I just realized I never shared these pictures from the opening day of football season (three weeks ago). Oh well, better late than never right?

Adam got about halfway through coloring these houses when he stopped and said, “Huh-huh-house…mama, house doesn’t start with “B”. It start with “H”. This is apposed to be “B” week.” I told him to keep working and he’d see what we were going to do the huh-huh-houses.

He had a lot of fun putting each bear family in their house. I purposely made four of equations total the same number and we spent some time talking about how 6+0, 1+5, 2+4, and 3+3 all equal the same number.

Adam’s been doing a great job with his coloring lately.

I printed out some houses for Luke too, with the numbers 1-4 on them. I figured we could do some counting, but he was more interested in lining the bears up. He named the color as he put the bear down, which is great. He’s pretty much got his colors mastered. I think we need to start working on shapes with him next.

I love that Lumpy Bumpy comes to “school” with Adam. And I love this little corner of our house. I need to work on figuring out a better way to store all of our school supplies though, we’re amassing quite the collection of fun (and educational) things. I’m not complaining, we’ll get it figured out.

Maggie was hanging out with us the other morning while we worked.

I brought out the scissors for Adam to try the other day. He had a lot of fun and was super proud of himself, but he doesn’t quite have the dexterity yet to manage them one-handed.

Luke loves puzzles and is really good at them. We did this puzzle together once (it was the first time he’d seen it) and then as soon as it was done he took it apart and did it again (twice) with no help from me. And when I say “as soon as it was done” I’m not kidding. I was mid-celebratory-clap and it was in pieces again.

I love how much he loves puzzles right now (or “pieces” as he calls them). And that hat? Don’t even get me started on how much I adore seeing him running around the house wearing it.

These pictures were all taken within minutes of each other last Friday.

“This bee thinks Maggie’s a flower, and so that why it’s buzzing on her.”

A couple of days, ago Adam told Dave and me that he wanted to have a “Family Night”. We asked what he meant by that and he told us that he wanted to have everyone watch a movie together, eat snacks, and drink drinks. So we promised him we’d do just that on Friday.

He reminded me each morning and told me how excited he was about Family Night. We started working on the letter B on Thursday, so we decided to go with a B-themed evening. We played a new board game (Seeds for the Birds) and then Dave cooked dinner on the grill. After supper, Dave put together Maggie’s new swing (more on that later) and Adam and I made brownies. When I originally suggested we “buh-buh-bake” something that started with the letter B, Adam said bacon. He doesn’t eat bacon, so it was easy to convince him to go with brownies.

Once the brownies were in the oven, we got settled to start our movie. Dave filled up the boys’ water bottles and Adam got Lumpy Bumpy Pillow and all of his friends ready to watch the show. Once everyone was settled he asked if he could turn out the lights, so it would be like in a movie theater. 

We watched A Bug’s Life and Adam was quick to point out that since the main characters were ants it could be about the letter A too. Midway through the movie I brought the brownies down. Luke was a big fan. He said, “mmm, that’s good!” after almost every bite.

After the movie we set up the bird game again and Luke even played too. I’m not sure he knew what was going on, but he cheered when we did. And can I just tell you, Adam and Luke giving each other high-fives is one of my favorite things right now. It’s hilarious because neither of them stands still and it normally takes them 3 or 4 tries to get it right.

It was a really fun night and I’m so glad Adam suggested it. I’m looking forward to our next “Family Night”. I think Dave has the movie already picked out.

We started back up with “school” again last week. Adam and I decided to do the alphabet in order this time, so we started with “A”. I have a couple of goals in mind for Adam. I’d like him to be able to properly print, in both upper and lower case, and learn to use scissors. He has set goals for himself of being able to count to 100 and learning to read. I don’t see any reason why we can’t accomplish all of those things.

I am also working on having Luke “do school” with us. He’s interested about half of the time, depending on the activity and his mood. One of the days last week he decided he wanted to color for a couple of minutes and then left to go play with his trains. I don’t push it. He knows his letters (upper and lower case) and his numbers (1-10). My goals for him are color recognition (he knows most of them – and I can’t take credit for this – it’s from his favorite cartoon “Color Crew”), counting to twenty, and learning the order of the alphabet.

Normally Maggie is sleeping while we work. Adam likes to tell her about what we’re working on when she wakes up from her nap.

Luke is a big fan of puzzles and we have a ton, since Adam has always liked them too.

We started out “A Week” with some alien eye math. Adam was quick to point out that he’d already done this activity before, but they used to be called monsters.

When he was done, he asked if he could make a pattern with the eyes.

Luke loved playing with the pom pom magnets.

Adam stuck with the googly eyes.

Here’s a random self-portrait Adam did during rest time.

We also did some painting last week. Adam had been begging me to paint all week. He painted one popsicle stick and decided it was too messy and he would rather use markers (which weren’t any neater – art time was immediately followed by bath time).

I cut an apple in half so we could stamp with it. Turns out I can’t cut a straight line. It took several test stamps and re-cuts to get the apple to behave like it was supposed to.

We did a lot of other “A” things, but I didn’t take pictures of them all. Adam is a big fan of worksheets and they aren’t the most exciting things to photograph.

I did really like this one though. He drew a line through the lower case letters when he was done, because he wanted them all to be holding hands.

This little lady had her four month check-up today.

She weighs 13 lbs 5 oz and is 23.5 inches long. The doctor said she looks great (he really liked her hair – it was particularly fluffy today) and we go back again in two months. She got two shots today (and was not a fan – her poor thighs).

And in case you’re wondering how she compares to her brothers, at this age:

Adam weighed about 14 lbs 12 ounces and was 24.75 inches long.

Luke weighed about 14 lbs 5 ounces and was 25.75 inches long.

Yesterday was a very busy day for us. Adam had another building workshop in the morning. He and Dave built a wooden firetruck. I think this might have been his favorite one yet.

Afterwards, we all went to a fall festival.

The boys took a ride on a carousel. Adam had his pick of all the animals, but choose this boat to ride in.

Luke was happy on the goose.

She’s “gourd-gous”, as my brother said.

There were a bunch of animals there and Luke loved watching them and talking to them.

Hi cow!

Hi Piggy!

We hung out with that goat for a while. The little girl who owned the goat asked Adam if he had anything he wanted to ask her about the goat. So he asked that goat’s name (Sapphire), what she ate, and a couple of other things. Then the girl asked if he had any other questions and he said, “Do you like my shirt?”

It was a lot of fun and all three kids fell asleep almost as soon as they were in their carseats.

On the way home we stopped at a couple of stores so I could run some errands. Maggie woke up and loudy protested being in a non-moving vehicle. Luke was not impressed.

This kid knows all his upper case letters and almost all of the lower case ones (some of them are tricky – like “b” and “d”). He loves pointing them out and having me write different words and names for him.

I took Adam to a kids’ workshop at Home Depot on Saturday. I’m really digging these workshops and so is Adam. This time he made a football ring toss game and was super excited to paint it (green of course – no surprise there).

He got a bright orange work apron and a pin showing the project on it.

He was so proud of the finished product. He’s going to another one this weekend at Lowe’s and we’re also signed up for the next two at Home Depot. He’s really looking forward to them (and so are Dave and I).