5/31/2014

Van's newest favorite phrase is 'On second thought'

Van: "More applesauce please"
Me: "Well, you just ate a huge bowl, how about you eat some ravioli's first and then you can have some more."
Van: "On second thought, I'd like some right now. please."

Last Day of Preschool

Yesterday was Van, Finn, Elin and Solvej's last day of pre-school.
It is Finn's last day of preschool forever, next year he'll be in kindergarten! Van, Elin, and Solvej, will be back next year.

Here are Van and Finn riding some cute ponies at the end of the year picnic.

Bike Ride Adventure

Today I took Van and Finn on a bike ride down to Menchies the frozen yogurt store. It's a nice ride, 5 miles, but mostly flat and/or downhill.

Here we are having arrived successfully, eating frozen yogurt. It was so fun!

Then Svea picked up Finn for a BBQ with her friends and Van and I biked to Abbott Loop Elementary school and played for an hour. It was a great day and fun to spend an afternoon with the boys. (Esther was napping)

Grandma's porch

Esther with her ponytail. Riding her big wheel and snacking on goldfish. 

Cutest pony

A captive audience. What are they watching?

Grandpa and Uncle Peter are cutting down a tree.

Playing pretend

Like a dream come true, all 5 kids (mine and Svea's) are playing in my yard, on a beautiful sunny day. They find a pile of tile squares (~1ft x1ft) sitting in a pile by the house.

Van: "hey want to play tile step!"
Everyone else: "Yeah!"

They quickly determine the groundrules. I tell them the tile squares can only be on the grass and not the cement. They determine that the grass is hot lava. Once they have 4 tile squares down in a line, they each stand on them. Van is one one end, then Finn, then Solvej, then Elin. Van picks up a tile, hands it to Finn, who turns and hands it to Solvej who turns and hands it to Elin who runs to the end of the line and adds it to path.
It's amazing to watch them organize so efficiently into an assembly line. They talk about how much hard work they are doing.
"We are working so hard."
"hard work, hard work"

Then once the pile is gone (about 20 tiles) they begin picking up the first tiles and adding them in interesting directions at the end.

"We made a letter T!" Van says at one point.

The boys like this part, especially Finn, who loves building things. The girls are a little less interested now. Solvej sits on one of the tiles and Elin rides a bike nearby.

Finn: "We are guards." Van agrees. They continue to build neat shapes by moving the tiles from one end of the line to the other.

Solvej: "I am the queen." She stands up authoritatively.
Elin: "I am the queen too." Elin calls from her bike.
Van: "You're the bike queen."
Elin: "No I am the queen too."
Me: "You could be the princess."
Elin: "I am the queen too." she gives up her bike and stands by Solvej to cement her position.
Solvej: "Shoulders! I am the queen. Bring me a necklace."

 (I wish there existed puncuation to convey how she said this. First, so much authority. And she says 'necklace' as if obtaining one is the most nefarious, yet serious task. It's as if she's just asked for someone to be beheaded to exact revenge on the behalf of her kingdom. She would make a great queen.)

Elin: "Give me a necklace."
Finn: "Yes queen. We will get you a necklace" in his robot/soldier/guard voice.
Solvej: "Shoulders, give me necklace; and make it red and sparkly."
Elin: "Mine blue and sparkly."

Anyway, the game goes on from there, but I am loving this new stage of playing pretend, especially on a group level.

2014 Drafts

I have several 'Drafts' on my blog list, ideas or fragments I've captured but never published. I decided to compile them all so I could delete the drafts.
I have so many, I had to categorize them by year.

These are the 2014 ones, in no particular order.


"I can't sleep. My brain is keeping me awake. It keeps snoring."
- Van

***

Esther is sitting on the edge of the window seat now trying to put on a pair of pants. It is the cutest thing ever. She sits down, gets to the edge and lets her little feet dangle then puts the pants to them. Or pulls a shirt up to her head in an effort to get it on. so cute.

She continues to be the most delightful thing in the universe.

***

"I don't need a kiss. The kisses are too slimy for me."
 - Van

***

Van walks in pushing a shopping cart containing his jammies and books, I had sent him out a few minutes ago to do his before bed jobs which include: going poddy, brushing teeth, getting jammies on, and picking out story time books.

Van: "Hello, what's your name?"
Me: "My name is Vanessa, what's your name?"
Van: "Ank."
Me: "Your name is Ank?"
Van: "yeah.
Van: " Yes, I work with Uncle Andy, I work where he works. We work together."
Me: "Oh, what do you do?'
Van: "Well I go in the secret passageway to his work."
Me: "But what's your job there?"
Van: "Well sometimes I sleep at work. The man doesn't let me sleep at work all the time."
Me: "Just some of the time?"
Van: "yeah"

***

Me: "Van let's go on an adventure!"
Van: "I have an idea for an adventure, but we're going to need a gun."
Me: Funny look
Van: There are a lot of dangerous moose and bears out there."

***

Van now has 3 dog alter-egos: 'pickle', 'follower' and 'french fry'.

French fry is his favorite right now, it is who he normally pretends to be, but the others will usually be somewhere in the room.
Pickle seems to have all the skills, at dinner today we learned

"Pickle eats everything, even pepperoni!" (Van personally does not like pepperoni)

and

"Pickle learned how to kill a moose. You know, to eat for food."

Follower only has the distinction of being a dog that follows you around.

***

Me: "Oh no! Van what happened to your knee?" (he had some scratches)
Van: "It's ok, it's just from 'Oscar 1 2 3'"
Me: "Oscar 1 2 3?"
Van: "You know, that place we went with the water and the pirate ship."
Me: "Ooooh, H 2 Oasis"
Van: "Yeah, that one."

Andy said he called it 'Oscar's Oasis' the other day, which is the name of a show he likes to watch.

2013 Drafts Part 2

(Consolidated content of all the Draft posts I never published)

(This is from last year, in our old house)

Today we had new closets installed downstairs to put my clothes in. I had been using the downstairs bedroom as a closet, but since we moved Van into it a few months ago, I haven't had anywhere to store my clothes and they have been in the downstairs living room. I have been looking forward to these closets for a long time.

Our conversations about them today have gone like this.

Van: "Mom, these closets are for all of us"

Me: "No, these closets are only for me. These are my closets."

Van: "Mom, you have to share your closets. These closets are for everyone"

Me: "Nope, just for me."

Van: "Mom, that's what it says here on this tape. Share. You have to share mom."

Me: "No, I paid for these closets and I want them."

Van: "Mom I will share my closets with you. Mom, if you don't share you closets, you can't get a present. So what do you want, to get no present or to share your closets?"

***

Van is working on his set of wooden puzzles (thanks grandpa pat!). He's really good at them now so he's just chatting away as he puts the pieces together and I'm absentmindedly watching him.

Suddenly he is serious,

Van: "Mama. Did you know that sometimes mamas die?"
Me: "Oh dear"

Then he immediately relaxes,

Van: "But that only happens to other kids, not me."

***

Have I posted about similes yet? Hopefully this isn't a repeat, but I've noticed Van uses similes to describe things.

"That bus is as tall as a tall tree"
"that dog is black like a black bear"
"that garbage can looks like a hippo head."

Alright the last one didn't have quite the right form but it made me laugh.

Other things are "High like an airplane" or "strong like daddy"

***

3 years, 5 months, 23 days old.

Van snuck out of the house for the first time.

I went outside to get something from the car and found he had crawled out his ground floor bedroom window and was riding his bike on the front porch.

"I don't want to go to bed mama" he said.