Clement seemed amply engaged by his book so I went in to the other room to change Peter's diaper. Mid change I happened to notice how quiet things had gotten. I put on Peter's diaper cover and held off on the clothes to go check on Clement. Here's what I discovered:
If only it were that easy tonight. Despite the slightly slurred proposition from Clement this evening as we returned from our day out of doors, "I think my body is telling me I need a nap." He is currently the last son standing. Clement is in a weird in between phase that he could probably still use a nap but if I don't catch him at precisely the right time it takes him an hour to actually close his eyes. Truth be told we've all been thrown for a loop with the move to the new house. With the move we also transitioned Clement to a big boy bed, although some nights he prefers the floor. This wouldn't be such a biggie until he insists that mommy or daddy joins him there at 3am. Oh well, it gives us the opportunity to reminisce of our younger years and to be in solidarity with those youth ministers out there that spend nights on gymnasium floors or primitive campsites for mission trips and/or retreats. Hooray for redemptive suffering.
As evident by the background of most of these pictures we were still at Spangler and I am ridiculously behind on blog updates. Below are Luke and Augustine NOT on their first day of school. Luke was aggravated this evening about the distance home that is ever so slightly farther than what we had to our old house and pointed out that there are only 3 things about our new house he likes.
1. our bigger yard 2. our friends in our neighborhood and 3. the playroom .
Admittedly there are some things I miss about Spangler too- like being able to clean the place top to bottom in the matter of ninety minutes or so. The bus transportation is the other. Being in Plain Local they bussed both Luke AND Augustine as a preschooler. No such luck with Canton City. Consequently, on the days Augustine goes to school three days a week we must drop off and pick-up eliminating one of Augustine's favorite things about school (the bus ride). If all goes well he'll be able to join in the fun next year as a kindergartener which I've got to get crackin' on because technically he misses the cutoff by 5 days. Here's to contacting the principal and setting up a screening/assessment.
Luke thoroughly enjoys school and is tuckered out by the end of the day as well. He is quite fond of his teacher, Mrs. Zenobi, who he recently invited over to our house for homemade pizza and drew a wonderful picture of with her colorful necklace on one of his worksheets about his friends. He was selected to be part of a speech class at the beginning of the year to work on his "c", "k" and "g" sounds which have improved greatly. He rang a red bell like mad at the Christmas concert where mommy, daddy, grandma and grandpa Schafer were all quite impressed by the musical showcase of all the children at the school between the bells, chimes, percussion and rhythmic motions. As parents we are losing the edge as Luke cracks the code in our spelling communications across the table. At home he's not so fond of sitting down to read books all the time but his reading is coming along as he continues to expand his sight word recognition.
Augustine likes to brag that he doesn't do any work. He just plays ;-). He has a different teacher than Luke had for preschool and no written homework like Luke had on a weekly basis. He can give Luke a run for his money though as we go through letter recognition and flashcards. Despite the frequent wailings of Clement, "I want to go to school!" he is stuck at home with mommy and Peter. We sing and dance a lot during the day and play monster truck in the basement while folding laundry. He likes to wear Pete's intramural hockey helmet and instruct me on how to help assemble the monster truck (the folding table). He is the driver of course.
Don't let these pictures fool you as Peter dates only two and a half months. He's been crawling and pulling himself up on things since Thanksgiving and will stand on his own briefly when concentrating on something else in his hands. The more spacious house is another tricky part with a mobile infant around exploring every nook and cranny. Naturally he watches his big brothers like a hawk and giggles as Clement uses him as a bass drum despite mommy's protests. He refuses to sit still for a diaper change and has two bottom teeth that broke through late December that will likely be joined by others on the bottom soon.
Enjoy some other random photos of summer shenanigans at the Akron Zoo and in Massillon for a polka jam session.
No comments:
Post a Comment