Our dancing boy took some time to entertain us during a family dance at Jason's school.
Oh yes, things are busy at our house. But, we still have the chance to sit back and reflect. Sometimes it's nice to force ourselves to sit still.
I guess Michael likes that, too. The other day he pulled out an old notebook and started writing away. He called it his diary. He even asked me if I was going to check his spelling and punctuation afterward. I told him I wasn't going to do that. It was his private place to write.
Private was the key word. He even wanted to know if I could fashion a lock for it.
He said, "I want to write things down so I can remember later." He's almost seven (!), going on 17, that one.
I imagine he would write about the girl who has offered to pay him so she can sit next to him. It's our neighbor and she is such a great little girl. She offered him TEN dollars for a guaranteed spot. He told us the story and I could tell he was considering taking the deal. I told him absolutely no, but I'm not sure Doug was that emphatic. I think Michael may now wondering what he might be able to do in the future to get that kind of return.
We recently enjoyed a neighbor's night in, by the way. The kids, as you can see, had a blast!
To Joshua, the world is filled with princesses and magic. In fact, he sometimes pretends HE is the princess with blankets he uses for hair. He had the opportunity to attend his first magic show, courtesy of his preschool. There was an in-school field trip and apparently Joshua raised his hand to be one of the magic show volunteers. I haven't been able to get too many details on his day, though. I asked him, "Joshua, how was the magic show?" He simply gave me one word: "Awesome."
Not so awesome is a little pattern I'm seeing with our number three. He seems to make a habit of holding onto his #2s until we have to pay a visit to the doctor. ...sigh. Everybody remembers us afterward.
Lots of new words are popping up in our vocabulary. Quidditch, muggles, Hogwarts, Voldemort. It has been a lot of fun since the kids began reading the Harry Potter books. We started with the audiobooks and now the kids are tackling the written word. It's a bit of a challenge and I get more questions I can't answer than anything else, like "Is Diagon Alley real?" "Does Harry Potter die?" "Why are there so many ghosts at Hogwarts?"
We knew Jason and Michael would get into the story. In fact, the boys each have their own "houses." Jason is Gryffindor, Michael is Ravenclaw, and Joshua is Hufflepuff and Doug and I award and take away points based on their behavior and accomplishments. This was actually not my idea; it was theirs. You better believe I embraced it wholeheartedly. Right now, Joshua is at -10, Michael is at 15 and Jason is at 20.
The baby's reaction to Harry Potter has been the funniest of them all. We started listening to Harry Potter during a long road trip and so Joshua is familiar with the characters even though he really has no idea what is going on. So, the older two will be talking about a scene between Harry, Ron, Hermione or Dumbledore (Dumbledore is very popular, by the way), Joshua will interject with, "And don't forget Snape!"
No matter where the Harry Potter talk leaders, Joshua will squeeze in a Snape reference.
His main squeeze is, of course, Lizzie. We had the chance to visit with her and her brother, Tommy, a few weekends ago. Lots of fun!
Our trip included quite a bit of climbing, too. We're glad the weather cooperated.
And, what a handsome crew. We had a wonderful visit with Grandma, Grandpa, Aunt Jeanne, Dave, Stacie, Ezekiel and Elijah. Hooray! Happy 2012!
