Monday: quilt show

Today Joshua and I finished up the raspberry plot.  Joshua finished up his stick garden.

We went to the quilt show after school.

Then we went to get some tulip pictures.  The boys...I mean Isaac and Puppy, were happy to have their picture taken several times.  (Puppies have their tongues sticking out.)

Sunday: quote

We were watching a Planet Earth show about mountains.

Joshua: I think mountains are bigger than Dad.

Saturday: race

Today was the kids' fun run.  It was advertised as a 1k, which I think it has been in the past.  This time Isaac had a 0.5mi run (which I just converted and it is 0.8km, so not that far off) and Joshua had a 0.2mi run.

It worked out quite well though.  I got tired around the 0.3 mi mark and started walking fast.  Isaac kept going...but he isn't a very fast runner.  He kept moving the whole time, although he did slow down to take a drink.  We were near the end of the pack, but oh well.  It has been rather cold and we didn't prepare for it as well as we could have.

Joshua and Ben and Grey Bear ran the whole race and finished rather near the front.  At that point Joshua was more worried about getting a snack than the fact that he had just run a race.

We then proceeded to walk a mile back to our car.

Upon getting home, but boys played out in the raspberry dirt some more.  They started by hammering it, but then used shovels and a rake.  The last time I looked at them Joshua was working again on making a stick forest near the raspberries.

half the nights: teeth

When I go to sleep before Ben, I have the tendency to ask Ben if he brushed his teeth when he comes to bed.  I know that he does, but I fall asleep in between the time that he comes in the room and when he comes to bed, so it feels as though he hasn't had enough time to brush his teeth.

It is quite hilarious how much I care about whether or not his teeth are brushed.

Thursday: raspberry prep and other stuff

It's exam week, so my schedule is wackier than normal.  I also have an exam in the last exam slot, Friday at 12:30pm.  (Note - the students were not happy about this.  However, I warned them several times not to make arrangements to go home, start jobs, etc.  For once, students listened!  I did have one change to the other section's time slot due to a job, but he at least asked first.  Anyway...)  I was working this morning and instead of grading like I should have been doing I instead worked on making a program to grade for me.  It was about 1000x more interesting than grading, and I can at least pretend that it will help the grading go faster later.

This afternoon we started raspberry prep with CC.  We got dirt and some barrier stuff and a fence. 

It turns out we only got enough dirt, but we also don't have the raspberry plants yet so there is enough time to finish it up.  Putting it all together was easier than I expected and the kids had a blast.  I think they especially enjoyed hammering the dirt.  It had clumps in it that were unacceptable.

Isaac wanted me to take a picture of his Fun Dip so that he "can remember it forever."  Since it'll get lost in the plethora of pictures, I'll put it here so there is a slightly better chance.

Wednesday: ice skating

The boys' first ice skating lessons were today.

Joshua did fine.  He started by always needing a hand, but by the end he could balance.  There were some tears, but he stuck with it.  I saw a few smiles too.

Isaac loved it.  He hadn't lost any of the balancing skills that he had learned last time, and this time even managed to move a bit!  It was a march.  It started out very slow, and by the end it was slightly less slow.  I told him that there were five more lessons and if he still enjoyed it he could have more...and he immediately wanted more.  He had lots of smiles.

Tuesday: you are my puppies

"You are my puppies, my only puppies, you make me happy, when skies are grey.  You'll never know how, much I love you.  Please don't take my puppies away.  Woof-woof-woof."

I sang this this evening and both boys liked it...until Isaac paid attention to the last part of the song.  Then he got weepy about the thought that he would go away from me.  I tried playing it as not a big deal...he'll leave to go to college and that is a good thing.  And then he said, "but when we both die we'll see each other in heaven."  Yeah.  It's true. 

So we got some snuggles in and talked about it a bit.  I mentioned that if he were to die before me he could see Grandma Julie.  It instantly cheered him up..."I can live with her!"  He was still a bit weepy, so we read in his Bible about heaven and how it is even more homier than our home.