Tell me you aren't in love with this boy and his smile!!
Givin' some luv to the merry-go-round cow
1...2...3...yep this is probably a stupid thing to do but I'm going to do it anyway!
I prefer the fun but safe way to play
What kid doesn't love balls
Monday, January 9, 2012
Playplace pictures
What do you do with 3 active kids when it's cold, windy, and dreary outside for days on end? Take them to one of the many indoor kid's play areas! Our kids love to go and bounce, roll, slide, throw, and generally have a grand time going crazy in a relatively safe environment. Here are some pictures of them enjoying themselves!
Saturday, January 7, 2012
The Time-Out Chair
David has continued to do a wonderful job adjusting to our family. He is getting even more affectionate with us (I probably get 30 kisses a day) and more friendly and out-going with others as he feels more safe and secure here. I can tell I have another natural extrovert on my hands! He does have a tendency to put on a show for attention or to get out of doing what he doesn't want. If I ask him to come to me, he'll shake his head no, then give me a huge squishy-face smile as if that is going to get him off the hook. Adorable, but not usually effective. He is also I think planning a career as a soccer player because he can take a fake fall like no one I have ever seen. Elijah will raise his hand as if to push David over, and David will immediately throw himself on the ground and start wailing as if Elijah had just decked him. We are working on this. We are also working on helping David to use words to communicate what he wants instead of "UH UH UH". He can use words because he will repeat them when we ask, but he is used to just grunting urgently and someone will come run and fetch whatever he is pointing at. Or if another child is doing something he doesn't like, he shrieks instead of talks. Now when he wants something we require him to use his words and ask for it. And if he shrieks unless he's actually in pain he gets a time out and has to go back and talk to whoever he shrieked at. We're starting to see some results.
I'd say though, that 70% of our energy has gone to helping Elijah in his adjustment. He has an unfortunate combination of being 2 and having a new brother. The result is his feeling the need to test every boundary known to man and push every button that his brother has. It didn't help that in the middle of it all he had a cold and a sore in his mouth that made it so he couldn't suck his pacifier at night. Prior to David's arrival, we had never used time-out as a discipline method. But Elijah was so constantly getting into trouble that our traditional methods were no longer appropriate for every instance. So we created the time-out chair, and I don't even want to add up the number of days of his life that Elijah has spent in that chair over the last 2 weeks (all in 2 minute increments). And of course, even with the chair, he has to test all of the boundaries of what he can get away with while being in the chair. Can he sit sideways? Dangle his butt off the edge? Stick his head through the hole in the back? Stand up? Stand on his head? Slide his legs down so his toes dangle a mere centimeter from the floor but don't actually touch it? Lay on his back? His stomach? You name it, that kid has tried it. I eventually became so entertained by his creativity that I tried to take pictures of the different poses. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to get some of my favorites because as soon as he sees that I'm looking at him he immediately goes back to sitting the way he knows he's supposed to. But for your entertainment, here are a few of his many different time-out chair poses. :)
I'd say though, that 70% of our energy has gone to helping Elijah in his adjustment. He has an unfortunate combination of being 2 and having a new brother. The result is his feeling the need to test every boundary known to man and push every button that his brother has. It didn't help that in the middle of it all he had a cold and a sore in his mouth that made it so he couldn't suck his pacifier at night. Prior to David's arrival, we had never used time-out as a discipline method. But Elijah was so constantly getting into trouble that our traditional methods were no longer appropriate for every instance. So we created the time-out chair, and I don't even want to add up the number of days of his life that Elijah has spent in that chair over the last 2 weeks (all in 2 minute increments). And of course, even with the chair, he has to test all of the boundaries of what he can get away with while being in the chair. Can he sit sideways? Dangle his butt off the edge? Stick his head through the hole in the back? Stand up? Stand on his head? Slide his legs down so his toes dangle a mere centimeter from the floor but don't actually touch it? Lay on his back? His stomach? You name it, that kid has tried it. I eventually became so entertained by his creativity that I tried to take pictures of the different poses. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to get some of my favorites because as soon as he sees that I'm looking at him he immediately goes back to sitting the way he knows he's supposed to. But for your entertainment, here are a few of his many different time-out chair poses. :)
Look, I'm sitting so nicely and even smiling!
Ha! Mom thought she had caught me standing up, but I sat down just in time!
It was really all David's fault and I have to be on my knees because my bottom is too sore from sitting
Just trying to see how the world would look if I were Sidney in time-out
I can see my toes!
Thursday, January 5, 2012
Christmas at the car wash
A couple weekends ago we went back to visit our friends at the car wash to have a Christmas party. I'm pretty sure it was the first Christmas party any of the kids had ever had. We had no idea how many kids to expect since the times we had gone in the past there were at most 3-4 kids that really interacted with us. Well much to our delight, there were 11 or 12 kids crammed into one small room to celebrate with us!
We brought a small Christmas tree and some ornaments, and it was a great hit! Everyone wanted to help decorate, and the tree kept toppling from all the enthusiasm. We sang some Christmas songs in Chinese and talked about the tradition of giving gifts. Then we let each kid choose one of the small gifts we had brought and they were so excited! Afterwards we used some of our nativity figurines to tell them the story of Jesus' birth and had an impromptu English lesson including such very useful words as "angel", "camel", and "wise men".
It was so fun to have a small opportunity to bring joy to these families! It was encouraging that so many came, and it made us feel like the community is beginning to realize that we really do care and are committed to helping as we can. More English lessons are in the future!
We brought a small Christmas tree and some ornaments, and it was a great hit! Everyone wanted to help decorate, and the tree kept toppling from all the enthusiasm. We sang some Christmas songs in Chinese and talked about the tradition of giving gifts. Then we let each kid choose one of the small gifts we had brought and they were so excited! Afterwards we used some of our nativity figurines to tell them the story of Jesus' birth and had an impromptu English lesson including such very useful words as "angel", "camel", and "wise men".
It was so fun to have a small opportunity to bring joy to these families! It was encouraging that so many came, and it made us feel like the community is beginning to realize that we really do care and are committed to helping as we can. More English lessons are in the future!
Decorating the tree chaos
The boys liked to pick up Elijah :) I promise the tree did look better in the end
Santa Jeff leading Christmas carols
Whenever not being hauled around, Elijah just sat there and stared at a comic book of his current obsession, a Chinese cartoon character called Happy Sheep
But he was hauled around a lot :)
Sunday, January 1, 2012
Christmas Eve
I've figured out part of my problem. I actually think about sitting down and writing on my blog, but all of the pictures are on the camera or my phone, and I can't write without pictures. Because honestly, no one really wants to read what I write. They just want to see pictures of the kids. So I need to suck it up and figure out how to download pictures myself so I'm not waiting for the once-a-month download from Jeff. If I'm lucky.
So anyhow, you will probably get a bunch of posts in a row that are all old. Deal with it. The first installment in this series is our Christmas Eve. We had 2 other families join us for a potluck dinner, nativity play put on by the children, and a time of singing and prayer. Considering that David had been in the hospital the previous weekend and Elijah had been sick and CRANKY all week, we weren't sure it would be a very merry Christmas weekend. But everyone was feeling better and we actually had a great time!
When I told Miriam that we were going to do a nativity play, she could hardly stand the wait until the big day. She obsessed over who might play what part (she would be Mary of course). She worried about whether everyone would have costumes. She fretted that there wouldn't be enough kids to play all the parts. And when I suggested that the adults could play some parts if need be, she replied, "Well, but if the adults play some of the parts they will have to wear costumes too! They're not allowed to say just because they are grown up they don't have to wear costumes!" When the big night arrived, she was relieved to discover that she had the uncontested role of Mary, since the other two girls were much more interested in being angels.
Here's my play-by-play of the production:
Mary is standing meekly in the room.
Sydney Angel with great animation and vigor: YOU WILL HAVE A BABY AND NAME HIM JESUS!!!!! Now what else am I supposed to say?
Enter Joseph (aka Jesh): Time to go to Bethlehem. Over here.
Mary: No, over here!
Joseph: No here!
Joseph's mommy: You all go over there!
Mary and Joseph get settled and the baby is born.
Mary in a very distressed voice: Help, I can't get this swallowing to work! (swaddling in case you couldn't guess).
Mary's mom comes to the rescue and then tries to herd shepherd Elijah onto the carpet.
Shepherd Elijah: No thank you! No thank you!
Mom: Elijah, you get over there right now and make a sheep sound!
Shepherd Elijah (none too happy): Baaaa
Angel Bree: Behold, I bring you good tidings _______
Angel Sydney: No!! I'm the angel!!
Sydney mom: Sydney, there were lots of angels in the story. You are one angel, and Bree can be one too.
Angel Sydney: Oh! I didn't know there was more than one!
Angel Bree (with a warning look to angel sydney): Behold! I bring you good news of great joy! Today in Bethlehem the savior is born!
Shepherd Elijah is trying to climb into the manger and being hauled out by mama while Mary shrieks at him.
Wise man Stephen enters carrying a gift for baby Jesus. Shepherd Elijah promptly snatches it away and wise man starts crying. Wise man's daddy tries to offer a substitute gift, but no doing. So the original precious gift is retrieved from the now sullen shepherd and it is handed to Mary by the wise man. The shepherd then tosses baby Jesus out of the manger and climbs in again in time for the closing photo of the production. All in all a pretty successful play I think! :)
So anyhow, you will probably get a bunch of posts in a row that are all old. Deal with it. The first installment in this series is our Christmas Eve. We had 2 other families join us for a potluck dinner, nativity play put on by the children, and a time of singing and prayer. Considering that David had been in the hospital the previous weekend and Elijah had been sick and CRANKY all week, we weren't sure it would be a very merry Christmas weekend. But everyone was feeling better and we actually had a great time!
When I told Miriam that we were going to do a nativity play, she could hardly stand the wait until the big day. She obsessed over who might play what part (she would be Mary of course). She worried about whether everyone would have costumes. She fretted that there wouldn't be enough kids to play all the parts. And when I suggested that the adults could play some parts if need be, she replied, "Well, but if the adults play some of the parts they will have to wear costumes too! They're not allowed to say just because they are grown up they don't have to wear costumes!" When the big night arrived, she was relieved to discover that she had the uncontested role of Mary, since the other two girls were much more interested in being angels.
Here's my play-by-play of the production:
Mary is standing meekly in the room.
Sydney Angel with great animation and vigor: YOU WILL HAVE A BABY AND NAME HIM JESUS!!!!! Now what else am I supposed to say?
Enter Joseph (aka Jesh): Time to go to Bethlehem. Over here.
Mary: No, over here!
Joseph: No here!
Joseph's mommy: You all go over there!
Mary and Joseph get settled and the baby is born.
Mary in a very distressed voice: Help, I can't get this swallowing to work! (swaddling in case you couldn't guess).
Mary's mom comes to the rescue and then tries to herd shepherd Elijah onto the carpet.
Shepherd Elijah: No thank you! No thank you!
Mom: Elijah, you get over there right now and make a sheep sound!
Shepherd Elijah (none too happy): Baaaa
Angel Bree: Behold, I bring you good tidings _______
Angel Sydney: No!! I'm the angel!!
Sydney mom: Sydney, there were lots of angels in the story. You are one angel, and Bree can be one too.
Angel Sydney: Oh! I didn't know there was more than one!
Angel Bree (with a warning look to angel sydney): Behold! I bring you good news of great joy! Today in Bethlehem the savior is born!
Shepherd Elijah is trying to climb into the manger and being hauled out by mama while Mary shrieks at him.
Wise man Stephen enters carrying a gift for baby Jesus. Shepherd Elijah promptly snatches it away and wise man starts crying. Wise man's daddy tries to offer a substitute gift, but no doing. So the original precious gift is retrieved from the now sullen shepherd and it is handed to Mary by the wise man. The shepherd then tosses baby Jesus out of the manger and climbs in again in time for the closing photo of the production. All in all a pretty successful play I think! :)
The few seconds when Elijah actually wore his costume
Mary and Joseph - what a cute couple!
Mary and the baby. She was so very happy for this moment!
And all were there to celebrate the birth of our Saviour!
Singing carols with Jason on the guitar
Abba and his little man
We are so blessed to have such a great community of friends!
I guess it was a long night. :) Mostly this picture is on here just to embarrass Angie :)
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