Owl Pellet Day

Today we had a total of 18 kids (and 6 moms) ranging in age from 10 months to 14 years for a fun-filled day of owl pellet dissection. 

I had no idea so many kids could fit at my table!

A little background: Owls eat rodents and they eat them whole.  They can't digest the fur and bones, so they "yarp" up a pellet instead of eliminating the undigestables out the other end.  Ever since IJ read The Guardians of Ga'Hoole, he has been very interested in owls.

Owl Pellet

I offered to host a Science Day for our new little homeschool group and bought a bunch of these nasty-looking pellets for the kids to dissect.  It was fun!  MESSY, but fun.  I seriously do NOT recommend doing this kind of project at home if you have any pet hair or rodent or messy things issues.  Now, why on earth would I be willing to do something like this?  Because I like science, I like the kids, and I like the idea of us coming together and helping each other out.  I can't possibly do a project like this on my own because I just don't have enough hands for my five kids.  It is so strange that bringing in 15 extra kids makes my job easier!  When F asked for water, I sent her to her special mom-buddy.

Time for Lunch!

After everyone washed their hands, WITH SOAP, dispensed by me, we had lunch.  Lunchtime is always fun. 
Everyone brought a sack lunch and we had a picnic on the floor.  When the boys got crazy, we sent them out for recess and never saw them again.  That was when the moms drank coffee and laughed and had fun too!  But all fun comes to an end and when the friends went home, my kids had to finish their lab!

Finishing the Lab

Every writing kid was given a lab sheet with a place to write out a hypothesis, a place to describe what the pellet looked like, how they dissected the pellet and what tools they used, what they found, and whether or not their hypothesis was correct.  I also set up my stereomicroscope so we could get a close look at the bones!

"I found one of those bones!"

E doesn't write, so she just matched her bones to the bones in the picture.  IJ sorted his bones by type and estimated how many different rodents were in his pellets.  S and IJ both tried to recreate the skeleton.

IJs Bones

Although we were very organized and neat, some bones got away from us and ended up on the floor.  Eventually, walking through the school room sounded like walking through the kitchen after D has been given cereal: Crunch, crunch!

Smile for the Camera!

Snow Day

February is traditionally my least favorite month.  If you go back to the beginning of my blog, you can find a post where I talk about how February makes me feel.  Usually around February 15th I cheer up because the month is half over!  Spring is coming closer!  A snow day is always a welcome change from the cold, gray days, but I'm not really enjoying this snow event.  Mostly because D is sick with a virus that has congested him.

 This one has her mother's sense, or lack, of style

Poor D is so congested that he can't nurse because he can't breathe through his nose.  This causes him to stop nursing to take a breath through his mouth.  Sometimes he tries to hold on at the same time with his teeth.  Which obviously causes me to jump.  So now he is on a nursing strike.  Which may lead to an early weaning.

"Princesses don't wear pants," F reminds me.

And not because I want him to wean, but because he doesn't want to come back.  I've been pumping and offering him a cup, but he doesn't want that either.  He is off his feed because of the illness, so hopefully this is temporary.  Sigh.  I've been rejected!  Wah!  Oh well, I'm sure we all will survive.  He does seem to have that GO-GO-GO! personality.

"What is everyone laughing at?"

Anyway, the other kids are enjoying the snow!  The local schools are on mid-winter break, so our activities are also on break.  I was supposed to take this time to focus on academics, but with the combination of sick baby and snow, the kids have been...playing and watching DVDs.

In the picture above, one boy is wearing snow pants and a jacket.  The other boy is wearing sweat pants and a sweat shirt.  I think the boy wearing the sweats figured out why we wear snow clothes in the snow:

Maybe!

Another fun thing for us in-house people is watching the birds come to the bird feeder.  We made bagel bird feeders in Cub Scouts and here is the proof the birds like them!

This little towhee has a seed stuck in his mouth!

We have also noticed that our old Christmas tree (that has now left the porch and has migrated closer to the burn pile) has served as nice habitat.  The birds hang out waiting for their turn at the bird feeder!

And, of course, our power went out.  FOUR TIMES last night.  Why?  Well, there is a piece of land along the main drag where the main power lines are.  In order to pay his taxes, the land owner sold the timber and clear cut.  Because of the laws that require leaving an aesthetic buffer along the road, trees that used to not have wind exposure are being tossed about.  Any time we have a wind event, the wind that used to be diffused through the forest is hitting old maples with rotten cores.  And those maples keep falling on the power lines.  This morning we boiled our coffee water on the camp stove I wisely bought myself for Christmas.  This was my other Christmas present to myself:

A mug that says, "Knitting keeps me from coming unraveled."  I can knit warm socks for my sick kids while drinking coffee when there is no power!  Now if that isn't a reason to cheer up, I don't know what is!

Transitions

I absolutely love watching my children transition from one stage to another in their lives.  We have two big transitions going on right now: E is reading and D is walking.

At first, I have to prop them on their feet or make them do a reading lesson...and they don't want to!  They plop on back on their bottoms or whine and complain and try to get out of doing what I want them to do.  After awhile, they get used to the routine and they start stumbling over words or toys on the floor.  Then, as they get better at what they are doing, they start maneuvering over and around...and doing it on their own without being prompted.  And when I catch them reading the cereal box or walking on their own...

...that is when I can say they can walk or read!

A Good Weekend

Happy Birthday Grandad!

"Wow, I have a lot of kids!"

Baby Boys Chapter 2

"Okay, I'm up from my nap.  Where should I start my destruction?"

He has entered the terrible baby phase.  The phase where he pulls books off shelves, digs in the dog food, opens the cupboards, turns the TV on and off...I've been through this before.  Four times.  But not in this house!  Not in a house that needs to be senior friendly as well as baby proof!

"I see a bit of molding that is loose around the door.  I wonder if I can pull it off?"

I would like to completely gate off the entire house!  But then Grandad might starve to death.  I would definitely have to put a gate across his door and the door to the laundry room where his refrigerator is plugged in.  The biggest problems with gates, including the gate I already have, is that the siblings can't remember to close them!  Sometimes I really miss how easily my old house baby proofed.

And how do you like this shiner?  Apparently, according to S, D crawled into something.  I think that after S retrieved D from Daddy's office, he set his brother down on his feet too close to the dresser.  And then he fell down and hit his eyebrow.  That was a few days ago, so now he has the most fabulous purple and green bruise.  D also cut his first upper front tooth on Valentine's Day.  What a gift!

Baby Boys

He only looks sweet and innocent

Baby D's personality is really developing!  He knows exactly what he likes, exactly what he doesn't like, and he's not afraid to let us know.  I've already complained about how he won't sit in a high chair.  The same is true for shopping carts.  He wants to stand.  And crawl!  And he is a fast crawler!

Yesterday, after we were done swimming, I took D and F into the locker room to get showered and changed before the rest of the kids were done with their lessons.  While we were in the shower, he kept crawling out to go examine other people's lockers.  Slamming locker doors is one of his favorite pastimes.  When we were getting dressed at the lockers, he kept crawling back in the showers!  Needless to say, he rode home in a wet shirt. 

His power nap of 20 minutes is now over and he is ready to start chasing his favorite inflatable globe around the house!

Homeschool Moment

IJ was worried this morning when he saw that you can no longer read the original Declaration of Independence.  He was relieved when I showed him the transcription and read it out loud to him.  What a great moment in homeschooling- witnessing the emotion that rises in the heart of a young, patriotic American.

Feelin' the Love

I have the best husband and kids.  I had to leave early this morning to take D in for his well baby check up.  While I was there, M had the kids make valentines for me and he cleaned the kitchen.

IJ wrote the coolest poem, inspired by the Guardians of Ga'Hoole series.  S and E wrote all about how much they love me.  M left a dozen thousand digital roses on my screen saver and changed my wall paper to a picture of the two of us.  Aren't they awesome?

Feeding the Baby

One would think that after five babies, I would have the feeding thing down.  Um, no.  I hate feeding them.  It is so messy and smelly and takes so long to clean up.  I put off starting solids because I dread having to deal with the mess the American Academy of Pediatrics says that I should only start introducing solids at six months of age and continue to nurse until he is a year old, and longer if I want!

"My favorite food is cottage cheese, but I'm not supposed to eat it for another two months."

I also hate highchairs.  My kids always seem to climb out of them.  Today I found D hanging off the edge of the counter...again.  Did I mention the highchair get so messy that I have to clean them after every meal (but I don't)?  And highchairs have lots of little cracks where food disappears.  Those highchairs may look cute with their soft little fabric covers, but you have to take them off and wash them after every meal unless you want moldy things crawling on your baby's legs!  I would never suggest letting your dog take care of clean up either, no matter how many times you hear a dog's mouth is cleaner than a human's.  That is just gross.  And you have to wash the baby's clothes and change his diaper and give him a bath after every meal too (bathing babies is the other thing I don't like to do)!  Like I have time for all that.

My favorite way to feed them is to take a bunch of food, puree it in my Vitamix, and put it all in a sippy cup.  I haven't bought commercial baby food since IJ was a baby!  But look what I discovered today:

HappyBaby Food Pouches!  Wow!  It's like astronaut food for babies!  Imagine a Capri Sun drink pouch crossed with a toothpaste tube and you have the HappyBaby food pouch.  For the low, low (whatever) price of $.89, I bought a pouch of spinach, mango, and pear puree.  Who cares if I can buy a whole pound of spinach for $.89!  When I got to the YMCA, I popped the top and gave it to D.  He sucked it down, just like he was eating toothpaste!  I felt so guilty and...wasteful buying this product.  There sure was a lot of packaging going straight into the garbage for such a tiny bit of food.  But he was so happy!  And clean!  You can even buy a spoon attachment to screw on to the tip.  Sometimes I wish I had no problem consuming and dumping hundreds of pounds of plastic byproducts into the landfill every year.  But I do.

But anyway, when we got home from the YMCA, I had a herd of hungry, hungry kids on my hands.  Thank goodness I put dinner in the crock pot before I left!  D would NOT SIT in his highchair and kept fussing and whining and climbing out... I watched him for awhile and saw he was mainly frustrated because he was trying to eat, but the food kept falling out of his hands and on to his lap.  I pulled him out, sat down on the floor with him, and let him climb all over my lap while I fed him spoonful after spoonful of shredded pork, cottage cheese, peas, and noodles.  Dinner was all over me instead of all over him.

Now I know what my next sewing project will be: baby feeding clothes.  Instead of washing the highchair after every meal, I will change my head-to-toe apron and let the dog lick the floor clean.  The highchair can go to the dump Goodwill!

The Revolution Continues

It was below freezing last night when M and I were asked to come outside to watch the play IJ wrote.  It was also pitch black outside!  So not only were we cold, we couldn't see.  We tried to reason with IJ, "We can't see.  Show us tomorrow when it's light."  He protested, "But it happened at night!"

 E, perched in the cherry tree (and those are not her eyes glowing)

Any guesses?
Here's one more hint:

The battle ended with:

A quick battle in the dark

S getting shot right away.  Since there were no more redcoats to shoot, we went inside where it was warm!

One of the greatest moments of the night was when IJ learned that not only did famous people fight in the revolution, the J in his name also fought.  JD was left for dead but survived and filed a claim for a spur, a coonskin cap, and his horse.  History is living within this child! S wanted to know if the guy we named his middle name after was also a warrior in the American Revolutionary War.  Well, Grandad isn't that old.  But he's pretty close!  He turns 80 years old today!

The American Revolution

Now this is what I call homeschooling!  This is my homeschool dream!  This week is American Revolution Week and IJ is really into it.  He built himself a flintlock musket and created this costume from an old blue velvet jacket that belonged to my mother.  The hat is from a pirate costume.

 S is modeling the British look with an old red velvet jacket that I used to wear to job interviews.  Along with a T-shirt that says "I didn't do it."

Did he kill his brother, the rebel, or not?

IJ has been reading about the American Revolution on the side because we have more books than you can shake a stick at.  S started reading The Magic Tree House book Revolutionary War on Wednesday and I read Can't You Make Them Behave, King George? out loud this morning.

This is when S finally figured out he was working for King George and he was not happy!  So he shot his brother.

Who shot him back...

Who shot him back again...

Who shot him back again!

Home Again

My boys (big and small) are home again, safe and sound.  They had a great time playing.

M inspired the other dads to join in and play with the Scouts.  He is, after all, just a big kid.

 S sledding

IJ sledding

IJ hiding in the tree pit

And the whole crew! (fingerprint on lens? condensation?)

We go back and forth about Scouts.  This was such a good weekend for M and the boys!  After going camping with these families, one really feels like they are part of a clan.  One thing I really like is the way meals are organized.  The meals are split by den, so each family only brings one item per child.  For example, S is a Wolf.  The Wolves were assigned breakfast on Saturday.  One family brought the sausage, one brought hash browns, and two brought eggs (guess who?).  IJ is a Bear and had Saturday dinner.  He brought 4 tomatoes and a box of cookies.  That was all the food they brought for the whole weekend.  It seems like there wouldn't be enough, especially since there are mothers and sisters and grandparents, but somehow (like the fish and loaves of bread) there is always enough food.  The dens cook (with the help of their parents) and clean up afterward.  This way everyone has the opportunity to help out.  We like camping this way!

TGIF

My friend has a blog update bar on her blog so we can see when her favorite blogs were updated last.  Mine said "4 days ago" when I checked her blog this morning.  Oh horrors!

 I would flinch too if IJ came flying at me like that

We've hit another busy sporty time of year where the kids are on the road all day (scouts, swimming, PE, gymnastics and taekwondo).  I have to sign them up for little league on Saturday.  They are working on this new trick where they run across the room, jump off their dad's crossed arms (see pic), and do a spinning round house kick in the air to break a board.  These boys aren't as small as they used to be, so M hurt his knee practicing and now wears a brace.  The hurt knee has caused some sleepless nights and he and I are walking around in a fog...

Today is Friday, gymnastics day, and then the boys are heading out for a Cub Scout camping trip.  Last year I went.  This year I'm staying home with the three younger kids and M is going.  Wish him luck!  He has to share a loft with the kid with ADHD and ODD.  Whether or not he has these disorders or he is suffering from his parents nasty divorce and his mother's new marriage to a yucky guy is not up to me.  But I do know that they doubled his medication levels...yesterday...and the mom wants M to tell her how her son handled it because her ex won't.  M is bringing his tent so he can go sleep outside if he can't take it anymore.