Thanks Uncle A

The boys received some great birthday books from Uncle A and Aunt R to go with their Raspberry Pi.  Tonight they tried to hook up the Dinoscope (another birthday present) to the Raspberry Pi in order to more closely examine the chip (and Mr. 3's hair).  They tried to use a phone for wi-fi to download the drivers but when that didn't work tried to directly hook up with an ethernet cable.  They finally got it working and Mr. 10 downloaded the drivers.  Despite all their work they were never able to get the dinoscope to work but had a blast trying.

An unexpected snow

Sunday morning we woke up and were dressed and ready for church early (not typical for us - we tend to make it right on time for an 8:35-8:40 service).  We looked outside and it was white.  David checked the weather and we were supposed to get 4-8 inches in the morning.  We decided we would rather not brave the highway and attended church from home (you have to love live streaming and owning your own hymnal).  By late morning we all headed out to shovel but the wind was blowing so hard that everyone went back inside except our intrepid older brothers.

Blueberry Muffins

I've been trying to work out a blueberry muffin recipe that involves as much protein as possible but not too much sugar and is still yummy enough to please the boys.  This one worked well - a mixture of many recipes I looked at.

2 cups almond-coconut milk
2 tbsp apple cider vinegar
1/2 cup ground flax seed
2 cups whole wheat flour
1 cup all purpose flour
1/2 cup almond meal
1/4 cup wheat germ
1 tbsp baking soda
2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 cup maple syrup
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup olive oil
1/2 cup applesauce
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp almond extract
3 cups frozen blueberries

1. Preheat oven to 375.  Mix milk and apple cider vinegar.
2. Mix together dry ingredients (ground flax seed, flour, almond meal, wheat germ, baking soda, cinnamon, salt).  Add in wet ingredients (maple syrup, brown sugar, olive oil, applesauce, extracts) and milk.  I could have mixed all the wet ingredients together first and then added them but that would have been an extra step and I tend to eliminate those (I was cooking with both Mr. 3 and Mr. 1 at the time and someone was always grabbing something).
3. Stir in frozen blueberries.
4. Bake 25 minutes.  I'm sure you're supposed to cool them but I ended up just breaking one in half just out of the oven and blowing on it until Mr. 1 could eat it.  He gobbled it up and demanded more - even bringing his bowl to the kitchen and desparately reaching for the counter where the muffins were.

Many of the recipes had a struesel topping (sugar, cinnamon, butter, flour, oatmeal) but I skipped it.  I may try it next time but they were delicious just as they were.  I thought about freezing some (I made 24 big muffins and 12 little muffins) but realized our family would eat them in 48 hours so they're all in the fridge instead.

Mr. 1 is a suddenly pickier the last few weeks ad I recently discovered green smoothies.  Why did I never try this before?  He loves fruit but had begun to reject basically all vegetables so you mix frozen blueberries, frozen mango or pineapple, plain yogurt, and apple juice in the blender and add 3-4 handfuls of fresh spinach.  It's amazing - he drank 2 full cups as did Mr. 3 and Mr. 8 (Mr. 10 does not like smoothies - crazy but true).  I would have had more but somehow there wasn't any left.  Veggies into Mr. 1 - success.  I also add pureed sweet potato or squash into our mac and cheese and everyone happily eats it.  Mr. 1 still eats hummus by the spoonful, as much scrambled eggs as I'll give him, and black bean quesadillas so if this is the peak of his crankiness I'll take it.

 

Goon-da

Mr. 1's favorite word is "goon-da".  He says lots of things - Mama, Dada, good night,  more oatmeal (he eats 2-3 bowls every morning) - but "goon-da" is his favorite.  It began with Goodnight Moon which we read him each night before he goes to bed.  He says good night to each thing and good night sounded like "goon-da".  Somehow over time good night became clear but goon-da stayed as a separate word.  Now goon-da clearly refers to a picture of someone he loves.  Especially of Mr. 3.  He wants you to pick him up so he can point at a picture.  If he knows the people he loudly proclaims goon-da.  Maybe it actually means "tell me about the people in this picture - I know them".  We're not sure but we do know we love our goon-da guy.

Our Mr. 3

Yesterday Mr. 3 was wielding a big stick rather threateningly and David told him not to.  "Don't worry, Daddy.  It's a battle ax."  Oh well then.

Today Mr. 1 took Mr. 3's hat and Mr. 3 turned to him and said, "Hey Bro.  That's my hat."

Mr. 3 is the first of our boys to try to use his charm to get his way.  Mr. 10 would just try to reason with you on how his way was really the right way.  Mr. 8 would just yell, determined that his way was the right way.  Mr. 3 will tell you what he wants and then very deliberately smile at you.  Or give a "whole Super-A" hug.

The B-2

Mr. 8 is officially celebrating his birthday tonight with a few friends and requested a B-2 bomber for his cake (actually he was talked out of his initial request of a SR-71 Blackbird or a C-130 but seemed happy with this and it looked much easier).  It was a bit rough going but I'm rather proud of the finished product!

Is that what those are?

"Quit using your invincible ship to shoot me!" said by Mr. 8 to Mr. 3 when Mr. 3 flew his binoculars too close to where Mr. 8 was sitting.

Happy birthday Mr. 8!

Our Mr. 8 was up bright and early this morning to celebrate his birthday.  David had made him a treasure hunt with a code to break and he was working on it when Mr. 10 joined him.  Soon they were both working through the clues and the present was found.  He requested cinnamon rolls and scrambled eggs for breakfast before heading out into the snow.  He also managed to fit in some Super Mario Brothers and Space Rail building before lunch of avocado and cottage cheese toast (his favorite sandwich).

It was a good day of celebrating Mr. 8 (I even let him choose waffles for dinner and both finishing Swiss Family Robinson and playing Seven Wonders after dinner).  Mr. 8 is so full of energy and enthusiasm (of course that means he spends most of our movie nights jumping up and down) and brings so much laughter to our house.  He loves airplanes and is currently designing his own plane, the Avalanche, with Grandpa (most of its weight is due to its impressive artillery load).  He starts his day with so much energy but often runs out of steam before he's finished all his work.  He loves his brothers and is especially good at taking care of Mr. 1.  He and Mr. 3 have recently had so much fun pretending together.  And today he chose to spend his birthday night playing Mr. 10's favorite game.  We love our Mr. 8 and I can't wait to see what he accomplishes this year.

Snow day

We woke up this morning to feet of snow - winter storm Nemo was here.  The kids were excited to get out and play but I decided that Mr. 10 was old enough to join in the shoveling fun.  He grumbled at first but then grabbed a shovel and started helping our neighbor shovel out her sidewalk.  She thanked him but he kept on going and started on the next house.  It was great to see him take such joy in helping out our neighbors.  We took a break and tried to get in a bit of sledding but the snow was a bit too fluffy.

After lunch, it was back to shoveling.  Our neighbor has this amazing sled shovel and moved 5x as much snow per shovel as I could and the job actually wasn't as terrible as it looked when we first opened the door (and hit a snow drift).  And the kids loved the huge mountain of snow we made in the backyard.

Mr. 10

On Tuesday we welcomed our first double digit son to the family.  Somehow we have a 10 year old!

Mr. 10 and Mr. 7 (soon-to-be Mr. 8) chose a ski day for their birthday so we celebrated Mr. 10 with a small  party with just Nana and some family friends.  He designed his own Mario game (complete with music) which everyone had a good time playing.  He requested pesto pasta (also known around here as green pasta) and shrimp for dinner and Mario-themed chocolate cupcakes for dessert.  Follow this up with some Super Mario Brothers on the Wii and you have a great night celebrating one of our favorite people.

A winter walk

It was a cold winter walk around the block (the wind was just too cold to go any farther).  Today Mr. 1 insisted on walking himself and Mr. 3 huddled in the stroller.

We try to get out every day even if it takes longer to bundle up than we're out.  Definitely improves everyone's outlook even when I have to push one or two shining kids out the door.

Parenting boot camp

This week has been a hard week in the parenting department.  Mr. 1 continues to rampage the house and continues to get teeth (he's gotten 8 in the past 2-3 months - 4 molars and 4 incisors - and he is not a happy teether).  Meanwhile we've been dealing with the hard issues that come with parenting older kids.  Try-outs and the anxiety of waiting for results - then negotiating not getting the part you want when your brother does.  Breaking the rules and lying about it - and convincing your brother to also do it.  Understanding that gifts are not necessarily all about you.  We're enjoying the boys so much as they get older but some weeks it's really tough to keep it up.  But then the disappointed boy congratulates his friend who got the part.  Heartfelt apologies are made and accepted.  And we make it down the mountain even though it's scary.  So often I worry that we're doing it all wrong and not raising the kids I hope we are - but then there's a glimmer of who the boys are becoming and I'm so proud of them.  And take a deep breath and deal with the next crisis, hopefully a bit better than I dealt with the last.

Ski day

Yesterday we headed up to Crotched Mountain for some skiing with an additional skier in tow.  Mr. 3 really wanted to give it a try and after chatting with the ski instructor on the phone I decided to try it.  I was a bit nervous about the afternoon - the older two were in ski school in the morning but really wanted to ski with friends in the afternoon and I wasn't sure if Mr. 3 would have the energy for a whole day of ski school.  We got all geared up and I dropped them off with plenty of enthusiasm.  One of the instructors was explaining to Mr. 7 how the high speed lift worked and Mr. 9 was telling Mr. 3 how much fun he would have.

The day was much colder and icier due to the earlier warm weather in the week followed by a freeze but they had made fresh snow overnight so it was manageable. Midmorning I sneaked over to the little hill and watched Mr. 3 take the Magic Carpet up and he down with his instructor.  He looked happy.  I gave him goggles (the older boys had borrowed some and it was just too windy without them) and he was off again.  At lunch I picked up the boys for lunch but Mr. 3 said he was staying and did not want to join us for lunch.  Not even for pizza with the brothers.  So I had to bring lunch down to him and happily signed him up for the afternoon.

After pizza and hot chocolate, we headed back out on the slopes.  The boys wanted to go to the top on The Rocket and ski down a blue to a green with some small jumps.  The first time was great and you could really see their improvement from last time.  We did a few more runs then headed back up The Rocket.  This time Mr. 9 hit a slippery place and froze up.  He has always been cautious about new things, unlike Mr. 7 who likes to go fast and is much more daring.  And so he inched his way down, barely moving and near tears.  The wind had picked up and it was cold and Mr. 7 skied ahead with friends while I coaxed Mr. 9 down.  My patience was just about exhausted by the bottom and I thought a quick break would really help but Mr. 7 and friends were ready to go, having waited for us for the last 20 minutes or so.  And Mr. 9 refused to take a break if others were going up.  We took an easier run and you could see his confidence slowly start to return.  He's definitely slower than his brother but by the end he was moving a little faster and more confidently.

Near frozen, we headed back to the lodge for hot chocolate and to get Mr. 3.  Mr. 7 was dissolving in a puddle of weeping coldness as was his friend C so I ended up carrying 3 sets of skis back to the lodge but we made it and everyone perked up with snacks and hot chocolate.

I picked up Mr. 3 who had a great day.  He told me that he took the Magic Carpet to the top by himself and skied down "full speed ahead".  He was so fast that his instructor couldn't catch him (although he also said he needed the pole to help him keep his balance so obviously his instructor was with him).  He loved it and can't wait to go again.

For the boys birthdays we gave them a number of choices of activities they could do and they chose a special ski day so they're definitely loving it!

As you wish

We just finished watching all 3 of the original Star Wars movies with the 3 older boys.  We had to do it in 6 installments but we didn't let them just skip to the space ship scenes - we actually watched all of the movies start to finish.  They all enjoyed them and even made it through the scary parts.  We asked what Mr. 3 liked best and he said one of his favorite parts was when the ewok rolled down the hill and said, "As you wish."