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.

Time to brag on Bethy for a bit. I've been amazed and really pleased with how far the twins' reading skills have come in the last three months, but Elizabeth has surpassed everything expected of her. Her teacher said in our last parent-teacher conference that in both reading and writing Elizabeth jumped ahead of students who started out the year ahead of her. She's reading at an end-of-third-grade level and has been willing to tackle some tough little books already this summer including a retelling of The Town Mouse and the Country Mouse and The Little Mermaid, (not the Disney version.) We picked those because the story is familiar but there is a lot more detail and a larger vocabulary than the versions she's read before, plus it gave us a chance to explore some of the themes in The Little Mermaid including not always getting what you want and what happens when there isn't the happy ending you expected. Good stuff.


Wil's turn -- my boy can read! I'm so pleased. He's been cruising through 3-6 books a day. He agreed yesterday that some of the ones we borrowed from the library were too easy, but even a month ago he couldn't have said that. Yesterday he read to me for over half an hour and probably would have kept on reading except that Sean came home with the movie Sky High. (That's a post I'll save for later.) If he's up to it, I'm going to have him try some of the Henry and Mudge books that Elizabeth brought home. They're not particularly challenging for her, but she's enjoying reading them without my supervision. That's fun. Mudge makes Wil laugh. That's fun too!

Go, Wil. Go!

Wil rode a bike with petals without training wheels for the first time this morning! He's been practicing coasting, balancing and steering on his bike without petals. He'd liked it when I counted, "1, 2, 3, whee..." and gave him a push, but his favorite thing was the "Daddy Slingshot." Sean can push a lot harder, faster and farther than I can, so Wil got more practice that way. Now he's ready to go! It was a joy to watch. His face showed his delight. We went to Chik-fil-A afterwards to celebrate with chicken mini biscuits.

Our first day of Summer Break.

The twins and I are having a wonderful day together. I'm going to try to provide a better balance of structure and free time this summer. They mostly played "beach" this morning with the new beach towels spread out on the living room floor. Also Elizabeth set up their umbrellas to provide shade. They've got big plans for a "beach party" this weekend if one of them wins the Goblet of Choice tonight. They have both been extra good helpers today trying to earn points.

We also went to the grocery store together - something I've avoided as much as possible the past two years. It went surprisingly well. Wil was in charge of the coupons and Elizabeth crossed items off our list. I'm so pleased with their reading skills! After lunch we spent more than half an hour reading together for the library's Summer Reading program. As I write, they are writing in their Summer Journals. It's something their teachers recommend they do daily. Both teachers set home a variety of suggestions of things to do over the summer so "their brains don't get rusty" as Wil's teacher put it. Should be mostly fun!

The boys: Sean, Wil, and Mario

Wil's playing Super Maro Sunshine in the other room. Then I hear him yell: I jumped!

I say 'Wil, do you need help?'

'No, I totally know how to do this.'

I say 'I hear ya.'

Then follows more 'I jumped!' and some mumbling.

I'm proud of that boy. Like father like son ;-)

Finally, he accepts my offer.

Then I kill off all of his Marios trying to get through that screen. Not the plan :-(

Oh, well, not even Daddy as Mario can win 'em all...

Wil got C-3PO first on the Star Wars quiz, which he hated. So we retook it, trying to answer like Luke would, and got:

Your results:
You are Luke Skywalker

Luke Skywalker 78% Han Solo 72% Mace Windu 66% Chewbacca 65% Anakin Skywalker 63% An Ewok 60% Jar Jar Binks 60% Qui-Gon Jinn 57% Princess Leia 56% C-3PO 56%

You value your friends and loved ones, but can sometimes act recklessly because of your emotions. Occasionally you resort to whining. You look ahead to great things for yourself.

(This list displays the top 10 results out of a possible 21 characters)


Click here to take the Star Wars Personality Test


Then Bethy got C-3PO, but she didn't hate it as much as Wil. Christine got Qui-Gonn Jinn. That's a pretty good one, too. Better than Han Solo, really...

Then Wil wanted to take the quiz as himself. He got:

Your results:
You are Spider-Man

Spider-Man 80% Robin 70% The Flash 60% Catwoman 50% Green Lantern 50% Superman 50% Iron Man 45% Hulk 45% Supergirl 25% Wonder Woman 20% Batman 15%

You are intelligent, witty, a bit geeky and have great power and responsibility.

Click here to take the Superhero Personality Test


Like father, like son. I am, of course, very proud. :-)

Then Bethy wanted to take the quiz as herself, but she didn't like the results, so here is what she got when we answered like Wonder Woman:

Your results:
You are Wonder Woman

Wonder Woman 85% Supergirl 75% The Flash 65% Superman 65% Green Lantern 60% Hulk 60% Robin 55% Spider-Man 45% Catwoman 40% Iron Man 30% Batman 25%

You are a beautiful princess with great strength of character.

Click here to take the "Which Superhero am I?" quiz...

I could have told you about the beautiful princess part. She has a lot of willpower, and we're working on the character part.