Odds and sods

Evelyn is into trouble again!  She bit her soother through this week.  This time she did not get a replacement, and is doing pretty good at getting to sleep without it.  But every now and then, and especially before nap or bedtime she'll say "bwo!  doodur!"  (broke soother)  She even put in the garbage last night, but repented and tried get it right out again!

It's not often the kids have Lego upstairs (it's an awful mess when all 6 of 'em get into it!) but they had it out today, so they could copy some domino thing off instructions on the web.  We ended up with Lego everywhere!

Jennifer spent some time "drawing", by which she means writing.  She carefully fills in the spaces between the lines, sometimes more wiggly to look like letters, sometimes more like straight lines.

Now, if I move the stool to the pantry I can reach the handles and open it up.  But how do I open the bottom part at get at the snack shelf?

Melanie made a lovely candle holder for us.  Cost her nothing, only a rummage through the recycling, a hunt for hammer and nails (plus a piece of wood to hold the shape of the can while hammering) and a cut in her finger.  It's the Christmas tree she wishes she had. ;)

Matthew the artist showing off his drawing of a mug with it's shadow.

Evelyn came crying to me while I was busy with Jennifer in the bathroom, because her siblings weren't being nice.  Really, we ought to look this way on account of the number of hours we spend in the washroom in our seemingly futile attempts to get Jennifer ready for underwear.

 I must have the world record for slowest potty training children.  Sigh.  Maybe Evelyn will surprise me.  (Fat chance.)

 A puzzle finished at last!  Matthew wanted his grandparents to see.

Painting around the house.  (Thankfully with imaginary paint!  They do enough scribbling with pencils on the walls that we don't need paint on the furniture too!)  Jennifer had been painting the pictures in the book, but I missed that Kodak moment.

And the grand finale being another astounding Kapla project by my creative children: 

It should read "ate" not "eat".  Matthew thought it was funny too, otherwise I wouldn't have posted it. ;) 

Drawing together

(But not quite all of us joined in.)

School playstations and a touch of schoolwork

Everyday play

 Jennifer is still into dolls, but does take a break from motherhood more often, and enjoys pretending to be various people we know.

She also loves to do "crafts" her favorite being "scissoring.  It means chopping a piece of paper into  many many pieces.  Often the bigger pieces of them are handed out as bookmarks.  When I'm busy she'll take out glue too, and use copious amounts of it.  She does a fair bit of careful drawing too.

Matthew can spend his naptime hour all in careful constructing.

 Usually it's K'nex, but sometimes he'll try something new. 

 Other times he will appear to have done nothing other than watching out the window and thinking.

 Jennifer did some schoolwork, and was very proud of it.  She did have to modify it with a hole punch and turn it into a mask like Daniel has been doing lately.  She needed a hand with getting them in the right spots. ;)

 Book worm.

Watching others and planning his next project.

A rocket, almost ready for it's first launch!

Evelyn on the counter.  She now can push the stool up to it and get up herself!  :o

Daniel is 5!

 So, about a month ago, or rather more...

 Daniel turned 5!  He opted for having a friend over, but the friend had moved out of town, so he had to wait almost two weeks for his "party" but meantime, we had a party with the family.  Hats were important-Matthew made one, another one was from Nathan I believe.  Since Daniel loves dressing up, he was sure to wear a hat for a while during his special day.  He had a good time, and we enjoyed letting him know he is special to us!