Joel's a helper

Joel started tutoring a little friend after school a couple afternoons each week in phonics. I'm not sure that I even understand all the terminology of phonics, but Joel does. He is so excited to be helping. It should be a good situation for everyone -- Joel's student (who is the son of my previous students) will understand his phonics lessons and Joel will receive the reward of serving someone other than self. I'm so glad to see my son maturing. He doesn't look at this as a job, but as an opportunity to help out a friend.

Here they are being studious (and cute!):

funny boys

This is how I found Luke and Seth last night when I went in to check on them:


Seth DOES have his own bed, but he's not staying in it these days. Apparently, Luke was hot and Seth was cold. Luke took his shirt off, and Seth pulled the edge of the blanket over himself. I was laughing -- silently so that I didn't wake them up. Seth's a pretty sound sleeper, so he didn't wake up when I moved him back to his bed and changed his diaper.

Tonight Seth untied his little tunnel and set it up while he watched "Franklin."


He's SOOOOO cute!!!!!!!!!!

wrestling and pictures

Luke wrestled in the state tournament on Saturday. I was AMAZED at how aggressively he wrestled this time! I was shaking after a couple of the matches, they were so exciting. Luke's goal all season was to get a medal. He finally did it!!! YAY, LUKE!!


Luke got a camera for Christmas and has been taking lots of pictures since then. He took it to the wrestling tournament last weekend, too. He was taking pictures of everyone in the van on the way to Wasilla. He told Seth, "Say cheese!" And Seth did. But the camera didn't take the picture correctly (or Luke didn't push the button correctly?). So Luke told Seth, "Wait!! Keep your cheese face on!!" hahahahaha

Happy Easter

I don't usually make Seth wear uncomfortable clothes, but Easter's one of the exceptions:


Seth wanted to be in the picture with Luke:


Luke was also required to wear a suit today.


I tried hot rollers in Makenzie's hair, but they didn't really work. When I told her to turn sideways to get a picture of the rollers, Seth stood beside her and also turned sideways.


My Easter princess:

Each year, we've had all the cousins sit together for an Easter picture. Placing Luke and Seth next to each other was obviously not a wise decision.


(about an hour later) I just spent way too much time looking for these supposed annual pictures we've supposedly been taking. I found the one from last year:


And I stole this one from Amanda's facebook page, but it's not a nice sit-on-the-couch-and-pose picture:


Apparently we took no group cousin pictures in 2008, and the first annual cousin picture was Christmas, 2007:


We've got cute kids! :-)

broken toes

Joel broke three of his toes in wrestling practice a week ago. His foot didn't move when it was supposed to. We spent several hours in a clinic waiting to get an x-ray, boot, and crutches. He was pretty tough about the whole thing as long as he didn't have to put his foot down at all. We had to wait almost a week to get in to see the orthopedic surgeon, so I was afraid to let him do anything at all. He got a little bored staying at home all those days watching t.v., so I'm pretty sure he's really ready to agree to anything to go back to school. I want him to stay in his classroom the whole day because his class is on the second floor (no elevators). The doctor said that the boot was just as good as a cast, and that he could put a little weight on his foot unless it hurt to do that. He has to wear the boot for five more weeks (school will be out by then), and go back for another x-ray at the end of May to see if the bones and tendons heal correctly. If they didn't, he'll have to have surgery to put in a pin to hold everything together correctly so that he doesn't have foot pain the rest of his life. If they do heal correctly, he'll start some rehab exercises to get his foot back to normal. Yesterday, he was home the entire day, so his cousin Gavin came over to play with him for a couple hours. Joel and Gavin both had SO much fun!! I had thought we'd be at Luke's wrestling tournament until about 2 p.m., but it ended up lasting till after 7 p.m.!! I'm so glad Gavin was able to keep Joel company for some of that time! Today, Joel went outside to play with our little neighbors. They all had fun :-) It was sweet to see my big sixth-grade 12-year-old playing with smaller children.

Of course, with my kids, there has to be something funny in every situation. Here's Joel's funny: When he took off the boot to show the doctor his foot, Joel saw that the side of his foot was a little green and yellow. I told him it was probably bruised. The doctor looked at the foot and the x-rays and started explaining to Joel what kind of injury it was and who first documented this type of injury. He told us that way back then (1800's), people usually had to have the injured leg amputated because of gangrene. Joel just heard the "green" part of that word and said, "My foot is green!" hahahahahaha!!!!

Luke's funny

Luke's version of getting his fingers shut in the car door:

"Remember when I was getting out of the van, but you shut the door right on my two favorite fingers?!"

hahahahaha

Seth knows what he wants!

Luke didn't feel well yesterday, so I let him have ice cream for dinner. Seth felt fine, so I asked him if he wanted a corndog. He very clearly said, "No corndog -- ice ceem!" Yay for Seth!!! To know what he does and doesn't want and to express that clearly is really something :-)

so glad it's spring

spring in Alaska STINKS! we get snow, high winds, melting snow, dirty slush, then jagged ice in the driveway and roads. but today i'm SO glad that it's spring and over 40 degrees outside because i had to open all the doors and windows tonight to air out the smokey house!

here's a word of warning -- don't EVER microwave a bowl of microwavable noodles without adding the water!!!!!!!!!!

i had to call my nurse sister-in-law to make sure we didn't need to go to the e.r. it still smells YUCKY in here!!!!!!!!!