Odds & Ends

 I was so excited one afternoon at the library to stumble upon this collection for sale; .50 cents each!  It's missing Volume 6 (Letter F), but the rest are there!  I loved reading these when I was a child!  I remember their stories, illustrations, definitions--I promptly bought them up and the boys and I have been loving snuggling up on the couch and reading!  The boys will pick a letter, and I'll read through the Index, until we find a subject they want to read about.  Then we'll read it, and go on to the next one.  They've been as enjoyable to read as a mama!  The day we read about airplanes, and looked at all the different kinds of flying machines that have been invented, Pace put together his own lego biplane with a propeller.  

Our backyard neighbors had some topsoil delivered.  All the boys had been out back riding their bikes, and when the truck came, they all came over to our wall to sit down and watch.  I was getting dinner ready and heard shouts of joy, truck honking, and laughing.  The boys learned how to wave their arms and the truck driver honked in return!

I'm not sure I remember why Max was karate chopping his notebook, maybe something about the sound of a letter?  He sure thought it was funny.

Pace was pretending to be a "Good Ghost" one day with his blanket, and the "Good Ghost" wrote Max a letter:  "Max I Luv Yoo.  From Gd Goost".  Pace is doing such a great job reading, writing, and sounding things out.  He's the little thinker!

Another great story from the encyclopedia, I think the story about the invention of the wheel.  It had an experiment to make a little paper cart and wheels and attach them to an axel (the pencils) to see how they turn.  Pace thought that was pretty cool, although our wheels kept falling off. 

Another rousing game of saving the ants from the anteater!  This one was full of flying machines, trampolines, ladders, and hot air balloon rides.

Sweet Max, on a movie night, snuggling in my bed, saying he wanted to give me a kiss.  "Here, and here!"

And chores.  Max loves following me around, and especially loves vacuuming.  The only problem is his method of vacuuming is picking up individual pieces of carpet, dirt, crumbs, etc., and feeding them, one by one, into the vacuum tube.  Takes a while.

Odds & Ends

 I was so excited one afternoon at the library to stumble upon this collection for sale; .50 cents each!  It's missing Volume 6 (Letter F), but the rest are there!  I loved reading these when I was a child!  I remember their stories, illustrations, definitions--I promptly bought them up and the boys and I have been loving snuggling up on the couch and reading!  The boys will pick a letter, and I'll read through the Index, until we find a subject they want to read about.  Then we'll read it, and go on to the next one.  They've been as enjoyable to read as a mama!  The day we read about airplanes, and looked at all the different kinds of flying machines that have been invented, Pace put together his own lego biplane with a propeller.  

Our backyard neighbors had some topsoil delivered.  All the boys had been out back riding their bikes, and when the truck came, they all came over to our wall to sit down and watch.  I was getting dinner ready and heard shouts of joy, truck honking, and laughing.  The boys learned how to wave their arms and the truck driver honked in return!

I'm not sure I remember why Max was karate chopping his notebook, maybe something about the sound of a letter?  He sure thought it was funny.

Pace was pretending to be a "Good Ghost" one day with his blanket, and the "Good Ghost" wrote Max a letter:  "Max I Luv Yoo.  From Gd Goost".  Pace is doing such a great job reading, writing, and sounding things out.  He's the little thinker!

Another great story from the encyclopedia, I think the story about the invention of the wheel.  It had an experiment to make a little paper cart and wheels and attach them to an axel (the pencils) to see how they turn.  Pace thought that was pretty cool, although our wheels kept falling off. 

Another rousing game of saving the ants from the anteater!  This one was full of flying machines, trampolines, ladders, and hot air balloon rides.

Sweet Max, on a movie night, snuggling in my bed, saying he wanted to give me a kiss.  "Here, and here!"

And chores.  Max loves following me around, and especially loves vacuuming.  The only problem is his method of vacuuming is picking up individual pieces of carpet, dirt, crumbs, etc., and feeding them, one by one, into the vacuum tube.  Takes a while.

Pace is Riding His Bike!!

After getting home from our trip, Pace decided he knew how to ride his pedal bike!  We've been practicing in baby steps with him, and he's been riding his balance bike for about 2 years.  This kid is a thinker, thinking through every step before acting on it.  Climbing the stairs as a baby:  He sat back and looked and looked at those stairs, touching the bottom one every so often, and then finally decided he was ready and climbed from bottom to top and back down like he'd been doing it forever.  Potty training:  I had to teach him the whole digestive and urinary systems, and also all the pipes from a toilet to the water treatment center, and once Pace could see the whole system, from start to finish, then he was ok sitting on the toilet.  

Riding a bike:  He's been on his balance bike for 2 years, and we got him a pedal bike last fall for his birthday.  He'd shake with anxiety if I tried to just sit him on it, and refused to put his feet on the pedals.  So we spent a lot of time showing him his pedal bike was the same size as his balance bike, and he could still reach the ground if he felt like he was going to tip over.  Then we practiced balancing again, but with his feet not he pedals.  Then we practiced pedaling.  

After we got home from our trip, I guess it'd been enough time for Pace to piece everything together.  he said he wanted to practice, I went out with him one morning, helped him balance with his feet on the pedals a couple times, then headed back inside to do some cleaning.  I told him to just practice going down the driveway with his feet balanced on the pedals, and not worry about pedaling yet.  A little while later Pace came running in the house, saying, "Mommy!  Watch this!"  He hopped on his bike, and pedaled down the driveway, did a hairpin turn down the sidewalk, and stopped and grinned at the end of our yard.

That was it!  I can't get him off his bike now!  He very quickly went from simple pedaling to dirt biking in the back to doing tricks (one foot, one hand, standing on the pedals, standing while pedaling, etc.).  

Max has also stepped up his biking game!  He's picking up his feet, balancing like a champ, gliding along the driveway, across the cul-de-sac, keeping up with the band of kids!

To celebrate learning to ride his bike, Pace rode his bike to the Library the next week for reading time, and then we rode down tot he ice cream shop for a cone, and then rode home (I ran with Max in the jogger)!  He did a total of 5 miles!  And then asked if he could ride his bike some more after getting a quick snack and drink at home!

Date Day

After having all those runs with David while on vacation, I realized I much prefer a Date Day to a Date Night.  I don't know why it never crossed my mind before, but we called a sitter to come over in the morning and David and I went for a trail run.  We went up Diamond Fork to do the Hot Pot Trail, but it was so crowded when we got there!!  That trail would not have been doable, running with so many hikers.  So we decided to hike the lesser fork.  Perfect choice--we had to dive off the trail for two mountain bikers, but that was it!  It was funny--I didn't feel too much of a difference between running along the east coast, but running back in Utah, at a higher elevation, my legs had had it!  We only did 7 miles, I think.