pin the nose on the narwhal

it was about 1145 monday night and i was getting stuff ready for wee school--i had tuesday's stuff ready, but not friday's.  1145 is waaaaaay past our bedtime, and we'd both had pretty exhausting days, one of those days where the to-do list just keeps multiplying.  so here's how the conversation went down, and the evolution of the game "pin the nose on the narwhal" (if you ever see this for sale in target or something, just remember, you know where you saw it first...):

i had the brilliant idea that we could play pin the nose on the _______, but i didn't know what in the world we could pin the nose on!  i ran in to david and said, "hey, what are some things that start with N that we could pin its nose on?!"

"ummmmm, nightcrawlers." 

"nightcrawlers?  you mean like zombies?  you know these kids are 2 and 3, right?!"

"no, nightcrawlers are worms."

"worms?  i don't think one could successfully pin a nose on a worm.  do they even have noses?  what about a newt?  do they have a big enough nose to pin on?"

"yeah, that might work."

"what about a nebulous?!  that would be awesome!  pin the nebulous in the cell!"

"wait, don't you mean nebula?"

"no, nebula is plural.  a cell only has one nebulous."

"a cell?  like in your body?  isn't that a..."

  "oh, wait, that's a nucleus...hmmmmm....isn't there such thing as a narwhal?"

"i think it's called norwhal."

"no, i'm pretty sure it's narwhal.  you know, like pirates searching for gold and naaaaarrrrrwhals."

[david googling narwhals for evidence]

"oh yeah, you're right.  it's narwhal."

[clicking on a you tube video]

"whoa!  look at those things!  that's crazy!  how was that evolutionarily beneficial?!"

and then, just for some extra laughs:

pretty sure the first one is my all-time favorite.  i am always and forever going to picture a bike-peddling unicorn hooked up to a breathing apparatus inside of a narwhal...and, i admit, the second one is kind of gory.  it was way funnier at 1230 in the morning for some reason...

so.....it was mine and max's turn to host wee school this week, and boy did we have fun!  we did the letter N, and the first day we talked about nests and numbers.  we read "the best nest" by p.d. eastman and talked about the sorts of things birds find to build their nests.  leaves, hay, straws, man hair, horse hair (ha ha--love this book!), etc.     

then we went outside and gathered our own supplies to build nests for baby birds.  we found leaves, soft grass, dryer lint, etc., and the kids pointed where they wanted me to hot glue gun their soft nest supplies (not trash...ha ha) on their nest.  we colored a little baby bird and stuck him in his happy home!

next we played the number game.  we worked with numbers 1-10, and had to count the items on the cards and match them with the correct number puzzle piece.  these kiddos did really well with their math skills and number recognition!

on day 2 we talked about Noses!  i asked them if they knew a body part that started with the letter N, and we cycled through a few things (belly button?  no... ears?  no... mouth?  no...) before we all agreed Nose started with the letter N.  this part was pretty hilarious--i asked the kids what we use our noses for, the very first response:  "we pick them!"  

"very good!  we can!  what else can we do?"

 " we sneeze!"

  "that's right!  how about this?" (i make a sniffing noise)  

"we smell!"

so we decided to test our sense of smell--close your eyes!  you can't look, you just have to guess what's in the bag based on what you smell!  cinnamon and vanilla were a little hard--they knew they knew the smell, but not what it was called, and they didn't know the name peppermint, but knew the extract smelled like a candy cane.  and they all guessed orange and banana right away!

then we played the matching smells game--we had to glue pictures of things that smelled yummy or yucky on the right side of the paper.

then we read "the nose book" by al perkins and saw all sorts of different kinds of noses on all sorts of different animals.  we found an odd looking animal called a narwhal, and watched a national geographic clip about them so we could see what kind of nose they have.

then we played pin the nose on the narwhal!  wouldn't you?!

flexible as a carrot stick

i am about as flexible as a carrot stick.  i can't even touch my toes.  but i love doing a yoga video i have for a few key reasons:

1. knees.  years ago, i took a yoga class as an elective for my bs.  this was a once a week class, and i noticed, doing yoga just once a week, helped my knees feel better while running.  for the first time in my life, i could run farther than 3 miles without knee pain!  after that semester i found a yoga video the most similar to that class i took (i cycled through A LOT of videos until i found the right one), and i faithfully do it at least once a week.  this has been for the last 5-6 years (and i haven't gained an inch of flexibility!).  i notice the knee pain will start up again between week 2-3 while running if i skip it!  i know it so well, i could probably do the routine without the video, but i love the music:.) 

2. back.  when i was pregnant with maxwell, i got a herniated disc on the left side between L-4 and L-5, i think.  i never had an MRI done, so i don't know for sure, but judging on the location of pain, i'm pretty sure it was L-4 and L-5.  i think i actually hurt my back leaning over backwards to reach something while holding pace, but then pregnancy (those 50+ extra pounds...) definitely exacerbated it.  i was in excruciating pain 24/7 for about 7 months of the pregnancy and then 18 months after max was born.  there were days i couldn't breathe because of the pain.  days my left big toe went numb for hours at a time because of the nerve being pinched.  i couldn't stand up straight without pain searing down my back and sciatic nerve down my left leg.  standing too long was painful, sitting too long was painful (which made church *really* enjoyable).  i felt like i would never be active again, never be pain-free again, never enjoy life again.  one week after i had max, i started seeing John G. Aznar, a chiropractor and my lifesaver.  although it took about eighteen months of seeing him regularly, i finally got to the point where i felt like life was livable again.  there were obvious structural issues that he helped realign, but also during that time, i really tried to be proactive--i kept exercising (yoga being part of it), scoured my anatomy books and discovered the muscle group that had tightened up and was causing a lot of the pain--and so i started rolling out my trouble spots on a foam roller, and i found stretches that targeted my trouble spots.  all in all, i spent two years in absolute pain.  i am always going to have a herniated disc, it isn't like it just slips back into place and everything is fixed (i was really disappointed when dr. aznar told me that!)--but there are ways to manage it.  yoga helps keep things stretched out.  ironically, there is no pain when i run--i feel great!--but it is crucial i stretch out and roll out after each run.  i still can't stand too long or sit too long.  if i have a super busy day where i am running errands and on my feet all day long, i pay for it for 2-3 days afterward.  i still have some painful days where i have to remind myself to breathe, remind myself to just keep moving, roll, stretch, and do yoga.

3. breathe.  even though i still can't touch my toes, and some of my yoga moves look funky because i just simply can't do them with completely straight legs, i do the best i can--and i am breathing the whole time.  deep breathing is an amazing stress reliever.  i always feel more balanced afterward, more relieved, more centered.  even if i've had the boys crawling over/under/around me the whole video...when i exercise, i feel better, more sane, in control, and happy, and my body craves healthful foods and a healthful lifestyle, and when i eat right i crave exercise, and when i exercise i crave whole foods; when i don't exercise, i definitely have a short(er) temper, feel blue, and want to eat good ol' pepperoni pizza and 5 guys cheeseburgers and fries, and when i eat junk i crave just sitting on the couch and vegging...and doesn't a pizza or burger and fries go great with vegging out on the couch?!...i definitely want to be the one in control of which cycle i end up in...so breathing it is.

ice castles

last christmas, christian and robin sent us a really cool and thoughtful gift--an amazon local deal to the ice castles in midway.  only by the time we got around to doing it, we discovered they had closed the weekend prior to our going due to mild weather.  we emailed the company and they said they would redeem our tickets the next year.  

well, this year we've had an even milder winter--sunny and in the 50s the majority of the time.  we've had a total of 7-10 days of weather under 20 degrees, and we did have a white christmas, but that's about it.  so we've been watching the ice castles website like a hawk, wondering if they would even open this year.  they did--for ONE weekend!  we made it over to the castles on saturday, and it was pretty fun to walk around the ice maze!  both pace and max fell asleep on the drive out there (they were all bundled up and warm in their snow pants and coats), and were only slightly disoriented when wearied at the ice castle light show.  since it was the only weekend it was open, there was probably a mile-long line of cars waiting to get in, but the wait went pretty smoothly and we walked around.  max wanted to be carried the whole time, but pace really loved walking around all the ice and snow and walking the corridors of ice.

it was a great family night!

busy boys

just trying to keep the boys busy and get through this winter!  we played "going on a lion hunt" one afternoon over and over and over and over and over...after crawling into the lion cave, pace would always poke his head out and say, "let's do it again!"  i finally decided to up the ante and we had to go on a lion hunt "snake style", then "monkey style", and i think pace finally gave up when i declared it was "kangaroo style"--he said he needed more fuel.

art time!  the boys love when we pull out the paint and brushes and their own, personal paper (i'm really a stickler about them taking my expensive art paper, so we got them their own art pad to share). i think pace said he was drawing a tornado, and then started mixing all the colors, which made brown.  whenever he sees brown, he automatically thinks "chocolate dome" (from kneader's), so his tornado turned into a chocolate dome pretty quickly.

we actually had a couple days of high 50s and sun!  the boys stayed very busy outside all. day. long.  this mama isn't complaining--outside boys are happy boys, and i got all my cleaning, laundry, food prep, and cooking, etc. done.  happy boys, happy mama.

i am really trying to cash in on the boys helping with chores while they think it's really fun, and they come running, asking to help scrub.

there was one afternoon where max carried around this block in a small tupperware container...he said it was his ice cream cone, and he dutifully licked it every so often throughout the day, during all our other activities.  he makes a great ice cream cone slurping sound.  very realistic.

i had a meeting last night for church, and david and the boys had fun playing dinosaur marble maze.  the dinos got a little destructive...when i got home and asked how everything went, david said, "great!  as soon as you left the boys were totally sweet and nice and played together so nicely!"  glad to know i'm that kind of a mom...

you know you have done a great job when you come out from folding laundry and the boys are crashed, snoring on the couch!