Sleepover Agenda

 The other morning, James presented me with this agenda for his sleepover. (Presumably for his birthday, which is in 8 months.) I guess he'd asked for a piece of paper at bedtime and had been working on it in his bunk. 

I got a huge kick out of everything about this - from the spelling to the format to the somewhat reasonable allocation of time for each item. 😂

I love that "Play with Leah" got a whole 40 minutes, and Sam must be proud that they'll be admiring his handiwork with "look at bunkbeds" at 2:30pm. Lots of time allotted to talk/sing songs and talk about movies and play outside and play games and play outside again. Of course, dinner is -> pizza and he's so polite with "Mabie watch another movie?" and the early bedtime (9:30pm). 

Gingerbread House and Ninjabread Men

 My coworker who lives down the road asked if we'd like a gingerbread kit that she'd bought when her college-aged kids were home but they hadn't gotten around to building and I said and enthusiastic yes! She dropped it off and then we had another fun winter break activity. 

She also brought a Ninja Bread kit, which was fun, especially since we have this book:

And we'll get to keep the ninja cookie cutters for future use. 

I was telling my other friend that never in the history of winter break had I felt like the kids didn't get a long enough time at home before it was time to go back to school, but we could have used another several days this year - just more evidence that COVID has made everything all weird. 

The kids subscribe to the more-is-more philosophy. 

Biiiig bite: 

Amelie being very precise:

They all liked using the pastry bag: 

When he first saw the box, James said, "I really like the Haribo Company. They make the best gelatin snacks." 

Here's the house: 

They got to eat the ninjabread right away but we saved the house as a centerpiece until Christmas Eve. 

Shrinky Dinks

 One of the kids activity-type Christmas gifts was a Shrinky-Dink kit from Michael's. I suppose this isn't as impressive without a picture from before they shrunk up. We baked them in the oven, and Amelie complained that the window wasn't 100% clean/clear to look through while they were doing their thing. 

Here's the tableau of some of the finished figures. Leah colored the punk rock black and hot pink fairy. 

And a gi-nan-tic preschool hand invading the scene. 

I thought this was us making them, but it looks to be a different game. 

Happy New Year!

A bit delayed, but here we are. We bought a bottle of champagne, a bottle of sparkling white grape juice, and made a mountain of finger foods for New Year's Eve. (Just the 5 of us, at home, because COVID.) 

Amelie wanted everyone to dress up. Look how grown!

She and Sam wore coordinating outfits: 

James was VERY impressed that AJR was on the TV festivities (they were also part of the Macy's Thanksgiving parade, which led him to think they'd be featured at the inauguration as well, ha) Spark was not impressed with the fuss. Rather like Eyeore, he decided to just lie down in the middle of these legos. 

James stayed up til midnight with me and Sam, but Amelie turned in after the official NY ball drop at 11 central time. Leah lucked into a somewhat later bedtime than normal because we were all up playing charades. The problem with that is that the kids want to be various Pokemon and video game and TV show characters that only they recognize. We also played some of the board games that the kids had gotten for Christmas. 

Professional Photos

 The wonderful Rhiannon Trask of Lollipop Photography did our photos yet again this year. Why am I leaned all the way over? 

This is the one we picked for the Christmas card: 

James is 8. He had a plaid sweater, too, but absolutely did not want to wear it. 

Leah is 3 and a half: 

And Amelie is 10. Sam bought her some fake frames so she wouldn't have a glare for the photos, but she could still wear glasses in them. 

For some reason, she likes this picture the best: 

Here's the link to last year: http://babybuffaloe.blogspot.com/2020/02/professional-photos.html 

Remote Learning Photo Catch Up

Here's an assortment of photos from learning at home from the first semester since the kids return (virtually) from their break tomorrow. There has been quite a lot of staring at screens. Look how long Amelie's hair is! 

Leah likes to see whatever's going on. 

I made James a letter board like the one they use in class. (Though he's a strong reader and I think he's basically done with it now.) 

Ipad plus beanbag equals second grade. 

Posture has been terrible. 

It looks like Amelie's doing Algebra in ST Math. 

Leah wanted to join in on her laptop: 

Amelie made a kiwi as an animal model out of things around the house. 

I have taken entirely too many embarrassing photos of zoom PE. As you can see, frequently other family members join in and Spark nearly always has to be put outside since the goings-on are just too exciting. Some of the workouts are hard - like this one where they had to get on and off the floor. 

Enough with the photos!

It appears James shares this sentiment as well. 

Leah is also hard at work.

We tried out having Amelie's class on the TV in an attempt to get her to focus on class and not click out of the app onto something else, but then we had to sneak around the corners of the room so we wouldn't be on the camera, too. Leah, again, wants in on the action. 

This was at school one day for one of the supply pick-ups. 

More zoom PE. They were supposed to hit the balls with rackets or sticks to practice striking. I believe Spark was put out immediately after this photo as well.