I love Sundays

We are attending the evening service at our church these days, and it makes Sundays very mellow. I slept until 8:22am this morning. That is definitely a record for me. The boys were already up and fed by that time. I picked clothes, Daddy dressed them, and we all headed to the park for the morning. The closest park is a little sketchy, but we went anyway. My boys can't read the graffiti yet, so it doesn't matter as much. I like this park because it has two play areas separated by long walking paths AND it is right next to an elementary school with an additional two play areas. It is perfect for the two-year old with very little attention span. We started in one area and eventually worked our way to the final "ultimate" play structure from which one can see the MAX trains as they pass by. Very cool. The boys had a great time and the parents were able to carry on conversations while pretending to ride on the MAX. Also very cool.
I almost forgot! I wanted to send a shout out to my fabulous father-in-law who is currently traveling in Europe and missing the opening games of NCAA college football. The Ducks thumped Cal yesterday 42-3!!!! Wish you were here. The boys are enjoying their football time each Saturday and we can hardly wait to have you and Grandma over. :-)
And now the pictures!

In completely unrelated events, Paul LOVES to wear his blanket around the house. It's actually pretty convenient for him. He came to me with it about a week ago, saying, "I wanna wear it." I decided the Pacific Islander look would be easiest.

Do you ever watch your kids do something and realize they are growing up?

Really angry Paul screaming NO because he doesn't want his picture taken. We think he looks like the MGM lion in this shot.

This is the MAX train. And the Daddy-Man sitting in the fake tire swing. That's right, folks. They don't use real tires anymore.

First Day of BSF

Today was our first class day for BSF (Bible Study Fellowship). I rave about this organization often enough that y'all should know of which I speak, but if you're confused, just click. :-) Anyway, today was momentous because for the first time ever, all four members of our family were registered, attending members of BSF. Luke, Paul, and I headed out the door together for class this morning. The church our classes uses is only about ten minutes away, so I don't really worry about being late, but there was a moment this morning when I wasn't sure if I would make it. See below.
Let me explain what you are viewing. This picture was taken about five minutes before we needed to be in the car, leaving our house. Notice the shoes in a neat line just beside our back door. Notice the barefooted four-year-old who HAS to finish "reading" (reciting from memory) Mike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel before we leave. Also notice the completely despondent two-year-old, laying prone in the dining room. All I could was take this picture and pray. Luke finished his book and was happy to put on his shoes and socks. Paul screamed the entire time as I wrestled him into appropriate foot wear. Fortunately the garage door opener saved the day. Paul got to push the button to open the garage door. Then, of course, Luke wanted to push the button, so we closed the garage door and went through the process again, allowing Luke to perform this sacred duty. Who cares? It got us in the car. We will do it every Wednesday if it means driving away from the house with two happy boys! My neighbors have to think I'm insane.
This was the only moment of chaos. We got to the church, set up the chairs for my discussion group in the foyer, which has no less than four exits, during which time Paul sat happily in a chair and watched all the action. There's a LOT of action when around 300 women are all showing up for a Bible study at the same time! I took the boys down to the room where they get to play while I pray with the other leaders. Then it was GO time! Luke and Paul headed to their class and I headed to mine.
I forgot how much I love this! As a discussion leader, I get assigned a new group of 10-15 ladies each fall. Meeting them today was so much fun. We were able to share a little about ourselves and get to know each other and I feel so blessed to have these women in my life already. We are studying John this year. I can hardly wait to get going on my questions tomorrow morning!!! I shared with the group today that I get my study done by getting up early and that my programmable coffee pot is a HUGE incentive for me. I'm just guessing though, that the excitement of getting back into a hardcore Bible study is going to be plenty to get me out of bed tomorrow.
How goes the home schooling, you ask? Answer: Awesome! It is Luke's favorite part of each day. He has been dressing himself the last few mornings and eating breakfast rather quickly. I have a bell that I ring to begin our school day. (Former students will remember my bell fetish.) Luke literally RUNS to our school room when he hears the bell. It's adorable. He's got the schedule memorized and can be heard chanting parts of it to himself during transitions. My favorite version so far is, "Science on the couch. Science on the couch." No, this is not a lab science on the couch. It's Berenstain Bears science on the couch. Very fun. Here are a few pictures of this last Sunday when we did school because we could. :-)

Luke completing a visual memory activity. The items on the tray were removed one at a time and he had to color the picture of the missing item. Cake for this guy.

Luke is practicing the letter "L" on his rough work surface during visual review for "Go Phonics." He definitely struggles with the hand writing portion of this curriculum, but loves this fancy board that Grandpa made for him. We will continue with the handwriting, but I'm not being a stickler about anything at this point. He's four. :-)

Luke uses his Feel Box for the first time, trying to figure out what /l/ sound word is hidden inside. It took him a few guesses and some hints to discover it was a leaf. He was delighted! This week is /t/ and I'm open to suggestions!

First Day of School

Today was the day! Luke and I started our home school experience together. He was up early, as usual. We ate some oatmeal together around 6:45 am and I realized that things were going to be starting up much earlier than I had planned. Sure enough, by 7:27 am Luke was dressed and checking out the additions to our school table. Last night after he went to bed, we prepped the area with all his curriculum and supplies, with the help of our good friend Ashli, a product of home schooling herself! I digress.
Our first activity was Family Bible Time. Our verse is Proverbs 4:20: "Pay attention my child to what I say. Listen carefully." Good verse, huh? We used hand motions to help us remember it. Then we talked about the attribute of attentiveness. "I listen with my ears, my eyes, and my heart." By the way, all of this stuff came with the curriculum I bought from Sonlight. It's fabulous stuff.
After Family Bible Time, we moved onto Language Arts. I am using a combination of perceptual growth workbooks from Sonlight and a phonics program called "Go Phonics!" that was written by a wonderful woman, Sylvia Davison. Luke used his new pencil to draw a line between Mr. Rabbit and his carrots. He also started learning to write his letters. Today's letter was L. Luke did a great job of forming his L's with his fingers on the rough work surface that my dad-in-law made for him. We also did a trace-copy-write activity with his pencil. He hasn't quite decided which hand to use to hold the pencil. He switches each time he puts it down. I figure eventually one of them will win out. Or he'll be ambidextrous. Whatever.
After Language Arts, we did Music and Motion! We have a great CD with some super fun songs. Today's song was "Drivin' in My Car." It's a fun one with motions and the opportunity to say beep a lot. Luke will happily sing it for you if asked. Eventually I want to start bringing in my guitar for Music and Motion, but it needs new strings and they didn't make the priority list for back-to-school preparation.
Science came next. We are reading "The Berenstain Bears' Big Book of Science and Nature" as our first venture. Today was pretty much just about introducing Luke to the idea of an Almanac and reading about the four seasons. We will get more into it tomorrow.
Art was so fast it almost doesn't count. I gave Luke a piece of his Color Wonder paper and his two recently acquired Color Wonder paint brushes. He swirled a few times with the blue and then got more focused with the yellow, making a great sun up at the top of his paper. And then he was done with that.
Our last activity is called Reflection and Prayer. I asked Luke what he liked most about his first day of school. He said, "The l's." :-) Then I asked him what he wants to do better tomorrow. He was pretty quiet at first. Then he said, "Maybe making the l's even better." Adorable. We closed our school day in prayer, thanking God for the opportunity to learn and asking Him for help to make our l's even better. I looked down at my watch and it was 8:14 am. So, I used the rest of the morning to do housework, play with the boys, and plan for tomorrow's school day. MUCH different from my first day ten years ago (!!!) as an 8th grade English teacher at Stahl Junior High. I know that if we continue with home schooling, the days will grow longer, with more subjects and more complex curriculum. At the moment, I am going to enjoy the absolute fun of teaching my son to read and write, knowing that God will equip me for whatever He has for our family, be it home school, or something else.
Here are the pics!

A complete throw back to my classroom teaching days - the whiteboard with the Daily Agenda! Notice the time estimates - WAY OFF!! :-)

7:27 am - He's ready to go, folks!

Ready to hit the books barefooted! Home school is so much fun.

Home Again

We drove home yesterday and were able to make it in record time despite the holiday. The boys did okay. Paul was only able to nap for an hour because Luke was almost completely unable to nap at all. Below are pictures of Paul's limited success and Luke's hilariously sad attempt.

This dude can still sleep anywhere. Lucky guy.

This dude did this to himself somewhere around Madras. It was sadly unsuccessful. But really funny.

In other news Erik earned the Best Husband Ever Award today for making it possible for me to park my car in our garage for the first time ever. This involved a trip to the dump and some seriously hard work moving stuff up into the attic above the garage. Yes, we've lived in this house for three years. This is actually the first time in my entire life that a car that I drive has a garage to come home to. We even found the clicker. I can hardly wait for it to rain!

Never had a winter when I didn't have to scrape ice. Woot!

Best Husband Ever: Erik Bangsund

Oh Deer!

Sorry for the cheesy title, but I couldn't resist. This morning after breakfast Paul was playing with the blinds, so I decided to remove the temptation by opening them. Paul looked out the window and said, "Wook. Deer." Sure enough, there were four deer, a doe, two fawns and a stag. I got a few pictures as they grazed past us. We were even able to go out on the deck without them running away. Pretty neato.

The two fawns munching some breakfast.

We took the boys to the park this morning. The weather here has been a little chilly, but we all put on sweatshirts and life was good. The boys enjoyed the ginormous merry-go-round and the tether ball the most.

Cutie Paul in the Tunnel

Love it.

Daddy and the boys on the coolest Merry-Go-Round ever.

Sleep has been going okay. We discovered that Paul is the problem, not Luke! The two year old is just way too in love with his older brother and is simply delighted to be sharing a room with him. We solved this by putting Paul down first, giving him a good half hour to fall asleep. Once he is asleep, Luke is able to get into bed and fall asleep without waking his little brother. For naps we just move the port-a-crib into our room so they can go down at about the same time. Today is actually the first day that Luke has napped here. I'm so thankful for the break.
The massage is not going to happen. Maybe next time. I was able to go for a wonderful bike ride all by myself yesterday morning. I rode up to the river and along it, stopping at this really cool bridge to enjoy the water and the view. Almost as relaxing as a massage and much easier on the budget. :-)
All the boys have been enjoying time with Mr. Mark, especially playing video games. Paul has started saying, "Wets watch Mario Tart." Oh dear.

Yep.

Slightly Crazy Sunriver Day

We arrived at the cabin in Sunriver yesterday evening at about 8:30 pm. It would have been sooner had we not been waylaid by the playplace at the Madras McDonald's and a twenty minute construction zone wait outside Terrabonne. Crazy. The boys did okay. It was only during the last twenty-five minutes from Bend to Sunriver that Paul began to ask to be excused from his carseat. Cute and sad at the same time. The real crazy started when we attempted to put both boys in the same room to go to sleep. The giggling and bouncing commenced. Who knows when it stopped. I put in earplugs at 10pm and went to sleep. Around 6:45 am I rolled out of bed, removed my earplugs and was immediately met by Paul's chipper voice from the confines of the port-a-crib. The door to their room was already opened, so I knew Luke was already up. I left Paul where he was and headed to the coffee pot. After pouring myself a cup, I returned to the front room to find Luke asleep in the recliner. Picture below.

Later when I asked him what time he came out: Afternoon 3. (3 am) He sometimes gets confused between naptime and bedtime. I told him that if it is dark outside, it's NOT afternoon 3 and he needs to go back to bed.

The day itself was filled with a little more whining than usual, but nobody died. Paul and I took excellent naps. Luke skipped his entirely and Erik played video games. We did slip into the Village Mall to get Paul a bike helmet of his very own. We haven't been allowing him to actually ride the balance bike he recently acquired from Luke because he didn't own a helmet yet. So Paul has been dutifully walking that bike all over the place. Sadly, he has formed a habit. Even after we got his helmet and placed it on his head, he refused to get on the bike! Pictures below.

Happy to be walking his bike alongside Mommy.

It's 8pm exactly. Paul is asleep. Luke is quietly sitting in bed. Perhaps tonight will be a bit better. Our good friend Mark is arriving this evening and ALL the boys are terribly excited to spend time with him. I'm going to finish my book and maybe look into getting a massage at the lodge. It's my vacation and I start teaching part-time preschool next week. I think I deserve a massage. :-)

Other cute pictures:

He's cute despite being really tired and mildly cranky.

Paul on the deck with the tricycle. This was earlier in the morning before it was warm enough for shorts. Paul didn't seem to mind the nippy air.