If I was moving today (which I'm not)

I would totally buy this house.

After School Special

I picked up X-man a book called, "Eat Your Math Homework: Recipes for Hungry Minds" by Ann McCallum this summer while I was in California. He's been math hungry crazy, so we signed him up for 45-minute sessions starting in September with the Mathman, Don Cohen. He's kind of an institution around the Champaign area. My cousin John went to him when he was in Elementary School. Don could serve as a tutor, but often times he serves as the guy who loves math. No work sheets but he makes complicated mathematical situations pretty easy for kids from ages kindergarten through college.

Anyway, X-man asked to start doing some of the work. So today we made our own trail mix out of honey nut cheerios, mini marshmallows, pretzel sticks and dried cranberries (most of it stuff I put in X-man's special after school snack from his first day of school). Hooray for leftovers.

He scooped varying amounts into a bowl, mixed them up and then put 1 cup into brown paper bags. We then poured out what we had and counted them out and put them back into the bag, so we could figure out the probability of pulling certain items out of the bag. It was a lot of fun for a snack time.

I elected to put all of my items in rows to make them easier for me to count. X-man preferred piles. 

Afterwards, we set out to decorate the GIANT BOX that our neighbor Mr. Ron gave us. It was a great activity for him to do while I set about doing laundry and getting ready for our trip to Maine on Saturday. When he started, X-man decided he wanted to make it into a submarine.

I came out a half out later and found X-man with some neighborhood friends all painting the big box.

Apparently, the girls saw that X-man was painting a flap blue (he wanted it to hide his sub under water) and in this town if one color is blue, the other has to be orange. And there apparently has to be a big I in the middle of everything. They've all been well indoctrinated, I see. :-)

So, you know, a little math, a little art, a little snack, some social-emotional development...

A New Baby

No, I'm not pregnant, and no, I'm not adopting. Instead, I started a new blog.

If you'd like to check it out, feel free. Although I just put up my starting post today regarding my interest in food and food science.

If you'd like to check it out, please do.

http://eatmedrinkmeblog.blogspot.com

First Day of First Grade

We woke up this morning at 6:15 a.m. I wake up at that time every morning to let out the dog and feed the cats. Then I usually have "Mom" time (i.e. running the dishwasher and doing laundry). But today, I had to wake the monster.

X-man likes to listen to the radio, particularly the morning show on 94.5. He ran into my room several times this week announcing, "Mommy! Facebook has no money!" or "Daddy's company has the most money!" But this morning was, "Some guy passed out in a car and had some kind of ring on his junk and some people went to breakfast when they should have called the police first." (And I totally took my advantage of it being 6:30 a.m. to negotiate around having to explain that some people refer to penises and vaginas as "junk.") I'm not ready for that yet.

He ate breakfast. He watched a little TV. Everything was fine until we went to take photos. Then he was cold and wanted long pants. I told him he'd be burning up at the end of the day in long pants. And I was right. As it was, he left his sweatshirt at school. :-) Anyway, he threw a fit about not wanting school to start. And this was the "first day of first grade" photo that I got.

We leave to walk to school at 7:30 a.m. X-man was bummed that none of the neighbors were walking with us, but I explained it would take each family some time to figure out what they'd like to do. We said good morning to the two county sheriffs that were directing traffic. We saw that the park bike rack was full. And then as we're going near the front doors, I asked if I could take another photo. X-man refused. But then he said, "Maybe you can take my photo after school, if I decide I like it."

There was some kind of SNAFU about "walkers" at school today. But at 2:35 or so (20 minutes late) X-man walks out the side door. He meets me down the sidewalk and announces, "I liked it!" Then he told me I could take is "happy" photo now. :-) 

He brought home a folder full of information. And in that folder was something we didn't get in kindergarten unless it had something to do with attendance. I know in my heart that every kid probably got one today. But to me, it was really special. 

Summer's End

Today is the last day of summer. X-man and I celebrated by going to the Children's Discovery Museum in Normal after getting some errands done. We've taken X-man every year since he was 18 months. They've done a lot of exhibit shuffling and updating, and he always enjoys going.

He met a friend who was 4 there. They played for two hours before the little friend had to leave. But then we did okay on our own. :-) The place was EMPTY.

"Let's Make a Deal"

When Wayne Brady retires, X-man will be very happy to fill in his shoes. Because I swear that every day for the last month, whenever something isn't going the way he wants it I hear the phrase, "Let's Make a Deal."

Sometimes the deals are in place of what would clearly otherwise be a tantrum. "If I get the toy I brought to a play date to leave by myself, you have to give us five extra minutes to play."

No.

Sometimes the deals are cute. "Let's make a deal. What if I can cuddle with you on the couch for one episode of Doc McStuffins and then go pick up my room? Because I love you."

Well, crap. Okay. :-)

Sometimes the deals are insane. "Let's Make a Deal. I'll clear my plate if you buy me the Lego Gold Mining Set (which is like $100)."

No.

I was trying to think about where he might hear let's make a deal... and then I remembered, we use it when we try to come to financial negotiations when we play the iPad version of Monopoly.

Nice.

One more day of summer. He made a special request for our last day together, so I'm trying to fulfill it. I'll take pictures tomorrow.

Motivation

So, after the awesome walk this morning, I came home and did what I told SuperShanna I was going to do today, which was clean out the garage. Normally, we have a SWAP in the fall and a SWAP in the spring, but with everything going on in everyone's lives lately and the departure of some friends, that tradition has come to an end.

It used to be my motivation to clean out my garage.

But today, it was just the need to clean. If you haven't met me, I'm not a clean freak. I'm not a germaphobe, but holy cow do I like the donating, selling and throwing things out part of household organization. Less is more. I live with two boys who like to rat pack things, so it takes some work to declutter sometimes.

I should have taken before photos, but it was too gross. You don't want to know how much mouse poop and dead bugs I swept up today.

But here are the after photos. And I'm pretty happy with it. (Now to start on the basement storage room, as soon as the garbage comes and empties out our blue waste bin tomorrow.)