Art

Today I mostly wanted to talk about Elinor.

She has recently discovered her inner artist and has put out some impressive artwork. Here is a selection of her standout pieces:

One of her earliest. It started out as an octopus... then it was a jellyfish... and now it's a sun (all at the suggestion of Emily and Caleb). Joseph and I like how the smile starts on the forehead and goes all the way around.

Those are ant bites all over this guy's head. Texas ants have traumatized my kids forever.

Doesn't he have the sweetest expression? She was figuring out toes here. Not sure what the big mark on his face is all about, but it shows up in a few of her subsequent pieces as well.

Monobrow.

The wild-eyed little thing in the corner is Joseph's favorite of the lot.

This is a snowman. It was a breakthrough in the hair drawing technique.

This is my all-time favorite. Just look at that teeny face and those flippers! This guy could be a pokemon!

 We may not have the most distinguished taste in art around here, but this is what the "gallery" in the school room looks like right now and I'm pretty happy with it!

And, a few random pictures.

Here's baby Jacob who just needs some love and attention.

Here are my zombie children eating popcorn and watching a movie totally oblivious to the chaos surrounding them. But isn't that how it always is?

He's a big kid! No, really! He can do schoolwork too!
Check out that furrowed brow! (That means he's REALLY serious about this.)

The Minecraft stupor. It's got all five of them.

Pantswitch!

Misadventure

Today we took the bus to the library because the kids love buses and we had some books due. It was fun at first because the kids and I literally not set foot out of the apartment for four days, and do you know why? Because the temperature has not risen above about 10 degrees the whole time. Right now it is 4 degrees outside and the high was 10. And we are fresh from Texas!
So anyway, the kids were so excited to be out and about and in the snow and I was just praying the whole time that no one would have to use the bathroom, they were so bundled up.
Here's a picture of Elinor from a couple of weeks ago. Isn't it awesome? She's wearing two coats but that top coat is not quite big enough to fit over the other one. 

And here's my little guy, also from a couple of weeks ago. He's trying to keep it together but might not last much longer. And Emily plays in the snow wearing a skirt pretty regularly. That's what she was wearing today as well.

So, the bus was great, the library was great, walking to and from the busstops... not so great. But it was a good experience for this family of cold-weather-wimps.

And we always have hot chocolate afterwards, of course. Today we used the Fat Witch Bakery mix my mom sent from New York. Joseph mixed up a big steaming pot of it and topped it with whipped cream. Just what we all needed!

And I really like this picture of Elinor and Elmo showing Joseph and Caleb how to do "big eyes." El's a pro!

FHE

Super Smash Brothers on the Nintendo 64. Because we're awesome like that.

New Experiences

This move has been pretty awesome for our family. We all miss Austin so much, but the kids have been able to gain much valuable experience throughout all of this.

At Grandma's house in Utah they learned about telephones and VCRs. I answered the basement landline and after I hung up, Emily looked at me quizzically and said, "but Mom, how does that phone see the tower?" And we got to have a good conversation about how back in the "old days" all phones had cords so as long as they were plugged in they would work.
Later on they were so confused about why they had to wait before a movie while it rewound. All of this was starting to make me feel really old.

When we first came here to Boulder, the kids got in the car one morning and were all shivering with cold. Emily called up to the front of the car, "Hey Mom! Can you turn on the air conditioner except make it blow warm air?" And I already wrote about how none of them understood what was happening when the leaves on the trees started changing colors. They all still try to put on skirts or shorts and short-sleeved shirts every day.

I sort of love being forced to think about all of this from their perspective. Four seasons would be pretty shocking after only having lived in Austin. Joseph and I, though, are enjoying the the beautiful changing of the seasons and the cold, crisp air. 

Autumn

Yeah.  That's pretty fun.

In the Wild

It has been a busy week. We went swimming at the Apex Center in Arvada on Tuesday (for "2 buck Tuesday"), which was so much fun! They have a great facility with slides and fountains and a little water playground area that even Jacob could run around in. Everyone loved it. We spent three hours there, even when it was just me and the four kids. Usually we don't last as long at places like this when I'm parenting solo.  Joseph came with us a second time and took the big kids on the big slides and they had a blast.

 Friday was the Denver Zoo's free day so I packed the kids up and we went to check it out. All in all, I was very impressed! They have a great zoo there! I am always a little bit sad to see some of these big animals in pretty small cages. I know that a lot of them are there to be protected and to raise awareness for their species' plight or whatever, but I always wish they could be living on some great big nature preserve. Sort of like the one Aang makes in Avatar. Maybe "The One and Only Ivan" spoke to me a little more strongly than I thought it had. Anyway, enough book/movie references. Here are a few pictures.

The zebras were the first things we saw at the zoo. It was our first trip to any zoo ever, so I thought the kids would be super excited to see all these exotic animals. Turns out, TV has desensitized them to the wonders of nature. They just wanted to look at their maps and assert their authority by charting out a course for us to follow. Case in point: Observe Elinor above.

A tiger! A real tiger! It's over there in the shadows, but it's there! I was much more impressed by this than the kids were.

It was very, very crowded at the zoo since it was a free day, especially around the more popular exhibits like the elephants and the gorillas. I will admit that I lost Elinor once in the monkey house and Jacob once in Bird World. And then I got very lost on the drive back to Boulder. We made it home though, with all four children, happy and intact.

Um, kay, is this crazy or what? We turned a corner following a sign saying "Indoor Flamingo Quarters" and bam! 40 flamingos packed into one easy-to-view room.

They got to play a little too. This was some monkey thing... brachiate like a gibbon?

And, yes, we were at the Denver Zoo. And it was fabulous.

I had a few more pictures to post, but if I am getting tired of writing about them, then you are getting tired of reading about them, right Grandma?

So let's move onto our always exciting Saturday Adventure!

Today we went for a hike. A serious hike. The kids have been asking to go to the Flatirons, so to the Flatirons we went!

We started at Chautauqua Park, which we are looking down on in this picture. If you click on it, you will see just how many people also decided to go on a hike starting at Chautauqua Park. It really weirded us out the first time we came, but this is the starting point for a lot of hikes, and a lot of people in Boulder like to hike. So you'll see people dotting the trails throughout the park and up the mountain. Both times we've been there has been a wedding there too. And this one time we were at another park and we saw a wedding procession on bikes! But that is another story. Aah, Boulder.

The climbing got pretty intense, but these two were troopers! They hiked probably close to three miles today, gaining about 1400 feet in elevation and it was steep and rocky. But they were awesome. Unfortunately, this hike happened right at Elinor's sleepy time, so she hiked for half of it and was carried the rest of the way.

Climbing the steep, unguarded, very dangerous stairs right at the end.

The three older kids nestled right up against Flatiron #1. I was not about to let Jacob out of the Ergo at this point. I was a little nervous about the steep, rocky dropoffs.

Boulder has definitely been a change for our family, and I really think it has made us more active and adventurous! Now we just have to come up with something for next Saturday...

Rock and Roll

Our weekend adventure took us to the Valmont Bike Park.  It was fantastic.  I just kept wishing I had a bike to ride.  Mine was taken while we were living in Austin.

At first, the kids seemed more than satisfied to just rock around on the little playground toys.

Pretty soon though, they got serious about biking.

The park has some impressive jumps and structures for doing tricks.  We saw people doing amazing things, but we stuck to mostly level ground.

We did get a little more daring once we felt like we were on a roll.

We'll be heading back here--especially if I can find an inexpensive bike so that I can roll along with the kids.

Grammarland and crying bugs.

Homeschooling has so far been a mostly positive experience. I still feel very unqualified whenever I think about how much experience teachers in public schools have, but I like that my kids are able to spend so much time together and that we can work at a pace that is personalized to them.

Emily and I were studying grammar the other day, and we talked about how if she were knocking on a door and I said "who's there?" she should respond, "It is I!"
She looked at me very strangely and said, "Is this for real? I mean, I wouldn't say that in real life, would I?"
Joseph and I were laughing later about how she was separating the magical grammarland that the author lives in from reality and how she's probably right to do it.

Caleb participates fairly regularly in our schooling. Piano and reading are mandatory every day, and he does math and handwriting as he feels inclined. Here is a sample of his work:

He says some of the bugs are sad and crying because they were caught.
He also said some were sad because they only had one wing or no wings and couldn't fly.
He puts a lot of thought into these drawings.

One other random thing about Caleb: The other day at church I heard one of his friends calling, "Bye, Kayla!" and he waved and said 'bye' in return. I asked him about that, and it turns out that all of the other four-year-olds in his class at church call him Kayla and he responds to it as happily as he does to Caleb. He's cool about stuff like that.

And here are my little kids, hard at work on their various lessons.

An Autumn Amble

The weather is now leaning a lot more toward the winter side of things, but the kids and I were able to enjoy a nice fall walk a couple of weeks ago.
It started out when I noticed the swingset was built for our family so I snapped a picture.

Kay, so it's not a great picture, but I wanted to get all four! I love that there's even a baby swing just for Jacob. He loves it too.

Then we (I) decided we needed to walk over to the Smiley Court sign for pictures. It was more of a leisurely amble, since we didn't have any pressing deadlines and the weather was so lovely. Kids are experts at taking their time and enjoying the journey.

A nice roll in the leaves. When they started changing color, I actually had to explain to the kids what was going on! Crazy Austin with its live oaks and no seasons!

If there is a tree, Emily will climb it...

... and Elinor will look crazy.

Baby Jacob just moseyin' along. He loves his Mummy. :)

I asked Caleb to take a picture of me because I thought it was funny how homely I was looking that day. I was still mostly wearing my morning running clothes, plus an attractive handkerchief tucked into my waistband.

I forced the kids to sit on this bench for a picture.

They're a good crew.

Caleb loves to jump off really high things (onto Elinor's head). He's such a boy.

And we finally made it to the sign. It's not the greatest picture, but now we have documentation. Good ol' Smiley Court!