Creativity

Caboose loves Legos. He especially got crazy about them once he watched Star Wars.

Caboose also loves chess. He learned how to play when he took a chess class last spring.

Last week Caboose created a chess board with Legos and Star Wars figures. I know he based it off of episodes 1-3 figures and he's got 'good guys' against 'bad guys'.


Although he loves to build the sets, occasionally he will come up with other ideas, and we're still using the pencil holder he made last year. If he had an endless supply of Legos it might help!

I call it a "Tooth Island."

Only our youngest would come up with that one. None of us had even heard this label until Hubby got home and Caboose was showing it to him.

Only our youngest would be clowning around most of the time while I was trying to take a picture of the "Tooth Island."

Do You See The Irony?

We're having Caboose's party later today. I guess you can tell what the theme is.

Caboose's Newest Joke

He thinks of them in the shower. He says that's where he does some of his best thinking.

I do some of my best thinking in the shower too, but it's certainly not jokes.

Question: "What do the toughest guys eat?"

Answer: "Macho Cheese!"

Meet The Kids: Part 4

I started the Meet the Kids series because I seemed to be posting a lot about Caboose. Then I realized I should actually do one on each of the kids that at least started in a similar fashion so you could compare apples to apples, as much as kids can be compared to each other.

Then I go and wait ridiculous amounts of time between each one. It's been about a year and a half since the last one. Caboose has asked occasionally when I'm going to do a post about him.

Caboose runs a close second to the child with the most nicknames. Why, I have no idea. He just seems to be nickname fodder. They come out of our mouths and stick. Caboose is only used on the blog.

Caboose doesn't care to have his picture made. He struggles with smiling naturally. We've worked on a secret code that helps him give a real smile. It's two words, but unless you're around us when we take a picture and happen to hear one of us whisper it, you'll just have to be in the dark. It's nothing life-altering, just silly. Except to him.

What would you like for people to know about you?

Hi! I like to play the wii. I like to play.

Do you think you're the best player on the wii?

It depends on what game. I can always beat Chatty. Sometimes I lose to you and Dad on Mario Kart.

I still think he goes easy on us, even though he won't admit it.

What do you like to play?

Legos and Imaginext.

What do you like to watch on tv?

Star Wars. It's on tv sometimes. I don't really know anything else.

He's now obsessed with Star Wars since we've watched them in the last couple of months.

What did you watch on tv when you were younger?

Thomas the Tank Engine, Barney, Arthur, Franklin, Dora, Blues Clues.

I just remembered while I was typing that list that when he was about 18 months old, he used to say, "Oh, man!" all the time like Swiper in Dora. There was another boy at church who was a late talker, and then his mom told us one Sunday that he started talking and was saying, "Oh, man!"

What do you think about having older twin sisters?

Annoying.

Both of them?

One of them.

She shall remain unnamed on the blog!

What do you think about having an older brother?

Sometimes it's fun. Sometimes it's not because he gets into my business.

Do you think you'll be taller than Sparky soon?

Yes. But I don't like being tall because then I have to make my own food.

He likes for people to wait on him hand and foot. He likes people to get his cereal for him, or his milk, and he has to get the stepstool to reach the bowls or cups. As he gets taller, he doesn't have the excuse. This boy is a bona fide stinker.

Do you think you are funny?

Sometimes.

Do you think the other guys think you're funny?

Probably not. They don't laugh.

He doesn't realize we're doing every thing we can not to roll on the floor laughing.

What do you want to be when you grow up?

Cheesecake Factory Worker. Either that or maybe a mailman. I'd get bored of being a mailman though.

Remember he's living at home forever. I don't know what his wife and four kids are doing. Oh, and I suppose if he's having his own kids, the nameless annoying sister won't have to have kids to keep him in his old age. (That story where the nameless annoying sister is not nameless can be found in the last half of this post.)

Why are you so afraid of needles?

They're scary and they hurt. I don't like tacks either. I can't watch anybody get shots.

What happens when you see a needle on tv?

I get queasy.

So I guess you won't be a doctor or nurse?

No, because it's creepy.

What do you like most about Michigan?

It's cold and I have a lot of friends.

What do you like least about Michigan?

Nothing.

You might also be interested in these posts:

Buddy — Meet The Kids: Part 1
Chatty — Meet The Kids: Part 2
Sparky — Meet The Kids: Part 3 and Meet The Kids: Part 3a

When Daddy's Away

His spot is safe.

Caboose doesn't even walk to his own bed anymore.

When Sparky was this age and Hubby went out of town, she'd wait until she woke up in the middle of the night before she crawled into my bed.

Catdog is...

...14!

Betsy is going to have to order a lot of croissants based on her comment.

Jessica is very smart because she knew exactly what Caboose was thinking. I think that makes her smart.

Caboose thinks 14 in French (quatorze) sounds like catdog in English, at least when spoken with the French accent by the people on the cd-rom. That's how he remembers it.

Of course he was born in New Jersey to parents that were born and raised in Arkansas, has a brother that was born in Louisiana, lived most of the first six years of his life smack in the midwest outside of St. Louis (on the Illinois side of the river) where there is no accent, lived in Virginia for two years, and then ended up in Michigan where there is just a bit of Norwegian/Canadian twist to the accent. Plus it seems like we have a lot of friends from New York that have a strong accent undertone (think of how they say the word coffee).

So I'm not really sure what words in English are going to sound like the French words to him, as long as it helps him remember them.

Archives

I was looking at my drafts where I started posts I hadn't finished, or put a few thoughts down so I wouldn't forget what I thought I wanted to say, and found these pictures I never posted from last summer when my parents came to visit.

You can't get much better than having Santa for your grandpa.

He also makes balloon animals and stuff. These were ant antennae.

I suppose that's how you'd make it plural.

Please Keep Off The Grass

April 15, 2001.

Caboose was two days past 15 months old.

He was a late walker. Being the youngest child, you are either an early walker to keep up with all the other older kids, or a late walker because you like to be waited on by others.

Caboose chose the late walker option, so he wasn't one to go outside and run around with the other kids.

That meant he didn't really know what grass was when he did his first egg hunt at our friends' house after church on Easter Sunday.

He freaked out a little. Like he just kind of stood there. There may or may not have been some crying and finger sucking and bed bear involvement.

We moved all the eggs (that were only for him anyway since all the other kids were older and had theirs hidden in the back) to the edge of the sidewalk and flower bed.

He kept hold of bed bear at first.

Eventually he was willing to sit him down and put the eggs in the bag.

He even decided to check out the grass.

He had to be careful not to step in that grass!

Until he got confident and decided he could do both hands at the same time.




I miss this age!

Lucky Ducky

Last October, the kids and I went to the dentist for our six-month cleaning. Each patient gets to enter a monthly drawing. They have one jar for the adults, and one jar for the kids.

Last October, I won the adult drawing for $100 in restaurant gift cards and Buddy won the kids' drawing for a $50 gift card so he could buy a video game he'd been wanting for the Wii.

We got a call at the end of March, and Caboose won this time. He got a massive Easter basket.

I think they're trying to drum up some extra business.

Overheard at our house tonight...

After a day of sledding at a party, Caboose had on pajamas but didn't appear to have had a shower.

So I checked with him and asked if he had.

His response, "I had two showers yesterday."

That must be how homeschool math works.

Humph!

Last night Hubby did the unthinkable.

He realized Buddy was taller than me.

None of us had realized it before that.

Of course, it could have been the illusion of the fluffy hair I have (that's why I had to use my finger and show you where my head really is).

He's a full inch taller than me now.

I had Hubby secretly follow Buddy up the stairs to see if he ran off to tell the other kids.

He did.

Buddy said to Sparky (our resident shorty at 4'11" who will always be my favorite child!), "Sparky, I just accomplished something that you'll never be able to say you accomplished."

Of course the plan was to tell her he was taller than me knowing that she never would be.

But before he had the chance, Caboose chimed in with his two cents.

"What, you kissed a girl?"

Buddy says over everyone's laughter, "No, I'm taller than Mom!"

Of course it lost some of it's impact by then.

Yesterday...

This guy...

had his 10th birthday!

That means all my kids are in double digits now. Life altering in and of itself.

Here he was almost two.

He loved those chocolate pudding cups, and would put them up to his mouth and lick out as much as he could at the end. That's what you see around his mouth and between his eyes — the squarish outline of the pudding cup.

He also has his zip-up pajamas on backwards. We put them on the right way originally, until one morning in his bed he was screaming. Chatty ran in to check on him, and he'd unzipped and rezipped himself up. He had a just a little pinch, but I know it would have hurt. From then on we put them on backwards because we knew he'd do it again.

The reason he could wear them backwards — they didn't have feet. We tried some hand-me-down pajamas from Buddy that had feet. Caboose must have outgrown sleepers and worn summer pajamas, and then by the time winter rolled around and we put the footed pajamas on him he flipped. That's actually putting it kindly. He looked at his feet like something foreign was growing there suddenly, all while screaming and trying to figure out how to get them off. He's never had a footed pair of pajamas since.

But he loves hats! The crazier the better.

We call him Cupcake at home.

Happy Birthday!

From Jericho to Gezer — the Land of the Olderites?

In our defense, we encourage our children to refer to people as older rather than old. And I can't think of any time that Hubby and I have ever used the word geezer, even in jest. Ever.

************

Sparky reads to Caboose from the Bible every night when he goes to bed. The other night she was reading from Joshua 16:1-4 "The allotment for Joseph began at the Jordan of Jericho, east of the waters of Jericho, and went up from there through the desert into the hill country of Bethel. It went on from Bethel (that is, Luz), crossed over to the territory of the Arkites in Ataroth, descended westward to the territory of the Japhletites as far as the region of Lower Beth Horon and on to Gezer, ending at the sea. So Manasseh and Ephraim, the descendants of Joseph, received their inheritance."

Last night out of the clear blue, Caboose tells Buddy, "There was a town named Gezer in the Bible."

Buddy says, "I bet that's where all the old people lived."

Caboose says, "Yeah, I bet that's where all the old people moved."

Buddy says, "Yeah, all the old geezers. I bet that's how old people got to be called old geezers, because the Bible is from a long time ago."

A few minutes later out of the blue, Buddy says, "I bet that's where Methuselah lived."

We've now been informed by Sparky that they learned it from Zach and Cody on one of the Suite Lifes on Disney Channel. They just had something this week on the msn homepage that Zach and Cody taught boys bad behavior. I guess I have some verbal proof now.

And two boys will be heading to Respect 101. Just as soon as we can get done giggling about it.

Sheep Babies

When the girls were born nearly 16 years ago after only 27 weeks in the womb, my aunt gave me a teeny, tiny gift at Christmas to go along with my teeny, tiny twin girls.

She gave me two Snowbabies figurines, each of which had two babies. They are hand-painted pewter.


This summer when we went to Bronner's, among the thousands of ornaments they carried they had Snowbabies. I decided my new ornament(s!) for this year would be Snowbabies in honor of my kids.

I got this one to represent the girls. They are supposed to be enjoying a spa day. I'm not so sure if Sparky would truly enjoy a spa day, but I loved the sweet relationship shared between these two.

This ornament represents both of the boys. It is only one of the Snowbabies, but it is holding a red ball ornament in one hand and a blue ball ornament in the other. Buddy's favorite color is red, and Caboose's favorite color is blue.

When we were decorating the tree the other night, Caboose saw me putting these ornaments up and started laughing. He started telling everyone else, "Look at the sheep babies."

I suppose if you didn't know what their proper name was that you might describe them that way.

This post is linked to Show and Tell Friday hosted by Cindy at My Romantic Home.

Boys and Their Toys

My Show and Tell today is going to be pretty short and sweet. First, let me show you a little table that is in my entryway and how it looks after I decorated it today (Thanksgiving Day) for Christmas.

In reality, these snowmen will probably stay out past Christmas and possibly well into February here in frigid Michigan.

A few days ago, this little table looked like this.

Nicely decorated for fall, with a few accents from Caboose. I never know where I'll find little men in my house.

You might notice the little arm too. Here's what he is doing.

Do you have boys? If you do, do their toys end up in unusual places?

This post is linked to Show and Tell Friday hosted by Cindy at My Romantic Home.

Did She Drink the Cholesterol?

Caboose is going through a phase where he has to go with Hubby and me whenever we go run errands together. If it's just me or just Hubby alone, he stays home, but if we both go, he has to go. He's afraid we're going to die and he won't be there with us. We're hoping he outgrows this phase soon, because it's getting a little stressful for us too.

Lately he's been bringing his DS along with him, but then when we get to the store he wants to carry it in. He'll be in the middle of a game and not want to stop, or not be at a saving point, or something crazy like that. So the other day Hubby and I said, "If you come with us and it's not at least as far as Ikea, then you can't bring your game."

Tonight we made a quick run to Wal-Mart together and so Caboose came along. Since he didn't bring his game it required him to make conversation. Who knew there was so much to talk about?

Since there were some dark clouds he talked about rain and how it formed, thunder and lightning and how it formed, hurricanes and tornadoes and how they form, and which one of the two can cause more damage.

Somehow we mentioned spiders. It could have been me mentioning it first, Betsy over at My Five Men being on some sick spider kick all of a sudden and creeping me out, but I can't remember. That made Caboose start talking about the black widow Hubby found right before we left Virginia last year.

Caboose asked if it died, to which I answered a definite yes. He asked why we didn't just step on it and get it over with. Well, Hubby had it contained already when I got home, and once we got it in that jar it seemed like it would die pretty fast. Who knew those things were such stinkers.

If you haven't clicked over and looked at the old posts yet, we stuck an alcohol-laden cotton ball in the jar to suffocate it since it was still alive seven days after being put in the jar with no air holes poked to help it breathe. Tonight on the way home from Wal-Mart Caboose asked, "Did she drink the cholesterol?" Well, the spider did attack the cotton ball, which was what he remembered, and I told him I wasn't sure if she actually drank some alcohol or just suffocated.

Hubby told Caboose that drinking cholesterol would have been pretty bad for her too.

I'm just glad she's dead.

Santa and Caboose

I've mentioned a couple of times that we've had company. They left this morning after having been here for a week and a half, thus the almost week break in blogging. Now I get to fill you in on some of the fun things we've been doing and some fun stories.

Last Friday we went to Frankenmuth, Michigan, a small town about an hour and a half north of where we live. It has a strong German heritage, but oddly enough, is well-known for it's chicken dinners.

When you tell people you're going to Frankenmuth, or even ask them about it, they will tell you, "They have really good chicken." So here's where we ate.

Here was my plate.

Here was the competitor across the street.

It was good chicken, but I'd say second best. The chicken dinner at Rockhome Gardens in Arcola, Illinois, gets my vote for best. It's in the Amish country. Sorry, Frankenmuth. Second gets a medal though at the Olympics though.

Frankenmuth is a pretty little town with a small downtown shopping area.


Frankenmuth is also the home of Bronner's Christmas Wonderland, World's Largest Christmas Store. I'm taking their word for it. It was definitely big, the biggest I've ever seen, and I must say extremely well organized. They had the ornaments in different sections by theme (snowmen, farm, sports, etc.), and the map had each section well marked. An organizer's dream...

We had to take a picture of Santa and the grandkids by the big Santa.

Now I have to explain here that we have never done Santa with our kids. The gifts have always been from us. But we've done a breakfast with Santa, had their picture made with Santa...gosh, Santa's their Grandpa. So obviously none of the magic of the season is lost. They know what other kids think, and the only thing that's been difficult is what to answer when people ask them what they want from Santa or what Santa brought them for Christmas. So when they were younger we helped them come up with an answer that they were comfortable with — one that didn't give anything away to other kids but didn't make them feel like they were 'fibbing.' They would just say, "I got so-and-so for Christmas," or "I want so-and-so for Christmas," and then that sort of covered it.

Well, Caboose knows that Grandpa doesn't take other kids presents. He also knows that his Grandpa is Santa, and that Santa doesn't really live in the North Pole either. Santa lives in Arkansas. This, my friends, is my child that has always been my brightest at the youngest age. We have not told him any of these things. This is his magic, and we have not discouraged it.

Before Grandpa and Grandma came to visit, Buddy and Caboose were having a discussion at the table, and I happened to be sitting there as well. I don't even know what it was about, I just remember hearing something about reindeer. I told them that reindeer were real and that we'd seen them at zoos before. Caboose proceeds to say, "But they don't fly Grandpa around."

For several years Caboose has asked what will happen when Grandpa dies and who will be Santa. I tell him he might have to do it. He's not sure he will have the whiskers.

But at Bronner's the other day he really got it going. I should have been prepared, but I wasn't. First he asked me, "Was Grandpa the first Santa, or were there others before him that have already died?"

Thank goodness the next question came before I had to answer that one.

"When Grandpa dies, will they just go up to somebody and say, 'Hey, do you want to be Santa?'?" (I know I probably didn't quotation mark that right, but I'm too lazy to check it.) I told him maybe it was a Santa secret, or maybe it had to run in the family and he'd have to do it, or if he was too young and didn't have whiskers, his dad would have to do it, even though he's an in-law.

The good thing is, now Hubby can grow whiskers. See his 'playoff beard' from a month or so ago.

Because for years we've joked about how he can't grow any facial hair, except in splotches. And when the girls were about two years old, look what he did with my eyebrow pencil!

Um, you might notice it's even getting a little more of the Santa-ish color, Hubby.

When I Was...

Caboose: "When I was playing crochet..."

Everyone else in the vehicle simultaneously: "You mean croquet?"

Caboose: "Whatever!"

A few minutes later...

Caboose: "Sydney stinks at crochet."

Everyone else: "Croquet!"

Caboose: "Whatever! What's crochet again anyway?"