Elizabeth's "Lightning Share"

At school on Wednesday: I have some good news, some more good news, some more good news, and some bad news. The good news is I finally got my room organized, yesterday was my Daddy's birthday, and I got another American Girl doll for Christmas. The bad news is that my Barbie mall is in the middle of my room and all the stuff fell out, so it looks like my room is messy, but it really isn't.

Update: The Barbie mall got cleaned up and put in the closet. Elizabeth's room is now the cleanest, most organized room in the house. It's inspiring. If she can do it, anyone can.

Wil on Civ4

I was looking at the Civ4 manual the other night while lying in bed with Wil, waiting for him to fall asleep. He said 'Daddy, do you have rememorize all that to play the game? I said I knew most of it and was just looking for the stuff I didn't know...

We told the twins at the beginning of second grade that if they ever heard something they didn't know if they were suppose to say to please ask us before saying it. In general this has worked well for us. Lately we've been watching and listening to some of the early Harry Potter movies and books. Ron's language, particularly, is a little troublesome. He says "shut up" twice when we first meet him, and in the movies he says, "bloody hell" a number of times. The twins know "shut up" is frowned on, but we weren't sure what they thought about "bloody hell" until tonight. While listening to an audiobook, I casually mentioned that Ron says some things we don't say in our house. Wil whispered to me, "I think one of the things he says is 'bloody owl.'"

NFL week 8 wrap-up

I've got good news and bad news. Let me give you the bad news first:

The Vikings got their clock cleaned by New England. I searched the internet and found a radio station out of Kansas City that was broadcasting the game live on the web and listened to the first half. The Patriots owned them. It was never close one time. They knew the Vikings might could defend the run, so they turned Brady loose and he went berserk. Went to sleep after the first half. Ugh.

The good news is that I have Brady on my fantasy team and his 4 TDs + yardage equaled 29 points. Add to that 6 for C Jackson, 2 for C Taylor, and 6 for the Vikings defense and I came back from a huge deficit and beat my brother, Cory! Woo hoo! Takes the sting out of the Vikings getting obliterated.

Interesting side note: The twins are kind of interested in my fantasy football league. They like the Yahoo interface, especially when someone customizes an 'avatar'. They want to know who that's supposed to be. Kyle and Cory, especially, have interesting ones. They're interested in the team names and who those represent. They're interested in the voting system (who do you think will win?). They're interested in the 'smack' speech bubble feature.

For example, during the second half of the Indy game I kept chanting 'Reggie! Reggie! Reggie!' and I put it in my 'smack' speech bubble. They thought that was funny.

I exclaimed this morning at breakfast about my victory and said I could put 'Brady! Brady! Brady!' in my 'smack' bubble (which I have since done ;-). Bethy was kind of hovering around and I told her she needed to go get dressed. She actually got dressed and came back and said 'We can talk more about fantasy football now.'! Shortly thereafter she said 'What if you could send a speech bubble just to Uncle Cory and say 'Reggie! Reggie! Reggie!'.

When they're not exasperating, second graders are fun! :-)

Wil's creative brain has been working overtime.

Wil's creative brain has been working overtime.

Bethy picked Harry Potter and the Sorceror's Stone for our family movie night saturday. They really got into it and have been playing HP a lot.

Plus, Wil has been talking about Wizard's Chess (I've almost got him cured of saying 'chest') a lot. He recently got a new Lego catalog that has a Lego Vikings chess set that he has enjoyed looking at. A couple days ago he said to me

'Daddy, I have an idea for chess. We could make a Star Wars chess set.'

Then he really likes to think about who would be each piece.

Last night we were talking about who we thought should be the pieces for a Lord of the Rings chess set. I said I thought the rooks were easy: Orthanc and Barad Dur, Minas Tirith and the Hornburg. I wanted Shelob to be the black queen, but he didn't like that idea. He picked the Witch King of Angmar (the Morgul Lord, Chief of the Black Riders), based on the premise that the queen doesn't have to be a girl and can be the king's strongest servant.

(Ooh! I just had a good idea! The ring could be the black king (slow, more vulnerable, you capture it and win) and Sauron could be the black queen! Hmm...)

He picked a Harry Potter robe for his Halloween costume, though he doesn't (didn't - maybe it will change) want to pretend to be HP. We're going to watch Chamber of Secrets sometime this weekend to continue to get ready.

Something you never want to hear your son say: I want to be a robber when I grow up. Worse - he put it in writing in his "All About Me" book to remember for all time who he was and what he was interested in at the beginning of second grade.

Wil wrote this essay at school. It's for the "Greatest Grandparents of South Carolina" essay contest.


Here's the translation:

My GranPaul is the best. He played the Princess Game with me and Elizabeth. He put on a crown. We thought that was funny, then... I put on one. He used to drive a school bus. I got to ride the school bus. Now he drives a tour bus. We are good friends. Sometimes he calls me "Buddy." I like that. He is the greatest. Sometimes my family drives to the farm. I get to play in the sand box. The end.

Wil and I and FotR

[I started this on August 22nd. Let's see if I can get it posted...]

I started reading Fellowship of the Ring with Wil last night.

I'd grown tired of re-reading comic books. I liked 'em fine the first 3 or 4 times. Time to graduate to chapter books like Momma and Bethy.

I gave Wil a choice of Prince Caspian, The Book of Three, or Fellowship of the Ring.

Then, when the book came home, I said 'How about if we read some of the book, and then [your reward will be to] watch that much of the movie.' He thought that sounded like a great idea.

Then Christine said 'Maybe we [girls] would like to get in on that!' Bethy said yeah!, but she only wanted to watch the movies. She doesn't want to read all together.

(I think there's at least 3 things at work here:
1. She thinks it would be more boring than her books.
2. She want to do the choosing.
3. She wants to keep Christine to herself.)

So, at bedtime, Wil came and got me [working on my laptop] and said it was time to read our book and then watch the movie. Whoa. Come to find out, he thought we were going to watch some of the movie each night. I said 'No way. You'd get too excited and not be able to sleep.' He promised me he wouldn't, but I insisted he would and that we'd watch some friday night or over the weekend and he accepted that.

As we settled down, I asked him if he knew The Lord of the Rings is my favorite book in the whole world (he said no) and that I'm so happy to be sharing it with him.

So I started reading the 'Concerning Hobbits' part of the Prologue, and Wil was really busy with his stuffed animals and blankets. I thought about asking him if he was paying attention, but his comments showed me he was paying attention:

+ He thought I was talking about Hobbit ladies called 'madam', but I was talking about 'mathoms'.
+ When reading the history of Hobbits and how some lived by rivers and fished and swam, he knew (from watching the movies) that that's where Gollum originally came from.
+ And a few more I don't remember...

Then he started telling me about the hobbit apartment he was building with his blankets and stuffed animals and what the different rooms were and where they got their water. I'd even go so far as to say that he was imitating my reading cadence a little :-)

[I think I was originally going to write more, but this is going to have to be a good enough start for now...]

Favorite Lunchbox Food

I asked the twins to name their favorite lunchbox treat. I thought the answer would be Hershey Kisses of some variety. Instead, Wil wanted to tell me all the things he liked best in his lunch, so here it is:
peanut butter & jelly sandwich - he once told me it tasted like cake
grapes and apples
carrots
chocolate, any kind

Elizabeth's was similar:
peanut butter & jelly sandwich
apple slices
chocolate
cheesestick (string cheese)
water

I was surprised by the last one because Elizabeth is a big milk drinker, but she gave up buying milk in the cafeteria back in Kindergarten.

The Secret in Mrs. Clytus' Class

After school today, Wil was excited to tell us the secret in Mrs. Clytus' class. If you get on yellow, he explained, but then have good behavior the rest of the day, you get to change back to green. "That's what I did today. I'm going to do that every day!" He was so pleased, I had a hard time explaining it's better to stay on green all day. We're still very proud of his effort.

The First Day of Second Grade

Momma: What was your favorite thing about the first day of 2nd grade?
Wil: I stayed on green all day. That was better than recess.
Elizabeth: Recess, and... (thinking) that Momma had homework and I didn't!

What was your least favorite thing?
W: Assembly was talk, talk, talk, boring. Except for "Why Gator Hates Dog." (The new principal is from Louisiana.)
E: Computer lab was pretty much talk, talk, talk, boring.

What do you want your teacher to know about you?
E: That I wasn't supposed to get a Barbie until I was 6 years old, but I started getting them when I was 5.
W: It's fun to be a kid.

What do you want to learn this year?
E: More about Louisiana.
W: I don't actually know yet.

What was one of your favorite things about this summer?
E: Hershey, Carowinds, getting snorkle gear.
W: Peeling skin off Mommy. Swimming lessons.

During the summer, what did you miss most about school?
E: Mrs. Wertz.
W: Mrs. Janus, Mrs. Wertz, Mrs. Adair, and I think her name is Mrs. Church.

Daddy: Was anyone else besides me tired today?
All: Yes!

My boy, the budding philoligist

+ Wil discovers the Law of Velar Villainy: 'Daddy, I just realized something: Lord Vladek (from Lego Knights of Morcia) and Lord Vader have the same letters!' Bonus: 'velar' has some of those velars, too! ;-)

(Incidentally, the search led me to this great old languagehat.com thread where Jason, Jaq, Dorothea and I debated the attractiveness of the word 'blog'. Unfortunately, some famous internet dude showed up at the bottom to tell us he'd coined the term and that pretty much killed it ;-)

And then, Jaq, I discovered your old comments are still out there on the web: http://rateyourmusic.com/yaccs/commentsn/b=90000033403_and_e=112232750340001842 . Crazy.)

I can't believe Summer Break is almost over and school starts in 10 days. That means I'll have 2nd graders in my house! That seems too big for words.

I can't let the summer go by without a note about swimming lessons. The twins had a week of private lessons in June. Elizabeth did beautifully, started swimming freestyle by the end of the week. Wil only learned to doggie paddle, but at least he had fun. They complete two more weeks of lessons last Thursday with the same company, different instructor. Wil is a totally different child in the water now. He blows bubbles, he goes underwater, he crawls, he backstrokes, and he's even learning the Butterfly stroke with dolphin kick. It's amazing. Elizabeth continued to progress, but similarly to riding a bike it was too much too soon and she developed all kinds of anxiety about swimming. She can side-breathe and backstroke well enough to pass "Level 2," her instructor hung that carrot out for her the last day of class, but she's not comfortable in the water. She'll have enough to do this year with ballet and Brownies, but I hope we can find an opportunity for Wil to keep swimming. He loves it and is a joy to watch!

Birthday

Pretty sure the twins had a good birthday. A couple of notes:

+ Saturday morning Wil was singing 'all things go, all things go' repeatedly (from Sufjan Stevens' 'Chicago').

+ Christine put up a spread of photos called Big 7 over at Picasa Web Albums. Warning: only go look if you like excessive cuteness, including toothless wonders ;-)

Speaking of Bethy...

Speaking of Bethy, she and I have been having a conversation about my going bald (which I don't think I am, lest you worry). She said she saw some bald spots on the top of my head. I said good. She asked why. I said because if I lost my hair I wouldn't have to cut it any more. But she said she didn't want me to go bald because she wanted me to win the best looking daddy contest (something she made up, but you get that point), and she didn't think I'd look very good without hair.

Then, last night she was looking over me shoulder (or maybe I was looking over her shoulder if she was on my lap) while I read Lifehacker. She asked what the picture was of and I said cigarettes. She asked... all together now... 'Why?' ;-) I told her it was an article about how to not get cancer. She asked what cancer was and after that explanation, asked what the other ways (besides not smoking) were. #2 was Don't weigh too much.

I told you all of that to tell you this: She asked if I was losing weight so I wouldn't get cancer. I said no. Then she asked if I was losing weight to win the best looking daddy contest. And I said... 'Something like that.' ;-)

Bethy's playlist

I sang 'So And So So And So From Wherever Wherever' by Built to Spill at Bethy (I say 'at' because it was pretty loud, as I am wont to do ;-). She started singing it, then asked if we could listen to it on the computer.

(We sing it 'Sorry, so sorry, so from wherever, wherever' because we didn't know until this minute that it was 'so & so so & so from wherever wherever"! When I pointed this out to them, Bethy said we could still sing it the old way. That's right, baby!)

Then we listened to 'Car', and she started singing that: 'I wanna see movies of my dreams.'

(Features a great verse:

I need a car. You need a guide who needs a map.
If I don't die or worse I'm gonna need a nap.
At best I'll be asleep when you get back.)

I am very proud...

The only bad part about listening to music...

The only bad part about listening to music as I work here in the office (I was listening to Built to Spill on MySpace) is that I can't hear Wil singing in the kitchen while he draws. He was singing 'Life in a northern town', which had me thinking that I have done all the fathering I need to do. Then he was singing something else I couldn't identify. When he came in here for more paper, I asked him:

Me: Whatcha singing Mr Buddy?

Wil: The music from Magmoor Caverns [in Metroid Prime, for GameCube. He doesn't play it. He just watches me play it, but it's been two weeks, at least...].

Then he proceeded to sing a few bars for me.

In the words of Ben Gibbard, 'Be still my heart!'.

Needless to say, I'm no longer listening to music in the office. I'm listening for strains of Wil...

I've been too depressed about the World Cup to post about it. I watched the whole match last saturday. Ugh. The best parts were:

1. Wil watching the first half with me. He was very interested in the red card for the bloody head and the own goal (and recounted them to his grandparents last night).

2. Bethy falling asleep in the recliner with me while I watched the second half.

Apart from that, it was pretty lousy. The ref in that game, obviously, totally sucked. You spend years and millions preparing for this think and two red cards can ruin the whole shooting match.

Not that I think it did for us. Could we have beaten Ghana with those two guys back? I doubt it. They're on fire and we're not playing well. We scrapped with the Italians, but...

Ugh.

Bethy's Spiderman Dream

"I had a good dream last night. Spiderman was dressed up like a bad guy and he had this girl. She was saying, 'Let me go! Let me go!' But her mother knew it was Spiderman, so she said, 'Not until you're down safely.' Then when the girl was down safely, I... I mean Spiderman took off the disguise. The End."

Bethy's turn to have irrational biking fears. What's even more frustrating is that she was riding by herself. We took a little break from riding because she had a busy week with her ballet recital. Went back out and she had to lay the bike down, but didn't get hurt, and now she's too scared to even try. Total regression.

It's a little less frustrating this time (ie, with her instead of Wil) because I know what to do: take the pedals off her bike, lower her seat, make her practice that way until she gets comfortable again, and then ramp back up.