Week Sixty-two

Pigs and Puppy Pancakes for Breakfast.  When it is cold and miserable out you have to do something to entertain the kids indoors.  That is how we started out the week last week but it quickly improved.  The weather got warmer, so warm that I was able to eat lunch outdoors with friends!  Also, Thursday we were able to venture out to the Zoo and Friday we headed to Technopolis, my favorite nerdy haven.

Below are some random and not so random pictures off my phone to show you how our week went.

We had one of Zane and Lily’s friends over.  She is the most adorable child and is learning english.  Her family is from Italy and have lots of great advice in regards to our upcoming vacation there in a few weeks.

Each day as I go to pick Zane and Lily up from school I have to deal with the hell that is our school parking lot.  The pick up time is at 3:20pm but I have to be there at 2:40pm in order to have a parking space.  That leaves about 30 minutes of sitting in my car working on my french homework.  As if having to sit there is not annoying enough, check out some of the terrific parking jobs.  I could and will have many more pictures but these were just two pics I snapped last Tuesday.  Yes that car up on top is PARKED like that.

This one grocery store has 3 aisles for beer and 1 small shelf for body soap.  This makes me laugh each time I walk through.

More fun with friends.  Lily, Sabrina and Zane built a vet clinic and were pretending to set the healed birds free out the closed window.

Two pictures from the zoo.  We spent 7 hours at this place on Thursday and I was so exhausted I could barely drive home.  There were more children with us than pictured above and keeping up with all of them is a marathon.

One of my favorite warning sign pictures.

Friday we headed to Technopolis where the kids used their bodies and brains all day playing in this scientific museum.

Yep, she is definitely my daughter.  This is the look of, WHAT is taking you so long.

Parental bragging moment.  Here is an igloo for kids to build.  Two older boys could not figure out how to do it because they were stacking the blocks short-wise (like the one on the ground there).  After they left, Lily said, UGH, don’t they know they go THIS way and stacked them tall.  I helped her sort the 3 different sized blocks but she built it all up herself and even added the blue chimney.

I tried to teach Zane about circuits, amps/volts and resistors but he just liked watching me make the lights go on and off after making a completed circuit or interrupting it.

Two older boys and a dad came up and I also tried to explain to them how this works. 12 hrs of college physics will make you a huge dork.  What will make you even more of a dork is realizing they don’t speak english and were just nodding along with you to be polite.

If I could build this in my backyard I would.

The vacuum sucker machine accidentally reversed its suction and was blowing the balls all over the place.  Admittedly it was a lot more fun shooting them across the room than just having them get sucked up the tube.

The bubble wall

Lily recruited a new friend to help.

She told him to stick his head in there while she rolled the wooden bowling ball down the slope.  He was quick enough not to get injured.

Lily refused to start checking this girl out until she lined up all her boxes properly on the conveyor belt.  She has obviously been watching me at the checkout line but not too closely otherwise they would then be subdivided into pantry, spice cabinet, fridge, freezer and bath.

Lily did this WHOLE roof by herself and I am impressed it only took about 20 minutes. The girl has some stick-to-it-ness that I am so proud of.

I want a room that is filled with these.

Zane working, Lily managing.

I love watching this contraption.  I would also like one of these in my house too.

Trying. to. keep. the. beat.

Interacting with the robot game on the screen in front of them (they have to move the white tiles to keep the robot in bounds) Zane and Lily did a pretty nice job of working together.  However, the Dutch woman over there, would correct them when they made an error.  Intensely.  I just stayed out of that one.

We had our parent teacher conferences last Friday to see how the kids are getting along in school.  Both kids are doing great and have small areas they both need to improve on.  We will continue to work with Lily academically to take the jump into full-on reading and practicing her math skills.  And with Zane, we will keep working on his social maturity, well, as mature as you can get with a young spirited boy.  Amazing what a little practice and time can do.  The first self-image drawing is from October of last year, the second image is from last month.

Zane still prefers abstract I guess.

Zane stole my pocket camera and took some self portraits early one morning after sneaking downstairs and before I was awake.

Blue Steel

Frog crossing????

I laughed and even texted the picture of the frog crossing picture to a friend.  WHY would they put up such a weird sign?  OH! It is because of these HUGE FROGS that are plaguing my yard!!!  I’m pretty sure one of them laid some eggs in small bucket we have that was filled with water.  Get ready for tadpole update 2013!

AND, that’s all the pictures I have on my baby camera and phone.  The warm weather from last week is gone and as I gaze out my window, it’s currently snowing. Again.