mathmom's blog

Today we went to a birthday party that was supposed to last from 3-5. I was planning on leaving early, but unfortunately there was a clown making balloon animals very slowly, and my kids have not learned how to push themselves up to the front (perhaps they are related to their mother?). Amanda finally got her flower at 5:15. Then we had to decide what to do for dinner. I had been thinking Chili's, since they have an extensive allergy menu that we could revisit, now that Amanda can have wheat... but the nearest Chili's was 20 minutes away at least, and not on our way home. Thinking out loud about the restaurants on the way home, I mentioned the Outback. Eleanor jumped on this idea (I had been thinking about McDonalds , but frankly Eleanor won't eat any of their food. She has better taste than I do, I suppose.) I was weak, she managed to convince me by promising to eat lots of vegetables =) We had an ok time, but going out alone with 3 kids does not give mama much tim...

We got to watch Michael at his conference today, giving his talk. The girls were very excited to see him (no, they hadn't forgotten after a few days of him being gone =) and watched enthralled for a few minutes. Even Luke made excited noises and was happy to see and hear him. However, after a few minutes when I announced that they could go downstairs and watch some TV, they ran from the room yelling TV! TV! TV! Sorry Daddy =) We can't wait to see you again!

This afternoon we went to Target, then a park, then the grocery store, and then we went out to dinner at one of the girls' favorite places, a soup and salad buffet. In the past we've always had baby food for Luke, but Luke is getting less and less enchanted with baby food, so I thought I would see what he could eat from the buffet. Unfortunately, he was on a no new foods jag tonight. Actually, he was on a no old food jag as well. The problem seemed to be that he got hold of a spoon and wouldn't let go. He only wanted to eat things he fed himself on the spoon---but he definitely didn't have enough coordination to accomplish that. He made a big big mess, but I suppose that is how you learn. My favorite was when he carefully picked up a piece of sweet potato and put it in the spoon, then carefully picked up the piece again (in his fingers) to eat it. He knows the spoon is important, but he doesn't quite know how to work it. Eleanor and Amanda both ate uncharacte...

shower eat sleep read play with kids clean kitchen and do laundry blog (my apologies to Maslow) Since one of the kids has been sick almost every day for the past few weeks, and you can see where writing blog entries falls on my list of what is important, I haven't been blogging lately. Plus, there are only so many days you can read "Well, so and so is sick again" before it gets really boring. I've composed a few entries in my head which I hope to type in sometime soon, provided we don't all get the flu.

After I went in to Luke this morning, I thought I heard Amanda so I hurried over (sometimes she uses the bathroom right after she wakes up, but she still needs some help). Her light was on, which was strange since she's not tall enough to reach the switch... Her room was empty, but the doors connecting through the bathroom to her sister's room were open. Apparently Eleanor had heard her crying and had gone over to Amanda's room to comfort her. Then Eleanor helped Amanda go potty and snuggled with her for a while (Eleanor thought Amanda had had a bad dream). When I got to them, Eleanor was looking in her own dresser for clothes that were too small for Eleanor that she thought might fit Amanda (never mind that Amanda is wearing 3T shirts and 2T pants, while Eleanor is growing out of her size 5 clothes). Eleanor was trying to teach Amanda to put on a shirt by herself, rather unsuccessfully. Eleanor said that Amanda woke up at 6:36, which I believe, as Eleanor has her eye ...

The other day Eleanor asked to have her training wheels taken off her bicycle. We had a few hours to kill and it was an absolutely beautiful day, so I got Michael's wrenches and took the training wheels off. I think I impressed Eleanor, she hadn't been sure that Mama could use Daddy's tools. Then Eleanor wanted to ride. I was trying to take care of Luke, but he was well (I had just dosed him up with motrin) so I let him play in the sand while I tried to push Eleanor. I wasn't able to get up very much speed, and she did not want to ride on the driveway, so she got a lot of experience falling off her bike in the grass. She actually got quite good at leaping free of the bike and landing so she wasn't hurt. Amanda seemed to think that she could help most by standing directly in front of Eleanor's bike just as Eleanor wanted to get going. It took a while to dissuade her of this idea. After a while I pushed Eleanor while holding Luke, which made the chances of ...

When I was in 2nd grade, my Grandma taught me to make Swedish hearts . Ever since then, I have made these for Valentines day (I often don't mail the ones I've made, so if you haven't gotten one, that doesn't mean I didn't make one for you...) I remember making 35 or so for all the kids in my class in elementary school. The best thing about them is that they look impossible, but they're really not too hard to make (although making 35 and writing names on all of them does take a long time, so I advise you to start much earlier than I did when I was younger.) When Eleanor started school, I continued the tradition by making the hearts for her class. When she was 2, I made all the hearts. When she was 3, she cut some of the hearts. Last year she did everything except weave the hearts. I was all excited this year to teach her how to weave the hearts, but when I asked her if she wanted to get started (it's best to start in January making a few each day) she ...

...by letting them throw up on us. Luke had a stomach bug (probably from something he put in his mouth while I wasn't looking) all Friday, and he still wasn't all himself today. He seemed to be getting over it by bedtime tonight. I had been looking forward to the first weekend in more than a month when the entire family would be well. Maybe next week. My theory of child illness: the two important things to do for sick children are 1) control their fever, and 2) keep them hydrated. If their fever gets out of control, they don't want to drink, and they get dehydrated, and then they can't keep anything down. With Luke, he had a hard time drinking anything, so I ended up giving him a few sips of pedialite in a medicine dropper every few minutes, up to 4 oz. per hour. He was mad that I wouldn't give him more at a time, but if I gave him too much, he would lose it all anyway. If you can keep the fever down and keep them from being dehydrated, the kids usually reco...