i heart homework 5 - slackers

sometime last week, anth went back and added a drawing to his first night's homework to represent the news that he had watched. 

fair enough. 

when i asked him to tell me about the drawing (always safer than guessing) he told me that this was the newsman on the TV pointing to the weather. 

"but i just drew a bunch of squiggles to show the map because that's all the news guys bother to do anyway.  i mean, they don't use words or shapes or anything."

i heart homework 4 - weather as food

while this did not actually happen on thursday, the sentiment expressed in anth's homework is correct. 

things happening in this drawing: 

- the orange guy is benny

- the device on his head is his "monkey hat"

- the line from hand to mouth is snow

- the right is the walkway at daycare, with the squiggles being the snow

if left to his own devices, benny would happily go outside and eat all the snow his little belly could handle. 

it would not, however, occur to him to play in it. 

for benny, winter is nothing more than an infinite syrup-free icee. 

our grocery bill totally goes down in the winter. 

below is some photographic and video evidence of this. 

as usual, from the phone so the quality is less than ideal. :)

benny, shoveling it in his face with hand. 

note, gloves had been removed. 

they complicate the snow-to-mouth motion.

good to the last drop. 

for those not familiar, ben is referencing the children's book The Gruffalo, when he states that he will bite the snow with his "terrible teeth and his terrible jaws." 

super cute. 

in the way that horrible monsters in children's stories can be cute. 

...?

i heart homework 3 - driveway drama

Um...this pretty much sums up wednesday...

the teal box represents our garage, with the brown lattice being our shelves, and the door to the house in the middle.
the squiggles surrounding the car are a pretty accurate demonstration of our patterns left behind by several failed attempts to make it up the steep driveway.
this picture does not, however, capture the following things:
- mom walking up and down the grass to the right of the driveway to crush a "path" into the ice-covered snow.
- the small-boys-from-car-to-garage rescue mission.
- Benny panicking because i got anth up the driveway first and he concluded that we were leaving him outside in his car seat.
- and, the highlight of the evening: ben darting back from safety of garage to driveway while mom went down for a final bag-and-coffee-cup recovery mission.
(mom knew Ben had done this after hearing a wail and looking up to see a crying version of Benjamin slowly sliding down said driveway on his tush.)

lesson learned?
have more than table salt on hand.

The Baking Soda Incident - Part 1

some of the fodder for my posts gets put on hold until the right time. 

(and some of it waits until i get around to getting it off of my phone.)

in this case, both apply. 

today is a long day in the savvy house. 

it started this morning with me heading to campus to help facilitate a StrengthsQuest session at the Annual Conference on Leadership and Civic Engagement, while Bern took the boys to what benny calls "the haircut store."

they were a floppy-haired mess. :)

they looked like they were Beatles fans. 

then i came home to "tap out" bern and watch ben while the two older boys went to a birthday party for one of anth's friends. 

then bern ran them home and we did a costume change so that bern and i could go to the annual RA Cultural Event while the lovely Lauren Decker watched the boys. 

this event ranges each year from opera to ballet to the symphony, all with the intent of exposing students to something they may not have yet had the opportunity to experience. 

the performing arts lover in me is usually pretty geeked about these events. 

this year might take the cake. 

this year the event is the Columbus Jazz Orchestra doing "Broadway: From Oklahoma! to West Side Story."

so, bernie and i are equally happy about this.

he for the jazz, me for the broadway. 

and a hot date with 350 of our closest Res Life friends. :)

as a result, i prepped this post on Thursday night. 

aka, i cheated. 

here is the first half of what has become known as "The Baking Soda Incident." 

mainly by me. 

allow me to briefly set the stage:

- this was in early december

- anth was having a rough day

- i went upstairs to put on my PJ's

- this took approximately 2 minutes

- in that time, benny came up with an idea for making anth feel better

here is part 1: 

tomorrow, ben and i will explain what he really thought he was going to do with this small pile of baking soda...

i heart homework 2 - slippery when frozen

tuesday's homework was a bit more straightforward than monday night's.
the kids went outside on the playground at school.
it was still icy.
(not sure why they were out there, but ok.)

things to note in his artwork:

1. as evidenced by the right side and "tuesday" region of the paper, someone did not wash their hands thoroughly after dinner. 

2. anth's winter jacket is green.

3. apparently he was balancing a book on his head.

4. the other little person in the picture is one of his female playmates.

5. she is not this much taller than him in real life.

6. nor a zombie.

i heart homework - part 1

you can take the girl out of california. 

but, even after a decade of living in Ohio, you can't quite take all the california out of this girl.

especially when it comes to weather.

i still find a good thunder storm or display of lightning absolutely fascinating.

so, being in one of the many states being hit by the ice/other storm festivities of the last few days has been...special.

on one hand, i find the idea of driving on frozen water terrifying.

on the other, it's all really pretty and it makes me want to take pictures.

bernie lovingly told me, "you are such a californian," yesterday after i tromped around in front of our daycare taking pictures of ice-encased shrubs on my phone because i didn't have my camera handy.

i also took phone photos in front of the post office.

and then out on The Oval as i walked around campus.

but, i wanted my real camera.
and by real, i mean my old point and shoot, as i am still figuring out manual mode on the fun new camera.
it was dark by the time i got home, so the photos opps were limited.
this first one is low quality. 
because it is through my window, for fear of falling on said camera.
(dear neighbors who i don't really know across the street...if you saw me taking photos in the direction of your home through my window last night, i promise i was operating with good intentions.)
this is the end of my driveway leading into our street.
the rest of our driveway is basically an 89 degree angle.
fun.

then bernie humored me and gave me a few minutes to wander around on our deck in the back and take these pictures of icicles before he ran out the door to go study.
(note: he quickly came back in the door to study at home after finding out every good coffee shop was closing at 8pm.)

so, yes, i'm a nerd and like to take pictures of these things.

neither of these facts should surprise most folks.

but...i was going somewhere with all of this.

promise.

anth's teachers decided to capitalize on the weather and make it a learning experience.

on monday, they sent home a week-long project.

on monday night, anth was to watch the news and take note of what weather was being predicted.

then, over the week, he was asked to write/draw/note his experiences, thoughts, observations of the weather in his journal.

cute.

so far, the first two entries seemed like they were worth sharing widely.

the first one was the one about the forecast. 

"the news said it will be icy"

***important note: anthony's teachers have asked that the parents allow the kids to sound out their words and not correct their spelling for them. 

i clearly am willing to poke fun at much of the day to day portions of my kids' lives.

anth LOVES homework. 

mom and dad love that anth loves homework.

so homework is sacred.

make fun of his spelling and we have issues.

ok, protective mommy PSA over.

the second included his prediction of what an ice storm would look like.

seeing it made me think that maybe my verbalizations regarding the coming storm were, in fact, quite "californian."

"this is what ice storm i thought it would be like"

apparently my  poor little man thought that an ice storm entailed people running around in the streets trying to avoid giant human-sized shards of ice. 

old soul

putting ben to bed took me quite a while the other night.
the kid just wasn't interested in the process.
meanwhile, anth was downstairs.

when i finally came down the stairs, i found him on the couch.
he was on his side, propping his head up with one of his hands.
he had snuggled into a blanket.
the other hand was in the bowl of popcorn that he had put in front of his belly.
and he was patiently waiting with his addition flashcards for me to come "do numbers" with him.

bless.
his.
heart.
no TV. no toys. just sitting with his thoughts.

i told him that i thought he was a pretty mature guy.
then i asked him if he actually knew what mature meant.
"does it mean i'm good at playing games?"
i spent a minute explaining what i had meant.

anth went back to his popcorn and his thoughts for a moment.
"mom...i've been thinking. since i am now mature, i think we should talk about getting a hamster."