Monday, January 7, 2008

Back to life, back to reality

Aaahhhh... Right now all of the kids are off at school, and I have the house to myself for the first time in what seems like forever. Even with all the effort put in to trying to get the kids ready to go back to school, this morning was a rough one for all of us. Sleepy kids, lost shoes, and undesirable breakfast choices added fuel to their grumpy demeanors. Hopefully time spent with friends today will help to remedy that. Spring vacation seems very far away. Before we get too wrapped up in the new year I want to take a minute to remember a few more fun things about Christmas vacation.
-Fuller and Grayson's daily chess battles- I can't even explain how cool it is to watch these two play chess. I don't play them much anymore, because truth be told I think they can both beat me. They are so intense and serious, and yet have huge smiles and "happy dances" when they make an especially good move. The high point this last week was when Grayson finally beat Fuller. I think Fuller was almost more surprised than Grayson. It was also neat when our power went out this last week and they ended up sitting in front of the fireplace playing chess.
- Fuller and his cookbook- Fuller got two new cookbooks for Christmas and spent quite some time perusing the recipes. He even cooked us lunch one day (with a little help with the stove). Then he and Grayson did quite some planning on the items they're going to serve at the restaurant they want to own when they grow up. They even decided that they'll give me 10% off on Saturdays. Such generous boys!
- Movie quotes galore!- This vacation the boys became fixated on two movies, "Elf" and "Napoleon Dynamite", and quoted their favorite lines from them endlessly. In fact it got to the point that I would have to demand no quotes at dinner just to keep my sanity and keep them from getting too silly. Here are some of their favorites:
"I like to whisper too."
"What's a Christmas gram? I want one." (Except they didn't say Christmas gram, they substituted any word or item that worked in the situation. For example, I would ask them if they wanted a bowl of cereal and they would say "what's a bowl of cereal? I want one."
"Buddy the Elf, what's your favorite color?" This quote got so bad that Paul even started saying it when he answered the phone (if he knew who was calling).
"Hunting wolverines, what do you think!"
"Grab my arm....other arm...MY other arm!"
"Can't find my checkbook, hope you don't mind if I pay you in change."
"Bow to your Sensei!"
"...scientists tried to blow Nessie out of the water.."
And so many more that I've tried to block out!
-Rowan and his puzzle obsession- He's become so into puzzles, sitting for over and hour at a time working on 100 piece puzzles, and finishing them on his own.
-Having Paul home to install new lighting in the bedroom, and cook some Lumpia!

Hope 2008 is as much fun as 2007!

4 comments:

Paige said...

Ooooh, I LOVE lumpia. We had a little philipino neighbor when I was little and she would make it and bring it over. HEAVEN. Elf is one of our favorite movies, too. Napoleon Dynamite I could do without. :)

Aundrea said...

We love lumpia too! And the movie quotes had me cracking up:) I'm sooo happy to have the kids back to school and to get everyone back on some sort of schedule! I've never learned to play chess, it always seemed too confusing for me, I'm glad you have smart kids to pass your knowledge down to:)

Toshia said...

I can't imagine why it would be annoying to hear the movie quotes over and over again. We never did that to our mom!

Jodi said...

The movie quotes seriously had me laughing out loud!!! You have some funny boys...4 of them. And I don't know about you but I enjoyed the power outage. You must have loved it if the boys were *quiet* in front of the fireplace playing chess :)