

Thankful Thursday

1. The Dr. Seuss program at the library last Thursday night was very enjoyable. The kids listened to a story, played  hot potato with a stuffed cat in the hat, played a Dr. Seuss version of BINGO (each space had a picture of a different character from one of his books), colored Dr. Seuss pictures, played pin the hat on the cat while blindfolded, ate cookies, and drank milk. There were about 30 children in attendance. Nadia won one of the door prizes. I forgot to bring my camera, but I did download a couple of pics from the library's Facebook page.

2. It was SO nice to have warmer weather a few days. We made three trips to the playground over the past six days! It felt heavenly to get some exercise in the fresh air. We're planning to go back tomorrow and Saturday, if the weather forecast is accurate. :)

3. It's so thrilling to see Nadia reading chapter books. I am glad she is enjoying the Magic Tree House series.

4. Oliver's 12th tooth came in on Monday, which means he should get a break from teething! Thank goodness, as teething isn't fun!

5. I got a good report at the Periodontist's office on Monday that the gum grafting was a success. What a relief! I can now brush ALL my teeth again. WOOHOO! I have an appointment to do five more teeth in May. We shall see if I stick with that plan or not. If I do, that will be the last teeth I am doing this year. I did three last month.

6. All three kids slept until at least 7am on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday! This morning Ian was in our room about 6:35am, but then he fell back in our bed, and the other two didn't wake up until 7:20.

7. My three kids love each other very much. I pray this will always be the case. Lately Oliver has been going up to Nadia and Ian and giving them big hugs (all his own initiative) at various points throughout the day. What a sweetheart!

8. Paul had a phone interview on Friday. We'll know by March 26th at the latest if he was selected for the next stage of the interview process. Paul heard from seven of the first 19 applications. I'm hoping in the near future we'll hear from some of the more recent applications. Thus far I've submitted 29 applications for Paul and 11 for myself.

9. On Tuesday we started a five day thematic unit on Ireland that we will conclude on Monday (St. Patrick's Day). We've been reading books about Ireland and Irish Setters, watching videos of Irish music and dancing, etc. I overheard Ian when he was playing talking about the Giant's Causeway, which made me smile. Nadia colored an Irish flag today.

10. On Saturday we had dinner at Pizza Hut. It was Paul's turn to pick last week. I don't believe we've ever eaten in a Pizza Hut together. Usually if we buy pizza, we go the carryout route, which definitely is the cheaper way to go and easier as Oliver had a hard time waiting in his high chair for the pizza to be served, but Paul remembered eating out at Pizza Hut with his family as a child, and he wanted to experience that again. It was also a memory lane experience for me as well.

11. I am very thankful for my washing machine and dryer. I think I've set a new record this week as far as the most loads of laundry I've done in one week. This happened because I did three loads of laundry yesterday (I rarely do more than two in one day) and then today Ian didn't tell me the toilet had flooded until it had REALLY flooded and Oliver had the stomach flu and threw up ALL over the place a few times today. I don't usually do laundry two days in a row, but I did another two loads today due to all the wet towels and soiled clothing. I am hoping Oliver is feeling better tomorrow and that no one else catches the bug from him.

12. Nadia and Ian are really enjoying Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.

4.25 years old

Ian has changed in quite a few ways over the past three months:

1. He learned how to write ALL the uppercase letters of the alphabet. When he turned 4 years old he could only write one (I), so he made a lot of progress with that over the past 3 months! His pencil grip isn't perfect yet, but it's also come a LONG way over that time span.

2. He's been completely obsessed with Star Wars, even though he's never seen the movies. We are all very tired of the CD I gave him for Valentine's Day. He also loves his Star Wars socks and often plans his outfit to coordinate with his socks. He told me he was going to save his money so he could buy Star Wars underwear. How many four-year-olds save their money to buy underwear?

3. His afternoon naps have become very rare; he's gradually learning how to have a quiet time in his room.

4. He's gotten MUCH better at playing games with rules such as Candyland, Chutes and Ladders, BINGO, and UNO.

5. He's been completely obsessed with wearing his Big Brother shirt that he got for Christmas. He wears it at least two days a week. I think he'd wear it six days a week if I let him. He likes to get dressed up on Sundays.

6. He's now wiping himself after he goes to the bathroom, which means he's now 100% independent with with going potty!

7. He's started working on not touching his belly button so often. It was his idea to start working on this.

8. When he refers to things in the past, he often says "when I was a three-year-old....".

9. He completely stopped going to Wee Worship. He's overall doing a great job in the worship service. He sits on my lap for the sermon, and sometimes he falls asleep.

10. He accepted Christ as his personal Savior on January 20, and he frequently talks about it!

11. He's continued to make progress with his reading skills. Lately we've been working on "th" and "sh" words (such as this, math, that, shop, cash, and with). He's also doing a better job of accurately counting various objects. For example, I'll ask him to build a tower that has 8 blocks.

12. He can now reach all the light switches in our house. This is not a good thing for our electricity bill, as this boy loves to go around and turn on all the lights. I'm trying to teach him to remember to turn the lights OFF as he leaves a room.

13. He's made significant progress with his eating skills. He actually does better than Nadia some nights (such as when I serve beef stew), and in particular he's made huge progress with eating pasta. What a relief!!!!!!!!!

14. He's getting better at turning over the iPad when I tell him that his turn is done. Thank goodness.

15. I put away all his 3T sized pants and promoted him to size 4T pants. He's now only wearing size 4/4T. Some of them won't stay up around his waist, but the 3T pants were just too small!

Spring Forward

Most adults do not enjoying losing an hour in the spring, but ever since 2009 I've been a fan of this time change as it's helped my kids sleep in a bit longer. I find falling back an hour in the fall to be MUCH harder on the kids (and therefore on me as well). Yesterday Oliver didn't get the memo about the time change, but the other two slept in much later than usual (according to the new time anyhow, it didn't actually represent any extra sleep). This morning all three of the kids slept past 7:00am, which was just heavenly. Here's to hoping that this time change will help Oliver and Ian sleep in closer to 7am on a more regular basis.

Nadia went to bed later than usual on Saturday night because I put stuff on her thumbnails which would make them taste awful if she put them in her mouth. This brought on many tears and even a little vomiting, which proves that the thumb guards weren't doing an ounce of good because obviously the thought of not being able to suck her thumbs was very disturbing to her. I threw those thumb guards in the garbage. She had worn them a total of 8 weeks (4 weeks when she was 3 years old and the last 4 weeks). I have to reapply this stuff (looks like clear nail polish) every other day so we shall see how that goes tonight. Now that she has two permanent teeth, she really needs to stop sucking her thumb! 

Last night she also stayed up later than usual, but this time it was for a happy reason. On Friday afternoon she started reading Revolutionary War on Wednesday, and she finished it on Sunday afternoon! I told her she could stay up an extra 15 minutes to celebrate her completion of her second chapter book. She thought this was SO awesome to be able to stay up later than her brothers. She used her extra time to read a chapter in another Magic Tree House book (one Aunt Wendy gave her at Christmas in 2012) and to play two games of Uno with her parents. It truly is the little things in life that can make us so happy! I finished reading the fourth Imagination Station book to the kids at lunch today and then began reading them Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Paul and I are thrilled that all three of our kids love books!

Speaking of spring, we are finally getting a taste of spring weather although there's still snow on the grass. It's about 50 degrees out right now. When Oliver wakes up from his nap, we're headed to the playground again, although I'll learn from our mistakes on Saturday and have them wear snow boots today as the playground was still covered in snow. It's supposed to be close to 60 tomorrow. Wahoooo! Then it's supposed to be cold again starting on Wednesday, but hopefully we won't have to wait too long to see temps in the 50's and 60's again. It's no shock that of the first nine applications I've submitted for jobs for myself four went to Georgia, one to North Carolina, and one to South Carolina. I'd like to move south!

Hit the Rim!

I deleted the Junie B. Jones book from the Kindle before she finished reading it. I don't plan on letting her read any more of that series. I got Revolutionary War on Wednesday at the library yesterday, and it seems much better. She's already half-way done with the book! I've noticed there's a wide range in difficulty level within the Magic Tree House series, but some of the books are definitely at her current independent reading level.

The boys and I watched Nadia's sixth game today. One of the five kids on her team wasn't there, which meant each of the other four had more playing time. The Leopards didn't do very well today. Paul is glad there are only two games left in the season. In practice last night Nadia hit the rim with one of her shots, which was the first time that ever happened!

Now we're about to head outside for a walk, as it's about 50 degrees out. Yahoooooo!