Monday: Memorial Day

We went to the parade this morning.  I like the Memorial Day parade because it is just the right length and it is easy to get in and out.  And it is good to pay respect to those who have served in our country.  I briefly told Isaac about the purpose for the parade, but I'm not sure he got it.  The thing I forgot about this parade is how people stand up for most of it.  One of these years I'll get front row seats.  (Also, I took some pictures but my phone is acting up and won't let me access them right now.)

After the parade Joshua was downstairs in the big room and managed to scoot about 20 feet...that's the farthest he's gone yet. It took about 45 minutes, but every time I looked in on him he was somewhere else.

We spent this afternoon with Ben's family.

Isaac tried to play croquet, tried being the key word.

Then he decided he wanted to go on a boat ride.  He asked both grandparents and since nobody objected, that's what we did.

Joshua wasn't a fan of the life jacket.  He and Ben went inside shortly after this picture was taken.

He got to drive too.

Sunday: more balloons

Balloons are still being enjoyed this weekend.

In other news, I helped teach Isaac's Sunday School class today.  We learned about the Holy Spirit, since it is Pentecost.   Yup, trying to do that was about as hard as it sounds, although there was a good lesson laid out for us.  It compared the Holy Spirit to the wind and there were a bunch of activities.  Then we went outside to feel the wind...and it wasn't windy.  Luckily, we got some breeze at the very end.

Joshua is pulling himself onto his knees all the time now.  If you put him by something stable (or, for that matter, not stable), he'll start trying to climb it.

Saturday: comparison, flowers

Last night was was delaying going to bed and looking through old blog posts.  I found a handy one on what foods I had given to Isaac.  And realized that it might be time for another comparison picture.

Joshua's on the left, Isaac on the right.  The shape of their face seems a lot different to me.  And the hair. :)

Aunt C also planted some flowers for us today.  They're beautiful.  Much better than the weeds I've been growing the last few years. :)

Friday: balloons

We pulled the following out of the jars today: Balloons and make freezer meals.  We just got the balloons yesterday, so that one was good.  I was also looking forward to it.  (The nice thing about making the activities myself is that I look forward to most of them.)  Freezer meals...blah.  I wasn't feeling it.  I had the ingredients for some, but the kitchen was a mess.  I thought I'd see what happened.  We went to the park in the late morning with friends and by the time nap time was done it was too late.  Bummer.  I put it back in the jar, because I do want to do it sometime.

Anyway, balloons!  We had a good time with them.  (It should be noted that Isaac kept asking to take silly pictures today.  I guess they were a hit too.)  A nice thing about this activity was that Joshua could enjoy it too.

Isaac is hiding in there too.

There were two black balloons in the pack; they're Isaac's favorites

An untied balloon, about ready to be released.

And released!

Ben got in on some of the action after work.  He made a really big balloon.

Then we made a Joshua sized balloon.  And made his mohawk even mohawkier.

Throwing a balloon up.

We ended the day with many balloons in the room.  Maybe between 40 and 50?  Possibly as low as 30.  It's hard to tell.  It was a 100 pack and with a long weekend, we might end up finishing the rest.

Today we drew out "put up a curtain" and "take silly pictures".  We bought the curtain, but didn't put it up.  A few days ago we had drawn out "help with VBS" but didn't have anything to help with, and today we did.  So we tested about 400 tea lights to see if they work.  It was a really good activity for Isaac...I wasn't expecting to get through so many today.  There is about 1 in 20 that doesn't work and one silly one that won't turn off.  Guess it's a good test of the battery.

On to the pictures...there's a lot.  I set up the timer on the camera with burst, so each picture type had three options and I choose the best.  They're not as silly as I envisioned, but it was still a lot of fun.

1) Making sure it works.

2) Ties

3) Hats

4) Towels

5) The little red tabs from the tea lights.  Joshua has a baster bulb.

6) Flip flops

7) Puzzle pieces.  When looking back at the pictures, Isaac laughed the most about this one.  I didn't see why it was so funny.

8) Stuffed animals

9) A lot of stuff

10) Sitting backwards

Oh, then we took a break for nap time.  I also got a picture of Joshua standing by himself.  He's just starting to do this and not really very stable yet.

11) Duplos.  Isaac is playing the harmonica.

12) Silly faces

13) Backwards

14) To the right

15) To the left

16) More red tabs.  Sigh.  How long before I can sneak them in the trash?  I tried once already.

17) Throwing balls

18) Throwing balls again

19) Balls dropping from our heads.  Isaac followed his ball and did a face plant.

20) Paper bag heads

21) Screaming while standing in bags

21b) More screaming in bags

22) Jumping.  This was mostly just blurry, but you can kind of tell Isaac's feet were off the ground.

Wednesday: life

Today we pulled out "do a chromatography experiment" (link) and "weed".

The experiment was a flop.  I didn't have the recommended markers and the glasses we used were too big.  We could see the colors separate a bit, so I guess it wasn't a total flop, but they didn't look nearly as cool as the pictures.

But then we joined Aunt C for some weeding.  Ah, much more fun to do it with someone else.  We also were outside for the only two hours that was semi-warm today, which was really nice.  And the front of the house looks 100x better now!  We got Isaac some gardening gloves at the store.  They're still a little big for him, but not as big as normal sized gloves.  He's pretty funny because he doesn't want to touch anything unless he has his gloves on.  But I kind of feel like I was that way too, so I understand.

Tuesday: 42 weeks

Joshua is 42 weeks!  The thing I've noticed most this week is how happy he is to see Ben all the time.  He comes in the room and there is great wiggling.

Today we drew out of the jars "clean a room" and "read a Jesus Story and do an activity" (link).  We cleaned the office.  Or at least cleaned the floor off so the rumba could work and took up all the water bottles.  It really needed to be done.  For the Jesus story, we started with reading about God promising a son to Abraham.  The activity didn't sound super fun to me, but I thought I could find enough materials to sort-of do it.

While reading the story I came up with a different activity.  It still had the same concept, but was cooler.  The concept was how many descendants Abraham would have and how that's a really big number.  So we punched holes in a box and shown a flashlight through it to make stars.

At one point early on we counted the number of holes.  There were thirty-some holes and he counted them with only a medium amount of help.  I was impressed.  (The other day he also told me there was a 24 on his shirt.  I didn't think anything of it until he left and was surprised he knew the number.)  But then we made a lot and he couldn't count them...just like Abraham couldn't count the stars.

This was a good project because Isaac kept going back to it throughout the day and making more holes.

Joshua enjoyed his cottage cheese at lunch.

and he wanted to grab the camera.

Sigh.  Super cute but oh so annoyingly messy.