he would play with these...
They would make appearances in all of the rooms in our house... they would come to the bathroom with him, join us for dinner and even get the opportunity to sleep with him. Now Mr. E can be found with a hat pulled over his face pretending to be Spidy, using his fingers with his special noise effect to cast webs. He's even pretended to save one of the girls' dolls. When I picked him up from school yesterday he said, "I'm not Eli, call me Spidy", and the hat went over his face. So, Spidy and I walked out together hand in hand, with him opening the doors for Mack and I. At least he's a gentleman. Okay, maybe he really just enjoys showing us he's big and strong. Either way, I like it = )
Mackie has become a bride. She prances around the house in Schuyler's old white, flower girl dress with the matching white leather shoes and wears a pink-tie tutu that she has concocted to be a veil. She has tried to marry her brother and used to be successful but now Eli has informed her, in his old man voice that we love, that he is too young to get married. Smart boy. My daughter, on the other hand, worries me. She kissed one of her classmates as we were exiting school. We had a little chat when we got home as this is something I certainly don't want to repeat. On a separate note, Miss M had a complete blast with her 2 classmates on her Kindergarten field trip. He dressed up in her bright pink dress, with light pink tights, tall brown boots, and her beautiful hat that my mother made which bore both shades of pink. She even took a little purse for her kleenex. There is no denying she is getting older.
Schuyler is an Olympicaholic. Hockey, skiing, iceskating, sledding and even curling. I don't understand a thing about that event but found myself sucked in trying to figure it out. It is one of the s-l-o-w-e-s-t events! Back to Olympics. One of the positive side benefits is it has sparked an interest of flags. She has been one of those kids who are good at, and take an interest in maps. Well, now she can make another connection with identifying the flag. She has come to me with multiple questions, which I did not know but google always seems to answer! On a not so positive note, she is a remote expert, being able to rewind, record, fast forward, etc...
TGIF!
We have a celebrity in our home. Okay, not really but Schuyler was on Channel 8 news last Friday with the rest of her 2nd grade class. It featured the use of "Domesti-pups" in the classroom. Traditionally, these dogs have been used to aid those with disabilities. However, new research is showing these dogs can also benefits students. Daisy comes to visit the 2nd grade class 1 or 2 times a week. During her time there, students read to her. This can alleviate the pressure of reading aloud in small or large groups as well as the anxiety some students face in general when it comes to reading aloud. It also teaches the students a sense of community. This is where the 2nd part of the story comes in. Daisy was injured this past summer and required surgery. Schuyler's teacher came up with the idea of "Dimes for Daisy" where students would bring in dimes and this money would assist with the cost. During her absence, Joker came to visit but Daisy is now well enough to resume her duties. We have the news special taped = )
While on the subject of school, Mack and Eli had parent visitation at the Montessori last night. Mack was uber excited to show us all she has been learning at kindergarten. She has always had a passion for her workbook work but has recently blossomed in her reading. She read several books to us as well as wrote sentences with the movable alphabet. Eli chose to show us his puzzle work with the world map. Mack will be going on her kindergarten class field trip this weekend (the whole 3 of them =)
We're trying to stay healthy. Eli had a fever from Sunday a.m. until Wed afternoon sometime. Mack's voice comes and goes. The other night she said, "Mom, have you ever last your voice", to which I replied, "Yes, many times. It always comes back". Mack responds, "I've lost my voice before and it came back. I hope it will come back again." = )
Schuyler's last bball game is this weekend. We are hoping it does not get cancelled.
Oh, during Eli's sickness, we watched a new movie, Spiderman 2. It has moved it's way to number 1 on his movie list. "Spidy" as he calls it.
Here's my bath-tastic boy = )
Every year at this time, the kids and I become the valentine assembly line, crafting valentines for all of their classmates. See, the montessori where they attend does not allow store bought valentines, or should I say strongly encourages homemade valentines. Although Schuyler's school does allow store bought, it has become a bit of a tradition to make our own. I find this a bit ironic since I'm really not a fan of valentine's day. I don't really like flowers and, in fact, roses are one of my least favorites and the fact that they mark everything up by 50%. Instead, the Riese family typically enjoys takeout, most often Chinese, my candle light. The kids get a big kick out of the candles and I have no cooking or clean-up! This year, the Chinese new year and Valentine's day are the same day so our little tradition makes perfect sense = ) Back to the homemade valentines. I cheated a bit this year and made photocards. However, we still had to decorate the outside of the envelope. The potato stamper returned and made an appearance, along with some other stamps I had laying around the house from my scrapbooking days. Eli hit his limit at 8 or 9 valentines before he relinquished his duty to me. Mack and Schuyler thoroughly enjoyed the experience, making each valentine unique and special.
I have officially caught the "winter blah". That's my new official term for it, "winter blah"! I would like to ring the neck of Punxsutawney Phil for seeing his shadow and condemning us to 6 more weeks of winter. I need warmth, light and energy to return to my life. Ugh!
Last weekend the girls participated in the Shirette kiddie clinic. This consisted of 3 hours of dance in the a.m. followed by a half-time performance at the boys basketball game. If that wasn't enough, between the 2 activities Mack had a playdate with one of her best friends who she has not seen since August. Later, as we were getting ready for the performance it was very evident how tired she was. As I was curling her hair, I accidentally nicked her ear. From that point forward it was tears, drama and mom could do no right, particularly b/c someone didn't know what she wanted. I offered to put the portion of uncurled hair in a bun or finish curling, etc... All my suggestions were shot down by our little fiery spirit. Eventually she came around and we were able to finish her hair to her specifications. The dance was very cute. For the grand finale, they got to choose the pose they wanted to end in. You will never believe what our miss Schuyler did, jumped into the splits! It blew me away. For the record, her father is extremely flexible for a male being and back in our day, when we used to bust a move, he was known to fancy the crowd with his splits.
Schuyler got her 2nd quarter report card and also recently received a high five award. This is a big deal as the award was presented to her in front of her whole class. I think they give one per quarter. As a prize, she gets a free kids buffet from Valentinos!! She got one last year, too. As you can imagine, we are so proud of her!! Have I ever mentioned that her name has dutch origin and means "scholarly" = )
These days, Eli can be found racing his cars all through the house and crashing them into things. The kid LOVES showers and baths and hops in with mom or dad whenever the opportunity presents itself.
