feb5blizzard2010

We survived the blizzard with eggs, bread, milk and toilet paper to spare. We didn't even lose power! Here are some pictures of our adventure:
http://picasaweb.google.com/constance.phelps/Feb5blizzard2010#

jan 2010 academics

Welcome to my 250th post!!!!
Jan 2010 Academics: One day over winter break it was time for story time before bed and Alex picked “Green Eggs and Ham”. Casey said “are you going to read it to me?” and Alex did! He got through most of it with very little help and Casey was super enthusiastic about Alex’s success. Alex has read it 3 more times since and we tell everyone we run into. Chloe’s been reading aloud since shortly after school started and just before the break her teacher told me that she was going to move Chloe into the highest level reading group in the class. Chloe was very proud of herself and she is one of only 3 members in the group. Shortly after joining the group the teacher assigned a book report. Mrs. Cornwall picked out a non-fiction about birds and suggested that Chloe write one sentence about what a bird is, one sentence about a specific type of birds, and one sentence about what birds eat. The bird book tied in nicely with the Kindergartener’s participation in a class project for the Science Fair. The teacher made different color bird feeders out of wax covered paper juice cartons and asked each child to record the number of birds that eat from each color feeder. Unfortunately our cat Disney is a bird killer and the birds won’t venture into our yard any more.

Every day the kids race to the bus stop, scarfing down breakfast, throwing on coats, gloves, and hats and literally running for the bus stop in hopes that they will get to be First In Line. There are only 4 kids at their bus stop and at the beginning of the year they would chase each other around and giggle while waiting for the bus. Now they are so hung up on who gets to get on the bus first that they race for the stop and then stand in line guarding their position. How strange our competitive nature is.

One Thursday Chloe told me that Friday is “jersey day” and students are allowed to wear team colors. She also said “Mom, I’m afraid that if I don’t wear a jersey the other kids won’t think I’m cool”. I couldn’t believe that she’d come up with something like that while still in Kindergarten. I wasn’t about to pay retail price for a jersey of a team she cares nothing about so I found the Raven’s logo online (her team of choice, Daddy likes the Eagles) and drew a copy of it on a white turtle neck and colored it in with fabric paint. It isn’t bad, but it is definitely not a professional job. Fortunately though, no one has told her that a shirt drawn on by your mom is far less cool than no jersey at all.

last week of dec 2009:

For the week between Christmas and New Years I was worried that the kids would get bored so I offered to take them to DC to have lunch with Dad and see some sights. They both said they’d rather stay home and play with their new toys. Casey asked, half jokingly, if this meant that toys were now officially more interesting that Daddy. For the rest of the week we enjoyed each other’s company and played with the new toys hardly needing to go anywhere else. We did go up to our visit our friends Jim and Lynn and Dave and Julie on New Year’s Eve for a slumber party with the kids, and we went to my friend Claudine’s for a gift exchange on Saturday the 2nd, but other than that we took it easy. When it came time for the kids to go back to school they were disappointed that the holiday was over and I couldn’t get either one to admit that they’d be happy to see their school friends again. I'll take that as a sign that they had a really good time on their break, and that was the plan!

xmas eve and xmas 2009

pictures:
http://picasaweb.google.com/constance.phelps/XmasEveAndXmas2009#
Xmas 2009: We started our Christmas groove before Thanksgiving by dressing the kids up in their holiday clothes, going to the mall to get a picture taken with Santa. When Santa asked them what they wanted for Christmas, Chloe said “Swim To Me Pup” (a water-proof dog robot that really swims), and Alex asked for “a flip-over remote control car that is the same on the other side”. Our official Christmas celebration started just before lunch on Christmas Eve when Casey’s dad (the kids call him “Big Daddy”), Bubbe, and Jeff came over for lunch and a gift exchange. They gave Alex a Lego set that had enough pieces and directions to build a jet, a prop-plane, or a helicopter. Alex decided to build the jet and by the time they left, he had completed it with little or no help from adults. We are all very impressed with Alex’s ability to stay on task, and his ability to understand complicated multi-step directions. That evening we went up to Uncle Steve’s house outside Baltimore for our annual Christmas Eve dinner with MomMom. PopPop was recovering from pneumonia and although he was well enough to be home from the hospital, he didn’t feel well enough to come to the party. Cori, Sarah, Blade, and Skye were there too, so the twins had lots of kids to play with. We didn’t get the kids in bed until 10pm and they didn’t have much trouble getting to sleep despite the excitement. In recent weeks the kids have been trying to get up as early as possible so they have time to watch cartoons before school. One day Alex got up at 4:30 am and I didn’t want that to happen again, so I told them before they went to bed, “don’t get up before 6am”. At 6:04 am they were in our bed asking if it was time to go downstairs. By 6:30 all the presents were unwrapped! Around 9am my family came over for breakfast and gift exchange. The kids really enjoyed showing off their presents to their cousins (Natalie and Aiden) and we got a chance to sit down and enjoy each other’s company while the kids played. Although each twin got the toy that they’d asked Santa for, neither one was their favorite. Alex’s favorite toy was a mini remote control truck. Playing games on the Wii over the past year has significantly improved his hand/eye coordination and he was able to drive the fast little truck wherever he wanted. Chloe had several favorites. She got an art set with pastels, paints, colored pencils and an easel that she’s been using a lot. She got a loom for weaving pot-holders and finished her first project before dinner Christmas day. She got a stencil set that both kids have been using a lot, and she got a “Spin Art” rotator painter that allows her to drip paint onto spinning paper to make patterns. For Christmas dinner we went to Grammy Barb’s house and got to visit with Blade and Skye again. After all that Christmas we were all exhausted, but joyful and very thankful. Here's a link to the pictures (I already sent the link around via e-mail) http://picasaweb.google.com/constance.phelps/XmasEveAndXmas2009#

blizzard of 2009

The Blizzard of 2009: The closer we got to the storm, the greater the snow accumulation predictions. It started snowing Friday, Dec 18 at about 9pm and started sticking immediately. By the time we got up Saturday morning there were already 9 inches. For a significant portion of the day it snowed over an inch per hour. The greatest accumulation we measured in our yard was 21 inches. Casey and I took turns, one of us shoveling while the other watched the kids sled down the neighbor’s side yard (nick-named “Jack and Jill’s Hill”). It is nice to have a sledding area so close to the house, but unfortunate that at the bottom of the hill is the street leading to our cul-de-sac. Even though almost no one was our driving in the blizzard, we felt obligated to stand near the kids and make sure they didn’t do a sledding run right in front of a car. All told we shoveled 4 times on Saturday and still had several inches left to do on Sunday. The temperature was just below freezing, so the snow was heavy and wet. Bad for shoveling, but good for snow men and snow forts. One of my Facebook friends posted a picture of an awesome fort that her husband and kids made by filling 5 gallon bucket full of snow then dumping them out like a sand castle. We tried several times but were unable to perfect the packing/dumping technique. Before the blizzard was predicted Dan and Danielle had scheduled Aiden’s 2nd birthday party for Sunday. They ended up cancelling the party, but we went over anyway to help them eat the cake that they’d already bought. Grammy Carole and Granddad ventured out too and we all trudged down to the park near Dan’s house for a sledding and a snowball fight. Alex has very fond memories of the snowball fight with his dad last year at Quiet Waters Park and so was more interested in snowball fighting than sledding. On Monday the county closed school and the Federal Government offices in DC closed. We decided to get some new tires for the truck at Sears which is across from the mall. It took us about 3 times as long as usual to get there, not because of the snow, but because of the Christmas shoppers going to the mall! I figured if several million Marylanders could get to the mall, surely schools would be opened on Tuesday. No such luck. The county closed school on Tuesday and Wednesday which brought us right up to Christmas Eve which was already a holiday. In all the kids were off school for 2 solid weeks! There was so much snow that even though the temperatures for the rest of the week didn’t stay below freezing, the snow didn’t melt until Friday, so the kids got to play in it for 6 days. Pictures are here: http://picasaweb.google.com/constance.phelps/AidenS2ndBdayPartyPart1# although I’ve already sent the link around, so you’ve probably already seen them.

week ending dec 6, 2009:

Week ending December 6, 2009: This week we had our first snow, and went to our first holiday party. Early in the week the kids asked “Mommy, when is it going to snow?” and I said “December 5th”. Casey chuckled and asked why I said that. I said “because it always snows on December 5th”. Guess what? It snowed on December 5th. It started out as rain and switched over to snow at about lunch time. From that point on the kids asked about 40 times “Is there enough snow to sled yet?” By about 3:30 I gave in and drove them to a local park that has a steep hill. The grass was still showing through and the sledding was REALLY slow, but the kids enjoyed the heck out of it. The party was the annual gingerbread house making party hosted by our college friends, Rob and Tina Read. There are several kids all about the same age who enjoy each other’s company, and of course we love our “grownup” time!

nov 2009, the rest of it:

Nov 2009, the rest of it: We had a great visit with Dan, Danielle, Natalie and Aiden, complete with a nice meal provided by Dan, and lots of fun in the pile of leaves. Aunt Danielle doesn’t like to get dirty, so as she was enjoying the play as an innocent bystander, Dan decided to sneak up behind her and toss her into the pile. The kids were only too happy to cover her up with leaves and complete her induction into the grungy fun.

The twins had a Thanksgiving celebration at school. Before the celebration one of their homework assignments was to tell me about the First Thanksgiving. I was really impressed by how much of the story they understood and could relate. For the celebration one of the kindergarten classes wore head bands to represent the American Indians and another class work pilgrim hats. Both classes were brought together for the celebration to symbolize the Indians and pilgrims coming together on the first Thanksgiving. Parents were invited to join the class I counted 18 parents for the approximately 36 students in the two classes. The kids were so excited about the simple pleasure of a special snack together. It was really heartwarming.

Chloe’s already starting worrying about Christmas. Well meaning adults everywhere ask the kids “have you been good? Is Santa going to bring you a lot of presents?” Now whenever Chloe realizes that she’s misbehaved she starts bawling and thinks that she’s ruined her Christmas. Casey and I have both given her pep-talks about how Santa doesn’t expect kids to be perfect and that everyone (even grownups) makes mistakes. I guess it is a hard lesson to learn that it is ok to be imperfect. About a week later Casey was showing Chloe how to play a song on the guitar and Chloe said to him (in her “don’t be silly” voice) “Daaaaddy! I’m only 6, I can’t do it right EVERY time!” I guess she’s getting the hang of it.