ish

I read a new book to the boys tonight, and I immediately wanted to share it with the one other person who would 'get' it (especially the bit at the end).... my grandfather.  And that made me miss him so much.  Here I am, one year since his death, and I am brought to tears because I will never be able to share these beautiful discoveries with him again.

Instead, I will force them on you.

ish 
by Peter H. Reynolds

Ramon loved to draw.
Anytime.
Anything.
Anywhere.

One day, Ramon was drawing a vase of flowers.  His brother, Leon, leaned over his shoulder.
Leon burst out laughing.  "WHAT is THAT?" he asked.
Ramon could not even answer.  He just crumpled up the drawing and threw it across the room.
Leon's laughter haunted Ramon.  He kept trying to make his drawings look "right" but they never did.
After many months and many crumpled sheets of paper, Ramon put his pencil down.

"I'm done."

Marisol, his sister, was watching him.  "What do YOU want?" he snapped.
"I was watching you draw," she said.
Ramon sneered. "I'm NOT drawing! Go away!"
Marisol ran away, but not before picking up a crumpled sheet of paper.
"Hey! Come back here with that!"  Ramon raced after Marisol, up the hall and into her room.

He was about to yell but fell silent when he saw his sister's walls.....He stared at the crumpled gallery.

"This is one of my favorites," Marisol said, pointing.
"That was SUPPOSED to be a vase of flowers," Ramon said, "but it doesn't look like one."
"Well, it looks vase-ISH!" she exclaimed.

"Vase-ISH?"
Ramon looked closer. Then he studied all the drawings on Marisol's walls and began to see them in a whole new way.  "They do look.... ish," he said.

Ramon felt light and energized.  Thinking ish-ly allowed his ideas to flow freely.  He began to draw what he felt- loose lines.  Quickly springing out.  Without worry.

Ramon once again drew and drew the world around him.  Making an ish drawing felt wonderful.  He filled his journals...tree-ish, house-ish, boat-ish, afternoon-ish, fish-ish, sun-ish.  Ramon realized he could draw ish feelings too.  peace-ish  silly-ish  excited-ish.  His ish art inspired ish writing.  He wasn't sure if he was writing poems, but he knew they were poem-ish.

One spring morning, Ramon had a wonderful feeling.  It was a feeling that even ish words and ish drawings could not capture.  He decided NOT to capture it.

Instead, he simply savored it....

                                                     And Ramon lived ishfully ever after.

It's Frank!

Look who came to 'visit' yesterday!

We had front row seats for the whole afternoon.

Food Allergies

Tonight, Zach came in from eating dinner on the porch and said,

"Mom!  We have a problem.  ..........   I think I am allergic to squash."

When I grow up

Recently, Zach announced that he wants to be a police officer when he grows up.

Not to be outdone, Eli quickly chimed in with, "When I grow up, I want to be a firetruck!"

It begins

This week was our first week of homeschool!  Overall it went really well, but my favorite part of the week was today when Zach read for the first time!!!  His first sentences were, "The rat sat on a mat"; "The fat cat is on the hat"; and "A cat is at bat".



After the first sentence that he read, he looked up at me with amazement and we both nearly burst a seam.  It was so wonderful to share that moment with him!!

Spring, Summer CRAZINESS

Looking back at the past 7 months, it is hard to believe how many huge life changes and events have taken place.  At each point I wasn't sure how it was all going to happen but somehow (really, we know it was the Lord's mercy) we have gotten through each step to arrive where we are today.


To recap the events...
*We sold our home
*Packed our house (7 months pregnant)
*Moved into two storage units
*Moved into my parent's home
*Steve coached little league
*We had a baby
*Steve went to Mississippi (twice)
*He prepared and spoke 16 times
*In addition to his regular job, he took over, temporarily, as the director at his office and due to another staff resignation, was doing parts of 3 full time jobs.


Then...
* We bought another home
* Moved out of storage and my parent's home
* Unpacked into our new home!

I'm exhausted just thinking about it all again.  We are so grateful for the wonderful home the Lord provided for us and glad to anticipate just regular-normal craziness this fall.

Biking on our new driveway.

Tails

I love imagination!!  (We have gobs of it around here.) 

 

This was last night's idea.  The tails are on the cute backsides of two ferocious meat eating dinosaurs.

 

Last Name....Burrito

The other day in nursery, the workers were talking to Eli about his new baby brother.  They asked him what his baby's name was.

Eli answered, "Marcus Alexander."

They then asked, "What is the rest of his name?"

He answered, "Burrito!"

You can see his inspiration for the new last name with these recent pictures;

 

It hurts!

As a mother, especially the stay-at-home variety, I feel as if my days are filled with officiating, correcting, disciplining and repeated, never-ending laundry, food prep, food cleanup and toy pick up.  Today Zach confirmed some of my suspicions about myself.

As I was gathering my things together to run a few errands, I told Zach that he and Eli would be staying with Daddy while I was out.  His response....

"Oh good!  Daddy's not really bossy.  He's just playful!"

A Predator in our midst!

Hope you enjoy this sequence as much as we did! 

6 weeks

My little guy has gone from this precious newborn...

...to an alert and smiling six week old.  He still sleeps like a champ and is a laid back, easy going little brother.  It is very rare that he actually cries, which is good because the other two still do plenty of it!

Some Pig

As a preface, this spring Zach and I read "Charlotte's Web" together.


Last week I prepared ribs for dinner and as I was spreading a rub on the raw ribs, Zach asked what animal the meat was from.  I answered that these particular ribs were from a pig.  His response, without an ounce of remorse or sadness...

"Bye, bye Wilbur!"

Half Birthday

For Zach's birthday we took the boys to play Jurassic Putt miniature golf.  My game was lousy but I blame it on having Marcus in the carrier and putting one handed.  Steve and Zach each played a good game of golf. But Eli had a great game of baseball!  No matter how many times we told Eli and demonstrated for him how to play golf, his game looked a lot like baseball.  Eli took huge swings at the ball and then would drop the club and take off running around the green.  

 

Underwater shark

Zach has been strongly against putting his face underwater.  We have tried bribing, coercing, tricking, everything to get him to try.  Swim classes haven't help, in fact I think the pressure made it worse.  Finally at the beginning of this season I told Zach that he was in complete control over when he wanted to go underwater.  No more pressure.  I told him when he was ready he could do it then.  He was thrilled with that conversation and told me one day he would be an underwater shark, but for now he would stay on top.

While we were at the beach, Zach overheard my aunt and I talking about a couple of strong swimmers that we knew.  Truly I was just making casual conversation with no hidden agenda.  When she and I were done talking, Zach asked me if he was a strong swimmer.  At first I was going to placate him because I didn't want him to feel insulted, but instead I gently told him that no, he wasn't a strong swimmer yet but that I knew he would be one day.  He accepted my answer without arguement and then turned around jumped in the pool and has been swimming underwater ever since.

Apparently honesty is the best policy.

To the beach

Last week we went with my family to the beach.  We had perfect weather and a wonderful week.  It wasn't quite as relaxing as last year's trip because we were trying to keep Marcus off of the beach, so one of us always had to be at the house.  

At first Eli was miserable on the beach and kept asking to go back to the house, but eventually we figured out that he was sensitive to the sunlight and wearing glasses helped.  After that both boys had a great time, especially at low tide when natural tide pools formed.  Zach has gotten more brave each year going out in the surf and this year he played where the waves were breaking.  Eli, completely out of character, was very afraid of the waves and would only play in the tide pools.  Maybe next year both of the older boys will enjoy the ocean.