One of my New Year's goals was supposed to be to blog more frequently, so I guess that pretty much sums up how things are going around here. Hahahaha. Just kidding, just kidding. My personal shortcomings aside, I've been doing my best to crack the whip around here and try to get everyone on board with actually DOING something about our "Back to Basics" theme for the school year. Change is hard for everyone, though, so we've basically (see what I did there -- back to BASICs?? 😂) only been managing 2 baby steps forward and 1 step back all along the road of our journey this month (and hopefully this year) to focus on the small and simple things we can do each day to improve all of our lives. But FIRST, here's a little year in review from each of the kids as per tradition...
- ETHAN:
A LITTLE ABOUT ME
Name: Elder Ethan _______
Favorite Food: Chicken Alfredo
Age: 19
Favorite Activity: Going to the temple
Favorite Color: Orange (still)
Favorite Book: Probably the Book of Mormon
HIGHLIGHTS OF 2022
Greatest lesson learned: Obedience brings blessings
Hardest thing of the year: The Mission
Favorite memory: Working in the temple
What I loved most about 2022: BYU and the people I've grown to love on the mission
LOOKING FOWARD TO 2023
Want to learn: How to love missionary work more
Want to get better at: Street contacting 🙄
Biggest goal: Help a family get sealed in the temple
- GRACE:
A LITTLE ABOUT ME
Name: Grace
Favorite Food: Pasta/stir fry
Age: 18
Favorite Activity: Roblox
Favorite Color: Green
Favorite Book: Selection, Percy Jackson, Lord of the Flies, Catcher in the Rye
HIGHLIGHTS OF 2022
Greatest lesson learned: How to drive better
Hardest thing of the year: APLAC 10 page research paper
Favorite memory: Road trip & raft trip
(King's Island & Mackinac)
What I loved most about 2022: Hanging out with friends
LOOKING FOWARD TO 2023
Want to learn: How to play piano/life skills for when I move
Want to get better at: Saving money
Biggest goal: Get a job finally (this has been on my sheet past 3 years)
- SOPHIE:
A LITTLE ABOUT ME
Name: Sophie
Favorite Food: Mashed potatoes
Age: 15
Favorite Activity: Reading & watching stuff
Favorite Color: Pink
Favorite Book: Catcher in the Rye & Dinky Hocker
HIGHLIGHTS OF 2022
Greatest lesson learned: None
Hardest thing of the year: idk
Favorite memory: Road trip
What I loved most about 2022: Road trip
LOOKING FOWARD TO 2023
Want to learn: Guitar
Want to get better at: Guitar
Biggest goal: Read 50 books
- JANE:
A LITTLE ABOUT ME
Name: Jane
Favorite Food: Kraft mac n' cheese (idc if you make fun of me)
Age: 13
Favorite Activity: Anything Taylor Swift related
Favorite Color: Pink
Favorite Book: Hunger Games: Catching Fire
HIGHLIGHTS OF 2022
Greatest lesson learned: Where there's one there's usually another
Hardest thing of the year: Getting Taylor Swift concert tickets
Favorite memory: Getting Taylor Swift tickets or Mackinac Island
What I loved most about 2022: The road trip and Midnights by T Swift
LOOKING FOWARD TO 2023
Want to learn: How to bake better
Want to get better at: Band (ew.)
Biggest goal: Get better grades
As you can see, the girls are a long way off from paying me back for those T Swizzle tickets. I told them they have until the end of June to get it done or I'll be reselling those tickets and making a killing on them.
- ALEX:
A LITTLE ABOUT ME
Name: Alex
Favorite Food: Cereal/pizza/mac n cheese
Age: 11
Favorite Activity: Video games/tv/reading
Favorite Color: Red/pink
Favorite Book: Hunger Games (the OG one)
HIGHLIGHTS OF 2022
Greatest lesson learned: Don't judge a book by its cover
Hardest thing of the year: School
Favorite memory: Seeing my friends at school and Christmas
What I loved most about 2022: Getting to take off my mask at school and getting in the same pod as almost all of my best friends
LOOKING FOWARD TO 2023
Want to learn: More math
Want to get better at: Handwriting
Biggest goal: Better at handwriting
The junior high band went to the middle school back in December to perform a mini concert, and one of their teachers snapped this photo of Alex and Jane with her xylophone.
- ISAAC:
A LITTLE ABOUT ME
Name: Isaac
Favorite Food: Pizza
Age: 7
Favorite Activity: Roblox
Favorite Color: Green
Favorite Book: IDK
HIGHLIGHTS OF 2022
Greatest lesson learned: My lisp
Hardest thing of the year: Making a sandwich
Favorite memory: Go karting
What I loved most about 2022: Road trip
LOOKING FOWARD TO 2023
Want to learn: My lisp (I guess)
Want to get better at: Art
Biggest goal: Makeing money
And here he is in all his glory doing the hardest thing of the year -- making a sandwich. Hahahaha.
As I said, most of the changes we're trying to enact -- ok, that I'M trying to enact -- revolve around getting the kids/our family back to basics on things like chores, homework, MANNERS, reading the Book of Mormon, life skills, etc. It's been a mixed bag so far, but we'll just have to keep plugging along.
And in case anyone was wondering, THIS was what broke the camel's back, so to speak. Apparently I committed the unpardonable by overhauling our chore chart and adding some new elements into the mix. The uproar and outrage over being a dinner helper alone unhinged almost all of them. It was nuts. You would think I was asking them to make a 5-course meal for the entire family every night in perpetuity with the reaction I got from them.
To encourage everyone to participate in family Book of Mormon reading, we've essentially resorted to bribes, with the promise of a trip to an amusement park once we've read for 100 days.
Part of the "life skills" basics that I'm trying to impart to us all, is some mental health awareness and some coping strategies for when things are a little rough. With multiple ADHD, high anxiety, and SPD (sensory processing disorder) kids in the house, meltdowns and freak outs happen on the regular. After scouring Pinterest for ideas, I copycatted several different posters/infographics to hang on our wall and I'm hoping SOMETHING out of the mix will speak to whichever kids are needing it in the moment. A mother can always dream, amiright?? Hahaha.
I cobbled together a few different things I saw online (and used my own ideas for the picture representation for quite a few of them) to create this "A to Z Coping Skills" poster for the wall.
In closing, I'll finish up with a quick recap of January highlights -- although highlights may be stretching the term as it's been a fairly nondescript month in my opinion. (As most Januaries usually are. Hahahaha.) There have been school projects, some attempts at journaling from the kids, a lost tooth, one or two moments of sweetness, Target runs, and some planning for the future by the girls -- or at least planning for the names of their future children. You know, as one does. Hahahaha. {In all seriousness, though, I did the exact same thing when I was a teenager. And I even ended up using several of the names from my list: Ethan Scott (chosen well before I had ever met or married my Scott), Grace, Sophie, Jane (although I had it as a middle name), and Alexander.} UPDATED to note that I've been ordered to redact the "embarrassing" pictures of said names. 🙄
With his school research project on Spiders, I discovered that Isaac has aspirations of becoming a magician when he grows up. So that's good to know. Hahahaha.
After seeing the journals I got for all the big kids at the beginning of them month, Isaac was insistent that he really needed one, too, so I ordered this "Little Heroes" edition for him online. In the opening info section, I was confused to see that Isaac's superpower was "TPing" and not any less confused when he informed me that "TP is for teleportation." Hahahaha. That kid.
And speaking of that kid, he's had a wiggly tooth for MONTHS now and it was still hanging strong up until a few days ago. Contrary to appearances, this is NOT an after picture of losing the tooth. No, it's a snapshot of what I called his "goofy tooth" which was being pushed out of the way and to the side by the grown-up tooth coming in behind it. It's impossible to tell from this angle, but the tooth was pointing almost straight out from his mouth and practically perpendicular to the rest of the teeth around it. It was, without a doubt, super goofy looking. Hahaha.
In one of the aforementioned moments of sweetness, Alex -- of his own volition -- made a card for Sophie one day when she was having a rough time. It was so sweet (and borderline out of character) that I had to document it for the record.
(The picture has an arrow pointing to the girl saying "you" and another one saying "amazing." Seeing as how words of affirmation are Sophie's love language, I think it really hit the spot.)
#when-you-go-to-target-to-buy-new-sheets-and-discover-all-the-gardening-stuff-on-display (and then end up buying ALL the stuff).
(It didn't help that they also had all the Valentine's Day stuff on display, and I obviously needed to get some stuff for the 5 Days of Valentine. 🙈)
How could I resist this cute little garden gnome?? It's a smaller version of the one I bought last year that, incidentally, was what I modeled the kids' Christmas ornaments after.
Last week we had a legit snow storm and no school for two days. This week, we've had ice/sleet/a tiny bit of snow and the kids haven't had in-person school since Friday. This week has been all AMI (alternate methods of instruction -- i.e. using Google classrooms and zoom calls to get the work done) and I think everyone's happy enough to stay home that they don't mind having to actually do some school work as well. I mean, did Alex have a mini meltdown this morning because he hates zooms and didn't want to join in for any of them today? Yes. Yes, he did. But he sucked it up and did it anyway, so I'm obviously counting that as a win. Hahaha.
We probably got about 5 or 6 inches last week. Unfortunately, since it was so cold and we have no appropriate snow gear, no one ended up playing out there for very long and the one attempt to make a snowman ended before they were even halfway through.
Meanwhile, I used last week's snow days to work on this puzzle that I had picked up at Barnes & Noble the last time I was there. I did the whole thing by myself (minus a few pieces Alex put in while I was elsewhere) and I can't emphasize enough how satisfying it was to put in the last piece.
And on that note, I'm gonna go ahead and sign off for the day -- and hope that it won't end up being the whole month. Hahaha. Until next time...
