I’m Lovin’ It: Home

Well. Here we all are again.

So the new camera has been a total dud and I’ve pretty much stopped taking pictures. It frustrates the hell out of me right now so I’ve had to just stop.

But while the camera hangs out in Repair Shop Land, I’m thinking I’m way over due for catching up on that last few months of pictures that have been sitting patiently in my Picasa file waiting for me to something with them.

And as I drift back through all those memories from Spring, I see a simple theme: home.

Like these pictures from the kids’ last off-track break when the snow-rain-sleet-hail-bleh thing lasted well into May—like the end of May. There were so many days where we whipped up hot chocolate, cranked up the furnace and spent the morning creating masterpieces in our pajamas with absolutely no plans to go anywhere.

Cameron spent one morning creating a picture encyclopedia of all the dragons from the movie How To Train Your Dragon.

Of course some mornings the crayons stayed put and the kids huddled on couches with their Grandma blankets watching PBS all morning while I tried to convince myself that watching educational shows was just like preschool, right?

Thankfully Kade totally came to my rescue after an episode on prisms on Sid the Science Kid when he figured out the otherwise scratched and destroyed DVDs + an open window + white ceiling = the greatest light show ever.

 

“See, Mom? It’s a prism AND a crescent moon!”

Of course Cameron wasn’t about to be outdone by a Kindergartner so he got into the action, too.

And it was the coolest stay-in-your-jammies-blow-off-day ever as the kids laughed and thrilled at a little science magic in the living room.

So by the time Kade figured out that two DVDs could make cooler lights than one …

… and rocked the rainbow figure-8 …

… Ashy couldn’t stop jumping and twirling and laughing on the coffee table in her green tutu and serious bed head as Kade the Science Kid rocked his Rudolph The Red Nose Reindeer and Monsters, Inc.  prisms.

And for the record: DVD prism shows in morning sunlight will be part of all blow off day routines from here on out.

FAMILY HOME EVENING

So I had the brilliant idea a few weeks back to play Pictionary for FHE. And by brilliant I mean oh-crap-it’s-7:30-and-we’re-just-finishing-dinner-and-I-have-nothing-planned-so-let’s-play-Pictionary-and-see-if-anyone-notices-that-I-completely-spaced-this brilliant.

Or something.

The only problem with totally shooting from the hip is that you don’t have the chance to think through the fact that perhaps words like Zarahemla and Holy Ghost might be a touch too abstract or complicated for the mostly junior primary crew.

Or that perhaps Seanry might insist on a turn, start coloring something completely different than the word he was given and then decide who gets it right based on who shares toys with him.

Case in point—the word was temple … and Sean started drawing some random stick figures … and Dylan “accidently” saw the slip of paper that says temple and guessed it over and over … and Kaden yelled out Joseph Smith … and Sean smiled and shouted, “You got it! Good Job!” … and Dylan threw a fit.

And maybe while Ben rolled his eyes at me after each questionably age-appropriate word for his team, Ash kept scaling the railing trying to eat treats off the Easter candy art.

And since you can all see where we’re going here, the answer is yes—Ash eventually did eat or knock off every . single . piece . of candy on those pictures. And yes—Ben got me to promise him that I’d never do Pictionary for FHE again until Ash is driving.   

Moving on.

CREATE

On one particularly stormy Saturday while Ben was working, I drug the kids up to Michael’s to get some glue for a Thrive project and snap some 10 yr. old pics of Dylan for his birthday.

And despite the sideways hail, biting wind and temps in the low 40s, the awning in between Michael’s and Office Depot turned out to be an awesome spot for pictures.

 

One of my favorite pictures of Dylan ever. Straight out of the camera with no editing. Love.

While we were in Michael’s I let the kids each pick out a $1 art kit to work on since it seemed like one of those perfect yup-it’s-still-raining-and-we’re-bored-stiff kind of projects that help my mom self esteem.  Because I remember sitting in the kitchen in Woodinville during storms while Mom worked on projects or sewed or something and how cool it was to know that you had no where to go and no schedules – just time to hang out, enjoy the rain and relax.

 

And so Nike Kristeen Peterson, Cool Mom, drug out everything for our art day … and told myself that I wasn’t going to care if the paint got everywhere and the markers were destroyed on their maiden voyage … and if projects and bodies ended up with equal parts of craft schmeer.  Because cool, crafty moms who do cool, crafty things on rainy days are like that.

So I told the kids to turn their shirts inside out and have fun. And despite the fact that cool crafty mom day is something that happens rarely, I’ve decided that it’s good to go through the motions and raise the bar a bit.

Because as it turns out, I really don’t care about the paint or marker messes on days when I’ve decided in advance that I’m not going to care and it’s more important for just that day to enjoy the moment.

And I love having excuses to all hang out and talk and create together. And so while thunder rolled over head and the rain pounded the windows in a furious display, I once again got to watch my kids at their creative finest: Kaden painting away on his catapult as he wondered out loud about the coolest-heaviest-biggest thing that he could launch with it … Savannah meticulously coloring her unicorn as she told stories of castles and dragons and fairies …

… Seanry impressing the heck out of me (again) at how well he paints and cares about details for a four year old … Dylan fueling his passion and building a train and understanding more and more how they work …

… Ashy scribbling on her dolphins and then wondering off to play with toys and help momma … and Cameron getting covered in paint in his pursuit of the coolest, most accurate fighter plane ever.

Mission accomplished, dude.

Right now I’m lovin’ … home.

Oh … and I’m loving something else, too. Our Saturday adventures have started up again now that Summer decided to finally show up. Quality, quality photos from our local grocery stores coming soon.