"Accelerated reading" certificate

Xander won nuggets at McDonald's for reaching his reading goals.  A McDonald's dinner for all (last week, before Pesach) commenced!

Second seder at temple

Ari and his bestie, with bestie's family.

Connor with our amazing mother's helper Erin

Xander the focused.

Pesach food

So far we are fans of:

Matzah with cream cheese and jelly
Matzah with cream cheese, cinnamon/sugar
Matzah with peanut butter and raisins
Matzah with Nutella
Matzah with butter
Hard boiled eggs



Not on the list:

Brisket
Tzimmes
Egg salad
Matzah brie (eggs and matzah) with syrup (despite our label of "Matzah French toast," it's new)
Roasted potatoes
Horseradish
Parsley in salt water
Tuna salad
Charoset
And pretty much anything else that doesn't involve matzah and sugar

Our scientifically-minded eldest child (by Jonathan)

Xander constantly amazes me.

Besides solving exponents, square roots, and writing numbers in binary just for fun, he also likes to write instructions on how to make his own art.

 Below is a step by step how to make a 3D letter that he created. He made it because he knew Mommy would have trouble understanding how it was made.

 He's 7.

 I just love it.

Darth Seder

I had to, I just had to: click here for a Star Wars Passover (a few years old, but still hilarious). My favorite is the Battlestar Galactica guy... "So sorry, I'm not Jewish!"

Big news

I can't believe I haven't posted this here, it's consumed all my free time since February:

We're buying a house!

We close in two weeks.

We then are doing a lot of work to it, and will move in mid-May.

It's gonna be fuuuun....

Shout-out to Jessica

I reconnected with an old friend who it turns out still reads this blog!

Who knew?  

I was kinda thinking only my mother and grandmother did, with my dad peeking in occasionally.

So now I'm curious... if you actually read this, can you comment even with "hi" so I know?

The myriad definitions of "Frozen"

We were reading books in the morning, and Ari's story of choice was a tale from the "5 Minute Star Wars Stories" book.   I was reading about how Han Solo was frozen in carbonite, and Connor got very upset.  He was having none of it.

It took a second to realize what the issue was.

Han couldn't be FROZEN!  

"Frozen" is not an action, nor a description, in Connor's world.  It's a noun only.

And forget Jabba the Hut - Anna and Elsa were nowhere to be found!

Ari's photo of his younger brother.

When the stars align

My day off was a gorgeous sunny day.

Swimming in a pool of perfect temperature, gliding through the water, splashing with children.

Having homemade "ice pops" outside on the patio, from smoothies I had frozen in popsicle molds.

Checking email once, to find nothing controversial.

Talking with friends on the phone.

Children going to bed easily.

Watching a movie with my husband on the couch.



These are the moments I hold onto for when the stars don't align.   If only every day off could be like this one!

Adorable ballerinas

Connor and friends

Engineering for Kids

Xander is taking an Engineering for Kids after-school class, and is over the moon about it.  It's an 8 week course that explores each type of engineering: mechanical, electrical, chemical, etc.  This past week was electrical: he came home with a battery covered with foil, alligator clips, a light bulb, and a bunch of gizmos.

He was SO excited to show me what conducted electricity and what didn't, and to explain the negative and positive charges to me.  We talked about what conducted better, thin or thick materials, we experimented on pennies and zippers and plastic and magnets, etc.

The kid explained things to me that I honestly didn't know.  I'm not quite sure how I feel about that! :)

My children in a nutshell

The eldest: We filled out a summer camp application and had one sentence's space worth to summarize any special notes for the counselors.  We put, "Our son is shy and loves science and math."  If that's not proof that children are different from their parents, then I don't know what is.  It's fascinating watching him differentiate.

The middle:  Defiant social awareness.  More likely to say "no" than "yes."  When I ask him how he his day was, he doesn't tell me what he did (as his older brother would do).  Instead, he tells me all about other people, about who played with who on the playground, who wore Spiderman, who got in trouble.  At dinner out I notice him being quiet, looking over at the next booth, while munching on pizza, and I ask him what he's thinking about. "Just watching people eat," was his answer.

The youngest:  Has run head-long into the stereotypical two's.  He can communicate so well now that he's crestfallen when he knows we understand him... and we still don't do what he wants!  Full-on body tantrums have arrived.  But he's so affectionate and gives us so many kisses that all is forgiven.

I've also been reading up on how birth order shapes personality, thanks to my mother's gift of Jeffrey Kluger's The Sibling Effect: What the Bonds Among Siblings Reveal About Us.  Apparently we have irrevocably messed up our children by giving birth to three of them and creating an eldest, middle, youngest dynamic.  Oh well!  College fund, therapy fund, it's all the same. :)

Ari's birthday party

Ari is 5!!

We had originally planned his birthday at the park. 

But it got rained out.

Actually, it got tornado-warning'd-out.

So we went to a bounce play area instead, Monkey Joe's.

We brought in Costco pizza and a BB8 cake, with soda for the adults, and the place provided juice, plates and cutlery.  Good deal for all.

Hudson, Elijah, Ari.

"Monkey Joe," Connor and Jonathan

Xander and Sebastian

Ari's BB8 Star Wars cake