Catching Up

Here are some things that we've been up to in the last month or so:

Owen had his first Kub Kar Rally.  He made a really neat car with a lightning bolt on it.  We discovered that we didn't know all the tricks (despite having twins go through three years of this) with slicking the car down with carbonite and other sleek oils...next year, right?  Owen's car didn't come in dead last every time--but enough that he surely noticed.  Alas for competition right?  However, he kept a very brave and even happy face on and enjoyed cheering everyone on.  I enjoyed watching him next to his leader at the end of the track, helping her determine who was 1st, 2nd, and 3rd.  He won The Most Colorful Car Award.  :-)

Thomas and I got to make a Leprechaun Trap together this week.  He carefully planned it out and drew a picture of it, then we put it together.  After we made the initial "plan" he added some more ideas:

The Leprechaun approaches the trap.  He sees the shoe (small green thing in front).  He puts it on, and heads on over the rainbow, attracted by the glitter glue along the way and the pennies at the far end--which lead into the cabin-like structure.  The little sticks are the crocodiles--they chase him into the trap if the pinwheel ("treadmill") doesn't do it first. The idea is that the treadmill will blow the gate shut and trap him in there.  Tommy, always a thinker, asked me how we could get the treadmill to blow?  Thinking quickly, I replied "It's always windy in Southern Alberta!  I'm sure it will blow."

Notice the four-leaf clovers on the pinwheel, and lining the inner walls of the trap.  Another lure for the unsuspecting leprechaun.  I'm not sure if the little sticks at the base of the "treadmill" are crocodiles as well, or just colorful bits of rainbow to attract the leprechaun--these were stuck in while I was distracted with George, so I missed the explanation.

James had inspiration the other day when he attended a student's baptism.  He shared his idea with me and I love it!  He bought each of the boys a notebook and we are going to start (well he already did) writing little messages to the boys in their notebooks when we think of something we want to say to them individually and maybe don't want to forget it or don't want to wait to say it, or maybe just would rather write it.  Then we leave the book for them on their bed.  After they read it, they can write something back if they want or they can just return it to our bed.  We're excited to see how it connects us and strengthens our modes of communication with them.  We are dubbing the books "PACC journals" which stands for Parent and Child Communication.  

Georgie has one too, but he had already fallen asleep on my lap by the time we took the picture.  His is a little one with  a colorful plaid design on it.

The other day we had the most beautiful hoar frost.  I noticed the tree out front, but forgot to point it out to the boys, so it was really fun when a bit later THEY pointed it out to me!  And Will took some pictures: 

Of course our camera doesn't do it justice, but it was so amazing to see each little tiny snowflake!  So perfect.