Kids Fun Fest, Date Night, table manners

Saturday was a fun day, it was Kids Fun Fest at the fairgrounds. I had a henna booth there, so Guy brought Nico and they spent at least an hour wandering around the exhibits and enjoying the bouncy house and surf board. Somehow he came home with 3 new water bottles!

After giving Ivy a henna tattoo. She wanted a ladybug.

Grandma Salisbury helped me at my booth that day. Thanks Ma! It was a fun time!

On Sunday Nico and I went to visit the Grandparents Salisbury to pick up some milk and eggs. It is so nice having them in town so close by, we stayed for a bit and chatted. 

On Sunday at church Nico came up to me after his Sunday school and told me he had invited Miss Kayla (his teacher) and her family over for dinner on Thursday. I apologized to Miss Kayla and told her we would love to have her over once we move. Nico said that he heard Miss Kayla say that she loves turkey burgers, which is what we have every Thursday night. What a sweet boy!

On Monday night Guy and I have instituted Date Night, which is not much more than doing something special and unordinary after Nico goes to bed, like play a new game or watch a movie. On Monday night Nico asked if he could stay up later and I said "Not tonight, I have a date with Daddy!" and Nico's response was "Oh, so you can have another baby?" 

Jaw drop.

I asked him how he associated date night with babies and he said "I just guessed." ????

Tuesday Brianna came over for dinner, we had sweet potato crusted quiche, it was very yummy. We are starting to teach Nico table manners, which I think we should have done a long time ago. I guess it was difficult to see the need before, but with having Brianna over it's become evident that he doesn't quite know what to do. So we had a "training" dinner on Monday night. And surprisingly, he does know just how to behave. Little stinker. He knew just what he should and shouldn't do. So every night is training night now. Table manners are a thing now. Don't test us quite yet ;) 

We are in negotiations for purchasing the car that we are borrowing from friends. We will need one more car and then we can save up for moving out! 

Nico expressed an interest in joining the Chess Club at school, so we signed him up for it and his first meeting is tomorrow. They meet once a week on Fridays at 8AM, before school. This session is just for 3 weeks. He also came home with information about the Children's Race on June 3rd. It's for kids age 6-12, and it starts at the train depot and runs down to the Capitol building, it's just 1 mile. So we signed him up for that, too. He will get a t-shirt and a medal for participating.

It's been quiet without Aadam and Sammy around, but he is playing with Evelyn more now, which is fun! Today was 85+ degrees outside and him and Evelyn played outside after school.

That's it for this week!

Fuzzy, Lost tooth, Sore tummy

We went to Fred Meyer last Friday and Nico bought a little fox that he named Fuzzy. Fuzzy came with a blue bag (purse?) that he sits in, Nico calls it his bed. He brought Fuzzy and his bed to Bible Study on Sunday, and has been sleeping with Fuzzy right next to him in his blue purse bed.

Saturday morning, I made pancakes per usual, and Nico sat at the table and said it was hard for him to eat because his tooth was loose. He said he was going to pull it out and I thought that maybe he might succeed in a few days, but Nico sat at the table, determined, for about 10 minutes, pulling at his tooth until it came out. He wanted to enjoy his pancakes (it's his favorite day because of the pancakes in the morning) and pulled his tooth out so he could do just that. We forgot about the tooth fairy and in fact I'm not sure where the tooth ended up.. hmm. It's in a baggie somewhere.

On Tuesday, Brianna came over for dinner. We ate tuna pasta salad on a bed of lettuce and roasted veggies on the side.

Wednesday morning, Nico woke up with a sore tummy. He had a slight fever so I wrote his teacher that he wouldn't be coming to school. He laid on the couch and said "I don't think I want to eat fudgesicles ever again." He had eaten an entire fudgesicle the night before, right before going to bed. At about 10 am his fever went up to 101.3, he had a headache, took a nap, and felt a lot better after waking. He never threw up, but drank milk and ate banana bread all day long. He slept well last night and woke up this morning, stood up and said "Hey! I don't feel sick anymore! And when I walk my head doesn't hurt!"

I still kept him back from school for one more day. He has been watching iPad a lot today, lounging. He will go back to school tomorrow!

That's really all we did this week, short and sweet!

Garage sale, Kestrel

One night before bed, Nico asked Alexa to play his favorite lullaby which is called Australian Lullaby. We started talking about playing the song on the piano and I asked him if he wanted to learn how to play the piano and he said Yes so I started talking about it and after I was done I hear this almost silent whine come from Nico. I look over at him in his bed and he has this sad look on his face and I ask him what's wrong. He says, "I don't WANT to learn how to play the piano."

Wow! The first thing Nico has declared he doesn't want to do. And I am A-ok with that! I really just want to give him opportunities to pursue the things he wants to pursue. If it's not piano, then OK!

Last Friday, the entire new season of MST3K was released on Netflix and Guy took the day off to watch them. I watched some with him, but some of the day was spent getting ready for the yard sale which we had on Saturday!

We had everything priced in boxes, so Saturday morning we moved boxes and tables and then just unloaded all the boxes onto the tables. This was actually a bit more work than I was expecting, but we had it pretty much unloaded by the time 9AM rolled around. Papa came that morning to drop off some moving boxes to give away at the yard sale, and to help haul boxes. Thank you Papa!

Nico and Evelyn went up and down the aisle and picked out things to buy. Evelyn was purchasing stuff for her Grandma's cabin. Nico chose to buy Papa's old wallet, a cherry pitter, and an empty tin.

Relaxing in the afternoon after a hard morning of selling his toys

Nico sold a lot of his toys and was a very eager salesman. He asked people outright if they wanted to buy some of his stuff, and when one lady paused to look at his toy table he said to her: "I think your dog would like this gorilla. Do you want to buy it?" When someone tried to haggle with him and lower his price on his train set, he said "No. $10." She laughed and said he drove a hard bargain and bought it from him. He made $32 total! 

And it turns out, about an hour before the end of the garage sale, he grabbed his gorilla and said "I think I want to keep this." so he brought it inside.

We ended at 3PM. A lot of stuff sold but we still had a lot of stuff leftover, so we loaded up our car and Jeff and Allicia's van and Guy and Jeff drove a load to the Youth Ranch to donate it. On the way home they picked up Chipotle for dinner and some Izze Pops from Whole Foods. We ate our dinner on the front lawn, picnic style. We were beat!

The day was sunny but it started out very cold! We were thankful for the sun.

That evening, though we were beat, Guy took Nico to the glow-in-the-dark Easter egg hunt that our church was putting on. Because it was glow-in-the-dark, it had to start late. The mini-sermon started at 8:00 and the hunt wasn't until 8:45. The church was expecting about 100 people but they had about 500. The hunt itself lasted maybe 3 minutes and some kids didn't get any eggs. Nico grabbed 3 eggs and then they sped to the car to get out of the parking lot before the rush. Nico came home and was asleep instantly.

Sunday was Easter, it was a good sermon. Then we went to pick up the eggs and milk from Papa. Grandma Salisbury was out of town visiting her mom in Moscow. Papa told us how to make egg nog with the milk and eggs, so we tried it that night. Guy liked it so he put some in his coffee! 

Since we weren't able to do pizza on Saturday night, we did it on Sunday. We started watching Star Trek: The Next Generation. Nico actually enjoyed it! Guy told us that he used to watch this with the fam while eating pizza on Saturday nights. I remember watching it with my brothers all the time and it will be a fun tradition to continue.

We played a game Easter night that we learned last time we were in Arlington. Grandma Russell sent us what we needed, a list of nursery rhymes, which we cut up and put into all the eggs we could locate which was just 4. You go around and pick an egg, and then sing/say the nursery rhyme. Then it's the next person's turn. Video link here if you'd like to see the round we did: https://goo.gl/photos/cVRu4d1ZtwjPPLVS7

Thanks Grandma Russell! :)

Yesterday was a sunny day, so I picked Nico up from school on my bike. He had his scooter, and we rode to the MK Nature Center (aka Fish Park). I wanted Nico to see the American Kestrel they have there. The greenbelt path was closed due to risk of deterioration because of the height of the river, though everyone was still using it. We rode it to the Nature Center but used a different route home. It will be hard to get around this summer on our bikes because all the paths are closed. They don't think they will get around to assessing danger until August.

Nico found a shady spot and asked if he could finish his lunch that he didn't finish at school.

We went into the lobby of the Nature Center and saw so many animals that had been stuffed. We saw some different birds, a crane, a heron, lots of different ducks, quail, even a bald eagle! All stuffed. Then we went out to meet the American Kestrel. Meet Fiona. American Kestrels are a bird of prey but they are surprisingly small! They have Fiona at the nature center because she is missing an eye. 

Nico told me his leg was hurting from pushing on the scooter, so we figured out a way for him to stand on the lowest bar of my bike right in front of me and I swung the scooter over my handle bars. We rode that way about half of the way home. It was so nice to be outside!

Nico is on Magic Treehouse book #13

We are waiting for its arrival at the library along with #14.

Until next time!

Virtual Reality, Goodbye to Friends

On Sunday night, Allicia and Jeff had friends over who had designed a Virtual Reality game that they let everyone try. Nico and Guy both had a turn (I declined due to being a tad motion sick from watching Nico play.. hehe) Nico was a champ, and played really well (see video at end). He had a leaf blower and got to blow leaves and other things with his leaf blower. If you point it at the ground then you fly. Then he played one where there were a bunch of things you can throw.

Also on Sunday night, Guy and I and Jeff and Allicia sat downstairs to watch a part of the first release of the new MST3K movies. Since Guy supported the kick starter, he got early access to the first episode. Guy and I watched the entire episode earlier on Sunday, but that evening we shared part of it with Jeff and Allicia. 

We said goodbye to our friends Aadam and Sammy and Tiffanie on Tuesday. They moved out of state and we will miss them!

We got the pictures back from the henna photo shoot. It's nice to have those pictures of the 4 kid crew.

He entered the Adams Elementary Yearbook Cover Contest.

He drew two wolves on a cliff howling at the moon and then two bears down below with some trees.

Sittin'

Nico is on #9 of the Treehouse books. 

Here's the virtual reality video! (notice the newly painted and carpeted downstairs!!!)

See you next week!

Sleepover, Date Night, Magic Treehouse, GG

Last Friday morning I dropped Nico off at the Grandparents Salisbury's house, him and some of the other cousins were there for another sleepover during Spring Break!

Guy and I spent the afternoon at a coffee shop and then went for a walk in downtown Boise, before picking up some Chipotle and coming home to watch a movie. We chose Around the World in 80 Days.

Then on Saturday morning Guy went with me to hang some of my henna designs up at Awakenings Coffee House.

Guy and Nico went to Lexie's birthday party that afternoon, I stayed home to get some work done and then we had pizza that night!

Nico lined his stuffed animals up on the floor in the kitchen this morning so I could feed them all breakfast. Apparently they don't like oatmeal.

Nico was very proud of himself tonight for eating everything on his plate. It's true it's easier when it's turkey burger night! Here he is eating a tater tot that has been dipped in his strawberry milkshake, Guy showed him how to do that.

He has been reading the Magic Treehouse books in order, I think there are 55 total. At first he was picking them randomly from the library but the week before Spring Break he decided to read them in order. On Sunday (I think?) Guy took Nico out to 2 different library branches to get #3 and #4. We are on Thursday right now and he has finished up to #6. We don't have any more to read but will probably pick up more on Saturday.

We are rescheduling our trip to Arlington to happen at the end of June, and we are flying! It will be a fun trip and I am looking forward to it. Nico will get to fly for the first time and I am very excited for that.

We were scheduling our garage sale for this Saturday but the weather looks pretty bad, 50 degrees and raining with thunder, so we decided to move it to the next weekend, the 15th. We were going to visit GG that day so instead, I went to see her today while Nico was in school. It was great to see where she is living now (with her sister Pat), with her room all set up and her comfy chair and couch in the living room. I was able to meet Pat for the first time, too!

That's it for this week!

Spring Break!

Nico had a bit of a cold last weekend, with a fever on Saturday. We were planning a trip to see Allicia's Roller Derby game on Saturday night but I stayed home with Nico and Guy went to the game. He had never seen a game before so we figured that would be the best arrangement! We actually had a pretty fun night ourselves, we ate dinner and watched Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.

Saturday and Sunday I went over to the Grandparents Salisbury new house to help unpack. All their stuff was moved on Friday.

Grandma and Aunt Ellen laughing.

SPRING BREAK is happening this week, and Guy also has the whole week off. We've had plans to go do some fun things but haven't realized those plans yet. It has been rainy and we've been working hard to get stuff organized for our garage sale and clearing the clutter out of here. We purchased a wardrobe and switched around Nico's bed so that he is now sleeping on top of the bed. When we pulled his mattress from the floor underneath the bed we discovered mold on the bottom, so we tossed it outside and ran and bought a new mattress.

Monday - went through all our storage in the cellar, pulling stuff for the garage sale and repacking the storage boxes.

Tuesday - sorted through Nico's toys. Met Grandma Salisbury, Bruce, and Rory at Red Robin for lunch, then they took Nico for a sleepover at the Grandparents Salisbury new house. Tuesday evening I had a henna photoshoot at Quarry View Park. The photographer took pictures of the kids (Evelyn, Nico, Sammy, Aadam) with henna and also Allicia with henna. I took a few shots of Allicia myself after we came home, just to capture the moment, since I won't get the professional photos for a few more weeks :)

Wednesday - went to Pojo's with Bruce and Rory and Grandma Salisbury. He got 383 tickets and had quite a bit of fun playing games and riding bumper cars. We went to Big-Os to get the oil changed, here are Rory and Nico sitting down at Big-O Tires.

Thursday - This morning Nico opened a package from the Grandparents Russell that had some fun activities in it, we colored some bird coloring pages and we picked out where he would hang up the bird migration poster. This was also a Lego sorting day. Nico sat down with Guy and I at the table and worked on a miniature Lego panda while Guy and I sorted Legos. Rain rain and more rain, so much rain, snow too. But mostly rain, hard rain.

Here's a picture of Nico tucked into bed ready to sleep tonight. First night he has ever slept with a TOP SHEET in his own bed. I figured it was about time. We are using a quilt now that Grandma Russell made (can't remember if I helped or not?) It is beautiful, though, and so soft. And you can see the wardrobe we purchased. It has a mirror in the middle panel and Nico has been enjoying that. We find him practicing his ninja skills in front of the mirror sometimes.

It has been quite a cozy Spring Break so far.

Last trip to the cabin, Photronics

Last Friday was St. Patrick's Day. Allicia bought all the kids something green to wear to school. Nico forgot his green bowtie so I brought it to him as soon as I got home from dropping him off. He was very grateful. Here are all the kiddos after school while walking home.

On Saturday morning I went up to the cabin and Guy and Nico went to the Photronics Phun Day. There was a scavenger hunt, a tour, and he got to try on the bunny suits you have to wear into the Fab.

After they were done they met me up at the cabin because this was the last get together before the Grandparents Salisbury move to their new home. It was good to say goodbye to the place. They are officially moving tomorrow (Friday!). Here's to new adventures!

Sunday was church and Bible Study, and sitting between the two was a birthday party for Ivy, who turned 2 years old on the first day of Spring! It was a rainbow party. Yummy food, colorful streamers. They held it under the covered porch. We had to leave early to get to Bible study on time.

We are planning a garage sale to sell some things and save up for a car. We have a lot of stuff that needs to go. We plan to spend a lot of time during Spring Break decluttering. Just tonight we had delivered a wardrobe we purchased off craigslist. This will help with the clutter, it will replace our hanging closet, and it has doors to close so you don't have to see the stuff inside it. I am very pleased with it. One of the doors even has a mirror.

Picture of Nico at dinner tonight drinking his milk. Thursday is always turkey burger day! His favorite. He eats it one small teeny bite at a time so it lasts longer. He then tells Daddy - "Eat small bites so it lasts longer!"

He has been reading...

Captain Underpants
Magic Treehouse books

These are chapter books and he's been reading them outloud several times a day, he even takes them outside while he's playing and reads them to Sammy and Aadam. If he doesn't know a word he either guesses what it is and moves on, or he asks what it is. He sometimes comes into the bathroom while I'm taking a shower and sits on the toilet to read me a book.

There is a Dogman comic where the evil cat takes away all the books in the world and all the people get really dumb. Then when the books come back, they get smart again. So Nico says that he is getting smarter and smarter because he reads.

GG, Park, Squirrel

On Saturday we visited GG. Missy (Guy's cousin) was there helping GG pack because she is moving soon, in with her sister Pat. The next time we go visit GG we will be seeing her at her new place! GG gave Nico the cars that he plays with whenever he comes over, the one that Grandpa Russell made and I think one that Guy's Uncle Larry made, plus some tiny cars that you pull back first and then they go. I also found out that Uncle Larry is an ornithologist! If I already knew this then I must have forgotten! Guy knew, of course. It was great to see GG and to see her house one last time before the move.

Nico has been taking pictures of animals that he finds, here's his latest.

And some flowers.

The weather has been so nice that he has had lots of time to play outside with his friends. We even went to Quarry View park for the first time this year! We had to go to setup my henna canopy to install a wire onto it, and while we set up the canopy Nico played on the playground. It felt like the whole neighborhood was there!

We went another time but with Nico's friends.

They also had a "Spring picnic" out front last Friday, because it was so sunny and warm!

We bought bird seed and squirrel food for our feeders, we hope to hang them on Saturday. They are sitting outside now and while we haven't had any birds interested in the feeder while it's on the ground, we DID get a curious squirrel that came over and went to town on the sunflower seeds.

This squirrel is one that lives in Tiffanie's yard. We are very excited to be moving the feeder into her yard so they will have much easier access to it.

That's it for this week!

Birds birds and more birds and some other animals

We spent all of Saturday morning working to rebuild our Eiffel Tower lego, and in the afternoon we went to an engagement party at the church. We were planning to leave Nico here for Jeff and Allicia to watch but the kiddos in the main house caught a stomach bug, so we took him with us, which turned out to be the BEST thing we could have done. It was a family-friendly event at the church, there were games for kids and he had several church friends there with him. It was announced that whoever found the most toy rings won a prize at the end, so Nico searched everywhere for rings throughout the whole event. There were games that Nico and I participated in too. Then a "jeopardy" type game with questions about the couple getting married. Whoever raised their hands first got to answer first, and Nico raised his hand almost every time. He answered enough questions right to win 2nd place and picked out a BIRD FEEDER for his prize!! When he brought it over to me I was so excited, it was beautifully hand crafted by the father of the bride. Everyone was cracking up that Nico was answering all the questions right. He stole the show.

Then the couple opened presents and Nico brought them all their gifts. He had so much fun.

Then everyone counted up how many rings they had found and Nico had 13, which means he tied for 1st place! He chose a Squirrel Feeder for his prize and with all that we came home with I am just exceedingly grateful. We are SET for watching birds and squirrels and we can't wait to hang them. We are going to let Tiffanie use our squirrel feeder until we move since she has 2 lively squirrels living in her tree and we all get a kick out of them. Check out these little stools for the squirrels to sit on!

I'm so glad that it worked out that Nico came with us!

He says he wants to study animals and birds when he grows up, and wants to be an ornithologist (we had to look up what a bird scientist was called. I didn't know. Guy probably did but he was at work). We spent a few minutes looking online for what it would take to be an ornithologist and he said he wanted to go to college in Seattle near Grandma and Grandpa Russell. We signed him up for a nature camp this summer that's just a week long over at the Botanical Garden, it's called Bugs, Birds, Bats, and Botany. The description reads: This week focuses on winged wonders and the plants they call food and home. Use nets to capture insects, hold a wild bird’s nest, and learn how living things fly."

He's been taking pictures of animals with our phones. Not just real animals but pictures of animals in comic books or wherever else he sees them. He also snaps pictures of birds with my phone on the way to school.

I understand there's room for him to change his mind about what he wants to do when he grows up, but it is awesome to see him so passionate about something and it makes me want to give him everything he wants that is bird related. 

Coloring some mandalas

Guy let me put henna on his foot, which we washed off right after.

Sorting lego bins.

He's been playing over at Aadam and Sammy's a lot after school.

He's been reading...

Heidi Hecklebeck books

Bird and Squirrel comics

Dogman

Late Post

Late henna night last night, update is coming this morning!

IEP, Spring Break Plans

I forgot a few pictures last week! On the Friday that Nico had off, Guy came home from work early and we attempted to hike the Table Rock trail but when we arrived there there were signs saying the trail was closed due to mud. Nico was very sad about it, he was looking forward to hiking and spying out birds with our binoculars. He had packed his fanny pack with a Lara bar, sunflower seeds, and pistachios.

Guy looking up the trail report after we saw the signs

We got back in the car and drove instead to the library where we played two board games. One of them was called "Secret Code 13+4" where you are trying to pass through lasers to get to the end of the game, and each laser has a number. You roll 6 dice and try in some way to get that number by adding, multiplying, subtracting, whatever it takes. We all enjoyed that one.

Ok now on to this past week!

Whenever I see birds, I take a picture, even if it's a goose, so that I can show Nico and ask him "What kind of bird is this?"

We sold our car on Saturday. We posted it on craigslist and 30 minutes later had a call about it. Then he came over and bought it right then. It was so rushed we didn't have much time to think and plan about what we needed to do to actually sign the title over to him. We signed the title over right but forgot two things - to remove the license plates and to detach the release of liability from the title so we could mail it in. We were very anxious over the next few days as we tried to get it all sorted out. But, it is all sorted out now.. phew!

On Tuesday was Nico's yearly IEP meeting. Guy and I arrived a bit early so we sat on chairs in the hallway that just happened to have a straight shot to where Nico was sitting in his class. He never saw us so I had to take a picture.

The IEP meeting went well, Nico will continue to receive speech therapy in 2nd grade. His speech therapist said that Nico has come a long way since starting in Kindergarten, and even in this last year. He is very polite, has a sense of humor, and is always looking out for his friends and helping them. It was nice to hear all the good things they had to say about him. 

I tried a new recipe this week, a quiche with sweet potato crust. Nico liked it. That is a great thing. Honestly, a lot of the recipes I try are flops!

We made the hard decision to cancel our trip to Arlington over Spring Break. Due to our car situation we think it's best. We will really miss being able to hang with the Grandparents Russell at their house and also just being in Arlington. We may try to take a trip in June, we will see how things go!

Over Spring break we plan instead to find some places around Boise to visit. We are thinking Birds of Prey and perhaps the Bruneau Sand Dunes. 

Nico was reading "Heidi Heckelbeck Makes a Wish" to Sammy and Aadam today, Tiffanie took a picture for me. They were laughing and laughing.

That's it for this week!