Ninjas, stocks, and subtraction.

No, those three things aren't related at all. Just the three categories of pictures I happen to have put in this post.


But first, wanna know the cutest thing ever? Jake's version of zip-a-dee-doo-dah.

"Zop a doh doh doh doh!"

He also spilled milk on the floor today and said, "Dang eh!" It cracked me up.


And here are a few highlights from life lately:

Ethan is way into Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles right now or anything else that has to do with fighting... We got out some old bandanas the other day and practiced our moves.





Jake likes to say Hi -YA!






Ethan is getting better at taking pictures!




We have been building lots of towers (and mostly knocking them down. Ethan likes to ninja off the couch and jump at them to kick them down. )



And we've each had our turn in the stocks:


















Joy school has been really fun for Ethan. (and me!) This month the unit was on order and goal setting and he set a goal to be able to do all the subtraction problems with numbers from 5-0 in less than 3 minutes. He loves subtracting things. I thought maybe he would choose a goal to learn to tie his shoe, or to learn to cook something, but he wanted to do subtraction. We had a stack of flashcards that he practiced doing faster and faster until he got it!

He loved coloring in parts of the chart as he worked on his goal, and I loved watching him feel the joy of achieving it!!

Hooray for Joy School. Good stuff.



Kyle is taking boards tomorrow and Wednesday! (Prayers and fingers crossed that he passes!) After Christmas he got strep throat on top of some other nasty flu-like bug, and he has been studying his guts out ever since he felt well enough to be able to. I'm grateful to be married to such a hard worker, and looking forward to having him around again soon!



Jake is still a world-class snuggler. I love it. And Ethan loves taking pictures.




This semester is already going by quickly.... our days here are numbered...!


Okay, I'll end with a random quote I read the other day and liked:

"Confidence comes from making mistakes. The more mistakes you make, the more you know what not to do."
-Steve Tatham, staff writer, Walt Disney.

I've never quite thought of it that way before. That is a liberating paradigm! My initial approach to parenting was to try really really hard to never MAKE any mistakes. ha ha. The second time around, I've done a better job at laughing at my mistakes and chalking them up to the list of things NOT to do. I think there are more elements to confidence than just making the mistakes, of course--but I'm grateful for the reminder that my failures can point me toward future success. :)

K, the end.

Goodnight My Angel...

You know that Billy Joel lullaby that goes "Goodnight My Angel time to close your eyes..."
It's a favorite at our house.

I love the last few lines:

Someday your child may cry, but if you sing this lullaby,
Then in your heart there will always be a part of me.
Someday we'll all be gone, but lullabies go on and on
They never die, that's how you and I will be.


After I finished singing it tonight, Ethan said:

"Okay, I get it mom. So lullabies are immortal!"

Great logic, kiddo.

Best Quotes of the Week:

Jake, running behind Ethan: "Wait! Me! Wait! Me! Uh Gumming!"

********

I have started saying, "Okie Doke, let's roll!" incessantly. (Yes, I picked it up from Sid the Science Kid's grandma, and yes, I know it is even dorkier than when Hugh Grant says "Whoopsie Daisy" in Notting Hill.) But I love hearing Jake's version echoed back to me throughout the day:
"Doke uh Doke, uh Woh!!"

********

Ethan: "Mom, I wish I were a ninja turtle that lived in the sewer."

Me: " Oh really?" (I'm thinking of all the reasons Ethan would say that, including getting to fight bad guys and do cool ninja moves and stuff...)

Ethan: "Yeah, because then I wouldn't have to walk all the way to the garbage to throw something away."


********

Ethan: Does a band-aid have skin in it, mom? Is that how it heals your owie?

My little conversationalist.

Morning church is awesome. 9:00, baby! I like the whole, let's just get up, get ready, and go approach rather than the let's get up and not really do anything but try to eat breakfast, lunch, and get dinner in the crock pot before we leave--and the last 45 minutes before you have to be out the door somehow just disappears....

So 9:00 is good. But, it does kind of make we want an afternoon nap, and that's a little tricky to come by with a 4 year-old running around. So, I tried the old, "Hey Ethan, do you want to come snuggle?" trick to see if I could at least get a minute or two of laying in bed feeling like I was getting a nap. He cuddled up under the covers with me and and I put my arm around him and closed my eyes....

Then, very matter of factly, and without a shred of tiredness in his voice, he said,
"So, how was Relief Society today?"

Well, so much for that idea.
But I'd give up more than a nap for a little boy that cute. :)


Oh, and here's a picture, not taken THIS Sunday, but back in June, of two handsome boys ready to go to church...

Dr. Ricks, Paleontologist

It has happened. I now have a little boy who can look at pictures of dinosaurs and say, "that's an Anklyosaurus, that one is a Triceratops, and that one is an Ornithomimus." Ornitho what? Thank you, PBS Kids for teaching my son about dinosaurs I've never even heard of. :)

So, Ethan got this little surprise in his stocking for Christmas. Dig for dinosaur bones at home! It actually turned out to be pretty cool!

It came with a little scraper/pounder thing and a brush to dust off the bones, and then there were 26 separate, glow in the dark bones hidden inside the dirt cube.

So he scraped,



and brushed,


and dug,


and brushed some more,


and eventually found all of the bones!

Hmmmm, I guess we forgot to take a picture of the bones all put together. It was a T-rex! (and thank goodness it came with instructions of how to put it together because I got cross-eyed trying to piece it all together even knowing which pieces were supposed to go where)

Very fun, though!

"I'm a real paleontologist, Mom!"

Priceless.

New Year De-Cluttering and Moses 1:35

Happy New Year!!

We cracked down today and combed out over 6 garbage bags worth of stuff to take to Good Will. It feels great to simplify and just get rid of things sometimes, doesn't it? We will be moving once Kyle finishes dental school in May, so we decided to get ruthless about throwing things away. "If it's not worth storing it now, finding a box for it in a few months, filling that box, getting that box on a truck, hauling that box across the country, getting that box off the truck, unloading that box, and finding a new place for that item--then let's get rid of it now."

I am amazed at how much stuff you can accumulate in a lifetime! You think, "where did all this stuff even COME from?!" Yet, I can choose any item out of millions in my house and I can tell you why we have it and how we got it.

1. Little black socks: My son and I both got tired of trying to inch on his tight Sunday socks, so we bought some slippery dressy ones. He can get them on all by himself! I planned the purchase, went to the store, put them in my cart, paid for them, got them home, took off the tag, washed them, and found a place to keep them.

2. Fondue Pot: Lovely Christmas present from my husband. Came with a recipe book and 8 fondue forks. Filled it on New Year's Eve with a fabulous cheese fondue. (What do you get when you combine 2 incredibly nasty smelling cheeses with one normal cheese, some cornstarch, and some white grape juice? A delicious dip for bread and veggies!)

3. Old, broken laptop: Got as a high school graduation present from my parents. Used it through college, and it has been sitting in my closet for 3 years since it crashed. (Learned today that a friend can take it to his work and wipe the hard drive for us so we don't have to worry about a hacker getting it out of the dumpster and stealing our identity)

And of course, the list goes on forever. I have shirts, shoes, toys, appliances, books, jewelry, cleaning supplies, etc. And I can tell you exactly how and why (well usually) I have it in my house.


So, what does that have to do with Moses 1:35? Well, I was reading tonight about Moses and how God shows him "the world..and all the children of men which are, and which were created." I can't even fathom how many people that is. I can't even get my head around how many people live in one city, no less an entire country, a whole world, and then all that were and will ever be born. How can God know me personally if there are more than billions of others? How can He care about me, and be involved in the details of my life, when I am one grain of sand on the beach?

That's why I love verse 35: "And there are many [worlds] that now stand, and innumerable are they unto man; but all things are numbered unto me, for they are mine and I know them."

They are mine, and I know them. I understand that! I have innumerable amounts of stuff even just in my house, but all the things I have are mine, and I know them. I know the purpose of each item, and I took great care to purchase it for a unique reason so it could enrich our lives, help us accomplish things, and bring us joy. My son could never keep track of everything in our home and know where it goes and how much it costs or understand why we have it or what it's used for. (He can barely keep track of his 15 ninja turtle action figures!) So as I multiplied that all out,in the equation where I'm the little kid and God is the parent, I started to grasp a little bit more fully how it could be possible for God's creations to be innumerable to man, but for him to say, "all things are numbered unto me, for they are mine and I know them."

That was a neat thought for me. And the coolest part about it is that we're not just socks, or fondue pots, or old computers to the Lord. Each of us is his CHILD. We're not just a rusty old knick knack in a storage bin somewhere in his closet. We are his CHILDREN!
So many things come into clearer focus when we remember that. Of course I know my sons' names. Of course I know what that they need. Of course I know how they learn the best, and I care what they struggle with, and how to help them. And of course I don't do everything for them just because I can, because I want them to learn how to do it for themselves.
So that means that my Heavenly Father knows me by name, He knows what I need, He knows how I learn the best, He knows what I struggle with, and He is constantly devising creative ways to help me learn new things. So I can learn how to be like Him.

"All things are numbered unto me, for they are mine and I know them."

He knows me. He knows you too. :)