Arggg

I'm getting really lazy with this blog lately. (Sorry future Andrew, I will try and be better at keeping up to date)...

Ok, What have you been up to?

Word. Mario.

End of blog entry.///

Ok, just kidding, but really that's basically all you think of lately. Mario, Lugie (forgive my spelling), Princess Peach and Bowser. You sleep, breath and live for it. HELP.... It has gotten to the point where I had to limit your play time on them because you would be on it 24/7. The other day when you were playing you pleaded with me "MOMMY, PLEASE just let me save Princess Peach so that I can get on with my life". lol Good grief.

When you're not playing the game you're watching walkthroughs online. And if your not doing that then you are playing with the characters we bought you for Christmas and pretend you are in the video game and role playing the game with them.

Homeschooling is going well. Although you would much rather play then learn, so I have to come up with a way to make it more interesting for you so that you can enjoy learning rather then have it being a chore.

You are in your 5th week of Karate, that is going well too. You're learning how to count in Japanese and say other works as well. You seem to be really enjoying it.

Your favorite shows are still Scooby Doo. And some new ones as well. They are, Garfield, and The Winx Club, everything you get into you REALLY get into, like obsess into. You can watch them endlessly and still laugh.

Favorite food is still french fries. Mini pizza, chicken with chalet sauce or katchup. You are the fussiest eater on the planet.

Favorite color is still pink. What I like about you is that you DON'T care what other kids say about it either. It's what you like and that's it.

Health wise you are good. You've had a couple of head colds this winter but nothing major. You have yet to be put on any antibiotics in your life. YAY Andrew. Although I do pump you with vitamins because of your fussiness.

You're a great person to be around. Ya, like i'm not going to say that! haha. But seriously, you really are. I think that part of the reason is, is you're not picking up habits from peers. You love to be goofy.

All and all, you're just one small big FANTASTIC dude.

Stuff

Appointment #2 at the dentist office was today and it went great! Yay, well i won't say that it may be because he only got his teeth cleaned. Nope.

Home schooling is going wonderful. Andrew is learning to read phonically and is doing super amazing. I will sound out words and get him to write how he thinks it's spelled. He's usually right on. Math, he's learning to add still, but now with bigger numbers. Subtract. Greater and lesser. The ones the tenths place. He can count by 10's and 5's. And patterns. He's learning about how to use a map (Geography). Some science. And LOTS of art. I want to get him into swimming lessons and some sort of self defense class but i haven't figured out which one to go with yet. As for music i hope to get him into some local choir soon.

Health wise he's good. Still a fussy eater but were working on that still, sigh.

Don has had a very sore leg for about 2 months now. He went in to see the Dr about it. He ordered an Xray and ultrasound. He had the xray about 2 weeks ago, and the U/S last Fri. The tech girl said that she seen a cyst under both knee caps but the one that is really sore could quite possibly be sore because it looks like it may have erupted. We won't know anything more until our Dr gets back from his mini leave in the beginning of Aug. (his wife had a baby)...

Me.. Well, not so great. But not bad, i hope. I have been having this horrible on and off again pain in my left side for some time now. Dr did blood work and some of the stuff came back not that great. My white blood cell are low and some other crap but i forget. He told me to get it re-checked in 2 mths, if it was still low he would send me to a specialist. I got it re-checked and it was lower then before and i have become anemic. So he has set me up to see a Oncologist/hematologist on Oct 6th at our local hospital. I just hope it's not cancer.

Well that's about it.

The Facts

Fact: I swear that Andrew has to be the most cutest boy in the Universe (no i'm not biased).

Fact: Six yrs ago on this very day i was expecting his imminent birth in less then a month and i was totally excited and kept looking out the window from my office and stared at the hospital where i was to meet him for the first time outside of the womb.

Fact: Andrew still LOVES Scooby Doo, 3 yrs strong.

Fact: He is very smart.

Fact: He loves drawing monsters and is quite good at it.

Fact: He loves being a monster and scaring me and then solving the mystery of who the monster was that was trying to scare me.

Fact: He loves playing his Scooby Doo game over and over and over times infinity.

Fact: He HATES veggies.

Fact: He could live on just eating french fries IF i permitted him to.

Fact: He is being home schooled now, and always until he goes to University. Enough said.

Fact: You don't have to be a teacher to teach your child. Learning comes naturally and the world is full of education. HE WILL LEARN.

Fact: He's going to be a pack rat just like his dad, seriously, i can't even throw out the boxes that his new toys came in.

Fact: He knows how to defeat the big boss all by himself on his Scooby game and is quite proud of himself.

Fact: He is probably the most fussiest eater that i have ever met.

Fact: He is also the most lovingest child there is around.

Fact: He hates cleaning up after himself.

Fact: He becoming a whiner and there is NO way i will tolerate whining.

Fact: He loves animals. Isis being his favorite.

Fact: He could watch TV all day if i would let him.

Fact: His favorite color is still pink.

Fact: His best friends are still Ethan and Anika and Austin.

Fact: He is very articulate and love using big words.

Fact: More facts to come your way, stay tuned.

What's Up?

Well not a whole lot lately... It's been so cold outside, i rarely even want to step out. Thank goodness we need food or else i don't know if i would ever get out there.

Andrew's been doing his homeschooling everyday. Right now he's doing a unit on Winter. Last week he had a math test and got 100% on it. Not bad considering it's for a grade 1 student and he's still only in kindergarten. He's asking a lot of questions about how things work and where people originally came from and why the dinosaurs and humans didn't live together at the same period. Pretty deep kid. We only made it to the science center once last week, they had a buildings and structures workshop. It wasn't that great. I think they under estimate the abilities of kids brains there sometimes. All they had were blocks, and asked them how big they could make them. So the kids were more interested in that part then learning how buildings actually stand. He got to see his 2 friends Anika and Ethan. Anika lost her 1st tooth the same day and Andrew did (and then she lost another one a few days later). They are exactly 2 weeks apart in age. Ethan, Andrew, Sue and i went downtown to Nathan Phillip Square for the last weekend of WinterFest. They had some really amazing shows there. One from France, called Cosmogonia. If you ever get a chance to see them i HIGHLY recommend seeing them. It was amazing. Even the sound system was out of this world. Cosmogonia is a succession of 12 scenes, the book of Genesis is recounted, played, and danced on a background of projected images portraying the Elements, cascading water and fire. (pics below)... It was very cold out so we didn't stay too long, just long enough to see the show and then we sat in a warming tent and then headed home.

Here's some of my favorite pics from the past week.

Andrew and Anika and their missing teeth.


Goofing around.







Angel of the Apocalypse
Flaming Lotus Girls (from the Burning-man artists. This was amazing.


Andrew and Ethan


This are actual balloons. They were HUGE, this was at the Science Center.


Here are some pics taken of him throughout the week that i like.

Looking intently at a computer game he's been playing all week, called Pajama Sam.




This is his favorite pose when i take pictures of him.. No matter what, he's gotta make this face.


Pure LOVE...




The End.

WOW

Whoops, sorry for taking so long to post.

Compared to last month everything is pretty quiet. No visitors. No Christmas shopping. No wrapping either. No tree taking over the view. No fancy lights or decor. That's all gone for another year.

Sigh.

So then, what have we been doing?

We've been going to the Science center quite a lot. They have workshops for young children during the week. So i have been implementing that with Andrew's homeschooling. On the 7th, they had a work shop on Healthy Foods. Now Andrew will eat granola cereal with yogurt (i have only been trying to get him to eat that for years now), but oh well, at least now he'll eat it. Another thing to add to his VERY small list of things he'll eat. On the 8th they had a Optical Illusions workshop. On the 15th they had a Magnets workshop. On the 26th they had a Dinosaurs workshop. He really LOVED that one. He is starting to talk a lot and is very articulate in his speech. He'll talk for hrs about dinosaurs and Scooby Doo. He's actually got many of the workers there calling him by name now. They all really like him, you can really tell. He's got quite the magnetic appeal.

We've been doing more and more school work this month. He can count to 100. Printed his first sentence (by memory). I will post a picture of that. Learning how to read small sentences. He doesn't really like reading a whole lot so i think i will go slower on that and try not to push it, he'll be ready when he's ready. I don't want him to hate it. He's been learning about dinosaurs (since he likes them so much), i can't get over how much he already knows on them. He knows what a herbivore, meat eaters and omnivores are and which dinosaur eat what. And he knows almost all of the dinosaurs names. For science he is learning all about sound.

Art, he absolutely LOVES drawing. Everyday he sketches pictures of monsters and ghosts. And he's pretty good at it.

One night last week while we were lying in bed before he fell asleep he asked me, mommy, how long did it take for me to come out of my egg? I'm like what??????? Then it dawned on me that he thought he was hatched out of an egg like dinosaurs did.. LOL, too cute.

He's got his first loose tooth. And WON'T stop wiggling it. Another excitement for Andrew.

All in all, he's still the greatest kid in the universe.


Always trying to scare me:


His first sentence... I spoke the words out loud and he wrote what i was saying.


His first loose tooth.

For all you Nay Sayers

I knew it... The evidence is in :)

The whole research article can be found here.

Socialization not a Problem

But of most importance are these numbers.

When measured against the average Canadians ages 15 to 34 years old, home-educated Canadian adults ages 15 to 34 were more socially engaged (69 percent participated in organized activities at least once per week, compared with 48 percent of the comparable population). Average income for homeschoolers also was higher, but perhaps more significantly, while 11 percent of Canadians ages 15 to 34 rely on welfare, there were no cases of government support as the primary source of income for homeschoolers. Homeschoolers also were happier; 67.3 percent described themselves as very happy, compared with 43.8 percent of the comparable population. Almost all of the homeschoolers—96 percent—thought homeschooling had prepared them well for life.

What Is On Your Mind?

What is on your four year old mind? Why does it seem so much different then mine?
How does the world look through your eyes?
Why do the puddles call you to splash? Why don't they call me in the same way? That excitement? Where did it end in me? And why?
I like seeing the wonder, the joy and excitement in your eyes when you see that puddle, the tiny insect, the rising sun, the first snowflake falling from the seasons sky.
Somewhere that child that was inside me long ago but has been shoved away into "adulthood" has a "knowing" and "longing" of the places you see and relearns to come out and play again.

Thank you.

Jimmy Neutron and other Things

Andrew is on a Jimmy Neutron kick now, that's all he wants to watch. Could this be the end of a 2 yr long stretch from Scooby? Stay tuned - lol.
It's been really cold here lately so because of him getting sick and the weather we have been stuck in side for over 2 weeks now. I'm going to take him out for a wee walk today just to get some air.
Here are some recent pics since i'm clearing my memory card!

This was taken when he was sick :( ... Scooby nibbling at his ear ;)


Don's friend came here for 2 days last week, he's got gargantuan feet. Andrew and his together!


Andrew's growing a potato plant.


Little boy genius, here he is reading a Harvard Classic on Plato, Epictetus, Marcus Aurelius. :P


Flower boy




That's it :)

I like these pictures

Andrew is really into building things. He REALLY wants to make a robot. Everyday he wants to invent something. It won't be too supricing if he gets into the robitics field when he's older... Oh and he LOVES Teddy Bears, his fav one he names Lovey, he's takes him everywhere with him, it's aoooo cute.

So it's a new year!

This is Andrew's 5th new years since he's been here. He growing up so fast these days. He's still loving Scooby Doo and the gang (i have a feeling he's never going to stop loving them). He is right into talking about making robots lately and he is also quite the story maker. He already has a few Scooby episodes that he wants to make. His best friend as present is his stuff bear, whom he named Lovey. It's quite cute to watch him interact with him. He's learning some sign language because that's Lovey's only way of communicating :) .. He loves being read too. He can recognize all of the letters to the alphabet and recognize his numbers from 1 to 10. He can do simple adding and subtracting. His favorite foods at the present are basically the same as if always has been, chicken, fries, ham and eggs. We go to the science center quite a bit. He really is a great joy to have around. I only wish childhood didn't have to go so fast.

Andrew's Favorite Things

I thought it would be a great idea to ask Andrew what his favorite things are once or twice a year and see how they change over the yrs, if at all. Here's a list of questions i asked him, if you can think of any other nifty questions to ask him let me know and i'll add it to the list. Thanks.

Andrew's favorite things at 4.4 yrs old.

. What is his fav color? Red and Pink
. What is his fav thing to play with? Cars, books and his computer. (but in actuality he likes to play pretend that he's a monster the most)
. What is his fav T.V show? Scooby Doo (he could watch that all day long, over and over if we let him)
. What is his fav movie? he says the robot one, but i don't know what he's talking about.
. What is his fav treat? Gummie Bears
. Who is his best friends? Ethan and Anika
. Who is his fav pet? Tabatha
. What is his fav food? He said green eggs and ham. But i'll add that he LOVES chicken breast fried in olive oil and rosemary seasoning and salt with Alfredo noodles and sauce. For breakfast he likes "Telly toast" which is only peanut butter toast.
. What food does he hate the most? He said anything spicy. But i'll add to that as well, he HATE any form of vegetables.
. He says he likes winter more then summer.
. What is his fav thing to smell? chicken noodle soup
. What scares him the most? Bad people
. What does he love the most? Mommy and Daddy :)
. What do you want to be for Halloween? A ghost
. What do you want for Christmas? A Nerf gun and a bouncy toy with a switch attached to it so that it can jump around everywhere we go.
. What do you want to be when you grow up? A Robot maker.

Children See

I happened upon this video. I HIGHLY recommend it for any parent to see that are raising young ones. It's only a min and a half, but it's powerful.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=En-cJqmSjFY

Andrew and Albert

I am enough of an artist to draw freely upon my imagination. Imagination is more important than knowledge. Knowledge is limited. Imagination encircles the world.

Siblings Together

I was able to get some pictures of the 2 urchins together, not a common occurrence now a days. They are sooo goofy together, it's really hard getting a serious pose with them 2 together, but i guess it says something of their personalities :) It would be nice if i had a picture of him with all of his siblings! Hopefully someday soon!

Bees Wax

Do not put bee's wax in your or your offsprings hair. Don thought it would be fun to put some in Andrew's hair last night (sat), after about 8 washes with shampoo, bar soap, dish soap and baking soda the stuff is still in there. I googled a salutions and the only thing that really works is Goo Gone http://www.magicamerican.com/products_gg.aspx ), but crap man, that stuff is poison, there's NO way i'm going to put that in his hair. So it looks like my dear son will be looking like a greaser for the next week at least and the most washed hair kid around