Favorite Things

At the 70th birthday party I attended this month, Donna's three children sang several songs, and her four granddaughters plus one great granddaughter sang two songs. One of the songs the children sang was the one from Sound of Music about a few of my favorite things. I always ask the kids about their favorites in their birthday interviews, but I thought it would be nice to document a quick snapshot of a few of their favorite things as of October 2016.

Breakfast - Blueberry pop tarts (all three kids), Captain Crunch or Cocoa Puffs (Ian), and Apple Jacks (Nadia or Ian). Oliver eats a wide variety of foods for breakfast and doesn't appear to have one favorite like his siblings do. They all love to have a donut on birthdays.

Drinks - All three kids prefer milk to water and prefer chocolate milk to white milk although chocolate milk is only purchased in conjunction with birthdays. They also like to drink apple juice or any kind of drink in a box or pouch when we pack a lunch. All three also drink water.

Lunch - Nadia likes to have a Yo Crunch yogurt plus either a grilled cheese sandwich or a hot dog. Ian likes to have a Yo Crunch yogurt and either a hot dog or peanut butter and marmalade sandwich. Oliver and Ian also like to eat sandwich crackers. As for fruits and vegetables at lunch, all three love grapes, clementines, and baby carrots. The boys also love watermelon. Nadia also likes plums and apples.  All three of them love pretzels and chips. Nadia and Oliver love to eat raisins.

Toys - Oliver absolutely loves to ride his bike. All three kids play with Legos almost every day. Lately they have been enjoying a wooden castle and wooden blocks. Ian loves to draw with colored pencils. Oliver enjoys the play kitchen, and his favorite games are Candyland and Zingo. Nadia loves to play a wide variety of games such as Mancala, Uno, Racko, Clue, Apples to Apples, etc. When she is in her bedroom she plays with Barbie dolls, paper dolls, and Melissa and Doug magnetic dolls. All three of them also enjoy their daily turn on either the Wii or iPad.

Animals - Nadia would love to have a cat, but she knows we can't because Paul is allergic to them. Ian loves any kind of small animal. He adores baby animals and miniature breeds. He really wants a dog. We are actually planning to get the kids 2 guinea pigs for Christmas. Hopefully that will satisfy their pet craving for the time being.

Dinner - All three love rigatoni with meatballs, tuna noodle casserole, chicken nuggets, pulled pork, barbecue chicken, hot dogs, pancakes, goulash, and fish sticks. Nadia and Ian like pizza more than Oliver does, but he will eat just

about anything. The boys love bacon, and Nadia loves eggs. Oliver loves soups and stews; his siblings would rather not ever eat soup or stew. Potato soup is his most favorite. Oliver and Nadia love macaroni and cheese and pierogies. Oliver adores baked beans and vegetables of all kinds. Just the other day he asked me for "more salad, please." His siblings can't stand salad. Ian's favorite vegetables are cooked green beans or raw baby carrots. Nadia's favorite vegetables are cooked carrots and corn.

Desserts - All three like to eat just about every kind of dessert, although Ian is not a fan of pie. Their favorite kinds of cookies that I make are chocolate peanut butter chip, chocolate chip, Heath bar, M&M, and Reese's Pieces cookies. Nadia's favorite flavors of ice cream are cookies and cream and chocolate chip cookie dough. Ian's favorite flavor is anything with peanut butter and chocolate - his most favorite is the one by Turkey Hill called Touchdown Sundae. We don't eat cake or pie very often. The kids usually have things like pudding, brownies, cookies, ice cream, or candy for dessert.

The first four pictures in this post are from the one room schoolhouse at Landis Valley last Thursday. The fifth picture is of three photos I put in frames today. The one on the left is of myself, Wendy, and our cousin (Kurt). The photo was taken in one of those "old time" photo booths; the one on the right was taken at the same time and is of my parents, Aunt Janet, and Uncle Bill. The one in the middle is of my mom on her sixth birthday; every year their mom took a picture of them outside holding their birthday cake with candles. Nadia and Ian went through a phase (that lasted more than one year) where they were costumes almost every day. Oliver has never gone through such a phase, but he has had a thing for hat the past few months. Paul said I should take a picture when he saw Oliver was wearing a pirate hat while eating dinner.