It was a hard week.  No one (the Mommy included) was too thrilled about resuming school work.  There was weeping, there was whining, there was gnashing of teeth. Ok, maybe no real gnashing, but we got pretty close!

Despite all this, things were looking up somewhat by Friday, and overall, we ended up accomplishing more than I would have thought we could. And there was some brilliance in the midst of the hardship, for this week, I finally got smart, and put my $5 roll of Ikea paper to work for me!

Each day during schoolwork with the older children, I struggle with how to effectively spend time with Josiah and alternately, how to prevent him from bringing constant interruptions to the flow of learning that is going on. It is hard, and admittedly, it is my least favorite part of homeschooling. When I complain to Jay that I am missing out on serious quality time with my preschooler, he reminds me of mothers who work outside the home, and never see their preschoolers between the hours of 8 and 5. That usually puts a stop to my whining. Ahem.

Nevertheless…I have continued to look for creative ways to engage my four year old, and earlier this school year I brought home this beauty from Ikea to help….

At $14.99 this is worth every penny!! Josiah has used the chalkboard and whiteboard happily for several months.  But on Monday, I brought out the drawing paper roll…and the real fun began! He put on his “smock”, we chose paints and brushes, and used these awesome little paint containers that my wonderful MIL bequeathed to us. (Thank you, Grammy Ruth…these are sheer brilliance!)

See the holes in the top? Just perfect for your paintbrush. After some trial and error, I thinned out the tempura paints with some water, and they were perfect for creating fine art!

When Josiah was done painting each day, I covered every paint container with that sticky saran wrap and we were able to keep the same set of paints out all week for him to use. He had a blast, and was so proud to show off his paintings!

I really like his use of color and mood in this one. Very modern.

This is a more traditional rendering:

Oh he is so yummy…

But on Sunday night, his grandparents brought over a little present for us all to open…inside were ornaments for each member of the family, including one for Jay and I. Taking his cue from Grammy, Josiah must have decided that even though it was not yet Christmas day, at least it was high time to start the giving and receiving of gifts. The next morning I found him hard at work trying to tie a piece of string around the same box Grammy’s ornaments had been packaged in.

“What are you trying to do?” I asked him.

“I need to tie the string on this box. It’s a present for you, Mommy!” he replied.

Of course I helped tie the string, which pleased him greatly. Beaming from ear to ear, he held out “his” present to me…

“Here you go, Mommy…it’s your Christmas present from me!” he said.

I opened the box to find these treasures:

A beautiful pointsettia ornament (strangely similar to the one my in-laws had given me just the night before).

A drawing of a turtle, done by Josiah himself.

And a magnetized chip clip.

“The clip is so you can hang my turtle picture on the ‘frigerator” Josiah explained to me. Well of course it is…how clever!

I love my present from my littlest guy! I love even more that at his tender age, he is learning that part of Christmas is about giving gifts to others, just as our Heavenly Father gave the greatest gift to us more than 2000 years ago.

Well, of course he’s a turtle, can’t you see the shell tied onto his back with his big brother’s very turtle-patterned camo scarf?

Apparently turtles really love to lap up egg nog…especially when their mommies pour it into a nice plastic bowl.

Yummy!

He even cuts his own now, what a cool guy!

A year and a half ago, I featured Josiah’s first haircut with the flobee….remember this entry??

Eighteen months later, the poor boy has very little additional hair, but yesterday after Jay finished cuts on both Josiah and Jonathan it struck me that they look a lot alike with their twinkie haircuts…

Here they are post early-morning hair cuts:

Yesterday I decided that we’d waited long enough for the whole thing to get finished, so we brought in some professionals.

Pretty cool gig for them in these economic times especially!! That short one doesn’t even feel the need to spring for work clothes, apparently!

I’m here to vouch for the fact that expertise in painting directly correlates with the amount of clothing worn. In other words, if your painter shows up half naked, you’d be well advised to find yourself another guy for the job!

Well, after painting over the not so attractive streaks created by the littlest member of the crew, I think the wall is looking pretty great!

It’s ready for the carpenter to go to work and build the desk!

But this mommy only has a certain amount of time in her day to play on the computer, so now that my attention has been divided, I think facebook is getting some of my best material! Since status updates max out at about 40 words, my usual verbosity is curbed, a blessing to my readers, I am sure.  But I can’t keep all the good stuff from my faithful peeps here…..so I had to share this one.

Since receiving Guitar Hero for Christmas, my children have forayed into some new areas of music.  They love it, and it’s great fun for the whole family. But it has its downsides.  Those of you with multiple children know that despite how careful you were with your firstborn regarding what they saw/listened to, that it is nigh unto impossible to maintain that standard with the youngest when your firstborn is now ten.  Ergo, our three year old now runs around singing stuff like this…

“Gotta hold on..to what we’ve got!

It doesn’t make a difference IF WE’RE NAKED OR NOT!”

in his loudest singing voice. I’m not quite sure that’s what Bon Jovi was talking about. Of course, this from the boy who dresses like this:

Naked.... or Not??

Josey up a tree!!

Upon seeing the sippy cup, Josiah (whom, I should add, was decked out in a fedora, shoulder pouch, and brandishing a 6 foot long whip) protested loudly, “NO!! I don’t want a sippy cup! Indiana Jones does NOT drink from a sippy cup! He’s a grown-up! He uses a big boy cup!”

Just in case you weren’t aware…

“Josiah!! You’re nothing but a hippogriff!!”