The First Rule of Fight Club: You Do Not Talk About Fight Club

The girls are feisty today. We've had incidents ranging from "She keeps following me" to "She keeps pointing her toes at me." It's been an interesting morning to say the least and we've had to restate the rule of "If you get in time out 3 times for the same thing, we send a note to your mommy and daddy." I also had to make up the rule of "Ignore people who won't stop saying 'bee bee bee.'"

It's tough when they come to you with those pouty lips so serious and offended and I have to stifle a laugh because the huge overwhelming problem is "She keeps saying her name isn't Ash Lee and it is!"

I turned on Dora and I'm about to go make some lunch. I didn't trust them to not have emotional breakdowns while I make the sandwiches. I have a plan for after lunch involving The Grouchy Ladybug by Eric Carle. I hope it works...I'll keep ya posted!

Now THAT'S how you do Storytime!

The Wilsonville library has renewed my faith in storytime. The ladies who put on the show were energetic and didn't mind being silly in front of the crowd. They sang songs to welcome the kids and in between each story and kept all the girls engaged for the entire time.

In the picture they're performing the second story with a couple of children volunteers. You can see Ash Lee standing with the pink coat. Scout is to her right behind Blocking-Boy. Sydney is to Scout's right and poking above the BB's right shoulder and has a blue jacket on. Sorry about the lame-o-zoid picture. My others were blurry or had blocking grown ups (see baldy down in front there).

The theme this week was picnics so they read The Pig's Picnic, Mr. Gumpy's Outing, and Sam's Sandwich. One of the songs we sang (Ants At The Picnic) is definitely going into our Circle Time Repertoire.

Here are the songs we sang in case they want to perform for you but can't remember the words (or maybe you all just needed a little singing time break...come on, you know you wanna sing).

The Hot Dog Song
(Tune: I'm A Little Teapot)

I'm a little hot dog (Hands over head)
In a bun, (arms at sides)
Squirt on the mustard (squeeze "mustard" all over)
Oooooo! What fun (shiver all over)
Pour on the ketchup (shake on the ketchup)
Pickles too (slap hands together)
Wrap it in a napkin (rolling motion with arms)
Take a bite and chew!! (eat)

and

Ants at the Picnic
(Tune: Skip To My Lu)

Ants at the picnic (fingers crawling up arms)
What'll I do? (shrug)
Ants at the picnic
what'll I do?
Ands at the picnic
what'll I do?
Munch my lunch real quickly

Frogs-jump (munch my lunch real quickly)
Bees-wiggle index finger/stinger (munch my lunch real quickly)
Bears-hold up claws (run away real quickly)

B is for Bed

"Manda, this book will be my blankie"

Now say it with me..."awwwww"

B is for Books!

We just got back and you can tell by looking at us that the girls had a great time. Ash Lee is covered in purple juice and markers (I've anti-stain-stuffed it so they should come out), Scout's hair looks like it hasn't been brushed in a couple of weeks, Sydney looks a little wilty from sweating and I look about 3...maybe 4 years older.

First things first, STORY TIME! We made it to story time just as they were starting the first book. I had such high hopes for this. I thought the "Professional Storyteller" would not just read a boring book in a monotone. I thought the "craft" would be something kids could actually do. I thought the snack would be something semi-healthy. I thought the "Singing Time" would not be the "Professional Story Teller" shuffling through a book of finger plays and trying to remember how 'Rain Rain Go Away' goes. April Fools! Oh. Wait. It's April 2nd. The girls loved it though. Which gives me a ray of hope that my inept juggling of circle time looks slightly more graceful in their non-jaded cynic-free cute l'il eyeballs.

We lost Scout, found her again (no it wasn't that easy or that trauma free but it's over and I'll pay for therapy later) and headed over to the play place.

Someone needs to write their doctorate on the social dynamics of a mall play place. The disheveled veteran mothers in their yoga pants, the hyper-vigilant new moms with their constant look of panic, the socially starved Chatty-Kathies, the worn out grandmas, the awkward, out-of-place grandpas...and then the kids. 4 year olds rule the roost in these things. They are the oldest kids (during the school day anyway) and they have almost super-human large motor skills (they can climb toddler sized steps in a single bound!). The 3 year olds don't care what-the-heck anyone else is doing, they just gotta dance! The 2 year olds are frustrated that their slippery socks won't let them climb as fast as they want to and the babies...the poor babies. I spent a good portion of my time up-righting the poor tipped-over babies.

It was great to see all 3 girls really shine and let their alpha-female personalities come out. They all 3 had these troops that followed them around, up the slide, over the turtle, dancing at the mirror. I don't think they noticed what a fan club they each had but I was proud of how kind and patient they were with the kids around them.

Then to lunch! I brought sack lunches but the capri suns were woefully inadequate. Luckily we were right next to a Jamba Juice. Banana Berry is really stainy. Sorry about that.

Off to the library! The girls played in the dollhouse and each of them put on a puppet show for the other two. We picked out books (Sydney: Curious George, Scout: How to be a Princess, Ash Lee: Wide Mouthed Frog). I picked up a book on parenting and all the children's books I had on hold.

Now we're back. The girls are playing some game that involves an imaginary Scout and going to the store.

B is for Budding Authors!

We read a book called Barn Dance! by Bill Martin Jr. and John Archambault (they wrote Chicka Chicka Boom Boom if you're wondering why those names sound so familiar). The girls liked pointing to all the different animals and finding the "skinny kid" as the owl ushered in the "magic time" and the scarecrow began to fiddle.

We listed all the animals in the book and talked about what we knew about them. There were the regular farm crew: pigs, cows, chicken, sheep, horses, goats, mules, mice, geese; and the other "country kin": raccoons, foxes, bunnies, porcupines, crows, skunks and pigeons.

The girls made all the animal noises for the farm animals but some of those other critters were a little more perplexing...what does a porcupine say anyway? Ash Lee let us know raccoons say "Raccoon, Raccoon" but there were some interesting suggestions when we got to the others.

I found a fun book at the library that had pages to reproduce and make our own books. It's published by Scholastic and called 25 Fun-Filled Collaborative Books. I found it at the library a couple of weeks ago and have been waiting for Book week to use it. If you're looking for good summer activities I think this would be fun for the older kids too.

We made our own version of Barn Dance! featuring the 3 girls and their choice of animal dance partners. They learned that making a book was hard work...even a 3 page book!

At circle time they all read their books to each other and all of them were very proud of their accomplishment. I think they all also enjoyed the chance to "read" to their buddies. I think we'll need to do this more often.

What's Your Favorite Children's Book?

We're celebrating Children's Books this week. There are so many out there that sometimes it's hard to sift through the mediocre ones to find the greatest among them.

I'd like to read the best of the best this week as we celebrate so please let me know your favorites!

My favorites are:

Bark, George! by Jules Feiffer










and Tuesday by David Weisner

Field Trip

The girls and I agree that we need more Field Trips in our lives.

Wednesday is International Children's Book Day and I thought that was definitely cause for an outing.

If it's ok with everybody's moms and dads we'll be heading out to the Clackamas Mall Barnes & Noble for their storytime at 10am. Then we'll head over to the Play Center in the mall until we get bored. I'll bring a sack lunch to eat while we're there. After that we'll head to the library and let each girl check out a book to keep at my house during the week.

That should be a pretty good field trip...AND it's free! WOOT!

Weird Day

Well, Troy is sick today so everything is sorta weird. He stayed in bed for as long as he could stand it. We are lucky to have a bed at all and we really are grateful...but we'll be happy when our bed from Michigan gets here! He had to move out to the couch (yes, the couch is more comfortable than the bed) so the girls have been going between quiet activities at the kitchen table to playing around in the bedroom.

We had a picnic on the floor of the bedroom with tiny sandwiches and bendy straws (there were other things but these were the most important ^_^) and we'll be doing circle time in the room as well.

They've made a fort out of the bunk bed which then turned into the doctor's office. They were using parts of Savannah's dragons as doctor tools for pretend shots, checking ears and scanning for broken legs.

I recently read an article that quoted Tom Limbert, Head Teacher of Stanford University's Bing Nursery School of Child Development Research and Training which said that toys shouldn't be for only one purpose and our children will be smarter and more critical thinkers if they have more opportunities to use their imaginations instead of using "one dimensional" toys. So, hooray for our goofy girls and their budding rocket-scientist brains!

Happy Silky Day!

Oh man, the last one. We were all so tired, so full of sugar, so ready to be done! The kids were champs though.


We sang our song (I think you can hear me better than anyone on the video...be warned), played our game (we rolled Scout up in a blanket, then went outside to play tag), and ate ice cream cones.

Funny Moments:

The kids were all SO excited to go outside and play. They got their shoes and coats on and went out back. A few of them were out for less than a minute before they came clambering back inside. It was too muddy and way too cold. I managed to get them to take their shoes off before they hit carpet but the dining area floor was covered in mud. Scout, after tromping with her compatriots around in her muddy shoes, looks down and says, "Eww Mommy. Why did you make the floor all muddy?" Of course, I'm standing there with spoon of ice cream n one hand, cone in the other and clean white socks..."ME?!"

Savannah found a stick (plain old, fell-off-a-tree-somewhere-and-was-laying-on-the-grass stick) she was using to poke in the mud. She disappeared around the side of the building so I sent Rand out after her. She came running back and when I asked her why she didn't come right away she looked at her stick and said "I needed to see if this was Hailey's stick. She might have been worried about it." Mmmmhm.

Happy Stuffed Animal Day!

Everyone was really getting tired and a little crabby at this point. I think the sugar was starting to affect them pretty strongly now. They were restless but worn out.


We played Find-The-Bear...which was a variation on Find the Dragon Egg, sang the song (you can see the boys' eyes glazing over and Ash Lee's rashy face in the video) and ate gummy bears & Teddy Grahams (double teddy grahams for our silver teethed bandits and anti-gummy bear folks).

Funny Moments:

During the game all the kids would wait in the bedroom while one person hid the bear. The kids were starting to get rowdy/crabby...you know how it is...over stimulated and excited but everyone gets hurt (physically or emotionally) a little more easily. So I went into the bedroom with them and did Yoga while we waited. At first the boys thought it was weird but then I got all of them to do Proud Warrior with me and challenged them to get lower and lower.

We sang our song and everyone had a turn to do a different animal. Savannah's was Pink Bear so that's what we did for the song but there were some truly hilarious moments when the kids made up what sound their animals made. The one I remember most is William's Alien. It said "Ria ria ira" but you had to talk in a high alien voice, spread your fingers around and make your neck long so you looked like an alien. Our goofy kids looked pretty alien.

Happy Dragon Day!

This day was Rand's idea. He's a great kid and helped out a lot but he got a little bored at times...I'm actually glad. I would be worried if a nearly 10 year old thought the games that entertained the 3 and 4 year olds were TOTALLY RAD! I think he was trying to make a statement of his maturity with his choice of game and song.

We sang our song, which was a little rough since no one really knew how the tune went (to the tune of Grieg's Hall of the Mountain King), played Find the Dragon Egg, and ate Hot Tamale Popsicles (yes they taste as weird as they sound).

Funny Moments:

The little girls were always better at the finding game than the older kids. Everyone hid things down on the ground which was in perfectly plain sight to their lower eyeballs. The bigger kids were horrified!

This one wasn't funny. It was tragic and panic-inducing. Everyone was covered in red by the time they got done with their popsicles. I really would not recommend ever getting these for a number of reasons. First, they taste...disturbing. Second, they all fell off the sticks. Third, none of the kids even got close to finishing (except Ash Lee). Fourth, Ash Lee is really allergic to them! DANG IT. I wiped off their faces, but Ash Lee's didn't get any less red. She had a contact rash all over her chin. I felt so bad. I knew she was allergic to raw cinnamon but for some reason my brain didn't equate "raw cinnamon" with Hot Tamales. We'll just steer clear of all cinnamon flavored things now. SORRY ASH LEE! The double sad part is that she liked them better than any of the other kids.