Art Work

This week we took a trip to the public library to see a piece of art work that Emma had done and was selected to be hung up in the library. It was entitled "Texture Town." It was something she made in school in art class. She painted paper and then cut it out and glued it on a big piece of paper to make the shapes of things in a town. On our way into the library a bunch of people were walking in and Emma said, "There are a lot of people going to the library! I bet they want to see a lot of art!"

Legos

As it turns out, I like legos. I don't remember having them as a child. I am pretty sure we had at least some because I know what they are but I don't remember playing with them. John has been getting into legos lately. I have been playing legos with him and enjoying it.

I have always wanted to build a lego temple whenever I see pictures of lego temples. I think it would be fun. I decided that it would be a great activity for the kids to do during conference. I asked John's preschool teacher if I could borrow her legos to find the pieces I needed to build a temple. It turns out she has a million legos. I spent the better part of a rainy day searching through legos for white pieces and gray and tan pieces (when it was apparent that I didn't have enough white pieces). And by the better part, I mean several hours. My eyes were having a hard time adjusting to looking at any distance that was longer than about 18 inches from my face. It brought back a ton of memories of my programming days. Even John commented that his eyes were "weird." John's preschool teacher had 3 more bags of legos so if I wanted to, I could spend three more days looking for the right legos.

I decided that it was worth the $45 for a temple lego set. So the Nauvoo temple is coming on Wednesday. The kids have requested the large Salt Lake temple that is supposed to take an adult 6-9 hours to complete. We will have to see how Nauvoo goes.

Competition

My kids are starting to show their competitive natures or the lack thereof depending on the child. Emma comes from the Russell camp. She is totally competitive, even beyond what I could imagine her being. It has surfaced this year I think in part due to recess at school and playing tag with her friends.

John on the other hand, doesn't have a competitive bone in his body. He is Anderson. Yesterday we were trying to herd the cats (read kids) out the door to go to the park. They were not moving. So I tried to get John to race me in getting on our socks. John wasn't quite going to win. He said, "Mom is the first winner, I am the second winner, Emma is the third winner and Daddy is a rotten egg!" There are only winners and rotten eggs. They haven't even conceived yet that there is another option that begins with the letter "l."

Jokes

John told his first joke that he made up that makes sense. Here it is:

John: What is 2+2?
Me: 4
John: No, tooters!
Me: [giggling because tooters are still funny when you are 37]
John: What is 1+1?
Me: 2
John: No, tooters!
Me: [giggling some more]

Clean Up

We are trying something new in our house. Cleaning up for the kids is the equivalent to asking them to move a mountain. Not going to happen unless they are doing it to get screen time. It is extremely frustrating to repeatedly ask them to clean up and to watch the temper tantrums unfold. So Aaron and I came up with a new approach. It is new to our family. My parents did something similar when I was a kid.

At night Aaron and I go around and sweep up all of the things they left out. Then we lock it up. The kids have to do a chore to get the item out. When we explained this to the kids they were excited for a number of reasons. 1. We won't be nagging them to clean up anymore. And 2. they heard "mom and dad are going to clean up for us!"

So far after one day, we have about a third of the toys locked up in grandma's room. At this rate, in two more days, the kids won't have any toys left. I am giggling as I type this. There are some interesting side effect from this. The kids are now playing with tier 2 toys and enjoying them. These are toys that they don't normally play with but since the tier one toys are gone, they don't have much of a choice. Our house gets easier to clean because there are fewer and fewer toys to clean up. And lastly, I am pretty sure this will help us identify what toys can be sold off because if they aren't interested in doing a chore to get the toy back, then they don't need it.

As for my parent's take on this, we had to shoot baskets to get our cloths and toys back. For Aaron, this would have been a reward for not cleaning up. For me, it was torture. I would have rather done a chore to get my stuff back. This was all part of my parents attempt to get us out of the house and learn a sport. Unfortunately for my mom, I never learned to love basketball.

The real challenge today will be getting John dressed for church since I now have his church cloths. It looks like he might be going to church in corduroy pants in warm weather and wearing a polo shirt that bugs him. With any luck he will want to get his church cloths out for next Sunday.

New Friends

I took the kids to the park and a few of the neighbors were there that had kindergarteners as well. I was talking with one mom in an attempt to get to know her. Unfortunately I didn't get her name.

On the way home from the park Emma turned to me and said, "Mom, did you make a new friend?" She said it in the same way that Aaron asks Emma that same question. It was very clear that Emma was my mom at that moment. I giggled and told her "yes." Then Emma said, "What is her name?" (Also in a parenting voice.) I admit, I didn't know. Emma persisted. Finally, I came up with "Trent's mom." Mission accomplished!

Pets

Emma: I like dogs!

Aaron: No you don't. You like bees!

Several of our friends have bees. They make honey. We are tempted to get bees. Several of our friends have dogs. They make poop. We are not tempted to get dogs.